Enter BENVOLIO and ROMEO BENVOLIO Tut, man, one fire burns out another’s burning, One pain is lessened by another’s anguish; Turn giddy, and be holp by backward turning; One desperate grief cures with another’s languish: Take thou some new infection to thy eye, And the rank poison of the old will […]
Continue ReadingComic confusion (1.2.34-43)
CAPULET [To Servant] Go, sirrah, trudge about Through fair Verona, find those persons out Whose names are written there [Gives a paper.], and to them say, My house and welcome on their pleasure stay. Exit [with Paris] SERVANT Find them out whose names are written here! It is written that the […]
Continue ReadingFennel/female buds (1.2.26-34)
CAPULET Such comfort as do lusty young men feel When well-apparelled April on the heel Of limping winter treads, even such delight Among fresh fennel buds shall you this night Inherit at my house; hear all, all see; And like her most whose merit most shall be; Which on […]
Continue ReadingEarth-treading stars (1.2.20-25)
CAPULET This night I hold an old accustomed feast, Whereto I have invited many a guest, Such as I love, and you among the store, One more, most welcome, makes my number more. At my poor house look to behold this night Earth-treading stars that make dark heaven light. (1.2.20-25) […]
Continue ReadingChoice and voice (1.2.14-19)
CAPULET Earth hath swallowed all my hopes but she; She’s the hopeful lady of my earth. But woo her, gentle Paris, get her heart, My will to her consent is but a part; And she agreed, within her scope of choice Lies my consent and fair according voice. (1.2.14-19) […]
Continue ReadingA stranger in the world (1.2.1-13)
Enter CAPULET, COUNTY PARIS, and the Clown [SERVANT to Capulet] CAPULET But Montague is bound as well as I, In penalty alike, and ’tis not hard, I think, For men so old as we to keep the peace. PARIS Of honourable reckoning are you both, And pity ’tis, you lived at odds […]
Continue ReadingReflection on 1.1
Some thoughts on 1.1. It’s long – by a very rough line count, around 8% of the play. And it’s really good. The tonal shifts dazzle: the coiled spring of the Prologue. The increasing pace and driving rhythm of the servants (and the way in which this moves so naturally into first, verse, and then […]
Continue ReadingA note where I may read (1.1.219-229)
ROMEO ’Tis the way To call hers (exquisite) in question more: These happy masks that kiss fair ladies’ brows, Being black, puts us in mind they hide the fair; He that is strucken blind cannot forget The precious treasure of his eyesight lost; Show me a mistress that is […]
Continue ReadingTeach me how I should forget to think (1.1.216-219)
BENVOLIO Be ruled by me, forget to think of her. ROMEO O teach me how I should forget to think. BENVOLIO By giving liberty unto thine eyes, Examine other beauties. (1.1.216-219) Plenty more fish in the sea, in other words. (According to the OED, the Cambridge student Gabriel Harvey made this observation in […]
Continue ReadingShe hath foresworn to love (1.1.208-215)
BENVOLIO Then she hath sworn that she will still live chaste? ROMEO She hath, and in that sparing makes huge waste; For beauty starved with her severity Cuts beauty off from all posterity. She is too fair, too wise, wisely too fair, To merit bliss by making me despair. She […]
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