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Title: ROMEO AND JULIET by William Shakespeare ISBN: 0-671-72285-9 Publisher: Washington Square Press Pub. Date: 01 August, 1992 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $4.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.1 (120 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Innocent young love doomed due to unavoidable circumstances
Comment: At least that's what I feel should have been a worthy epitaph for these two ill-fated lovers. I read this classic work of fiction because I've never read anything by Shakespeare before. Being a romantic, I found it appealed to me as one unfathomable story of doomed love, and may I say the ending could not have been any other, even if it hadn't been a fictitious story. I agree with Ms. Paster, who in this edition gives a final, parallel account of the story in comparison to modern times; when she says that Romeo and Juliet's only way out to consumate their love was through death, because they had trespassed socially acceptable conventions of the era, and not just due to a family feud. This is true especially of Juliet, who, because she was a woman, had the least advantages and the most pressures to be married to someone previously chosen and approved by her father. She defies the world - literally - and runs to the arms of her Romeo to be married in secret. I cannot imagine the terrible strain and fear a woman would have gone through in the 1500's should she choose to follow her heart in such a way. I find Juliet, in this sense, a true pioneer of women's rights. She definitely risks it all, defying even her own father (the man who would "owned" her until she got married). The passage where he confronts her about her arranged marriage to Count Paris has to be one of the cruelest speeches in classic literature. She certainly would have to make use of a humongous supply of nerve to defy convention.
Romeo, on his behalf, is truly besotted with Juliet. He admires her beauty more than her courage and, like most men when in love, shows himself a pathetic spectacle. However, he loves her and cannot live without her. He only has eyes and, what's really important, heart for her. That is why, when he receives news of her death, he decides to go to her tomb and kill himself there. The ill-fated destiny plays these lovers a bad hand when Romeo does not get a letter in time explaining his beloved's circumstances for her death.
I enjoyed Shakespeare's language the most during the first half of the book. When Romeo climbs to Juliet's window and stays with her for a few hours in the night (the only time the young lovers have for each other throughout the play). He expresses his love with unforgettable lines. He wishes he would be someone else, so that he could love her freely: "Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized." (2.2.54)
This edition by the Folger Library has new comments and offers historical background on the life of William Shakespeare as well his times and his theatre. Dimensions of The Globe and explanations on how the plays were acted are shown in detail; together with illustrations of engravings of the period. It all helps to give a good understanding of the play. If, like me, you are new to Shakespeare, you will find the left pages in the book an invaluable resource since they are like a mini-dictionary clarifying words, idiomatic expressions of the era and even full verses. Above all, fear not; and dare to dive into this torrent of love.
Rating: 5
Summary: Italian Lovers
Comment: This might be shakespeare's best. Its certainly more accessible than Hamlet. This doesn't really need another review at all. I write to inform the reader of another monumental book. This may be the most famous story of Italian Lovers. If you like Italy and/or love Stories, I recommend The Betrothed(I Promessi Sposi) by Alessandro Manzoni. Renzo and Lucia(from the book) are almost as famous as Romeo And Juliet. If Shakespeare and Leo Tolstoy ever wrote a book together, their book would look like The Betrothed. Yes, its THAT GREAT!
Rating: 2
Summary: Boring
Comment: What a boring love story - I wasn't impressed. Bizarre plot, long tedious read.
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Title: Romeo and Juliet (Cliffs Notes) by Annaliese F. Connolly ISBN: 0764585924 Publisher: Cliffs Notes Pub. Date: 05 June, 2000 List Price(USD): $5.99 |
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Title: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee ISBN: 0446310786 Publisher: Little Brown & Company Pub. Date: 11 October, 1988 List Price(USD): $6.99 |
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Title: The Odyssey by Homer, Robert Fitzgerald, D. S. Carne-Ross ISBN: 0374525749 Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux Pub. Date: 05 November, 1998 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
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Title: Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck ISBN: 0140177396 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: September, 1993 List Price(USD): $8.00 |
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Title: Lord of the Flies: A Novel by William Gerald Golding ISBN: 0399501487 Publisher: Perigee Pub. Date: July, 1959 List Price(USD): $6.95 |
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