Books I read in Lockdown: Romeo and Juliet (SPOILERS)

**"For never was a story of more woe, Than this of Juliet and her Romeo ...." (page 125)

So, honesty time. This was my first time reading 'Romeo and Juliet'; in school I studied 'Macbeth' and 'Hamlet' briefly, followed by 4 years intense studying of 'Much Ado About Nothing' for both GCSE and A-Level. I picked this up because my partner gave me his old copy, as I was meant to be doing some tutoring for a student (before exams were cancelled) and I needed to get to grips with it. So, with the tutoring now out of the picture, I read this purely out of intrigue and largely because I felt like I had to given its reputation as one of Shakespeare's best and most famous plays. I'm going to be blunt - I really wish I hadn't!

The balance of this review is going to be around 40% positive, to 60% very negative. So, if you are an avid fan of Romeo and Juliet, maybe this highly controversial review isn't the one for you! However, I will start with the positives.

I am generally speaking a Shakespeare fan, and as a lover of history I also enjoy reading and studying his plays due to the amount of context that surrounds it and I am a lover of analysis and interpretation (I'm going to be doing a literature degree) for which Shakespeare is of course an absolute gold mine. As any experienced Shakespeare reader will know, his use of humour and language is reliant on four types of humour - wit, puns, quibbles and topical humour. Romeo and Juliet did not fail to deliver on that. Right from the outset and in the opening scene Shakespeare injects humour to soften the blow of such a tragic play with his quibble between Sampson and Gregory in which they refuse to 'carry coals' for 'then we should be colliers' (page 35) as they do not wish to be seen as refuse collectors. This instantly shows that there will be humour amongst such a sad tale and I found it somewhat reassuring that I would not be entirely disappointed.

I also enjoyed the character of Juliet's nurse. She delivered a lot of the humour surrounding Juliet and her mother, Lady Capulet. Whilst the humour is bawdy (which is also typical of Shakespeare in any romance play), she provides a lot of comic relief to Juliet in a tricky time for her and of course, like any good Shakespeare romance, sexual jokes are made at the expense of the bride as soon as the topic of marriage is introduced.  Lady Capulet's short one line responses to the Nurse's suggestion that Juliet will 'fall backward when thou hast more wit' (page 46) create humour, even if unintentionally and Act 1, Scene 3 certainly created humour for me.

However...

I have several major issues with this play. Firstly, the plot is overall frustrating and cliched. As I mentioned in my initial 'About Locked Down with my Bookshelf' page in which I answered some questions about me and my reading habits, I never read romance novels and anything that creates big cliches... unfortunately Romeo and Juliet is exactly that and if it wasn't written by Shakespeare and if it wasn't so famous, I would never had read it. The 'tragedy' that is Romeo and Juliet was I'm sure shocking and original in its time but unfortunately reading it in 2020, I'm far from inspired.

Secondly, I feel very little sympathy for the Friar. His dramatic confession in Act 5, Scene 3 shows that he feels guilt for the deaths of both Romeo and Juliet. The sheer amount of foreshadowing that Shakespeare uses surrounding his character proves fatal, as it makes it very clear that the Friar knew all along that his actions would be the downfall of the star crossed lovers. On page 74 he states that 'these violent delights have violent ends' and therefore whilst he is definitely responsible for their ultimate deaths, he is certainly not entitled to any sympathy.

My main issue (oh yes, I'm not done yet!) is with the Prologue. It is fourteen lines long and would make a lovely sonnet, but gives away the plot and ending of the entire play. Now, I understand that Shakespeare has written it as such in order for the play that follows to be an explanation of said sonnet. but personally the play is spoilt due to the removal of all suspense. Right from the sixth line we are told 'A pair of star crossed lovers take their life' (page 35) and this just spoils any tension that Shakespeare was attempting to create with the use of other language techniques. It is this that completely ruined the whole play for me.

Overall, I found it disappointing. It really didn't live up to expectations and there is certainly much better Shakespeare plays out there that are much more underrated.

Unfortunately, Romeo and Juliet gets 3 stars from me

⭐⭐⭐

** all quotes and page numbers mentioned in this post are in reference to William Shakespeare, 'Romeo and Juliet' (Wordsworth Editions Ltd, Hertfordshire, 2000) ISBN 978-1-84022-433-7

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