Two households both alike in dignity in fair Verona,
Where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean,
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes,
A pair of star crossed lovers take their life,
Whose misadventured pitieous overthrows doth with their death,
Burry their parents strife.
The fearful passage of their death marked love,
And the continuance of their parents rage,
Which but thier childrens end not could remove,
Is now the two hours traffic of our stage.
Leonardo Dicaprio
.................................................. Romeo
Claire Danes
...............................................................
Juliet
Brian Dennehy.................................................Ted
Montague
Christina Pickles........................................Caroline
Montague
Paul Sorvino.............................................Fulgencio
Capulet
Diane Venora.................................................Gloria
Capulet
Harold Perrineau Jr................................................Mercutio
John Leguizamo........................................................Tybalt
Dash Minhok.........................................................Benvolio
Vincent Laresca...........................................................Abra
Zak Orth.................................................................Gregory
Jamie Kennedy.......................................................Sampson
Carlos Martin Manzo..............................................Petruchio
Jesse Bradford.......................................................Balthazar
Vondie Curtis Hall...........................................Capitan
Prince
Paul Rudd..........................................................Dave
Paris
Miriam Margolyes......................................................Nurse
Pete Postiethwaite.......................................Father
Lawrence
Des'ree........................................................................Diva
Chior Boy.....................................................Quindon
Tarver
Romeo And Juliet
One book that I would have to say is a definite reader would have to be William Shakespheres Romeo & Juliet. It’s a wonderful book. It’s a book that depicts true love at first sight. It’s set in Elizabethan times. It starts off with a prologue that sums up the whole play into a tiny paragraph. It talks about how the two star crossed lovers are both alike in dignity, but torn by their roots. Due to ancient grudge the have to go behind everything to make their relationship work. Juliet said it best when she said, “My only love sprung from my only hate.” Once they’re married something obviously has to go wrong. Tybalt, Juliet’s cousin (the prince of cats) wants to kill Romeo. So he tracks him down and fights him but slips and stabs Romeo’s friend/Tybalts cousin which makes Romeo mad and so he kills Tybalt. Due to him killing Tybalt he is banished from Verona. Juliet can’t live without Romeo, so she goes and get a medicine that will render her body dead for a couple days, to fake her death so her parents can’t make her marry the rich Paris. They all think she’s dead. When Romeo hears of this he goes to her tomb and kills himself by her side. Then she awakens, so out of love she kills herself and then the families come together and morn the love of these two star crossed lovers. Me personally I would have to say this is the very best play ever written. It’s the story that describes romance, passion, and fate.
Do You Ever Read R & J and Wonder, What
is He or She Saying? Well, Here Are a Few Tips For You.
(4) Civil Blood Makes Civil Hands
Unclean: Civil in the sense of
"civil war":Citizens make their hands unclean by
spilling the blood of fellow citizens.
(6) Star-crossed: Star-crossed lovers werelovers born under an
unfavorable star, hense destined to destruction.
(9) Passage: Progress
(12) Two Hours Traffic of Our
Stage: Shakespears plays must
have been acted at a very rapid pace. The almost bare, open,
outdoor stage and the continuous flow of action, as well as a
rapid delivery of lines contributed to the speed of playing.
(2) Carry Coals: A coal hauler was one of the dirtiest and lowest
of all professions; hence a man who carried coals put up with all
kinds of insults.
(3) Colliers: Coal Carriers, who were regarded as shiftless
workers or cheats.
(4) An: If.
(4) Choler: Anger
(5)Collar: A halter or a hangman's noose
(2-5)Coals...Colliers...Choler...Collar:
These four words comprise the
first play on words, or pun, in the play, which abounds in such
puns. To fully appriciate the pun, it is necessary to pronounce
"coals" as the Elizabethans did, as though it were
"cowls". The pun runs thus: "...we'll not carry
coals (Bear Insults)...we should be colliers (Lazy Cheats)...I
mean to be in choler (Anger)...draw your neck out of the collar (noose).
(10-11)Moves...to Move: "moves" (to incite) played off against
"to move" (run).
(15)Take the Wall: Take the position farthest from the street, an
act of discourtesy. Even today when a man and a woman walk down
the street, the man gives the woman , as a matter of courtesy,
the position next to the wall. In Shakespeare's day any person of
rank or dignity was always given this position. The custom
probably grew out of the fact that the streets were muddy and
often contained drainage ditches down their center. The person
who took the wall was protected from an unpleasant splashing.
(17-18) The Weakest goes to the
Wall: From an Old Proverb
meaning "the weakest is shoved to the rear". Again note
to Gregory's pun.
(37)Poor-John: Salted and dry fish (hake). It was concidered
dull food.
(37) tool: Sword, but also a pun on the masculine genital
organ. Gregory puns here to top Sampson's vulgar bragging about
his prowess as a fighter and as a seducer of women.
(43)Fear: Mistrust
(44)Marry: Indeed; originally an oath, "By the Virgin
Mary".
(44) I fear thee: I have no faith in you. Gregory is not sure that
Sampson will not run when the fighting starts.
(45) Take the Law: Much as the case is today, the one one starting
the fightwas concidered wrong. The other could claim self defense.
(47) List: Please.
(49)Bite my Thumb: An insulting gestrue simmilar to the present day
"thumbing your nose:. The gesture was made by placing the
thumbnail under the teeth.
(61)I am For You: I'm your match or I'm ready to fight you.
(65) Say Better; Here Comes One
of my Masters Kinsman: Gregory
sees Tybalt approaching and grows bold.
(70)Swashing: Slashing, swaggering.
(73) Heartless Hinds: Weak-spirited servants. Tybalt puns on the heart
and the hind, the male and female red deer.
(79) Have at Thee: I shall attack; be on guard.
(80) Clubs, bills, and partisans:
A rallying cry for help in the
Elizabethian streets. The clubs were carried by apprentices.
Military men would carry bills and partisans, both of wich were
kinds of long spears with a cutting edge.
(82) Long sword: Prominent citizens often carried short swords for
dress or ceremony. servants would accompany them with their long
swords, which they used in fights. Most young men of
Shakespeare's day had abandoned the long sword for the rapier.
(83) A crutch: A crutch would be better for a man your age.
(85) Spite: To spite me; in defiance of me.
(89) neigbor stained steel: steel, or sword, stained with a neigbors blood.
(94) Mistempered: ill-used, with a pun on the tempering of steel.
(102) Cankered...cankered: Again a pun. The first "cankered" is
"rusted"; the second is "malignant" or "rankling".
(104) forfiet: penalty for
breaking the peace.
(109) Freetown: Shakespeare
took the basis of his story from a poem by Arthur Brooke, called
Romeus and Juliet. In that poem the house of the Capulets is
called freetown, Brooke's translation of the Italian Villa
Blanca.
(111) Who set this ancient
quarrel new abroach: Who gave
this old fight a new start?
(119) Nothing hurt withal:Not
at all hurt by this.(121) Part
and part: Either side.
(127) Drave: Drove.
(128) Sycamore: A tree
symbolic of unhappy lovers.
(131) Ware: Aware, wary.
(132) Covert: A hidden place
in the woods, such as a ticket.
(133) Affections: Feelings.
(134) Which...found: Benvolio
says that he too sought to be alone at that time.
(135) Humour: Desire,
inclination.
(142) Aurora's: Aurora is the
goddess of dawn; hence Romeo has stayed out till dawn.
(143) Heavy: Unhappy, as we
still use the word in "heavy heart".
(147) Humour: Here the word
has more the sense of "mood." Actually physicians of
the Middle Ages believed that four fluids, or humours, made up
the human body and mind. An improper balance of these fluids
caused mental and physical illness.
(151) Importuned: Asked
repeatedly or begged. The line means, "Have you begged an
explanation of him in any way?"
(153) Afflictions' counsellor: Feelings' adviser. In other words Romeo kept his
feelings to himself.
(155) Close:Secret. He was
close-mouthed.
(156) Sounding: Investigatiion.
We still use the phrase, "sound the depths."
(157) Envious: Malicious or
hateful.
(158) He: It.
(161) We...Know: We are as
eager to help him as we are to know whats wrong.
(163) Much denied: Greatly
refused. "He'll have to refuse me many times before I quit."
(164) Happy by the stay: Lucky
in your waiting.
(165) Shrift: Confession,
especially as one confesses to a priest.
(166) Marrow: Morning.
(166) Cousin: Term used for
any relation other than immediate family; hence Romeo and
Benvolio are kinsman.
(175) View: Appearance.
(176) In proof: In fact or
action.
(177) Whose view is muffled still: Whose sight is covered always. Love or Cupid, was
often depictedas wearing a blindfold. Even today we still use the
expression, "Love is blind."
(178) Will: Desire, i.e.,
Lovemaking.
(177-182): This speech
contains many couplings of contradictory terms, or paradoxes; e.g.,
brwling love, loving hate, heavy lightness, serious vanity, cold
fire, etc. The technical name for this figure of speechis
oxymoron. By use of such figures, Romeo expresses his recognition
of the contradictory elements that exist in love and the
confusion these elements present to the lover. The signs of the
fight remind him that love and hate are opposites of the same
drive.
(191) Transgression: Offense
or crime.
(193) Propogate: Increase;
pressed: oppressed or burdened.