Romeo and JulietBackground Notes
Theme•Tragic young love
•Star-crossed lovers
1595•The year the play was written
Shakespeare “borrowed”
from a lot of sources
•Tragedical History of Romeo and Juliet
•Arthur Brooke•Brook borrowed the idea
from an old Italian poem
(just like the other writers of his day)
Shakespeare and his times
Other actors included:
•Richard Burbage•Cuthbert Burbage•Will Kemp•John Hemminges
1594•Lord Chamberlain’s Men
1603
•The King’s Men
•Sets were not elaborate•Before theatres, taverns and town halls hosted plays
•$$$ meant you could afford to sit in the balcony
•Groundlings paid one penny to stand in the pit
• No artificial lighting
• Plays were usually performed in the afternoon
• Stage was a platform
• Groundlings threw garbage
• Familiarity with the plots help the audience appreciate the performances
• Women were not allowed to be actresses so young boys played the female roles
•Theatre troupes usually had 12 men
•Actors needed to be versatile (multi-talented)
dancers/musicians
The Playwright’s Art
No outside curtains
•Actors’ lines helped the audience understand the setting
This is the forest of Arden.
Prologue•an introductory speech
•spoken by a narrator also known as a chorus
Romeo and Juliet•takes place is less than one week
Romeo and Juliet•is set in Verona, Italy
•contrasted in –characters – mood– setting
Romeo and Juliet
Important Influences in Romeo and Juliet
•chance/fate•time•love
Languageمسالم paz
paixpace
MNPruhe
pokójpeace
•action + language = good show
•pun
Iambic Pentameter•five stressed beats and five unstressed beats per line
Shall I compare thee to a summers day?
∕ ∕∕∕∕
Literary Criticism•Shakespeare was popular with the people but not with the critics
Shakespeare broke the Rules of Good
Writing
Instead of writing for the king and queen…
…Shakespeare wrote for the “common folk”
Rather than avoiding the
realities of life and notshowing crime…
…Shakespeare showed murder on stage
Instead of keeping genres of theatreseparate…
…Shakespeare combined comedy and
tragedy to create a different form of entertainment
Rather than agreeing with other playwrights that theatre was to be serious and straight-laced…
…Shakespeare ignored the rules of decorum and made theatre fun and accessible for all