Romeo and Juliet cont...

"Through our tragedy are our bonds enlightened..." thus 'tis not Shakespeare, yet seems to be a summing of where we're headed in this play at large...yet in tragedy as in happiness/comedy do we also strengthen our bonds to our fellow common man, through life in general, the point? to live at large, living correctly fuses and endures our bonds with others, with indeed, the World?

but what does "living correctly" mean anyways?

Shakespeare fuses ideas together that are complex as they are beautiful, shadowing and enlisting facets of life that are enduring and woven, complexity that I heretofore had not realized, perhaps his insights are a part of what makes him a great dramatist? storyteller? poet? Surely. He brushes across certain ideas that are interesting like paradoxes and contradictions that are at home in each other's presence but not upon first glance are they in union, in fact, they are tied through their opposition, connected by what makes them opposing and at odds, their differences...one such idea connection not like this and infinitely interesting is the connection between love and death, Sjhakespeare has his characters Romeo and Juliet espouse such loving tender poetry to each other yet at the same time they touch upon darker aspects which truly give the story depth and feeling, a pathos, without which, would have the play wanting methinks

"Alack, there lies more peril in thine eye/
Than twenty of their swords"

This he says to a newest love, one indeed he had just met at the masquerade party ball down at the Capulet's happening Verona home...'tis not your regular rabble to a newest love, peril in thine eye? what is he jabbing at? death and love it is what Cemetery Man deals with, that lucid, not often apparent connection...but alas peril means danger here, (leading then to death logically) and so the teenage lust of danger and new love is obvious...it is passion, life, love, death all of it enrolled together, instead of life and death, there is indeed love and death...

O fiery Tybalt! O ratcatcher! You just had to put out the way the witty and rambunctious Mercutio! and then Romeo had to slain thee, to rebuke such a horrible fate upon his friend, death at the hands of a Capulet, one who was not even embroiled familial-wise with the whole feud within Verona, Mercutio actually being related to the Prince of the town, Escalus, Prince of Verona,a kinsman, one who decreed that the two families live in peace, and if they cannot, the ones who would be responsible for the duty breaking, public peace shatternment, would be executed in punishment, but ye know, those two who started the brawl, started the illegals, did die at their own hands per se in a way, Romeo being left to have the last, to have indeed a banishment i think is coming?

Romeo and Juliet: Act One, Scenes 1 and 2, Shakespeare, in the Year of Our Lord 2011

Thinking this to be the first installment in my year-long (possibly continuing beyond that) 2011 Shakespeare study extravaganza, March as Romeo and Juliet, tragic love story equals in the time of Spring, youthful love and lust, possibly the best time minus April? Here's where it begins

Romeo is an emo-goth kid. No doubt about it, his pining for his Rosaline, as Shakespeare put it, comparing her to Diana (goddess of the hunt and chastity) so Cupid's arrow just pings off her already heavy armor of chaste-ness, a fair target is early hit, yet this hit's a miss, as Rosaline is said to have the wit of Dian and so therefore, her being of the hunt, and experienced, although chaste as well, the double meaning allusion is brilliant, and the fact that he walks on the edge of town all night, then goes home to shut the shutters on the morning sun, goth, his poetry of failed and unrequited love, to a girl who has claimed chastity for her own, gets pretty emo-y as well

So, the play starts out with minor characters (Capulet's men), (seems to be a popular motif) sexual innuendos by the men (some would be saying homosocial right now, not me) blades are whipped out as Benvolio and Tybalt jump in the fray, oother citizens jump in as well, luckily the Prince heralds in and puts a stop to the brawl, for as he is the Prince of Verona, the moral that is building is that the tow warring families are a blight and a sickness to the town, their ancient hatred of one another must be healed, dealt with, under pain of death if one ever again tries to come up upon the other one, any of the house...he must keep his people civil! the moral being that nothing short of the death of their sprawling seed will solve it, will relinquish it to peace, tis a sick town, and the dying love can only calm the burning hate

great metaphors: crystal scales (romeo's eyes) as he must judge and contemplate all the other Ladies at the Capulet party, ones his ol pal Benvolio will show out for him...we know at this point that County Paris is trying to hook up with Juliet and he wants some, he wants to marry her (at thirteen mind you) and makes the case that there are happier mothers younger than she, yet Capulet wards him off saying, "hey guy, give her a couple more years guy, like at about 16 or so, and only with her consent will i give mine to you, ok? relax!) so Capulet seems to equal of mind, we'll see as the play progresses

We have a chorus in the begins as well, that basically sums up the story as to the tragic demise of our "star-crossed" lovers, btw Shakespeare took this story from an already established one that went some time back (Papp takes it as far back to fifth century Greek play Ephesiaca, and then later to 1476 and so on) leading me to believe that I simply do not steal enough when it comes to writing, but as my reading progresses, so shall the thievery...

to be continued...