There is, however, an absolute human right to hate this play, or any play. But it would not be as dramatic as moping in, merely because his friends dragged him, and then being dazzled by this girl. If he went to the party in an ordinary mood, and said, "Wow, that's an amazing girl," that would be normal. But he can't just start off happy, he has to BECOME happy, because that is more dramatically interesting. He meets the right girl and becomes wildly impressed with her. Romeo HAS to start out depressed, for the story to work, BECAUSE we need him to experience a big change. People read these plays (and see them live) for years, and eventually understand all the nuances. Don't worry about understanding each word and phrase. So you need to step back, and get the point of these plays before zeroing in on the specifics.Īs for the language, skim it and grasp what you can. Ouch.Īnybody who has tried horribly hard to make something very important work, and been thwarted by other people's craziness, can identify with R&J. It's a tragedy: the best efforts of honest well-meaning people do NOT work. It's about wild feeling, and an attempt to make it work. Romeo does indeed start out depressed, but the play is not about Romeo being depressed. That way you have an overview and you won't get bogged down in details. In your place, I would skim the plot summaries one can find online so you get the basic point, what is going on here. Shakespeare is fun but you do need patience at first. Today's movies are half that, an hour and a half. But that doesn't mean you should dismiss it.
You get to have an opinion on the whole thing. Do you like this Romeo? You're allowed to think he's whiny and annoying. You can't say, "What did he say? Hmmm, I wonder why he said it, I wonder what's going on in this scene." You can do that by watching it performed, preferably several different ways.
What situation is Romeo in here? What is he feeling? What might he say? What are his facial expressions? What might I say if I was in his shoes? You can't go backwards. You have to connect the words to the people, their actions and their motivations. This is coming to you from somebody that's read them all. It is far from Shakespeare's best play, and I know some academics who would be happy if we just put it away in the vault for a little while like a Disney DVD and focused on teaching and performing some other stuff for a generation or two.ĭon't read it in a vacuum. I've long held that Romeo and Juliet is taught most often because it deals with themes that teenagers can easily grasp - sex and violence. If you want to express something heartfelt and important? Chances are that Shakespeare already said it, and he said it better than I would have. I've quoted Shakespeare at weddings and funerals, on Valentine's Day cards and congratulations on the new baby. Even if you're a horny teenager whose girlfriend won't give it up, who meets a new girl and falls in love so crazy deep that you'd rather commit suicide than be apart, Shakespeare's got you covered. Father figure out of the picture? One Hamlet, coming up. Getting on in years and starting to think about your own mortality and how you will be remembered and cared for by those around you? Hello, King Lear. It is a recipe of what it means to be human (not to wander into Harold Bloom territory.) Willing to do anything to rise up the ranks in your job? Pay attention to Macbeth. It's been said that the entirety of human emotion is captured in the works of Shakespeare. I've been telling the stories to my own kids literally since they were born. I've gone into classrooms with students as young as 7. The tagline for my site is, "Shakespeare makes life better." So my opinion of when and how and why to teach Shakespeare is going to be pretty far from where you're at. But all those things were taught in high school, too, and nobody's saying we shouldn't. Other search options in the drop-down menu are "Title Starts With", "Title Contains", and "Author".I would argue that I use Shakespeare every day, far more than I use biology or chemistry or trigonometry or ancient history. Then either push the Enter key on your keyboard, or click the GO! button. To use this method, simply type a word, words, or phrase into the blank at the top of the screen. NOTE: For searches with "AND", "OR", etc, use More Search Options. Word order and letter case do not matter. You'll be presented with the list of library items based on their relevancy to your search. It searches all titles, subtitles, authors' first and last names, various notes, and a number of other fields. It performs a Google®-type search (including support for putting phrases in quotes). Most likely, you'll want to use this simple search.
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