William Shakespeare

“ And thus the dead lovers have become immortal victors.
Shakespeare did not intend to represent more than a fragment of human life in the tragedy. He did not aim at a criticism of the whole of human character; he cared to show us his hero and his heroine only as lovers, and as exemplary in the perfection of their love; faithful even unto death; choosing, with a final election of the heart, love at all costs. Here is no view of the whole of life; we are shown merely what befell a young pair of lovers during four days long ago in Verona. ”

“ Romeus does not yet know his doom. The Friar goes forth, learns the sentence, and returns. He tells the Nurse that Romeus shall come at night to Juliet to devise of their affairs. He informs Romeus that the sentence is good, not death but banishment. Romeus is frantic, tears his hair, throws himself on the ground, and prays for death; he blames nature, his time and place of birth, the stars, and Fortune. ”

“ Much nearer the mark was Goethe in his arrangement of Romeo and Juliet for the Weimar theatre, 1811: "Before Juliet revives," in Goethe's recast, "the Friar confesses that all his cunning wisdom was in vain; that if he had opposed, instead of aiding the lovers, things could not have come to a worse end. After Juliet has stabbed herself Friar Laurence acknowledges the folly that often attends the wisdom of the wise, that to attempt to do good is often more dangerous than to undertake to do evil. Happy those whose love is pure, because both love and hatred lead but to the grave." ”

“ ⁠I take thee at thy word: [E 12]
Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized; ⁠50
Henceforth I never will be Romeo. ”

“ The bridal feast is prepared; the dearest things are bought. In Juliet's chamber the Nurse praises Paris ten times more than she had praised Romeus: "Paris shall dwell there still, Romeus shall not retourne," or, if he do, Juliet shall have both husband and paramour. Juliet maintains a cheerful aspect; sends away the Nurse, for she would spend the night in prayer; then hides the viol under her bolster, and retires to bed. She doubts the unknown force of the powder. Will it work at all? Serpents and venomous worms may lurk in the tomb. How shall she endure the stench of corpses? ”

“ A dimne Saint, an Honourable Villaine:
O Nature! what had'st thou to doe in hell,
When thou did'st bower the spirit of a fiend
In mortall paradise of such sweet flesh?
Was euer booke containing such vile matter
So fairely bound? O that deceit should dwell
In such a gorgeous Pallace
Nur. There's no trust, no faith, no honestie in men,
All periur'd, all forsworne, all naught, all dissemblers,
Ah where's my man? giue me some Aqua-vitae?
These griefes, these woes, these sorrowes make me old:
Shame come to Romeo
Iul. ”

“ Will she not be stifled? She thinks she sees Tybalt's dead body; she is in a cold sweat; fearing her own weakness, she swiftly drinks the mixture, then crosses her arms on her breast, and falls into a trance. ”

“ It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!
seem to echo Marlowe's lines in The Jew of Malta, II. i. 41, 42:
But stay, what star shines yonder in the east?
The loadstar of my life, if Abigail.
Juliet's age is reduced by Shakespeare from the sixteen years of his original (the Romeus and Juliet of Brooke) to fourteen. "Death lies on her," exclaims Capulet (IV. v.) ”

“ But, soft ! what light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!—
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief, ⁠5
That thou her maid [E 3] art far more fair than she:
Be not her maid, since she is envious;
Her vestal livery is but sick [C 2] and green, [E 4]
And none but fools do wear it; cast it off.—
It is [E 5] my lady; O, it is my love! ”

“ We should not trouble ourselves about what might be explained as a mere stage-illusion of time, if Shakespeare had required such a stage-illusion, or if he had not dated the events throughout with more exactness than the stage requires. In Painter the Friar directs Juliet to drink the potion "the night before your marriage or in the morning before day"; in Brooke, "on thy marriage day before the sun do clear the sky." ”

“ That is to say, the amiable critic of life as seen from the cloister does not understand life or hate or love; he is not the chorus of the tragedy, but an actor whose wisdom is of a kind which may easily lead himself and others astray. ”

“ Jessica is on the balcony; love, she says, is blind, and lovers cannot see their pretty follies. Lorenzo bids her "come at once, For the close night doth play the runaway." When Lorenzo speaks it is night; when Juliet speaks it is day, and she is gazing at the sun.
I believe the genitive singular runaway's to be right, and I agree with Warburton that the sun or Phœbus is meant. It is objected that Juliet has complained of the slow pace of the sun; but now she imagines night as having arrived, and the tardy sun has proved himself to be the runaway he actually was. ”

“ On Saturday Juliet, the Nurse, and a maid, sent by Juliet's mother, go to the church. The Friar dismisses the Nurse and maid to hear "a mass or two." Romeus has already waited two hours in the Friar's cell: "Eche minute seemde an howre, and every howre a day." The lovers are married. Romeus bids Juliet send the Nurse to him for a ladder of cord. They think the day long; if they might have the sun bound to their will "Black shade of night and doubled darke should straight all over hyde." ”

“ O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo?
Deny thy father and refuse thy name;
Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love, ⁠35
And I'll no longer be a Capulet. ”

“ If they do see thee, they will murther thee
Rom. Alacke there lies more perill in thine eye,
Then twenty of their Swords, looke thou but sweete,
And I am proofe against their enmity
Iul. I would not for the world they saw thee here
Rom. I haue nights cloake to hide me from their eyes
And but thou loue me, let them finde me here,
My life were better ended by their hate,
Then death proroged wanting of thy Loue
Iul. ”

“ Some fifty years after the publication of Massuccio's tale Luigi Da Porto wrote his Istoria novellamente ritrovata di due nobili Amanti, and here the scene is Verona, and the lovers are named Romeo and Giulietta. Da Porto's novel was published posthumously at Venice without date, about the year 1530. It is substantially the story familiar to us, [10] but there are variations in detail, and certain personages of the drama are wanting. Romeo masks not as a pilgrim but as a nymph; the lovers touch hands and whisper their passion in the torch-dance ”

“ I'll conjure [E 3] too.—
Romeo! [C 5] humours! madman! passion! lover! [C 6] [E 4]
Appear thou in the likeness of a sigh:
Speak but one rhyme and I am satisfied;
Cry [C 7] but "Ay me!" [E 5] pronounce [C 8] [E 6] but "love" and "dove" [C 9] ;⁠10
Speak to my gossip Venus one fair word,
One nickname for her purblind son and heir [C 10] ,
Young Adam Cupid, [C 11] [E 7] he that shot so trim [C 12] [E 8]
When King Cophetua loved the beggar-maid.—
He heareth not, he stirreth [E 9] not, he moveth not; ⁠15
The ape is dead, and [C 13] I must conjure him.—
I conjure thee by Rosaline's bright eyes,
By her high forehead, and her scarlet lip, ”

“ So Romeo would, were he not Romeo cal'd,
Retaine that deare perfection which he owes,
Without that title Romeo, doffe thy name,
And for thy name which is no part of thee,
Take all my selfe
Rom. I take thee at thy word:
Call me but Loue, and Ile be new baptiz'd,
Hence foorth I neuer will be Romeo
Iuli. What man art thou, that thus bescreen'd in night
So stumblest on my counsell?
Rom. By a name,
I know not how to tell thee who I am:
My name deare Saint, is hatefull to my selfe,
Because it is an Enemy to thee,
Had I it written, I would teare the word
Iuli. ”

“ Who set this auncient quarrell new abroach?
Speake Nephew, were you by, when it began:
Ben. Heere were the seruants of your aduersarie,
And yours close fighting ere I did approach,
I drew to part them, in the instant came
The fiery Tibalt, with his sword prepar'd,
Which as he breath'd defiance to my eares,
He swong about his head, and cut the windes,
Who nothing hurt withall, hist him in scorne.
While we were enterchanging thrusts and blowes,
Came more and more, and fought on part and part,
Till the Prince came, who parted either part
Wife. ”

“ When his judgment had matured Shakespeare could not have written so very ill as he sometimes does in Romeo and Juliet, but a writer of genius could at an early age, when inspired by the passion of his theme, have written as admirably as he does even in the noblest passages of the fifth Act. That he was conscious of having already attained comparative mastery in his art may be inferred from his independence of Marlowe, and the implied criticism of the style of Kyd in the exclamatory lamentations over Juliet supposed dead. ”

“ Checkring the Easterne Cloudes with streaks of light:
And fleckled darknesse like a drunkard reeles,
From forth daies path, and Titans burning wheeles:
Now ere the Sun aduance his burning eye,
The day to cheere, and nights danke dew to dry,
I must vpfill this Osier Cage of ours,
With balefull weedes, and precious Iuiced flowers,
The earth that's Natures mother, is her Tombe,
What is her burying graue that is her wombe:
And from her wombe children of diuers kind
We sucking on her naturall bosome find:
Many for many vertues excellent:
None but for some, and yet all different. ”

“ On Wednesday morning Juliet is found in seeming death; the Friar arrives at the hour prefixed for marriage; all is turned from a wedding to a funeral; Juliet is laid in the tomb of her ancestors. At a later hour of what seems to be the same day (Wednesday) , Balthasar informs Romeo of his wife's death; Romeo obtains the poison, sets out for Verona, at night enters the monument by torch-light, and dies beside his beloved. Friar Laurence "at the prefixed hour of her waking" arrives to take Juliet from the vault; she stabs herself and dies ”

“ God mark thee to his grace!
Thou wast the prettiest babe that e'er I nursed: ⁠60
An [C 13] I might live to see thee married once,
I have my wish. ”

“ Bandello dwells on Romeo's amorous fancy for a hard-hearted mistress—Shakespeare's Rosaline—to which Da Porto only alludes. An elder friend—Shakespeare's Benvolio—advises the enamoured youth to 'examine other beauties,' and to subdue his passion. Romeo enters Capulet's mansion disguised, but no longer as a nymph. The Count of Lodrone is now first known as Paris. The ladder of ropes is now first mentioned. The sleeping potion is taken by Juliet, not in presence of her chamber-maid and aunt, but in solitude. ”

“ The tragic issues are the results not of love, but of love growing on the hatred of the houses. Shakespeare has set forth this in the opening scene, half humorous yet wholly tragic. He reiterates his statement of the fact at the close. Romeo and Juliet die as sacrifices to appease the insane fury, out of which their lives had risen and in which they had no individual part ”

“ He exhorts Romeus to fortitude; he has slain his foe; he is not condemned to death; his friends may resort to him at Mantua. Romeus grows reasonable; the Friar advises him as to how to quit Verona unknown; and bids him visit cheerfully his lady's bower. (1257–1526.)
Night comes; Romeus visits Juliet; he discourses of Fortune, and exhorts Juliet to patience; she pleads to be permitted to accompany him in disguise; he explains that they would be pursued and punished; he hopes to procure his recall to Verona within four months; if he does not, he will then carry her off to a foreign land. ”

“ Art thou not Romeo, and a Montague? ⁠60 Rom. Neither, fair maid, if either thee dislike. [C 15] [E 15] Jul. How cam'st thou hither, tell me, and wherefore? [E 16]
The orchard walls are high and hard to climb,
And the place death, considering who thou art,
If any of my kinsmen find thee here. ⁠65 Rom. With love's light wings did I o'er-perch these walls,
For stony limits cannot hold love out,
And what love can do that dares love attempt;
Therefore thy kinsmen are no stop [C 16] to me. Jul. If they do see thee, they will murder thee. ”

“ In particular we owe to Bandello the figure of the nurse, not Shakespeare's humorous creation, but a friendly old woman, who very willingly plays her part of go-between for the lovers. One more development and all the materials of Shakespeare's play are in full formation. From Bandello's mention of one Spolentino of Mantua, from whom Romeo procures the poison, Pierre Boisteau creates the episode of the Apothecary, and it is also to this French refashioner of the story that we must trace the Shakespearian close; with him, Juliet does not wake from her sleep until Romeo has ceased to breathe ”

“ Shifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts.5
I dreamt my lady came and found me dead—
Strange dream, that gives a dead man leave to think!—
And breathed [E 4] such life with kisses in my lips
That I revived, and was an emperor.
Ah me! how sweet is love itself possess'd,10
When but love's shadows are so rich in joy!
Enter Balthasar, booted. [C 3]
News from Verona! How now, Balthasar!
Dost thou not bring me letters from the friar?
How doth my lady? Is my father well?
How fares my Juliet? [C 4] that I ask again;15
For nothing can be ill if she be well. ”