+nr :xxo+:+ri s n:krs rr:rr

Romeo and Juliet

William Shakespeare
Fully annotated, with an Introduction, by Burton Rael
With an essay by Harold Bloom
+nr :xxo+:+ri s n:krs rr:rr
Burton Rael, General Editor
Yale University Press New Haven and London
Copyright :oo by Burton Rael.
All rights reserved.
This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations,
in any form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections +o; and +o:
of the U.S. Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press),
without written permission from the publishers.
Romeo & Juliet,from Shakespeare: Invention of the Human, by Harold Bloom,
copyright by Harold Bloom. Used by permission of Riverhead Books, an
imprint of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
Designed by Rebecca Gibb
Set in Bembo type by The Composing Room of Michigan, Inc.
Printed in the United States of America by R. R. Donnelley & Sons.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Shakespeare,William, +o+o+o.
Romeo and Juliet / William Shakespeare ; fully annotated, with an
introduction by Burton Rael ;
with an essay by Harold Bloom.
p. cm. (The annotated Shakespeare)
Includes bibliographical references.
isix o-oo-+o-; (paperbound)
+. Romeo (Fictitious character)Drama. :. Juliet (Fictitious character)
Drama. . Verona (Italy)Drama. . VendettaDrama. . Youth
Drama. I. Raffel, Burton. II. Bloom, Harold. III. Title.
rr::;:.ror :oo
:::.dc::
:oooo:,;
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
+o , : ; o : +
For my own Juliet: Elizabeth
cox+rx+s

About This Book ix

Introduction xv
Romeo and Juliet +
An Essay by Harold Bloom +,
Further Reading :+
Finding List ::+
:i ou+ + ni s i ook

ix
W
ritten four centuries ago, in a fairly early form of
Modern English, Romeo and Juliet is a gorgeously
passionate, witty, and complex text. Many of the
plays social and historical underpinnings necessarily need, for the
modern reader, the kinds of explanation oered in the Introduc-
tion. But what needs even more, and far more detailed, explana-
tion are the plays very words. Toward the end of act 1, scene 1,
Romeo and his loyal friend, Benvolio (the name means, in Italian,
well loved, just as Romeos name, in Italian, means pilgrim),
spar wittily about the nature of love:
Benvolio Alas that love, so gentle in his view,
Should be so tyrannous and rough in proof.
Romeo Alas that love, whose view is mued still,
Should without eyes see pathways to his will.
(lines ;::+)
For comprehension of these lines completely typical of the
plays languagethe modern reader needs help. In Benvolios
two lines,
gentle courteous, noble
in his view in his [Cupids] appearance (hisfrequently
means its)
rough disagreeable, harsh
in proof how it turns out/is experienced.
And in Romeos two lines,
view is mued still whose sight is forever/always blinded
without eyes: Cupid is blind
his will his pleasure, desire.
The modern reader or listener of course will better understand
this brief exchange in context, as the drama unfolds. But without
full explanation of words that have over the years shifted in mean-
ing, neither the modern reader nor the modern listener is likely
to be equipped for full comprehension.
I believe annotations of this sort create the necessary bridges,
from Shakespeares four-centuries-old English across to ours.The
only dicultwords I have not explained in this brief passage are
tyrannous and pathways; the omissions are deliberate. Many
readers new to matters Elizabethan will already understand these
still current, and largely unchanged, words. Some readers, to be
sure, will be able to comprehend unusual, historically dierent
meanings without glosses. But when it comes to words like
tyrannousand pathways,those who are not familiar with the
modern meaning will easily nd clear, simple denitions in any
modern dictionary. And they may be obliged to make fairly fre-
quent use of such a dictionary: there are a good many less familiar
words, in Romeo and Juliet, to be found in modern dictionaries
:iou+ +nis iook
x
and not glossed here.Yet most readers are not likely to understand
Shakespeares intended meaning, absent such glosses as I here
oer. I have followed the same principles in The Annotated Milton,
published in +,,,, and in my annotated edition of Hamlet, pub-
lished (as the initial volume in this series) in :oo. Classroom ex-
perience has validated these editions. Classes of mixed upper-
level undergraduates and graduate students have more quickly
and thoroughly transcended language barriers than ever before.
This allows the teacher, or a general reader without a teacher, to
move more promptly and condently to the non-linguistic mat-
ters that have made Shakespeare and Milton great and important
poets.
It is the inevitable forces of linguistic change, operant in all liv-
ing tongues, which have inevitably created such wide degrees of
obstacles to ready comprehensionnot only sharply dierent
meanings, but subtle, partial shifts in meaning that allow us to
think we understand when, alas, we do not. Speakers of related
languages like Dutch and German also experience this shifting of
the linguistic ground. Like early Modern English (ca. +ooo) and
the Modern English now current, those languages are too close
for those who know only one language, and not the other, to be
readily able always to recognize what they correctly understand
and what they do not. When, for example, a speaker of Dutch
says, Men kofer is kapot, a speaker of German will know that
something belonging to the Dutchman is broken (kapot
kaputt in German, and men mein). But without more
linguistic awareness than the average person is apt to have, the
German speaker will not identify kofer (trunk in Dutch)
with Krpera modern German word meaning physique,
build, body. The closest word to kofer in modern German,
:iou+ +nis iook
xi
indeed, is Scrankkoer,which is too large a leap for ready com-
prehension. Speakers of dierent Romance languages (such as
French, Spanish, or Italian), and all other related but not identical
tongues, all experience these diculties, as well as the diculty of
understanding a text written in their own language ve, or six, or
seven hundred years earlier. Shakespeares English is not yet so old
that it requires, like many historical texts in French and German,
or like Old English textsfor example, Beowulf a modern
translation. Much poetry evaporates in translation: language is
immensely particular. The sheer sound of Dante in thirteenth-
century Italian is profoundly worth preserving. So too is the
sound of Shakespeare.
I have annotated prosody (metrics) only when it seemed truly
necessary or particularly helpful. Readers should have no prob-
lem with the silent e: whenever an eis not silent, it is marked
.The notation used for prosody, which is also used in the ex-
planation of Elizabethan pronunciation, follows the extremely
simple form of my From Stress to Stress:An Autobiography of English
Prosody (see Further Reading,near the end of this book). Sylla-
bles with metrical stress are capitalized; all other syllables are in
lowercase letters. I have managed to employ normal Elizabethan
spellings, in most indications of pronunciation, but I have some-
times been obliged to deviate, in the higher interest of being un-
derstood.
I have annotated, as well, a limited number of such other mat-
ters, sometimes of interpretation, sometimes of general or histor-
ical relevance, as have seemed to me seriously worthy of inclu-
sion.These annotations have been most carefully restricted: this is
not intended to be a book of literary commentary. It is for that
reason that the glossing of metaphors has been severely restricted.
:iou+ +nis iook
xii
There is almost literally no end to discussion and/or analysis of
metaphor, especially in Shakespeare.To yield to temptation might
well be to double or triple the size of this bookand would also
change it from a historically oriented language guide to a work of
an unsteadily mixed nature. In the process, I believe, neither lan-
guage nor literature would be well or clearly served.
Where it seemed useful, and not obstructive of important tex-
tual matters, I have modernized spelling, including capitalization.
I have frequently repunctuated. Since the original printed texts of
Romeo and Juliet (there not being, as there never are for Shake-
speare, surviving manuscripts) are frequently careless as well as
self-contradictory, I have been relatively free with the wording of
stage directions and in some cases have added small directions,
to indicate who is speaking to whom. I have made no emenda-
tions; I have necessarily been obliged to make choices. Textual
decisions have been annotated when the dierences between or
among the original printed texts seem either marked or of un-
usual interest.
In the interests of compactness and brevity, I have employed in
my annotations (as consistently as I am able) a number of stylistic
and typographical devices:
The annotation of a single word does not repeat that word
The annotation of more than one word repeats the words
being annotated, which are followed by an equals sign and
then by the annotation; the footnote number in the text is
placed after the last of the words being annotated
In annotations of a single word, alternate meanings are usually
separated by commas; if there are distinctly dierent ranges of
meaning, the annotations are separated by arabic numerals
:iou+ +nis iook
xiii
inside parentheses(+), (:), and so on; in more complexly
worded annotations, alternative meanings expressed by a
single word are linked by a forward slash, or solidus: /
Explanations of textual meaning are not in parentheses;
comments about textual meaning are
Except for proper nouns, the word at the beginning of all
annotations is in lower case
Uncertainties are followed by a question mark, set in
parentheses: (?)
When particularly relevant,translationsinto twenty-rst-
century English have been added, in parentheses
Annotations of repeated words are not repeated. Explanations
of the rst instance of such common words are followed by
the sign*. Readers may easily track down the rst annotation,
using the brief Finding List at the back of the book.Words
with entirely separate meanings are annotated only for
meanings no longer current in Modern English.
The most important typographical device here employed is
the sign * placed after the rst (and only) annotation of words and
phrases occurring more than once. There is an alphabetically
arranged listing of such words and phrases in the Finding List at
the back of the book.The Finding List contains no annotations
but simply gives the words or phrases themselves and the num-
bers of the relevant act, the scene within that act, and the footnote
number within that scene for the words rst occurrence.
:iou+ +nis iook
xiv
i x+ roiuc+ i ox

xv
A
far more complex drama than it is sometimes thought,
Romeo and Juliet (+,?) takes its basic story line from
Arthur Brookes long narrative poem, The Tragical History
of Romeus and Juliet (+o:). Shakespeare could not have taken
much else: Brookes poem is written in one of the dullest verse
forms in English literary history, Poulters Measure, being rhymed
couplets of alternating hexameter and septameter length. The
Tragical History makes soporic reading.Yet the source of a plot is
no more than a beginning; Shakespeare almost invariably worked
from borrowed plots. He could have taken this story line from a
good many other sources, for many were readily available; there is
convincing evidence, however, that he worked from Brooke
alone. Again, what matters most, and what I will discuss here, is
what Shakespeare did with his ready-made narrative.
Romeo and Juliet is, rst of all, one of the central texts in the
long history of Western love stories. How and why one person
falls in love with another is obviously, and properly, of primary
human concern. Nobel Prizewinner Isaac Bashevis Singer often
said that all stories are love stories. The universal novel of cre-
ation,he wrote in Gifts, at age eighty-one,is nally a love story.
And Romeo has long since come to mean, in our language, a
lover, as well as someone persistently preoccupied with loving.
It is a mistake to believe either that Shakespeares Romeo is
excessively passionate or that he and Juliet are in some way reck-
lessly immature and unthinking. Renaissance (and to a large ex-
tent later medieval) approaches to love were founded on two
bodily organs, neither of them the brain.The eyes were thought
to begin the process. Sight was indeed indispensable, and sight,
like the wind and the rain, happens to be a physically based oc-
currence over which humans have no control. But the eyes alone
could not create love. The eyes transmitted the image they saw,
automatically and without any notion of preconception or plan-
ning, straight into the organs of emotion. Stirred by such a physi-
cal impact, the recipients heart and soul were inevitably and irre-
versibly bound by that wry, sly, and even malevolent god Love,
who was identied with the bow-wielding blind imp, Cupid.
In more physiological terms than the Renaissance usually em-
ployed: it was image-carrying light beams that, like Cupids ar-
rows, were shot into receivingand to be sure receptiveeyes.
These light beams traveled directly and without interruption
down into the inner, aective seats of being. (One must fudge a
bit, here, since it had not yet been fully settled that the heart was
uniquely the center of such matters; the liver and sometimes also
the kidneys were still considered relevant.) The many light-
oriented metaphors used, rst and last, to depict the heroine of
Romeo and Juliet fairly leap out at us; their ideational underpin-
ning is a good deal less obvious. It is still less obvious that Juliet,
too, sometimes uses light-related metaphors in speaking of
Romeo and of their love. Their love, she says, is Too like the
lightning, which doth cease to be / Ere one can say It lightens
ix+roiuc+iox
xvi
(:.:.++, +:o).When the Nurse is late returning from her mes-
sage-bearing visit to Romeo, Juliet declares, Loves heralds
should be thoughts, / Which ten times faster glide than the suns
beams (:..). It is entirely tting, to be sure, that her love is
not depicted in precisely the same terms as his. She can be his sun,
moon, and stars, but an Elizabethan woman views her beloved as
her lord. Juliet is crisp and direct, for a Renaissance woman
(though no more straightforward than many of Shakespeares fe-
male charactersthink of Desdemona, Portia, Cordelia, and the
often misunderstood Ophelia). She apologizes to Romeo for her
forwardness. Romeo is reverential, gentle, respectful. But he does
not apologize for his sweeping passion.
If, as often happens, the lover did not have the same powerful
eect on his or her beloved, love was unilateral and largely unsat-
isable. What factors made for receptivity were left vague and
largely undiscussed. Love happened, or it did not. The party or
parties involved knew with great clarity what they knew, once
they had been stricken; nothing else counted. Like so many de-
velopments in human existence, lifes directions were subject to
unknowable forcesdestiny, fate, or astrological congurations.
Rebellion against such outwardly determined directions was al-
ways possible. But not successful: fatalism was not simply another
way of looking at life but a recognition of fundamental reality.
Far from being wantons, accordingly, Romeo and Juliet were
fortunate to nd one another, just as they were unfortunate in
other ways. RosalineRomeos unseen, unheard, but often re-
ferred toinitial beloved, was to the Renaissance mind someone
our hero plainly loved only conceptually, intellectually.That sort
of love was not and could not be genuine, profound, and soul
shaking. Nor was it generally reciprocated. It was a mere game.
ix+roiuc+iox
xvii
People did not trie or toy with Cupids unstoppable arrows.
They bled from them, which is a very dierent aair entirely.
Love was not to be casually identied with mere happiness.
The comparative youth of Romeo and, especially, of Juliet is
yet another non-issue. Count Paris appears to be younger than
Romeo, and to my knowledge, no one has ever suggested that his
unreciprocated but apparently genuine love for Juliet is in any
way immature. The critical focus is of course largely on Juliet,
who is not quite fourteen. But not only do human females ma-
ture biologically at a much more rapid pace than do human
males, they also mature emotionally at roughly corresponding
speed.Wives have always tended to be younger than husbands; le-
gal limits on marriageable age (a relatively recent development)
tend to recognize and enforce custom. In the southern states of
the United States, not so long ago, males were permitted to marry
at sixteen, females at fourteen. It is generally accepted that matu-
ration accelerates in warmer climatesand Shakespeares play is
set in Italy. Indeed, Mary Queen of Scots had been married at f-
teen. For a marriage to be permissible, in England at that time,
the minimal age was at least + for a boy and +: for a girl.
1
Throughout Europe, indeed,girls could be betrothed at the age
of three, though marriage had to be delayed till twelve. In the f-
teenth century a daughter unmarried at fteen was a family dis-
grace.
2
Yet Romeo and Juliets misfortunes are not caused exclusively
by dark, mysterious, and unfathomable powers. Lawrence Stones
analysis of these lovers downfall does not fully explain the play,
but it does highlight a social vector that we in our time often ne-
glect: To an Elizabethan audience the tragedy of Romeo and
Juliet . . . lay not so much in their ill-starred romance as in the
ix+roiuc+iox
xviii
way they brought destruction upon themselves by violating the
norms of the society in which they lived, which . . . meant strict
lial obedience and loyalty to the traditional friendships and en-
mities of the lineage. An Elizabethan courtier would be familiar
enough with the bewitching passion of love to feel some sympa-
thy with the young couple, but he would see clearly enough
where duty lay.
3
We may say with equal justice that the norms
of the society in which these lovers lived, which tolerated (even if
they did not encourage) deep and dangerous feuds, brought de-
struction and death to many more than Romeo and Juliet alone.
In the course of the tragedy, Mercutio, Tybalt, and Paris die for
exactly the same awed cause.
Not only is it clear that the Capulets and the Montagues are at
fault, but we are given satiric, barbed portraits of the leaders of
both families.They are very old, but not remarkably wise, for all
their great years. What noise is this? Give me my long sword,
ho!croaks old Capulet in act +, scene + (line :).To which senile
bravado his wife responds,A crutch, a crutch! Why call you for
a sword? Capulet persists, seeing old Montague coming, and
to Capulets mindourish[ing] his blade in spite of me.
Montague is no wiser or more mature. Thou villain Capulet!
he cries, and then, when his wife too attempts to restrain him, he
exclaims, Hold me not, let me go. Lady Montague, womanly
more sensible, asserts,Thou shalt not stir one foot to seek a foe.
In the course of the play, we see more of old Capulet than we
do of old Montague, and what we see usually ts the same intem-
perate, often befuddled initial portrait. Capulet is more mellow, at
rst, in act +, scene , even urging calm and tolerance on Tybalt.
But when Tybalt argues with him, Capulet sputters out an explo-
sively irrational tirade, mixing his invective with staccato com-
ix+roiuc+iox
xix
ments on and to the dancing guests (lines ;o:+, ::::). Cap-
ulets denunciation of his daughter for refusing to honor her fa-
thers plans for her marriage is neither tempered nor sagacious:
Out, you green sickness carrion! Out, you baggage! . . .An you
be mine, Ill give you to my friend / An you be not, hang! Beg!
Starve! Die in the streets!(..+o, +,:+,).And in act , scene
, just before the discovery of Juliets death, Capulet plays the
role of an excited, dithering old fellow, far too caught up to dis-
play even minimal dignity. A jealous hood, a jealous hood! he
cackles at his wife, when she assures him that his errant nocturnal
amours are over and done with (line +).
A more trenchant argument based on the prevailing social
norms as Shakespeare has chosen to present them would be, in
fact, that the upper levels of Verona society are not only at fault
but badly in need of reformation. Capulet, Montague, says the
prince, plainly including himself and his reign in the castigation.
See what a scourge is laid upon your hate . . . / And I, for wink-
ing at your discords too, / Have lost a brace of kinsmen. All are
punished(..:,+:,).Veronas citizenry is literally up in arms
against violent brawling in its streets. Down with the Capulets!
Down with the Montagues! (+.+.:).As much as the deaths of
Juliet and her Romeo, so young and so alive,emphasizes Rosalie
L. Colie,the waste of a man like Mercutio cries out for civil set-
tlement of the old mens vendetta.
4
But the citizenry was not against the wearing of swords by all
males of the upper levels (gentlemen), nor against the chivalric
codes by which ghting among those gentlemen was more or less
regulated. Neither, at least in Romeo and Juliet, does Shakespeare
appear so disposed.Tybalt, negatively portrayed, is trigger-happy,
but Mercutio, not far behind in violence and aggression, is pre-
ix+roiuc+iox
xx
sented with magical warmth. So, too, is Romeo, who takes swift
and successful revenge on Tybalt, for Mercutios death, and who
reluctantly but eciently disposes of an angry and violence-
hungry Paris. It must be remembered that one of Shakespeares
most important dramatist colleagues, Ben Jonson, wore and on
occasion used a sword to settle a quarrel, once killing his antago-
nist. Jonson claimed gentlemanly status, though in all probability
falsely. Another major English dramatist, Christopher Marlowe,
was stabbed to death in a tavern brawl, the rights and wrongs of
which have never been decisively determined: Marlowes death
may well have been a political assassination. But Marlowe was a
university graduate, and thus of undoubted gentlemanly rank.
John Day, a distinctly minor playwright but also a university grad-
uate, killed the obscure playwright Henry Porter with his rapier.
Shakespeare had no gentlemanly background, but he spent years
trying, nally successfully, to obtain (for a price) a gentlemans
coat of arms. He was also, on the record, very much occupied
with attaining landowner status, yet another gentlemanly at-
tribute.
In short, social hierarchieswhich to this day play a large role
in Britainwere in Shakespeares time starkly powerful. The
key symbols of Tudor and Early Stuart society were the hat
[which the lower classes had to do to their betters] and the whip
[which the upper classes were entitled to use on their inferi-
ors]. . . . There was even Tudor class legislation about sport,
archery being prescribed for the lower orders, and bowls and ten-
nis restricted to gentlemen with an income of over +oo [pounds]
a year.
5
The masters commanded; the servants obeyed.Get me
ink and paper / And hire post horses, Romeo orders. His ser-
vant, Balthasar, demurs. I do beseech you, sir, have patience.A
ix+roiuc+iox
xxi
wiser servant can thus make what seem to him or her useful sug-
gestions. Romeo pays no heed:Leave me and do the thing I bid
thee do . . . Get thee gone (.+.::;, o, :). And Balthasar
goes, without another word.
One measure of the Nurses partially ambivalent class status is
precisely the impertinence displayed toward her by her servant,
Peter. She does indeed have a servant, which is usually a ladys pre-
rogative, but the Nurses servant talks back, most casually. I saw
no man use you at his pleasure (:..+o). Paris neither expects
nor receives such ippancies from his servant.Give me thy torch,
boy. Hence, and stand aloof (..+). Nor does Romeo indulge
his manservant, especially when he is grimly serious.If thou . . .
do return to pry . . . , he warns Balthasar,By heaven, I will tear
thee joint by joint(..).We may perhaps doubt, from our
twenty-rst-century perspective, that Romeo would so assault
his servant. But Balthasar quite rightly has no such doubts, know-
ing that aroused masters could and did do exactly such mayhem.
I dare not,Balthasar tells Friar Laurence, who has requested his
companionship in entering the tomb.My master knows not but
I am gone hence, / and fearfully did menace me with death / If I
did stay (..+++). Not even priestly protection and shield-
ing can persuade him to the contrary. Indeed, one sure sign of the
buoon stature of Petruchio, in The Taming of the Shrew, is pre-
cisely that, talked back to by a servant, he does not use his sword
or his dagger but rst argues with the servant, at some length,
then performs the commanded act himself, and at last wrings
[the wonderfully insouciant servant] by the ears. The servant
cries out for help, as no ordinary servant would even think of do-
ing, and even less typically announces that My master is mad
that is, insane (+.:.+;). It was not then considered a mad act for
ix+roiuc+iox
xxii
masters to behave with great violence to their servants. Patricia
Fumerton points out that much evidence points to unsettling
relations between servants . . . and their masters. . . . [A]s court
records testify, mistreatement and violence . . . were common.
6
Sir William Blackstones Commentaries on the Laws of England,
written almost two centuries after Romeo and Juliet, contains a
discussion of assaults committed by masters and mistresses on
apprentice and servants . . . , so as to endanger life, or permanently
injure health. Parents in Renaissance times had absolute rights
over their children, and there were similarities between the posi-
tion of servants in the household and that of children in the fam-
ily. . . . Both owed obedience and service to the head of the
household. It is generally speaking true that the sixteenth cen-
tury saw the ultimately successful assertion of a royal monopoly
of violence both public and private. But it is also true that In
the sixteenth and seventeenth century tempers were short and
weapons to hand. . . . [A] gentleman carried a weapon at all
times, and did not hesitate to use it. It was none other than Philip
Sidney who warned his fathers secretary that if he read his letters
to his father again I will thrust my dagger into you.And trust to
it, for I speak it in earnest.
8
Lord Herbert of Cherbury, himself a good poet and the older
brother of a great one, George Herbert, writes unashamedly in his
autobiography that, in January +oo,, a ship on which he was re-
turning from France began to break apart. A boat, a shalop, set
o from Dover:I got into it rst with my sword in my hand, and
called for Sir Thomas Lucy [the only other man of rank on
board], saying that if any man oerd to get in before him, I should
resist him with my sword . . . [A]fter I had receivd [Lucy], [I] bid
the Shalop make away to shoar.
9
ix+roiuc+iox
xxiii
Rapiers, dueling, sword masters, and sword-ghting treatises
were usually Italian imports, as Shakespeare of course well knew.
It was all something of an Elizabethan craze. And as A. L. Rowse
notes, it is socially signicant that the duel now vindicated, not
loyalty or the law, but personal honour, pride, or vanity.
10
Even
the dinner table could be a source of serious violence, for it was a
sobering fact needing to be reckoned with that literally everyone
ate by impaling food on knives, usually sharp ones that diners
brought to the table themselves. Forks, which were the replace-
ment for knives, were an Italian invention that did not come into
use, in England, until +o++.
11
Violence-loving aristocrats, from the sober and imperious
Duke to the dancers at Capulets festive ball, are plainly at the cen-
ter of Romeo and Juliet. But as he so often does, Shakespeare brings
onto his stage a good many representatives of Renaissance En-
glands lower classes, and not simply as traditionally low, or
comic, characters. Even Sampson and Gregory, two of the heart-
less hinds at whom Tybalt sneers (+.+.;), are a good deal more
than mere buoons. All Elizabethans relished quick wits and
nimble tongues; these two members of the serving classes dem-
onstrate bothand their punning jests quickly turn, as male prat-
tle has always done, to matters bawdy.I will take the wall of any
man or maid of Montagues,says Sampson, adding that women,
being the weaker vessels, are ever thrust to the wall (+.+.::,
:::,). And in the broader senses of the phrase, these two keep
their wits about them: Fear me not, says Sampson, assuring
Gregory of his support. And Gregory, knowing his companion
only too well, at once replies,No, marry, as far as your support
goes,I fear thee! (lines ;:).The nameless and illiterate ser-
vant sent as a messenger, bearing invitations to a written list of
ix+roiuc+iox
xxiv
persons, shows more good sense than Capulet, who dispatches
him (and to whose order any lowbred protest would plainly be
risky):Find them out whose names are written here? It is writ-
ten that the shoemaker should meddle with his yard and the tai-
lor with his last, the sher with his pencil and the painter with his
nets, but I am sent to nd those persons whose names are here
writ, and can never nd what names the writing person hath here
writ(+.:.::).
Still, it is only Juliets Nurse, among the plays servants, whose
role assumes major proportions. Having spent all fourteen of
Juliets years in relatively intimate association with the Capulet
family, she has taken on a status poised somewhere between aris-
tocratic and plebian. It is the Nurse to whom Lady Capulet hands
the keys to locked store roomskeys necessarily denied to mere
servants, since locking such doors is expressly intended, and per-
fectly understood by everyone, to keep servants from stealing
(..+). It is the Nurse who is admitted to Lady Capulets coun-
sel with her daughter (+..,); the Nurse who, told by Lady Ca-
pulet to hold thy peace, continues to ramble on (line ,); the
Nurse who has the temerity, not only to scold her master for his
usage of Juliet, but to protest his demeaning reply: I speak no
treason. . . . May one not speak? (..+;:, +;). And perhaps
most impressively, it is the Nurse who participates essentially as an
equal in the quasi-choral dirge spoken for Juliet by Capulet, Lady
Capulet, and Paris (..::o).
Romeo and Juliet was, in the words of our time, a smash hit.All
the young men quoted it, observes Muriel Bradbrook.
12
It has
remained a smash hit: no one, I think, has explained that fact so
well as Mark Van Doren: Few other plays, even by Shakespeare,
engage the audience so intimately. . . .The tension of the entire
ix+roiuc+iox
xxv
play, while we await the kiss of re and powder which will con-
sume its most precious persons, is maintained at an endurable
point by the simplicity with which sorrow is made lyric. Even the
conceits [metaphors] of Romeo and Juliet sound like things that
they and they alone would say. . . . [W]ith a correct and powerful
understanding of the surrendered heart, the listening mind . . .
[Shakespeare] spares nothing yet handles gently.
13
The purpose of this book is to make Romeo and Juliets glowing
words as readily accessible as if they had just been written.
Notes
+. David Cressy, Birth, Marriage and Death: Ritual, Religion, and the Life-
Cycle in Tudor and Stuart England (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
+,,;), ++.
:. Will Durant, The Renaissance (New York: Simon and Schuster, +,),
;:.
. Lawrence Stone, The Family, Sex and Marriage in England, :oo::oo
(New York: Harper, +,;;), :;.
. Rosalie L. Colie, Shakespeares Living Art (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton
University Press, +,;), :.
. Lawrence Stone, The Crisis of the Aristocracy, :::,:, abridged ed.
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, +,o;), :o, +:.
o. Londons Vagrant Economy, in Material London, ca. :oo, ed. Lena
Cowan Orlin (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, :ooo),
:++.
;. Alexander Cowan, Urban Europe, :oo:,oo (London: Hodder,
+,,:), ;+;:.
:. Stone, Crisis of the Aristocracy, :o, +:, ,;, +o:.
,. The Life of Edward, First Lord Herbert of Cherbury,Written by Himself,
ed. J. M. Shuttleworth (Oxford: Oxford University Press, +,;o), +.
+o. A. L. Rowse, The Elizabethan Renaissance: The Life of the Society
(London: Macmillan, +,;+), +,;.
ix+roiuc+iox
xxvi
++. Margaret Visser, The Rituals of Dinner (New York: Grove Weidenfeld,
+,,+), +:o, +,o.
+:. Muriel Bradbrook, Shakespeare: The Poet in His World (New York:
Columbia University Press, +,;:), ,,.
+. Mark Van Doren, Shakespeare (New York: Holt, +,,), ,oo.
ix+roiuc+iox
xxvii
Romeo and Juliet

cn:r:c+rrs ( ir:x:+i s rrrsox:r)

Chorus
Escalus (Prince of Verona)
Paris (a young Count, the Princes kinsman)
Montague and Capulet (heads of two feuding families)
An older, unnamed Capulet
Romeo (Montagues son)
Tybalt (Lady Capulets nephew)
Mercutio (the Princes kinsman and Romeos friend)
Benvolio (Montagues nephew and Romeos friend)
Friar Laurence (a Franciscan monk)
Friar John (a Franciscan monk)
Balthasar (Romeos servant)
Abram (Montagues servant)
Sampson (Capulets servant)
Gregory (Capulets servant)
Peter (servant of Juliets Nurse)
An Apothecary
Three Musicians
Three Watchmen
An Oicer
Lady Montague (Montagues wife)
Lady Capulet (Capulets wife)
Juliet (Capulets daughter)
Juliets Nurse
Citizens of Verona, Gentlemen and Gentlewomen of both houses,
Maskers,
1
Torchbearers, Pages, Guards, Servants, and Attendants
+ persons disguised by a mask
Act +

r roiocur
rx+rr Cnorus
+
Chorus Two households, both alike in dignity,
2
In fair
3
Verona, where we lay our scene,
4
From ancient grudge
5
break to new mutiny,
6
Where civil
7
blood makes civil
8
hands unclean.
9
From forth
10
the fatal
11
loins of these two foes
12
A pair of star-crossed
13
lovers take
14
their life,
+ a single actor, representing/speaking for the entire troupe of actors
: rank, nobleness, merit
beautiful, pleasing, delightful*
lay our scene place/set our play
ill will
o break to new mutiny burst into new discord/quarrel
; communal
: (+) communal, (:) becoming, proper, decent
, impure, foul
+o from forth out of
++ fated, doomed
+: the Capulets and the Montagues
+ star-crossed subject to malignant astrological inuence
+ receive, obtain
Whose misadventured
15
piteous overthrows
16
Doth with their death bury
17
their parents strife.
The fearful
18
passage
19
of their death-marked love,
And the continuance of their parents rage,
Which, but
20
their childrens end, naught
21
could remove,
Is now the two hours trac
22
of our stage,
The which if you with patient ears attend,
23
What here shall miss,
24
our toil shall strive to mend.
rxi+
s cr xr +
Verona. A public place
rx+rr S:xrsox :xi Grrcor., io+n C:ruir+s
Sampson Gregory, on my word, well not carry
25
coals.
26
Gregory No, for then we should be colliers.
27
Sampson I mean, an
28
we be in choler, well draw.
29
:c+ + scrxr +

+o
+
+ unfortunate
+o ruin, destruction (noun)
+; (+) inter, (:) abandon
+: dreadful, terrible, awful*
+, movement, course, progression, path
:o except for
:+ nothing*
:: business
: listen, consider, follow closely*
: be lacking
: submit to
:o insults (thrown like lumps of coals)
:; (+) dealers in/transporters of coal, (:) angry, wrathful (choler), () wearing
dog- or prison-collars, and () the hangmans noose (neck collar)
:: if *
:, pull a sword from its sheath*
Gregory Ay, while you live, draw your neck out of collar.
Sampson I strike quickly, being moved.
30
Gregory But thou art not quickly moved to strike.
Sampson A dog
31
of the house
32
of Montague moves me.
Gregory To move is to stir, and to be valiant is to stand.
33
Therefore, if thou art moved, thou runnst away.
Sampson A dog of that house shall move me to stand. I will take
the wall
34
of any man or maid of Montagues.
Gregory That shows thee a weak slave,
35
for the weakest goes
to the wall.
36
Sampson Tis true, and therefore women, being the weaker
vessels,
37
are ever
38
thrust to the wall.
39
Therefore I will push
Montagues men from the wall and thrust his maids
40
to the
wall.
Gregory The quarrel is between our masters and us their men.
Sampson Tis all one. I will show myself a tyrant.When I have
fought with the men, I will be civil
41
with the maids: I will
cut o their heads.
Gregory The heads of the maids?
Sampson Ay, the heads of the maids, or their maidenheads.
42
:c+ + scrxr +

:o
:
o

o provoked, stirred up, angered*

+ a dog a worthless/despicable person, coward
: household
(+) remain rm/steadfast, (:) have an erection
take the wall keep ones place on the inner side of a walkway/pavement
rascal, fellow* (always negative)
o succumbs, is defeated
; weaker vessels having less strength/capacity than men
: always*
, thrust to the wall (+) defeated, (:) copulated with, against a wall
o (+) women servants, (:) virgins
+ kind, courteous
: virginity (the hymen/virginal membrane)
Take it in what sense
43
thou wilt.
Gregory They must take it in sense that feel it.
Sampson Me they shall feel, while I am able to stand
44
and tis
known I am a pretty piece of esh.
45
Gregory Tis well thou art not sh. If thou hadst,
46
thou hadst
been poor John.
47
Draw thy tool!
48
Here comes two of the
house of Montagues.
49
rx+rr +vo o+nrr srrvixcxrx, Air:x :xi B:i+n:s:r
Sampson My naked weapon is out.
50
Quarrel! I will back thee.
Gregory How? Turn thy back
51
and run?
Sampson Fear me not.
52
Gregory No, marry.
53
I fear thee!
54
Sampson Let us take
55
the law of our sides.
56
Let them begin.
Gregory I will frown as I pass by, and let them take it as they
list.
57
:c+ + scrxr +
o
o

o
in what sense what (+) meaning, (:) physical feeling (of the ve senses)
remain (+) on my feet , (:) with penis erect
pretty piece of esh (+) handsome, well-made man, (:) sexually well
endowed/of considerable genital size
o were
; poor John dried salt cod, a poor mans food
: (+) weapon of war, (:) penis
, (singular and plural, in Elizabethan English, are often used dierently from
modern usage)
o (more sexual punning)
+ turn thy back: deliberately provoking misunderstanding of back you
: fear me not dont worry about me
exclamatory: oh yes!*
I fear thee Im afraid of you (being behind me? being disloyal?)
(+) follow, arm, be careful to keep, make use of (:) act as if
o of our sides on our side
; please (verb)
Sampson Nay, as they dare.
58
I will bite my thumb
59
at them,
which is disgrace to them, if they bear it.
Abram Do you bite your thumb at us, sir?
Sampson I do bite my thumb, sir.
Abram Do you bite your thumb at us, sir?
Sampson (aside to Gregory) Is the law of
60
our side if I say ay?
Gregory (aside to Sampson) No.
Sampson No, sir, I do not bite my thumb at you, sir. But I bite
my thumb, sir.
Gregory Do you quarrel, sir?
Abram Quarrel, sir? No, sir.
Sampson But if you do, sir, I am for you.
61
I serve as good a man
as you.
Abram No better.
Sampson Well, sir.
62
rx+rr Brxvoiio
63
Gregory (aside to Sampson) Say better.Here comes one of my
masters kinsmen.
Sampson Yes, better, sir.
Abram You lie.
Sampson Draw, if you be
64
men. Gregory, remember thy
:c+ + scrxr +
;

oo
o
;o
: have the courage/boldness
, bite my thumb snap my thumb nail with my upper teeth (derisive,
condescending)
oo on
o+ I am for you I am ready/a match for you
o: (equivocal remark, indicating uncertainty, indecision)
o (benVOLyo)
o are (subjunctive)
swashing
65
blow.
+nr. ricn+
Benvolio (beating down their swords) Part fools!
Put up
66
your swords.You know not what you do.
rx+rr T.i:i+
Tybalt What, art thou drawn
67
among these heartless hinds?
68
Turn thee, Benvolio! Look upon thy death.
Benvolio I do but
69
keep the peace. Put up thy sword,
Or manage
70
it to part
71
these men with
72
me.
Tybalt What, drawn, and talk of peace? I hate the word
As I hate hell, all Montagues, and thee.
Have at thee,
73
coward!
+nr. ricn+
rx+rr :x Orricrr, :xi +nrrr or rour Ci+izrxs
vi+n ciuis or r:r+is:xs
74
Oicer Clubs, bills,
75
and partisans! Strike! Beat them down!
Citizens Down with the Capulets! Down with the Montagues!
:c+ + scrxr +
:
;
:o
o slashing
oo away
o; with your sword out
o: drawn among these heartless hinds wielding your sword among such
spiritless/foolish domestic servants
o, but only*
;o wield, use
;+ separate
;: along with
; have at thee (an imperative, announcing an attack)
; long-handled spears with various lateral cutting projections
; long-handled, sometimes concave axe-like weapons with spikes jutting in
the other direction from their blades
rx+rr C:ruir+ ix nis covx,
76
:xi L:i. C:ruir+
Capulet What noise is this? Give me my long sword,
77
ho!
Lady Capulet A crutch, a crutch! Why call you for a sword?
Capulet My sword, I say! Old Montague is come.
And ourishes
78
his blade in spite of
79
me.
rx+rr Mox+:cur :xi L:i. Mox+:cur
Montague Thou villain
80
Capulet! (to Lady Montague)
Hold me not, let me go.
Lady Montague Thou shalt not stir one foot to seek a foe.
rx+rr Prixcr, vi+n nis :++rxi:x+s
Prince Rebellious subjects, enemies to peace,
Profaners
81
of this neighbor-staind steel:
82
Will they not hear? What, ho! You men, you beasts,
83
That quench the re of your pernicious
84
rage
With purple fountains issuing from your veins:
On pain of torture, from those bloody hands
Throw your mistempered
85
weapons to the ground
:c+ + scrxr +
,
:
,o
,
;o nightgown, dressing gown, bathrobe
;; long sword sword with long cutting blade
;: brandishes, waves about
;, in spite of as an insult to/in hatred/contempt for
:o (+) lowborn peasant, (:) rascal, scoundrel*
:+ delers, violators
:: neighbor-staind steel weapons stained with the blood of your neighbors
: men of animal nature
: destructive, ruinous, fatal
: (+) tempered for evil purpose, (:) disorderly (steel is temperedin its
manufacture)
And hear the sentence
86
of your movd
87
prince.
Three civil
88
brawls, bred of
89
an airy
90
word
By thee, old Capulet, and Montague,
Have thrice disturbed the quiet of our streets
And made Veronas ancient
91
citizens
Cast by
92
their grave,
93
beseeming ornaments
94
To wield old partisans, in hands as
95
old,
Cankered
96
with peace, to part
97
your cankered
98
hate.
If ever you disturb our streets again
Your lives shall pay
99
the forfeit
100
of the peace.
For this time
101
all the rest depart away.
You, Capulet, shall
102
go along with me,
And, Montague, come you this afternoon,
To know our
103
farther pleasure
104
in this case,
105
:c+ + scrxr +
+o
+oo
+o
++o
:o authoritative decision/judgment
:; indignant, angered
:: civil community wide/among citizens
:, bred of generated by/born of
,o (+) lightly spoken, ippant (:) empty, imaginary
,+ aged, old, venerable
,: cast by throw away/aside, shed, drop
, respected, revered
, beseeming ornaments appropriate/betting* equipment/accessories
, just as, equally
,o rusted, corroded
,; break up
,: infected, gangrened, depraved
,, pay for
+oo breach, violation
+o+ this time now
+o: must
+o the royal we,meaning I
+o farther pleasure additional wishes
+o set of circumstances
To old Freetown, our common judgment place.
106
Once more, on pain
107
of death, all men depart.
108
rxrux+ :ii iu+
109
Mox+:cur, L:i. Mox+:cur,
:xi Brxvoiio
Montague Who set this ancient quarrel new abroach
110
?
Speak, nephew.Were you by
111
when it began?
Benvolio Here were the servants of your adversary
And yours, close ghting
112
ere
113
I did approach.
I drew to part them. In the instant
114
came
The ery Tybalt, with his sword prepared,
115
Which as
116
he breathed deance
117
to my ears,
He swung about
118
his head and cut the winds,
Who, nothing hurt withal,
119
hissed him in scorn.
While we were interchanging thrusts and blows,
Came more and more, and fought on part and part,
120
Till the Prince came, who parted either part.
121
:c+ + scrxr +
++
++
+:o
+oo common judgment place general/usual decision-making place
+o; penalty, punishment
+o: go away (a command)
+o, except
++o set . . . abroach set astir, afoot (set abroach a cask/barrel of liquor to
open)
+++ in the vicinity, close by
++: close ghting ghting hard/at close quarters
++ before*
++ in the instant at that moment
++ at the ready, drawn from its sheath
++o even as
++; breathed deance exhaled/spoke hostility/challenge
++: around*
++, therewith
+:o on part and part some on one side and some on the other
+:+ parted either part separated each side/both sides
Lady Montague O, where is Romeo? Saw you him to-day?
Right glad I am he was not at this fray.
Benvolio Madam, an hour before the worshipped
122
sun
Peered forth
123
the golden window of the East,
A troubled mind drove me to walk abroad,
124
Where underneath the grove of sycamore
That westward rooteth
125
from the citys side
126
So early walking did I see your son.
Towards him I made,
127
but he was ware
128
of me
And stole
129
into the covert
130
of the wood.
I measuring
131
his aections
132
by my own,
Which then most sought where most
133
might not be found,
Being one too many by
134
my weary
135
self
Pursued
136
my humor,
137
not pursuing his,
And gladly shunned who
138
gladly ed from me.
Montague Many a morning hath he there been seen,
With tears augmenting the fresh mornings dew,
:c+ + scrxr +
+:
+:
+o
+
+o
+:: adored, venerated
+: forth from
+: in the open air
+: grows
+:o outskirts
+:; went, headed
+:: wary
+:, quietly withdrew*
+o shelter, dense/thickly grown part
++ judging, evaluating
+: feelings, emotions, state of mind*
+ most sought where most principally sought where most people
+ all by
+ (+) discontented, dispirited, depressed, (:) tiresome
+o followed
+; mood*
+: he who
Adding to clouds more clouds with his deep sighs,
But all so soon as the all-cheering sun
Should in the farthest East begin to draw
The shady curtains
139
from Auroras
140
bed,
Away from light steals home my heavy
141
son
And private in his chamber pens himself,
Shuts up his windows, locks fair
142
daylight out
And makes himself an articial night.
Black
143
and portentous
144
must this humor prove,
145
Unless good counsel
146
may the cause remove.
Benvolio My noble uncle, do you know the cause?
Montague I neither know it nor can learn of
147
him.
Benvolio Have you importuned
148
him by any means?
149
Montague Both by myself and many other friends.
But he, his own aections counselor,
Is to himself I will not say how true
But to himself so secret and so close,
150
So far from sounding and discovery,
151
:c+ + scrxr +
+
+
+o
+
+, (bed curtains were in common use)
+o the dawn
++ (+) grave, severe, somber, (:) troubled, sad, despondent
+: ne
+ melancholy, dismal
+ ominous, threatening
+ demonstrate/turn out to be
+o advice, guidance, judgment*
+; from
+: urged, pressed
+, by any means in any way*
+o uncommunicative
++ sounding and discovery investigation/determination and explanation/
disclosure
As is the bud bit with
152
an envious
153
worm
Ere he can spread his sweet leaves to the air
Or dedicate
154
his beauty to the sun.
Could we but learn from whence his sorrows grow
We would as willingly give cure as
155
know.
rx+rr Roxro
Benvolio See, where he comes. So please you step aside,
Ill know his grievance,
156
or be much denied.
157
Montague I would thou wert
158
so happy by thy stay
159
To hear
160
true shrift.
161
Come, madam, lets away.
rxrux+ Mox+:cur :xi L:i. Mox+:cur
Benvolio Good morrow,
162
cousin.
163
Romeo Is the day so young?
Benvolio But new
164
struck nine.
Romeo Ay me! sad hours seem long.
Was that my father that went hence so fast?
Benvolio It was.What sadness lengthens Romeos hours?
:c+ + scrxr +
+
+oo
+o
+;o
+: by
+ malicious, spiteful*
+ devote, open
+ as we would
+o the cause/nature of his grief
+; much denied deeply/intensely refused/rejected
+: would thou wert wish you might be
+, by thy stay on account of your remaining here
+oo to hear that you will hear
+o+ true shrift honest/sincere/reliable penance/repentance
+o: morning, day*
+o relative, any member of the larger family (often shortened to coz)*
+o newly, just
Romeo Not having that which having
165
makes them short.
Benvolio In love?
Romeo Out
Benvolio Of love?
Romeo Out of her favor,
166
where I am in love.
Benvolio Alas that love, so gentle
167
in his view,
168
Should be so tyrannous and rough
169
in proof.
170
Romeo Alas that love, whose view is mued still,
171
Should without eyes
172
see pathways to his will.
173
Where shall we dine? (looks around) O me! What fray was
here?
Yet tell me not, for I have heard it all.
Heres much to do with hate, but more with love.
174
Why then, O brawling love, O loving hate,
O anything of
175
nothing rst create!
176
O heavy lightness, serious vanity!
177
Misshapen chaos of well-seeming
178
forms!
:c+ + scrxr +
+
+;
+:o
+:
+o if one has it
+oo good graces
+o; courteous, noble*
+o: in his view in his (its) appearance
+o, disagreeable, harsh*
+;o in proof how it turns out/is experienced
+;+ view is mued still whose sight is forever/always blinded
+;: without eyes: Cupid is blind
+; pleasure, desire
+; (if herethe setting/location, because Rosaline, his current love, is a
Capulet [and thus with hate]; if hereinside Romeo, because his
heart is all awhirl)
+; from, out of
+;o created
+;; futility, foolishness, idleness
+;: appearing* to be good
Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold re, sick health,
Still
179
waking sleep, that is not what it is!
This love feel I, that feel no love
180
in this.
Dost thou not laugh?
Benvolio No, coz, I rather weep.
Romeo Good heart,
181
at what?
Benvolio At thy good hearts
oppression.
182
Romeo Why, such is loves transgression.
183
Griefs of mine own lie heavy in my breast,
Which
184
thou wilt propagate,
185
to have it pressed
186
With more of thine.
187
This love that thou hast shown
Doth add more grief to too much of mine own.
188
Love is a smoke raised
189
with the fume
190
of sighs;
Being purged,
191
a re sparkling in lovers eyes;
Being vexed,
192
a sea nourished with lovers tears.
What is it else?
193
A madness most discreet,
194
:c+ + scrxr +
+o
+,o
+,
:oo
+;, (adverb)
+:o feel no love take no pleasure
+:+ (used like mon ami, in French)
+:: burden, grief, trouble
+: sin
+: which griefs
+: multiply
+:o have it pressed squeeze my heart
+:; your love for me
+:: too much of mine own my own grief, already too much
+:, caused, roused, provoked
+,o with the fume by the exhalation/vapors
+,+ washed away, puried
+,: irritated, annoyed, grieved
+, besides, in addition*
+, (+) cautious, judicious, prudent, (:) courteous, polite
A choking gall,
195
and a preserving sweet.
196
Farewell, my coz.
Benvolio Soft!
197
I will go along.
198
An
199
if you leave me so, you do me wrong.
Romeo Tut! I have lost myself, I am not here.
This is not Romeo, hes some other where.
Benvolio Tell me in sadness,
200
who is that you love?
Romeo What, shall I groan and tell thee?
Benvolio Groan? Why, no.
But sadly tell me who.
Romeo Bid
201
a sick man in sadness make his will.
Ah, word ill
202
urged to one that is so ill.
In sadness, cousin, I do love a woman.
Benvolio I aimed so near
203
when I supposed you loved.
Romeo A right good markman,
204
and shes fair
205
I love.
Benvolio A right fair
206
mark,
207
fair
208
coz, is soonest hit.
Romeo Well, in that hit
209
you miss. Shell not be hit
:c+ + scrxr +
+;
:o
:+o
:+
+, choking gall smothering bitterness
+,o preserving sweet preservative sweetness
+,; wait a minute!
+,: along with you
+,, and
:oo in sadness in earnest
:o+ ask, entreat, beg
:o: harshly, hurtfully, wrongfully, blamefully
:o closely
:o marksman
:o beautiful
:oo right fair proper/upright ne/pleasing
:o; target
:o: (term of respect/courtesy: Shakespeare uses fairthree ways in the space
of eight words)
:o, stroke, guess
With Cupids arrow. She hath Dians
210
wit,
211
And, in strong proof of chastity well armed,
212
From Loves
213
weak childish bow she lives unharmed.
She will not stay
214
the siege of loving terms,
215
Nor bide
216
th encounter
217
of assailing
218
eyes,
Nor ope
219
her lap
220
to saint-seducing gold.
O shes rich in beauty, only poor
That, when she dies, with beauty dies her store.
221
Benvolio Then she hath sworn that she will still live chaste?
Romeo She hath, and in that sparing
222
makes huge waste,
For beauty, starved with her
223
severity,
224
Cuts beauty o from all posterity.
She is too fair, too wise, wisely too fair,
To merit bliss
225
by making me despair.
She hath forsworn
226
to Love, and in that vow
Do I live dead that live to tell it now.
:c+ + scrxr +
+:
::o
::
:o
:+o Diana goddess of hunting and of chastity
:++ mental capacity, intellectual power (also wits)*
:+: equipped for battle
:+ Cupids
:+ quietly endure (sustain, abide by, depend on, support)
:+ (+) conditions, (:) words
:+o submit to, tolerate
:+; face-to-face meeting, skirmish, duel
:+: attacking, assaulting
:+, open
::o (+) front of a skirt, (:) female genitalia
::+ with beauty dies her store what dies, along with her beauty, is her
capacity for reproduction
::: saving, frugality, economy
:: Rosalines
:: strictness, sternness, moral austerity
:: merit bliss deserve/obtain her (Rosalines) (+) happiness, (:) salvation
::o falsely sworn, perjured herself
Benvolio Be ruled
227
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.
Romeo Tis the way
To call hers exquisite in question
228
more.
These happy
229
masks that kiss fair ladies brows,
Being black
230
puts us in mind they hide the fair.
He that is stricken blind cannot forget
The precious treasure of his eyesight lost.
Show me a mistress
231
that is passing
232
fair,
What doth her beauty serve but as a note
233
Where I may read
234
who passed
235
that passing fair?
Farewell.Thou canst not teach me to forget.
Benvolio Ill pay
236
that doctrine,
237
or else die in debt.
238
rxrux+
:c+ + scrxr +
+,
:
:o
:
::; guided*
::: call hers exquisite in question more call/summon even more to
mind her beauty, which is exquisite
::, lucky, fortunate
:o (+) black (color), (:) unattractive
:+ woman commanding a mans heart, lady love
:: surpassing, transcendentally*
: sign, token
: see, nd
: surpassed
:o discharge the obligation of
:; lesson, knowledge
:: die in debt die trying
s cr xr :
A street
rx+rr C:ruir+, Coux+ P:ris, :xi nis Srrv:x+
Capulet But Montague is bound
1
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 honorable reckoning
2
are you both,
And pity tis you lived at odds so long.
But now, my lord, what say you to my suit?
3
Capulet But saying oer what I have said before.
My child is yet a stranger
4
in the world:
She hath not seen the change
5
of fourteen years.
Let two more summers wither
6
in their pride
Ere we may think her ripe to be a bride.
Paris Younger than she are happy mothers made.
Capulet And too soon marred
7
are those so early made.
The earth hath swallowed all my hopes
8
but she:
She is the hopeful
9
lady of my earth.
10
But woo her, gentle Paris, get her heart.
My will to her consent is but a part.
:c+ + scrxr :
:o

+o
+
+ (+) constrained, compelled, (:) under bond?
: account, distinction
(+) supplication, request, (:) wooing, courting (paternal approval being
primary)
newcomer
changing, succession, passing
o shrivel, fade away
; spoiled, injured, disgured
: expectations: children
, full of/laden with hope
+o my earth my life (and hopes)
An she agree, within
11
her scope
12
of choice
Lies my consent and fair according
13
voice.
This night I hold an old accustomed feast
14
Whereto
15
I have invited many a guest,
Such as I love and you among
16
the store,
17
One more, most welcome, makes my number
18
more.
At my poor house look
19
to behold this night
Earth-treading
20
stars that make dark heaven light.
21
Such comfort
22
as do lusty
23
young men feel
When well appareled
24
April on the heel
Of limping
25
Winter treads, even such delight
Among fresh fennel
26
buds shall you this night
Inherit
27
at my house. Hear all, all see,
And like her most whose merit most shall be,
Which, on more view of many, mine,
28
being one,
May stand in number,
29
though in reckning none.
30
:c+ + scrxr :
:+
:o
:
o
++ inside, in the limits of, contained within
+: sphere, range, freedom
+ agreeing, matching, harmonious
+ accustomed feast customary/habitual gathering/entertainment/banquet*
+ to which
+o you among to add you to
+; company, abundance of persons
+: my number the count of my guests
+, expect
:o walking, stepping, dancing
:+ make dark heaven light light up the dark sky
:: refreshment, invigoration, pleasure, delight
: lively, merry, joyful
: clothed, adorned (winter being bare, and April marking the coming of spring)
: lame (by April, winter is old and enfeebled, ready to die)
:o savory herb with yellow owers (some texts have female)
:; receive, take possession of
:: my daughter ( Juliet)
:, stand in number stand out/be rst/number one among them?
o though in reckning none though in the mathematics of probability one is
not strictly speaking a number
Come, go with me.
31
(to Servant, giving him a paper)
Go, sirrah,
32
trudge
33
about
34
Through fair Verona. Find those persons out
Whose names are written there, and to them say
My house and welcome on their pleasure stay.
35
rxrux+ C:ruir+ :xi P:ris
Servant Find them out whose names are written here? It is
written that the shoemaker should meddle
36
with his yard
37
and the tailor with his last,
38
the sher with his pencil and the
painter with his nets. But I am sent to nd those persons
whose names are here writ, and can never nd
39
what names
the writing person hath here writ. I must to
40
the learnd. In
good time!
rx+rr Brxvoiio :xi Roxro
Benvolio Tut, man, one re burns out anothers burning,
One pain is lessened by anothers
41
anguish.
:c+ + scrxr :
::

+ come GO with ME (the rst two feet of an iambic pentameter line)

: (used for low-ranking men and boys instead of sir,indicating authority or
rebuke)*
(undignied word for walking)
go SIRrah TRUDGE aBOUT (the last three feet of the same iambic
pentameter line: a spatial break is not necessarily a metrical break)
tarry, await*
o be concerned, busy himself with
; yardstick (measuring rod which a shoemaker of course does not use: the
servants confusionseems deliberate, intended by him to emphasize the
foolishness of sending an illiterate on such an errand)
: wooden model of the foot
, discover, learn
o must to must go to
+ another pains
Turn giddy,
42
and be holp
43
by backward turning.
44
One desperate
45
grief cures with anothers languish.
46
Take thou some new infection to thy eye,
47
And the rank
48
poison of the old will die.
Romeo Your
49
plantain
50
leaf is excellent for that.
Benvolio For what, I pray thee?
Romeo For your broken
51
shin.
Benvolio Why, Romeo, art thou mad?
Romeo Not mad, but bound
52
more than a madman is,
Shut up in prison, kept without my food,
Whipped and tormented and (seeing Servant) God den,
53
good fellow.
54
Servant God gi go den. I pray,
55
sir, can you read?
Romeo Ay, mine own fortune
56
in my misery.
:c+ + scrxr :
:
o

: (+) light-headed, frivolous, (:) whirling in circles

helped
backward turning facing the opposite way
dangerous, reckless, virtually hopeless*
o sickness, decline, wasting away, suering
; (In Rime Sparse, .+o;, foundation and source of Renaissance European
love theory, Petrarch wrote of the pathway from eyes to heart,along which
the instantly irresistible force of love travels. One look and the lover has
fallen; one mutual look, and love sweeps both lovers away.)
: strong, violent, excessive
, therather than modern your(see Romeos next speech for yet another
such usage)
o a low-growing herbal plant with broad, at leaves, rather than the tropical
tree with banana-like fruit
+ torn, bruised, wounded
: fastened down, tied up
God den good evening (God give you good even)*
(customary form of address, in speaking to someone of humble station, a
commonperson)
ask earnestly and politely
o future
Servant Perhaps you have learned it without book.
57
But I pray,
can you read anything you see?
Romeo Ay, if I know the letters and the language.
Servant Ye say honestly.
58
Rest you merry!
59
Romeo Stay, fellow; I can read.
nr rr:is +nr ir++rr
Signior Martino and his wife and daughters;
County Anselmo and his beauteous sisters;
The lady widow of Vitruvio;
Signior Placentio and his lovely nieces;
Mercutio and his brother Valentine;
Mine uncle Capulet, his wife and daughters;
My fair niece Rosaline, and Livia;
Signior Valentio and his cousin Tybalt;
Lucio and the lively Helena.
civrs i:ck +nr r:rrr
A fair
60
assembly.Whither should they come?
Servant Up.
Romeo Whither?
Servant To supper, to our house.
Romeo Whose house?
Servant My masters.
Romeo Indeed I should have asked you that before.
Servant Now Ill tell you without asking. My master is the great
:c+ + scrxr :
:
oo
o
;o
;
:o
; without book by heart
: decently, worthily, without falseness
, rest you merry may you be merry/happy
oo ne, elegant
rich Capulet and if you be not of the house of Montagues,
I pray come and crush
61
a cup of wine. Rest you merry.
rxi+
Benvolio At this same ancient
62
feast of Capulets
Sups the fair Rosaline whom thou so lovst,
With all the admired beauties of Verona.
Go thither, and with unattainted
63
eye
Compare her face with some that I shall show,
And I will make thee think thy swan a crow.
Romeo When the devout religion of mine eye
64
Maintains such falsehood, then
65
turn tears to res,
And these
66
who, often drowned,
67
could never die,
68
Transparent
69
heretics, be
70
burnt for liars.
One fairer than my love? The all-seeing sun
Neer
71
saw her match since rst the world begun.
Benvolio Tut! You saw her fair, none else being by,
Herself poised with herself in either eye.
72
But in that
73
crystal scales
74
let there be weighed
:c+ + scrxr :
:
:
,o
,
o+ drink
o: (oldin the sense of traditional)
o unspotted, free from blemish, clear
o (see act +, scene :, note ;)
o then let
oo those
o; in tears
o: (+) die (literally), (:) experience sexual orgasm
o, obvious
;o let them be
;+ never*
;: herself poised with herself in either eye Rosaline measured/balanced
against herself in each of your two eyes
; those
; crystal scales Romeos eyes
Your ladys love
75
against some other maid
That I will show you shining at this feast,
And she
76
shall scant show
77
well that now seems best.
Romeo Ill go along,
78
no such sight to be shown,
But to rejoice in splendor of my own.
79
rxrux+
:c+ + scrxr :
:o
+oo
; your ladys love your love of this lady
;o the one (literally, the one she)
;; scant show hardly/barely seem/appear
;: go along accompany you
;, splendor of my own my own lady loves splendor
s cr xr
Capulets house
rx+rr L:i. C:ruir+ :xi Nursr
Lady Capulet Nurse, wheres my daughter? Call her forth
1
to
me.
Nurse Now, by my maidenhead at twelve year old,
2
I bade
3
her come.What, lamb! what, ladybird!
4
God forbid.Wheres this girl? What,
5
Juliet!
rx+rr Juiir+
Juliet How now?
6
Who calls?
Nurse Your mother.
Juliet Madam,
Im here.
What is your will?
Lady Capulet This is the matter
7
Nurse, give leave
8
awhile,
We must talk in secret. (Nurse starts to leave) Nurse, come back
again.
I have remembered me, thous
9
hear our counsel.
10
Thou knowest my daughters of a pretty
11
age.
:c+ + scrxr
:;

+o
+ (+) out, (:) at once
: (she can swear by it at twelve but not thereafter)
urged, begged
sweetheart
well!/now!/hey!
o how now why
; subject, theme, substance*
: give leave please leave
, thous you are supposed to/must (thou shalt)
+o consultation, exchange of opinions, conversation
++ ne, proper, pleasing
Nurse Faith, I can tell her age unto an hour.
Lady Capulet Shes not fourteen.
Nurse Ill lay
12
fourteen of my teeth
And yet, to my teen
13
be it spoken, I have but four
She is not fourteen. How long is it now
To Lammastide?
14
Lady Capulet A fortnight
15
and odd
16
days.
Nurse Even or odd,
17
of all days in the year,
Come Lammas Eve at night shall she be fourteen.
Susan
18
and she (God rest all Christian souls)
Were of an age.Well, Susan is with God,
She was too good for me. But as I said,
On Lammas Eve at night shall she be fourteen.
19
That shall she. Marry, I remember it well.
Tis since the earthquake now eleven years,
And she was weaned (I never shall forget it),
Of all the days of the year, upon that day,
For I had then laid wormwood to my dug,
20
Sitting in the sun under the dovehouse
21
wall.
My lord and you were then at Mantua.
:c+ + scrxr
::
+
:o
:
+: bet
+ sorrow, aiction
+ August + (harvest festival for early wheat crop:Lammas wheatwinter
wheat))
+ two weeks (fourteennights)
+o and odd plus a few days over fourteen
+; (a pun on oddas just dened and oddas opposed to even?)
+: (the Nurses dead daughter)
+, on LAMmas EVE at NIGHT shall SHE be fourTEEN (iambic pentameter
is neither mechanical nor rigid)
:o laid wormwood to my dug placed bitter herb on my nipple
:+ pigeon house
Nay, I do bear
22
a brain. But as I said,
When it
23
did taste the wormwood on the nipple
Of my dug and felt it bitter,
24
pretty fool,
25
To see it tetchy
26
and fall out
27
with the dug!
Shake,
28
quoth
29
the dovehouse!
30
Twas no need, I trow,
31
To bid me trudge.
32
And since that time it is eleven years,
For then she could stand high lone.
33
Nay, by th rood,
34
She could have run and waddled
35
all about,
For even the day before she broke
36
her brow,
37
And then my husband God be with his soul,
A
38
was a merry man took up
39
the child.
Yea,quoth he,dost thou fall upon thy face?
Thou wilt fall backward
40
when thou hast more wit,
Wilt thou not, Jule?and, by my holidam,
41
:c+ + scrxr
:,
o

o
:: (+) have, (:) still have (though old)
: the baby
: of my DUG and FELT it BITter
: (term of endearment/pity, especially in speaking to/of children)
:o quickly irritable/annoyed
:; fall out quarrel, disagree (verb)
:: get moving!
:, said
o (the wall thereof shook, when the child started)
+ believe, expect, hope (I can tell you)
: go away, be o
high lone alone, by herself
the cross on which Christ was crucied
swaying from one leg to the other, like a duck
o cut
; forehead
: he*
, took up caught/lifted up
o fall backward have sexual intercourse
+ holy relic/place (variant spelling of halidom,from Old English
The pretty wretch
42
left
43
crying, and said Ay.
To see now how a jest shall come about.
44
I warrant,
45
an I should live a thousand years,
I never should forget it.Wilt thou not, Jule?quoth he,
And, pretty fool,
46
it stinted
47
and said Ay.
Lady Capulet Enough of this. I pray thee hold thy peace.
Nurse Yes, madam.Yet I cannot choose but laugh
To think it should leave crying and say Ay.
And yet, I warrant, it had upon its brow
A bump as big as a young cockrels stone,
48
A perilous knock,
49
and it cried bitterly.
Yea,quoth my husband,fallst upon thy face?
Thou wilt fall backward when thou comest to age.
50
Wilt thou not, Jule?It stinted, and said Ay.
Juliet And stint thou too, I pray thee, Nurse, say I.
Nurse Peace, I have done. God mark
51
thee to his grace,
Thou wast the prettiest babe that eer I nursed.
An I might live to see thee married once,
52
I have my wish.
:c+ + scrxr
o

oo
haligdom,meaning sanctity/sanctuary: halig holy, dom custom,
power, glory)
: pretty wretch ne little person/creature
stopped
come about come true
promise, pledge*
o pretty fool nice little innocent
; stopped
: young cockrels stone (+) young cocks testicle, (:) young mans testicle
, perilous knock serious blow/thump
o to age old enough
+ God mark may God set/make/identify
: at some/any time
Lady Capulet Marry, that marryis the very
53
theme
I came to talk of. Tell me, daughter Juliet,
How stands your disposition
54
to be married?
Juliet It is an honor that I dream not of.
Nurse An honor? Were not I thine only nurse,
I would say thou hadst sucked wisdom from thy teat.
Lady Capulet Well, think of marriage now.
55
Younger than you,
Here in Verona, ladies of esteem,
56
Are made already mothers. By my count,
I was your mother much upon
57
these years
That you are now a maid.
58
Thus then in brief:
59
The valiant
60
Paris seeks you for his love.
Nurse A man, young lady! Lady, such a man
As all the world why hes a man of wax.
61
Lady Capulet Veronas summer hath not such a ower.
Nurse Nay, hes a ower, in faith a very
62
ower.
Lady Capulet What say you? Can you love the gentleman?
This night you shall behold him at our feast.
Read oer the volume
63
of young Paris face
And nd delight writ there with beautys pen.
:c+ + scrxr
+
o
;o
;
:o
same, exact
bent of mind
think of marriage now now think about marriage
o ladies of esteem reputable/well-respected ladies
; much upon approximately at
: unmarried woman, virgin*
, in brief briey, shortly, in a few words
oo (+) brave, courageous, (:) rich
o+ man of wax man of perfect gure/stature (a model)
o: true, real*
o book
Examine every married lineament
64
And see how one another lends content
65

And what obscured

66
in this fair volume lies
Find written in the margent
67
of his eyes.
This precious book of love, this unbound
68
lover,
To beautify him only lacks a cover.
69
The sh lives in the sea, and tis much pride
For fair without
70
the fair within to hide.
71
That book
72
in manys eyes doth share the glory
73
That in gold clasps
74
locks in the golden story.
75
So shall you share all that he doth possess
By having him,
76
making yourself no less.
77
Nurse No less? Nay, bigger.Women grow by men.
78
:c+ + scrxr
:
:
,o
,
o married lineament joined/harmonious feature
o one another lends content one lends substance to another
oo hidden
o; comment written/printed in the margins
o: not tied up, (the pages) unrestrained/not secured
o, that which encloses (a books cover), which shelters (body cover armor,
clothing), which supports (a wife!)
;o outside
;+ the sh lives . . . to hide just as the sh by its very nature lives in the sea,
and shields/protects the sh that swim in it, so too it is a source of honest
pride for one who is fair on the outside (a woman) to shield/protect one
who is fair inside (a man)
;: the man
; admiration, praise
; gold clasps (noun) gold fastenings (as costly books were then often so
bound)
; locks in the golden story encloses/secures/connes the golden life
(story/history)
;o having him (+) possessing him, (:) accepting him/his proposal of
marriage (will you have me?spoken by a man to a woman, meant will
you marry me?)
;; no less no less esteemed/worthy
;: (by being made pregnant)
Lady Capulet Speak briey, can you like of
79
Paris love?
Juliet Ill look to like,
80
if looking liking move,
81
But no more deep will I endart
82
mine eye
Than your consent gives strength
83
to make it
84
y.
rx+rr Srrvixcx:x
Servingman Madam, the guests are come, supper served up,
you called, my young lady asked for, the Nurse cursed in the
pantry,
85
and everything in extremity. I must hence to wait.
I beseech you follow straight.
86
Lady Capulet We follow thee.
rxi+ Srrvixcx:x
Juliet, the County
87
stays.
88
Nurse Go, girl, seek happy nights to
89
happy days.
rxrux+
:c+ + scrxr

+oo
+o
;, like of approve, be pleased by
:o look to like take care/be sure to consider/nd out if I like (him/his
proposal)
:+ if looking liking move if looking makes me want to like
:: pierce with my eye (the eect of which is discussed in act +, scene :, note ;:
the usual meaning of dartis arrow,which is Cupids weapon)
: power, force
: (the antecedent of itis mine eye,though the modern sense of mine
eyeis my eyes)
: storeroom for food and often for table linen and dishes (in the rst line of act
, scene , the Nurse is given keys to the pantry; her absence therefrom is
probably why she is being cursed)
:o directly, at once* (though always printed as prose, this speech constitutes four
iambic pentameter lines and contains two vivid internal rhymes,nurse
cursedand wait . . . straight.)
:; Count (equivalent of Earl)
:: waits
:, leading to? in addition to? accompanying, in accord with? connected to?
s cr xr
A street
rx+rr Romeo, Mrrcu+io, Brxvoiio, vi+n rivr or six
o+nrr M:skrrs, :xi Torcnir:rrrs
Romeo What, shall this speech be spoke
1
for our excuse?
Or shall we on
2
without apology?
Benvolio The date is out of such prolixity.
3
Well have no Cupid hoodwinked
4
with a scarf,
5
Bearing a Tartars
6
painted bow
7
of lath,
8
Scaring the ladies like a crowkeeper,
9
Nor no without book
10
prologue, faintly
11
spoke
After the prompter,
12
for our entrance.
13
But let them measure
14
us by what they will,
Well measure
15
them a measure,
16
and be gone.
:c+ + scrxr

+o
+ speech . . . spoke (convention called for maskers, who were usually intruders,
not invited/expected, to deliver a speech, attering/propitiating the host
and the invited guests)
: proceed
the date is out of such prolixity the custom of delivering a prolix speech is
now out of date
blindfolded, and thus in eect blinded (as Cupid was often thought to be)
band, usually of silk
o Central Asian
; painted bow something not a bow but painted to look like one
: of lath made of thin, narrow strips of wood
, (+) scarecrow carrying a bow, (:) a eld hand/boy hired to frighten crows
+o without book (adjectival) memorized (as opposed to extemporaneous)
++ softly, hesitantly, uncertainly
+: after the prompter following a prompters reminders
+ for our entrance as/in place of our invitations/right to enter
(ENterANCE)
+ (+) look us up and down, (:) evaluate, appraise
+ give
+o dance*
Romeo Give me a torch. I am not for this ambling.
17
Being but heavy,
18
I will bear
19
the light.
Mercutio Nay, gentle Romeo, we must have you dance.
Romeo Not I, believe me.You have dancing shoes
With nimble
20
soles, I have a soul of lead
So stakes
21
me to the ground I cannot move.
Mercutio You are a lover. Borrow Cupids wings
And soar with them above a common bound.
22
Romeo I am too sore enpiercd
23
with his shaft
24
To soar with his light feathers,
25
and so bound
26
I cannot bound a pitch above
27
dull
28
woe.
Under loves heavy burden do I sink.
Mercutio And, to sink in it, should you burden
29
love?
Too great oppression for a tender thing.
30
Romeo Is love a tender thing? It is too rough,
Too rude,
31
too boistrous,
32
and it pricks like thorn.
Mercutio If love be rough with you, be rough with love.
:c+ + scrxr

+
:o
:
+; easy-paced, sometimes articial walking/dancing
+: oppressed, sorrowful
+, carry
:o quick, swift, agile, light
:+ so stakes which so fastens
:: (+) limit, (:) leap
: sore enpiercd painfully/severely penetrated/run through
: rod forming the body of an arrow
: with his light feathers as he does with the light feathers of his wings
:o fastened, tied down (adjective)
:; bound (verb) a pitch above leap higher than
:: slow, stupid, sluggish, drowsy
:, (+) load, oppress, (:) criticize
o a tender thing (+) love, (:) a woman, bearing his weight in sexual
intercourse (as he sinks into her), () a womans genitals
+ uncultivated, barbarous, harsh, violent*
: (+) sti, coarse, unyielding, (:) truculent, erce, violent
Prick love for pricking,
33
and you beat love down.
34
Give me a case
35
to put my visage
36
in.
A visor for a visor!
37
What care I
What curious
38
eye doth quote
39
deformities?
Here
40
are the beetle brows
41
shall blush for me.
Benvolio Come, knock and enter, and no sooner in
But every man betake him
42
to his legs.
43
Romeo A torch for me. Let wantons
44
light of heart
Tickle
45
the senseless
46
rushes
47
with their heels,
For I am proverbed
48
with a grandsire phrase:
49
Ill be a candle holder
50
and look on.
The game
51
was neer so fair,
52
and I am done.
53
:c+ + scrxr
o
o

(+) painfully sticking, (:) sexual intercourse (then as now the noun prick
vulgar term for penis)
beat love down overthrow/force down love
holder, sheath
o my visage my assumed/pretend face/appearance (his mask)
; a visor for a visor a mask (disguise) for a mask (his face)
: careful, attentive, fussy
, mark, observe, scrutinize
o in this mask
+ beetle brows black, jutting eyebrows
: commit himself, resort
to his legs dance
those free of care/given to unrestrained merriment, frisky
poke, touch, stir up
o incapable of feeling
; dry reeds spread on oors
: furnished with a proverb
, grandsire phrase proverb as old as a grandfather
o If a man does not know how to play at cards, it is kind of him to hold the
candle
+ (+) amusement, fun, (:) amorous play/sport
: neer so fair never so fair as it is now (and that being so, it is time to give it
up)
nished, used up
Mercutio Tut! Duns the mouse, the constables own word.
54
If thou art Dun,
55
well draw thee from the mire
56
Of save your reverence
57
love, wherein thou stickst
58
Up to the ears. Come, we burn daylight,
59
ho!
Romeo Nay, thats not so.
Mercutio I mean, sir, in delay
We waste our lights
60
in vain, like lamps by
61
day.
Take our good meaning,
62
for our judgment sits
63
Five times in that
64
ere
65
once in our ve wits.
66
Romeo And we mean
67
well, in going to this masque.
But tis no wit
68
to go.
:c+ + scrxr
;
o

Duns the mouse, the constables own word a mouse is brown, and
proverbially quiet, like an ocer of the peace (Romeo has just said he is
done)
(Mercutio swiftly changes directions, referring now to Dun the horse in an
old Christmas game: those playing the game try to pull a large, heavy log,
supposed to be Dun the horse, out of an imaginary mire)
o (+) boggy/swampy ground, (:) dirt, lth, dung
; save your reverence excuse me (Mercutio apologizes or pretends to
for using so obscene and dirty a word as mireto describe love: some texts
have sirreverence,with the same meaning, but sirreverencecan also
mean human excrement/dung)
: are stuck
, burn daylight delay, waste time
oo (+) torches, (:) feelings, () capacities (lightsalso the lungs: waste our
lights waste our breath, jabbering like this)
o+ lit/burning in daylight
o: take our good meaning choose/understand our/my correct meaning
(instead of pretending, as Romeo clearly does, that he does not understand)
o judgment sits deliberate opinion/good sense is located/can be found
o ve times in that ve times as much in that good meaning
o in preference to, rather than in
oo once in our ve wits one time in what we learn via our ve senses
(wits)
o; intend (Romeo changes verbal direction every bit as swiftly, and lightly, as
does Mercutio)
o: not sensible/wise/clever
Mercutio Why, may one ask?
Romeo I dreamt a dream tonight.
69
Mercutio And so did I.
Romeo Well, what was yours?
Mercutio That dreamers often lie.
Romeo In bed asleep, while they do dream things true.
Mercutio O, then I see Queen Mab
70
hath been with you.
She is the fairies midwife,
71
and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate stone
On the forenger of an alderman,
72
Drawn
73
with a team of little atomies
Athwart
74
mens noses as they lie asleep
75
Her wagon spokes made of long spinners
76
legs,
The cover,
77
of the wings of grasshoppers;
Her traces,
78
of the smallest spiders web;
Her collars,
79
of the moonshines watry
80
beams;
Her whip, of crickets bone; the lash,
81
of lm;
82
:c+ + scrxr
:
o

oo
o, last night
;o (an invented personage, probably meant to be mythological/fairy; but mab
slut, whore)
;+ (it is she, among the fairies, who deliverstheir dreams to humans)
;: (the gures of diminutive persons were cut into agate stones, mounted on
rings used for axing seals on letters and other documents; aldermen were
headmen/governors of trade organizations and municipal districts)
; (Mab is drawn by a team of tiny creatures the size of atoms)
; across
; (the next eleven lines are dierently ordered in some texts)
;o spiders
;; outer covering of the wheels
;: straps/ropes connecting the collar of the drawing/pulling animal to the
whietree/crossbar of the vehicle
;, her horses/draft animals collars
:o (+) moist, (:) thin, () pale
:+ exible tip of a whip
:: membrane, lament, gossamer (spider webs?)
Her wagoner, a small gray-coated
83
gnat,
Not half so big as a round little worm
Pricked from the lazy nger of a maid;
84
Her chariot is an empty hazelnut,
Made by the joiner
85
squirrel or old grub,
86
Time out o mind the fairies coachmakers.
And in this state
87
she gallops night by night
Through lovers brains, and then they dream of love;
Oer courtiers
88
knees, that dream on curtsies
89
straight;
90
Oer lawyers ngers, who straight dream on fees;
Oer ladies lips, who straight on kisses dream,
Which
91
oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues,
92
Because their breaths with sweetmeats
93
tainted
94
are.
Sometime she gallops oer a courtiers nose,
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit;
95
And sometime comes she with a tithe pigs
96
tail
Tickling a parsons nose as a lies asleep,
Then dreams he of another benece.
97
:c+ + scrxr
,
o
;o
;
:o
: gray-coated a uniform? a reference to traditional homespun cloth?
: serving maid (lazy serving maids were said to breed tiny worms in their
ngers)
: cabinetmaker
:o (squirrels gnaw; worm grubs bore)
:; pomp, splendor, exalted position/rank, greatness
:: those who congregate at a sovereigns court
:, gestures of respect, made by bending ones knees
,o without delay, immediately
,+ who
,: (verb)
, candies, cakes, etc.
, contaminated, corrupted, stained
, smelling out a suit discovering some cause for a lawsuit? or a patron who
will pay for his inuence at court?
,o tithe pig animal given as/in lieu of tithe money
,; salaried church post
Sometimes she driveth oer a soldiers neck,
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches,
98
ambuscadoes,
99
Spanish blades,
100
Of healths
101
ve fathom deep; and then anon
102
Drums
103
in his ear, at which he starts
104
and wakes,
And being thus frighted swears a prayer or two
And sleeps again. This is that very Mab
That plats
105
the manes of horses in the night
And bakes
106
the elocks
107
in foul sluttish
108
hair,
Which once untangled much misfortune bodes.
109
This is the hag,
110
when maids lie on their backs,
That presses them and learns
111
them rst to bear,
112
Making them women of good carriage.
113
This is she
Romeo Peace,
114
peace, Mercutio, peace!
Thou talkst of nothing.
Mercutio True, I talk of dreams,
:c+ + scrxr
o
:
,o
,
,: breaks in fortied walls
,, ambushes
+oo swords (made of superior steel)
+o+ alcoholic toasts/pledges
+o: at once*
+o she drums (verb)
+o is startled
+o plaits, intertwines
+oo hardens, cakes
+o; mass of tangled hair, caused in ones sleep by malicious elves
+o: dirty, untidy
+o, forebodes, promises (because it will anger the elves?)
++o female evil spirit/demon
+++ instructs, teaches
++: (+) bear a lovers weight, (:) behave, walk, () bear children
++ of good carriage of good bearing/capacity to carry
++ enough! quiet!
Which are the children of an idle
115
brain,
Begot
116
of nothing but vain
117
fantasy,
118
Which is as thin of substance
119
as the air,
And more inconstant than the wind, who woos
Even now the frozen bosom
120
of the North
And, being angered,
121
pus
122
away from thence,
Turning his face
123
to the dew-dropping South.
Benvolio This wind you talk of blows us from ourselves.
124
Supper is done, and we shall come too late.
Romeo I fear too early; for my mind misgives
125
Some consequence,
126
yet hanging
127
in the stars,
128
Shall bitterly begin his
129
fearful
130
date
With this nights revels and expire
131
the term
Of a despisd life, closed
132
in my breast,
By some vile forfeit
133
of untimely
134
death.
:c+ + scrxr
+
+oo
+o
++o
++ empty, vacant*
++o generated, created
++; empty, vacant, worthless
++: illusory/imaginary appearance
++, solid/real matter*
+:o seat of emotions/desires, heart
+:+ (because it is frozen/cold)
+:: blows abruptly/quickly/hard
+: (some texts have side)
+: from ourselves away from our purpose/direction
+: suggests, fears
+:o future result/event
+:; yet hanging even now pending
+:: astrologically/fatefully determined
+:, its
+o dreadful, terrible, awful
++ nish, end, conclude
+: shut, contained
+ vile forfeit (+)base/low/horrid/despicable penalty, (:)contractually
agreed-upon large additional penalty (for nonpayment)
+ premature*
But he that hath the steerage
135
of my course
136
Direct my sail! On, lusty gentlemen!
Benvolio Strike, drum.
137
+nr. x:rcn +o oxr siir or +nr s+:cr, :xi s+:xi +nrrr
:c+ + scrxr
:
+ steering, guidance
+o path, direction of onward movement*
+; drummer (a man leading the celebrants)
s cr xr
Capulets house
Srrvixcxrx coxr ror+n vi+n x:rkixs
1
First Servingman Wheres Potpan, that he helps not to take
away? He shift
2
a trencher!
3
He scrape
4
a trencher!
Second Servingman When good manners shall lie all in one or
two mens hands, and they unwashed too, tis a foul thing.
First Servingman Away with the joint stools,
5
remove the
court cupboard,
6
look to
7
the plate.
8
Good
9
thou, save me a
piece of marchpane
10
and, as thou loves me, let
11
the porter
let in Susan Grindstone and Nell. (calling) Anthony and
Potpan!
12
Second Servingman Ay, boy, ready.
First Servingman You are looked for and called for, asked for
and sought for, in the great chamber.
13
Third Servingman We cannot be here and there too.
:c+ + scrxr

+o
+ It is equally impolite to lick greasy ngers or to wipe them on ones tunic,
wrote Erasmus in +o.You should wipe them with the napkin or on the
tablecloth. Visser, The Rituals of Dinner, +o
: arrange, distribute
at wooden platters, in the next century replaced by plates
scrape o, clean
joint stools stools professionally made by a joiner/cabinetmaker
o court cupboard sideboard
; look to (+) attend to, take care of, (:) be careful of *
: silver or gold utensils
, (friendly/familiar)
+o marzipan
++ cause
+: (this and the next two speeches are attributed dierently in some texts)
+ great chamber main hall?
Cheerly,
14
boys! Be brisk
15
awhile,
16
and the longer liver take
all.
17
rx+rr C:ruir+, L:i. C:ruir+, Juiir+, T.i:i+,
Nursr, Gurs+s, :xi Grx+irvoxrx
Capulet (to Maskers) Welcome, gentlemen. Ladies that have
their toes
Unplagued
18
with corns will walk a bout
19
with you.
Ah, my mistresses,
20
which of you all
Will now deny to
21
dance? She that makes dainty,
22
She Ill swear hath corns.
23
Am I come near
24
ye now?
(to Maskers) Welcome, gentlemen. I have seen the day
That I have worn a visor
25
and could tell
A whispering tale in a fair ladys ear,
Such as would please. Tis gone, tis gone, tis gone.
You are welcome, gentlemen. Come, musicians, play.
xusic. +nr. i:xcr
A hall, a hall!
26
Give room! And foot it,
27
girls.
:c+ + scrxr

+
:o
:
+ (+) lively, (:) cheerily
+ quick, active
+o for a short time
+; the longer liver take all enjoy yourselves, make the most of the present
(proverbial)
+: not cursed/aicted
+, walk a bout move/make a turn/circuit
:o my mistresses my ladies (mistress: polite form of address)
:+ deny to refuse to
:: reluctant, disinclined
: bunions
: am I come near have I come close to/ reached/ touched
: mask
:o a hall! make room, clear the oor
:; foot it on with the dancing
More light, you knaves,
28
and turn the tables up,
29
And quench the re, the room is grown too hot.
(to Capulet Old Man) Ah, sirrah, this unlooked-for sport
30
comes
31
well.
Nay, sit, nay sit, good cousin Capulet,
For you and I are past our dancing days.
How long ist now since last yourself and I
Were in a mask?
32
Second Capulet Byr Lady, thirty years.
Capulet What, man? Tis not so much, tis not so much.
Tis since the nuptial
33
of Lucentio,
Come Pentecost
34
as quickly as it will,
35
Some ve-and-twenty years, and then we masked.
Second Capulet Tis more, tis more. His
36
son is older, sir,
His son is thirty.
Capulet Will you tell me that?
His son was but a ward
37
two years ago.
Romeo (to Servingman) What ladys that, which doth
enrich
38
the hand
39
Of yonder knight?
:c+ + scrxr

o
:: male servants
:, turn the tables up lift the at tops o their supporting trestles/sawhorses,
and stack them against the wall
o entertainment, amusement, recreation
+ presents itself, arrives, happens, turns out
: were in a mask (+) wore a mask, (:) were at a masquerade dance
wedding
seventh Sunday after Easter (Whitsuntide)
wants to
o Lucentios son
; under age twenty-one, a minor
: decorate, adorn
, (the mans hand holding hers, presumably, in the course of dancing)
Servingman I know not, sir.
Romeo O she doth teach the torches to burn
40
bright.
It seems she hangs upon
41
the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiops ear
42

Beauty too rich

43
for use,
44
for earth too dear.
45
So shows
46
a snowy dove trooping
47
with crows
As yonder lady oer
48
her fellows shows.
The measure done, Ill watch her place of stand
49
And, touching hers,
50
make blessd my rude hand.
Did my heart love till now? Forswear
51
it, sight.
For I neer saw true beauty till this night.
52
Tybalt This, by his voice, should be a Montague.
(to Servant) Fetch me my rapier,
53
boy.What, dares the slave
Come hither, covered with an antic
54
face,
To eer
55
and scorn
56
at our solemnity?
57
Now by the stock
58
and honor of my kin,
:c+ + scrxr
o

o to burn how properly to burn

+ hangs upon is suspended on, decorates
: (bright/glittering objects are seen more vividly against a dark background)
great, exalted, noble, splendid, ne, luxurious
for use to be used/usefully employed
(+) precious, valuable, costly, (:) scarce, unusual
o appears/is displayed/seen/exhibited
; that ocks/gathers/associates with
: higher than, beyond, in preference/comparison to
, her place of stand where she stands
o her hand
+ renounce, repudiate
: (for I neer SAW true BEAUty TILL this NIGHT)
light, sharp-pointed sword
grinning, fantastic (Romeos mask)
jeer, gibe, laugh contemptuously
o treat with ridicule, mock
; ceremony, special formality, festival
: line of descent, pedigree, genealogy
To strike him dead I hold
59
it not a sin.
Capulet Why, how now, kinsman? Wherefore storm
60
you so?
Tybalt Uncle, this is a Montague, our foe,
A villain that is hither come in spite
61
To scorn at our solemnity this night.
Capulet Young Romeo is it?
Tybalt Tis he, that villain Romeo.
Capulet Content thee,
62
gentle coz, let him alone.
A bears him like a portly
63
gentleman,
And, to say truth,Verona brags of him
To be a virtuous and well-governed
64
youth.
I would not for the wealth of all this town
Here in my house do him disparagement.
65
Therefore be patient, take no note of him.
It is my will, the which if thou respect,
Show a fair presence
66
and put o these frowns,
An ill-beseeming semblance
67
for a feast.
Tybalt It ts when such a villain is a guest.
Ill not endure him.
Capulet He shall be endured.
What, goodman boy!
68
I say he shall. Go to!
69
:c+ + scrxr
;
oo
o
;o
;
, think, consider, believe*
oo wherefore storm why* rage
o+ envious malice/hatred, contemptuously
o: content thee be satised
o dignied
o well-governed reasonable
o dishonor, indignity
oo appearance, bearing, demeanor
o; appearance
o: (used for people of rank lower than gentleman; boyalso is deliberately
insulting)
o, come on! (exclamation of incredulity and disapproval)
Am I the master here, or you? Go to!
Youll not endure him? God shall mend my soul!
70
Youll make a mutiny
71
among my guests,
You will set cock-a-hoop,
72
youll be the man!
73
Tybalt Why, uncle, tis a shame.
74
Capulet Go to, go to!
You are a saucy
75
boy. Ist so,
76
indeed?
This trick
77
may chance to scathe
78
you. I know what.
79
You must contrary
80
me! Marry, tis time
(to Dancers) Well said, my hearts!
81
(to Tybalt) You are a
princox,
82
go
Be quiet, or (to Servingmen) More light, more light! (to
Tybalt) For shame!
Ill make you quiet.What! (to Dancers) Cheerly, my hearts!
Tybalt Patience perforce
83
with wilful choler
84
meeting
Makes my esh tremble in their dierent greeting.
85
:c+ + scrxr
:
:o
:
,o
;o God shall mend my soul! May God purify my soul! (emphatic
exclamation)
;+ quarrel, disturbance
;: set cock-a-hoop cast o all restraint, set everything by the ears
; be the man! be in charge, give the orders
; disgrace, dishonor
; insolent, presumptuous*
;o ist so? is that the way it is?
;; prank, mischief, frolic
;: hurt, injure, damage
;, I know what I understand what Im doing, Im not a fool/incompetent (I
know WHAT) (and you dont!)
:o oppose, strive against (conTRAry)
:+ (term of endearment)
:: conceited young man
: (+) forcibly, (:) of necessity, under compulsion*
: wilful choler obstinately self-willed/irrational/perverse temper/anger
: in their dierent greeting because of the totally unlike and clashing
natures of patience and choler
I will withdraw. But this intrusion
86
shall,
Now seeming sweet, convert to
87
bittrest gall.
88
rxi+
Romeo If I profane
89
with my unworthiest hand
This holy shrine,
90
the gentle sin is this:
My lips, two blushing
91
pilgrims,
92
ready stand
To smooth that
93
rough touch with a tender
94
kiss.
Juliet Good pilgrim, you do wrong
95
your hand too much,
Which
96
mannerly devotion
97
shows in this,
For saints
98
have hands that pilgrims hands do touch,
And palm to palm is holy palmers
99
kiss.
Romeo Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?
Juliet Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.
Romeo O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do.
They pray: grant thou,
100
lest faith turn to despair.
Juliet Saints do not move,
101
though grant for prayers
:c+ + scrxr
,
,
+oo
+o
:o (Romeos uninvited presence)
:; convert to turn into
:: (+) rancor, (:) poison, venom
:, desecrate, pollute, treat irreverently
,o (her hand which, as he had earlier said he would, he is now holding)
,+ (+) reddish in color, (:) modest
,: (like religious pilgrims, he has sought out a sacred place)
, (his own)
, soft, gentle
, (verb)
,o and that
,; mannerly devotion decent/ moral/ modest and devout reverence/
impulse/observance/prayer
,: (+) holy persons, (:) those who are among the chosen, () statues of saints
,, pilgrims
+oo grant thou that prayer (that I may kiss your lips)
+o+ (+) commence, start, (:) speak, () become agitated, disturbed, () move (if
saintsmeans a statue)
sake.
102
Romeo Then move not while my prayers eect
103
I take.
Thus from my lips, by thine my sin is purged.
104
(kisses her)
Juliet Then
105
have my lips the sin that they have took.
Romeo Sin from my lips? O trespass
106
sweetly urged!
107
Give me my sin again. (kisses her)
Juliet You kiss by th book.
108
Nurse Madam, your mother craves
109
a word with you.
Romeo What
110
is her mother?
Nurse Marry, bachelor,
111
Her mother is the lady of the house,
And a good lady, and a wise and virtuous.
I nursed her daughter that you talked withal.
112
I tell you, he that can lay hold of her
Shall have the chinks.
113
Romeo Is she a Capulet?
O dear account.
114
My life is my foes debt.
115
:c+ + scrxr
o
++o
++
+o: though grant for prayers sake though they may, in response to a prayer,
grant what is requested
+o result
+o cleansed, puried, absolved
+o as a result, now
+oo sin, fault, wrong (noun)
+o; brought forward, presented, stated
+o: (+) book of manners, (:) book of sonnets (till the moment he kisses her,
their dialogue is a sonnet)
+o, (+) demands, claims by authority/right, (:) requests, () wants*
++o who
+++ young gentleman
++: with
++ money (that which chinks: coins there being no paper money)
++ dear account costly/dire/grievous reckoning
++ (she is his foe,but his life is owed to her)
Benvolio Away, be gone, the sport is at the best.
116
Romeo Ay, so I fear: the more is my unrest.
117
Capulet Nay, gentlemen, prepare not
118
to be gone.
We have a triing foolish
119
banquet
120
towards.
121
(they whisper in his ear) Is it een so? Why then, I thank you all,
I thank you, honest
122
gentlemen. Good night.
(to Servingmen) More torches here! (Maskers leave) Come on
then, lets to bed.
Ah, sirrah, by my fay,
123
it waxes
124
late.
Ill to my rest.
rxrux+ :ii iu+ Juiir+ :xi Nursr
Juliet Come hither, Nurse.What is yond gentleman?
125
Nurse The son and heir of old Tiberio.
Juliet Whats he that now is going out of door?
Nurse Marry, that, I think, be young Petruchio.
Juliet Whats he that follows there, that would not dance?
Nurse I know not.
Juliet Go ask his name. (to herself ) If he be marrid,
My grave is like
126
to be my wedding bed.
Nurse His name is Romeo, and a Montague,
:c+ + scrxr
+
+:o
+:
+o
+
++o see act +, scene , note :
++; turmoil
++: prepare not dont ready yourselves
++, triing foolish insignicant/petty/humble
+:o small repast/meal
+:+ on the way
+:: honorable*
+: faith (a common exclamation)
+: grows
+: yond gentleman that distant gentleman (over there)
+:o likely
The only son of your great enemy.
Juliet My only love, sprung from my only hate.
Too early seen unknown, and known too late.
Prodigious
127
birth of love it is to me
That I must love a loathd enemy.
Nurse Whats this? whats this?
Juliet A rhyme I learnt even now
Of one I danced withal.
: c:ii vi+nix: Juiir+
Nurse Anon, anon!
Come, lets away; the strangers all are gone.
rxrux+
:c+ + scrxr
:
+o
+:; (+) ominous, unnatural, monstrous, (:) astonishing, amazing
Act :

r roiocur

rx+rr Cnorus
Chorus Now old desire
1
doth in his
2
deathbed lie,
And young aection gapes
3
to be his
4
heir.
That fair
5
for which love groaned for and would die,
6
With tender Juliet matched
7
is now not fair.
Now Romeo is beloved, and loves again,
Alike
8
bewitchd by the charm of looks,
9
But to his foe
10
supposed
11
he must complain
12
+ old desire Romeos former love
: its
is eager
its
Rosaline
o would die (+) wished to die, (:) wished for sexual orgasm
; compared
: both Romeo and Juliet
, (once again, see act +, scene :, note ;)
+o (+) enemy, as a Capulet, (:) female belovd, in Renaissance love poetry
++ erroneously believed (referring to meaning +, in note+o, just above)
+: lament, moan, mourn (in a literary sense)
And she steal
13
loves sweet bait
14
from fearful hooks.
15
Being held
16
a foe, he may not have access
To breathe
17
such vows as lovers use to
18
swear,
And she as much in love, her means
19
much less
To meet her new belovd anywhere.
But passion lends them power, time means, to meet,
Tempering
20
extremities with extreme sweet.
rxi+
:c+ : rroiocur

+o
+ take secretly
+ allurement, temptation
+ fearful hooks dreadful/terrible snares, traps
+o believed to be
+; speak, passionately utter/whisper
+: use to customarily
+, resources, possibilities for action*
:o mingling, modifying
s cr xr +
A lane outside the wall of Capulets orchard
21
rx+rr Roxro
Romeo Can I go forward
22
when my heart is here?
Turn back, dull earth,
23
and nd thy center
24
out.
25
nr ciixis +nr v:ii :xi ir:rs iovx +nr o+nrr siir
rx+rr Brxvoiio :xi Mrrcu+io
Benvolio Romeo! My cousin Romeo! Romeo!
Mercutio Hes wise,
And, on my life, hath stoln
26
him home to bed.
Benvolio He ran this way, and leapt this orchard wall.
Call, good Mercutio.
Mercutio Nay, Ill conjure
27
too.
(loudly) Romeo! Humors! Madman! Passion! Lover!
Appear thou in the likeness of a sigh.
Speak but one rhyme, and I am satised.
Cry but Ay me!Pronounce but love and dove.
Speak to my gossip
28
Venus one fair word,
One nickname for her purblind
29
son and heir,
:c+ : scrxr +

+o
:+ garden
:: go forward move on
: earth Romeos body (humans having been created from earth/dust)
: she around whom his life revolves ( Juliet)
: nd . . . out search for
:o gone secretly
:; (+) invoke magically sacred names, (:) beseech
:: intimate/chatty friend
:, totally blind
Young Abraham
30
Cupid, he that shot so trim
31
When King Cophetua
32
loved the beggar maid.
( pause) He
33
heareth not, he stirreth not, he moveth not.
The ape is dead,
34
and I must conjure him.
(loudly) I conjure thee by Rosalines bright eyes,
By her high forehead and her scarlet lip,
By her ne foot, straight leg, and quivering thigh,
And the demesnes
35
that there adjacent
36
lie,
That in thy likeness thou appear to us!
Benvolio An if he hear thee, thou wilt anger him.
Mercutio This cannot anger him.Twould anger him
To raise a spirit
37
in his mistress circle
38
Of some strange nature, letting it there stand
39
Till she had laid it
40
and conjured it down.
41
That were some
42
spite. My invocation
Is fair and honest: in his mistress name,
:c+ : scrxr +
o
+
:o
:
o young Abraham young old
+ ne, beautifully
: (King Cophetua and the Beggar Maidold ballad in which a king,
hostile to love, is looking out the window at a beggar maid, when Cupid,
The blinded boy, that shoots so trim,hits the king with an arrow.
Cophetua falls in love and eventually marries the beggar girl. See Percy,
Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, +:+:,,.The kings name is pronounced
coFETya)
Romeo
ape is dead Romeo is playing dead, as performing apes were trained to do
regions (usually used for land, territories: diMEENZ)
o bordering, close by (meaning, here,genitalia)
; (+) supernatural being, demon (:) vital power, penis
: (+) magic cirle, used for conjuring, (:) genitalia
, be erect (bawdy)
o laid it (+) set it to rest (:) had sexual intercourse with it
+ (+) back to hell, (:) no longer erect (bawdy)
: considerable
I conjure only but to raise up him.
43
Benvolio Come, he hath hid himself among these trees
To be consorted
44
with the humorous
45
night.
Blind is his love and best bets
46
the dark.
Mercutio If love be blind, love cannot hit the mark.
Now will he sit under a medlar
47
tree
And wish his mistress were that kind of fruit
As maids call medlars when they laugh alone.
48
O Romeo, that she were, O that she were
An open arse,
49
thou
50
a poprin pear!
51
Romeo, good night. Ill to my truckle bed.
52
This eld bed is too cold for me to sleep.
Come, shall we go?
Benvolio Go then, for tis in vain
To seek him here that means not to be found.
rxrux+
:c+ : scrxr +
;
o

o
(bawdy)
united, in harmony
moody, capricious
o suited for
; a kind of apple, edible only when ripe enough to burst; thought to resemble
female genitalia
: (with no men present)
, (+) medlar fruit, (:) posterior, rump (arseBritish form of ass)
o and you were
+ a kind of pear, shaped like a penis
: truckle bed bed on castors/wheels
s cr xr :
Capulets orchard
rx+rr Roxro
Romeo He
1
jests at scars that
2
never felt a wound.
rx+rr Juiir+ :iovr, :+ : vixiov
(quietly) But soft.What light through yonder window breaks?
It is the East, and Juliet is the sun.
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief
That thou her maid art far more fair than she.
Be not her maid,
3
since she is envious.
Her vestal livery
4
is but sick
5
and green,
6
And none but fools
7
do wear it. Cast it o.
It is my lady!
8
O it is my love.
O that she knew she were.
9
She speaks,
10
yet she says nothing.What of that?
Her eye discourses:
11
I will answer it.
I am too bold. Tis not to me she speaks.
Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven,
:c+ : scrxr :
:

+o
+
+ Mercutio: Romeo hears him from the other side of the wall
: who
be not her maid (+) dont serve her, (:) dont remain a virgin
vestal livery virginal clothing, servants uniform*
pale, wan
o (green sicknessanemia common to pubescent young women)
; court jesters, who wore green and yellow coats
: adored woman (chivalric term)
, was my lady
+o is aecting/expressive
++ speaks, talks
Having some business, do entreat her eyes
To twinkle in their spheres
12
till they return.
What if her eyes were there,
13
they
14
in her head?
The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars
As daylight doth a lamp. Her eyes in heaven
Would through the airy region stream so bright
That birds would sing and think it were
15
not night.
See how she leans her cheek upon her hand.
O that I were a glove upon that hand,
That I might touch that cheek.
Juliet Ay me.
Romeo She speaks.
O speak again,
16
bright angel, for thou art
As glorious to this night, being oer my head,
17
As is a wingd messenger
18
of heaven
Unto the white upturnd wondring eyes
Of mortals that fall back
19
to gaze on him,
When he bestrides
20
the lazy pung
21
clouds
And sails upon the bosom
22
of the air.
Juliet O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore
23
art thou Romeo?
:c+ : scrxr :
,
:o
:
o
+: (in Ptolemaic astronomy, stars were contained in spheres)
+ in the sky
+ the stars
+ (subjunctive)
+o (Romeo is still talking, quietly, to himself only)
+; ( Juliet is at her window, which is abovestage level)
+: wingd messenger angel
+, fall back retreat, step back
:o he bestrides the angel mounts/rides on
:+ sending out wisps/vapors (some texts have pacing)
:: surface
: wherefore art thou why are you (named)
Deny
24
thy father and refuse thy name.
Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn
25
my love
And Ill no longer be a Capulet.
26
Romeo (aside) Shall I hear more, or shall I speak at this?
Juliet Tis but thy name that is my enemy:
Thou art thyself, though not a Montague.
Whats Montague? It is nor
27
hand nor foot,
Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part
Belonging to a man. O be some other name.
28
Whats in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name
29
would smell as sweet.
So Romeo would, were he not Romeo called,
Retain that dear
30
perfection which he owes
31
Without that title.
32
Romeo, do
33
thy name,
And for
34
that name, which is no part of thee,
Take all myself.
Romeo (speaking to her) I take thee at thy word.
Call me but love, and Ill be new baptized,
Henceforth I never will be Romeo.
:c+ : scrxr :
oo

o
: renounce, disavow, repudiate
: (once Romeo swears that he is her love, and intends to marry her, she will
consider herself married)
:o (since a married woman takes her husbands name)
:; neither
:: beLONGing to a MAN o BE some OTHer NAME (to aare partly elided
words, just barely syllables)
:, (some texts have word)
o noble, glorious*
+ possesses, owns
: name
lay aside, get rid of
in place/instead of
Juliet What man
35
art thou that, thus bescreened
36
in night,
So stumblest on
37
my counsel?
38
Romeo By a name
I know not how to tell thee who I am.
My name, dear saint, is hateful to myself,
Because it is an enemy to thee.
Had I it written, I would tear
39
the word.
Juliet My ears have yet not drunk a hundred words
Of that tongues utterance,
40
yet I know the sound.
Art thou not Romeo, and a Montague?
Romeo Neither, fair saint, if either thee dislike.
41
Juliet How camst thou hither, tell me, and wherefore?
The orchard walls are high and hard to climb,
And the place death, considering who thou art,
If any of my kinsmen nd thee here.
Romeo With loves light wings did I oerperch
42
these walls,
For stony limits
43
cannot hold love out,
And what love can do, that dares love attempt.
Therefore thy kinsmen are no let
44
to me.
Juliet If they do see thee, they will murder thee.
Romeo Alack, there lies more peril in thine eye
Than twenty of their swords. Look thou but sweet,
:c+ : scrxr :
o+

oo
o
;o
what man who
o hidden from sight, covered in darkness
; stumblest on comes upon accidentally/by chance
: private musing
, take away/remove by force/violence
o UTrance
+ oend, displease
: y over
boundaries
barrier, stop (some texts have stop)
And I am proof
45
against their enmity.
Juliet I would not for the world they saw thee here.
Romeo I have nights cloak to hide me from their sight,
And but
46
thou love me, let them nd me here.
My life were better ended by their hate
Than death prorogud,
47
wanting of
48
thy love.
Juliet By whose direction
49
foundst thou out this place?
Romeo By love, that rst did prompt
50
me to inquire.
He
51
lent me counsel,
52
and I lent him eyes.
I am no pilot,
53
yet wert thou as far
54
As that vast shore washed with
55
the farthest sea,
I would adventure
56
for such merchandise.
Juliet Thou knowest the mask of night is on my face,
Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek
For that which thou hast heard me speak tonight.
Fain
57
would I dwell on form
58
fain, fain deny
What I have spoke. But farewell compliment.
59
Dost thou love me? I know thou wilt say Ay,
:c+ : scrxr :
o:
;
:o
:
,o
impenetrable, invulnerable
o if only
; deferred, postponed
: wanting of lacking, without
, guidance, giving of directions
o incite, urge, inspire
+ Love/Cupid
: advice
steersman, helmsman, versed in local navigation
far away
(+) washed with bathed/wet by/beat upon by, (:) adjoining, touching
o take the chance/the risk, venture*
; gladly*
: dwell on form linger/insist on formality/decorum/etiquette
, ceremony, politeness
And I will take thy word.Yet, if thou swearst,
Thou mayst prove false.At lovers perjuries,
They say Jove
60
laughs. O gentle Romeo,
If thou dost love, pronounce it faithfully.
61
Or if thou thinkest I am too quickly won,
Ill frown, and be perverse,
62
and say thee nay,
So
63
thou wilt woo.
64
But else,
65
not for the world.
In truth, fair Montague, I am too fond,
66
And therefore thou mayst think my havior
67
light,
68
But trust me, gentleman, Ill prove more true
69
Than those that have more cunning
70
to be strange.
71
I should have been more strange, I must confess,
But that thou overheardst, ere I was ware,
72
My true love
73
passion.Therefore pardon me,
And not impute this yielding to light love,
Which
74
the dark night hath so discoverd.
75
Romeo Lady, by yonder blessd moon I swear,
:c+ : scrxr :
o
,
+oo
+o
oo king of the gods
o+ in truth, sincerely
o: stubborn, dicult
o in order that
o court me
o otherwise
oo foolishly tender, over-aectionate, doting*
o; behavior, conduct, deportment
o: wanton, frivolous, not to be respected
o, faithful, reliable, steadfast*
;o capacity, skill
;+ distant, reserved, cold
;: aware, conscious
; (adjective)
; this love which
; uncovered, disclosed, revealed
That tips
76
with silver all these fruit tree tops
Juliet O swear not by the moon, th inconstant
77
moon,
That monthly changes in her circled orb,
78
Lest that thy love prove likewise variable.
Romeo What shall I swear by?
Juliet Do not swear at all,
Or if thou wilt, swear by thy gracious
79
self,
Which is the god of my idolatry,
80
And Ill believe thee.
Romeo If my hearts dear love
Juliet Well, do not swear.Although I joy
81
in thee,
I have no joy of this contract
82
tonight.
It is too rash,
83
too unadvised,
84
too sudden,
Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be
Ere one can say It lightens.
85
Sweet, good night.
This bud of love, by summers ripening breath,
May prove a beauteous ower when next we meet.
Good night, good night.As
86
sweet repose and rest
Come to thy heart as that within my breast.
Romeo O wilt thou leave me so unsatised?
:c+ : scrxr :
o
++o
++
+:o
+:
;o adorns
;; frequently changing/altering
;: circled orb circular orbit
;, charming, attractive
:o idol worship
:+ rejoice, delight, exult
:: mutual agreement (conTRACT)
: hasty, impetuous, rapid
: spoken without proper thought/reection
: ashes
:o the same, equal
Juliet What satisfaction
87
canst thou have tonight?
Romeo Th exchange of thy loves faithful vow for mine.
Juliet I gave thee mine before thou didst request it,
And yet I would
88
it were
89
to give again.
Romeo Wouldst thou withdraw it? For what purpose, love?
Juliet But to be frank
90
and give it thee again.
And yet I wish but for the thing I have.
My bounty
91
is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep.The more I give to thee,
The more I have, for both
92
are innite.
I hear some noise within. Dear love, adieu!
Nursr c:iis vi+nix
Anon, good Nurse! Sweet Montague, be true.
Stay but a little, I will come again.
rxi+ Juiir+
Romeo O blessd, blessd night! I am afeard,
Being in night, all this is but a dream,
Too attering
93
sweet to be substantial.
94
rx+rr Juiir+ :iovr
:c+ : scrxr :
o
+o
+
+o
:; gratication of desire ( Juliet consistently shows a keen awareness of sexual
realities)
:: wish
:, still remained
,o generous, lavish
,+ generosity, liberality
,: what I have and what I give
, pleasingly, pleasurably
, real (subSTANtiAL)
Juliet Three words, dear Romeo, and good night indeed.
95
If that thy bent
96
of love be honorable,
Thy purpose marriage, send me word tomorrow,
By one that Ill procure
97
to come to thee,
Where and what time thou wilt perform the rite,
And all my fortunes at thy foot Ill lay
And follow thee my lord
98
throughout the world.
Nurse (within) Madam!
Juliet I come, anon. But if thou meanest not well,
I do beseech thee
Nurse (within) Madam!
Juliet By and by
99
I come
To cease thy suit and leave me to my grief.
Tomorrow will I send.
Romeo So thrive
100
my soul
Juliet A thousand times good night.
rxi+ Juiir+
Romeo A thousand times the worse, to want
101
thy light.
Love goes toward love as schoolboys from
102
their books,
But love from
103
love, towards school
104
with heavy looks.
rx+rr Juiir+ :iovr
:c+ : scrxr :
oo
+
+o
+
, really, positively
,o disposition, inclination
,; contrive, cause, get
,: husband (with the clear sense of head of the household)
,, by and by immediately, at once
+oo ourish, prosper
+o+ lack*
+o: go away from
+o away from
+o as schoolboys go
Juliet Hist! Romeo, hist! O for a falconers
105
voice
To lure this tassel-gentle
106
back again.
Bondage
107
is hoarse
108
and may not speak aloud,
Else would I tear the cave where Echo lies
109
And make her airy tongue more hoarse than mine
With repetition of my Romeos name.
Romeo!
Romeo (to himself ) It is my soul that calls upon my name.
How silver sweet sound
110
lovers tongues by night,
Like softest music to attending ears.
Juliet Romeo!
Romeo My niesse.
111
Juliet What oclock tomorrow
Shall I send to thee?
Romeo By the hour of nine.
Juliet I will not fail. Tis twenty years till then.
I have forgot why I did call thee back.
Romeo Let me stand here till thou remember it.
Juliet I shall forget, to have
112
thee still stand there,
Remembring how I love thy company.
Romeo And Ill still stay, to have thee still forget,
Forgetting any other home but this.
Juliet Tis almost morning. I would have thee gone,
:c+ : scrxr :
o;
+oo
+o
+;o
+;
+o keeper/trainer/hunter with falcons/hawks (who must call so high-ying
birds can hear)
+oo male falcon, nobler than a mere goshawk
+o; restriction (as a young unmarried woman)
+o: pitched low, not clear/smooth
+o, (See Ovid, Metamorphoses, book )
++o (verb)
+++ falcon/hawk too young to have own (some texts have nyas)
++: to have in order to have
And yet no farther than a wantons bird,
113
That lets it hop a little from his hand,
Like a poor prisoner in his twisted gyves,
114
And with a silk thread plucks it back again,
So loving
115
jealous of his
116
liberty.
Romeo I would I were thy bird.
Juliet Sweet, so would I.
Yet I should kill thee with much cherishing.
117
Good night, good night. Parting is such sweet sorrow
That I shall say good night till it be morrow.
rxi+
Romeo Sleep dwell upon thine eyes, peace in thy breast.
Would I were sleep and peace, so sweet
118
to rest.
Hence will I to my ghostly fathers
119
close cell,
120
His help to crave
121
and my dear hap
122
to tell.
rxi+
:c+ : scrxr :
o:
+:o
+:
+,o
++ wantons bird the pet of a playful/spoiled child
++ fetters, shackles, irons
++ (adjective)
++o its
++; pampering, caressing
++: (adverb)
++, spiritual guide/confessor
+:o close cell secluded room, small living quarters
+:+ request, ask/beg for
+:: fortune, luck
s cr xr
Friar Laurences cell
rx+rr Fri:r, :ioxr, vi+n : i:skr+
Friar
1
The gray-eyed morn smiles on the frowning night,
Checkring
2
the eastern clouds with streaks of light,
And eckd
3
darkness like a drunkard reels
From forth
4
days path and Titans ery wheels.
5
Now, ere the sun advance
6
his burning eye
The day to cheer and nights dank
7
dew to dry,
I must up ll this osier cage
8
of ours
With baleful weeds
9
and precious juicd owers.
10
The earth thats natures mother is her
11
tomb.
What is her
12
burying grave,
13
that is her
14
womb,
And from her womb children of divers kind
We
15
sucking on her natural
16
bosom nd,
Many for many virtues
17
excellent,
:c+ : scrxr
o,

+o
+ (some texts conclude act :, scene :, with the rst four lines)
: marking like a checker- or chessboard
dappled, spotted
from forth away from, out of
Titans ery wheels the burning wheels of the sun gods chariot
o move forward, raise, uplift
; injuriously damp
: container of woven willow twigs
, baleful weeds deadly/destructive/malignant herbs
+o precious juicd owers owers containing valuable juices
++ natures
+: natures
+ place
+ the earths
+ (the verb of which weis the subject is nd)
+o normal, ordinary
+; qualities, properties
None but for some, and yet all dierent.
O mickle
18
is the powerful grace
19
that lies
In plants, herbs, stones, and their true qualities,
20
For naught so vile
21
that on the earth doth live
But to the earth some special good doth give,
Nor aught so good but, strained
22
from that fair use,
Revolts
23
from true birth,
24
stumbling on
25
abuse.
Virtue itself turns
26
vice, being misapplied,
And vice sometime
27
by action dignied.
28
Within the infant rind
29
of this small ower
Poison hath residence,
30
and medicine power,
31
For this, being smelt, with that part
32
cheers each part,
33
Being
34
tasted, stays
35
all senses with
36
the heart.
Two such opposd
37
kings encamp them
38
still
:c+ : scrxr
;o
+
:o
:
+: much, great
+, wholesome virtue/ecacy
:o capacities, natures
:+ wretched, repulsive
:: distorted, pressed, corrupted
: departs
: true birth its correct/real/right/legitimate origin/lineage
: stumbling on falling into
:o turns into
:; is sometimes
:: action dignied what it does is raised/exalted
:, infant rind new/early stage of the peel/skin/membrane
o hath residence is contained
+ medicine power medical remedies have strength/active capacity
: quality (scent)
cheers that quality (its odor) comforts/cures/enlivens everything (all
portions)
but being
stops
o following on/along with its stopping
; adverse, hostile
: encamp them settle/lodge themselves
In man as well as herbs grace and rude will
39

And where the worser is predominant

40
Full
41
soon the canker
42
death eats up that plant.
rx+rr Roxro
Romeo Good morrow, father.
Friar Benedicite!
43
What early
44
tongue so sweet
45
saluteth
46
me?
(recognizing Romeo) Young son, it argues
47
a distempered
48
head
So soon to bid good morrow
49
to thy bed.
Care
50
keeps his watch
51
in every old mans eye,
And where care lodges sleep will never lie,
But where unbruisd
52
youth with unstued
53
brain
Doth couch
54
his limbs, there golden sleep doth reign.
Therefore thy earliness doth me assure
:c+ : scrxr
;+
o

, Gods grace and rough/raw human longing/passion (GRACE and rude

WILL)
o (the WORser IS preDOMinANT)
+ very
: ulcerish decay
bless you! (BENeDIciTAY)
early in the morning
(adverb)
o greets
; indicates, proves
: disturbed, troubled
, morning (greeting it as one leaves it for the new day)
o sorrow
+ vigilance, wakefulness
: undamaged (as yet) by life
not yet swarming full
lie down
Thou art uproused with
55
some distemperature.
56
Or if not so,
57
then here I hit it right
Our Romeo hath not been in bed tonight.
Romeo That last is true the sweeter rest was mine.
Friar God pardon sin! Wast thou with Rosaline?
Romeo With Rosaline, my ghostly father? No.
I have forgot that name, and that names woe.
58
Friar Thats my good son! But where hast thou been then?
59
Romeo Ill tell thee ere thou ask it me again.
I have been feasting
60
with mine enemy,
Where on a sudden one
61
hath wounded me
Thats by me wounded. Both our remedies
62
Within thy help and holy physic
63
lies.
I bear no hatred, blessd man, for lo!
My intercession
64
likewise steads
65
my foe.
Friar Be plain, good son, and homely in thy drift.
66
Riddling
67
confession nds
68
but riddling shrift.
Romeo Then plainly know my hearts dear love is set
:c+ : scrxr
;:
o

uproused with awakened by

o disorder of mind or body (thou ART upROUSED with SOME
disTEMperTURE)
; (Romeo perhaps indicates that this is not the case)
: grief, lamentation
, (but WHERE hast THOU been THEN)
oo enjoying myself, celebrating, partying
o+ someone
o: cures
o healing knowledge/art
o my intercession what I am asking you for
o prots, helps
oo homely in thy drift simple/everydaylike in your meaning*
o; puzzling, enigmatic, ambiguous
o: meets with
On the fair daughter of rich Capulet.
As mine on hers, so hers is set on mine,
And all combined,
69
save what thou must combine
By holy marriage.When, and where, and how
We met, we wooed and made exchange of vow,
Ill tell thee as we pass.
70
But this I pray,
That thou consent to marry us today.
Friar Holy Saint Francis! What a change is here.
Is Rosaline, that thou didst love so dear,
So soon forsaken? Young mens love then lies
Not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes.
Jesu Maria! What a deal of brine
71
Hath washed thy sallow
72
cheeks for Rosaline.
How much salt water thrown away in waste
To season
73
love, that of it doth not taste.
The sun not yet thy sighs from heaven clears,
74
Thy old groans ring yet in mine ancient ears.
Lo, here upon thy cheek the stain doth sit
Of an old tear that is not washed o yet.
If eer thou wast thyself, and these woes thine,
Thou and these woes were all for Rosaline.
And art thou changed? Pronounce this sentence
75
then:
Women may fall when theres no strength in men.
:c+ : scrxr
;
oo
o
;o
;
:o
o, unied, agreed upon
;o proceed, walk along
;+ salt water (tears)
;: sickly yellowish
; avor, make savory
; removes
; judgment, wise maxim/saying
Romeo Thou chidst
76
me oft for loving Rosaline.
Friar For doting,
77
not for loving, pupil mine.
Romeo And badst me bury love.
Friar Not in a grave
To lay one in, another out to have.
Romeo I pray thee chide not. She whom I love now
Doth grace
78
for grace and love for love allow.
79
The other did not so.
Friar O she knew well
Thy love did read by rote,
80
that could not spell.
But come, young waverer,
81
come go with me.
In one respect Ill thy assistant be,
For this alliance may so happy
82
prove
To turn your households rancor to pure love.
Romeo O let us hence! I stand on
83
sudden haste.
Friar Wisely, and slow.
84
They stumble that run fast.
rxrux+
:c+ : scrxr
;
:
,o
;o scolded*
;; displaying excessive/foolish/infatuated emotion
;: favor
;, approve of, accept
:o memory
:+ shifter back and forth, vacillator
:: lucky, fortunate
: stand on insist on
: wisely, and slow it is better to proceed wisely and slowly
s cr xr
A street
rx+rr Brxvoiio :xi Mrrcu+io
Mercutio Where the devil should this Romeo be? Came he not
home tonight?
1
Benvolio Not to his fathers. I spoke with his man.
Mercutio Why, that same pale hard-hearted wench, that
Rosaline, torments him so that he will sure run mad.
Benvolio Tybalt, the kinsman to old Capulet, hath sent a letter to
his fathers house.
Mercutio A challenge, on my life.
Benvolio Romeo will answer it.
Mercutio Any man that can write may answer a letter.
Benvolio Nay, he will answer the letters master, how
2
he dares,
being dared.
Mercutio Alas, poor Romeo, he is already dead! stabbed with a
white wenchs black eye, shot through the ear with a love
song, the very pin
3
of his heart cleft
4
with
5
the blind bow
boys butt shaft
6
and is he a man to encounter Tybalt?
Benvolio Why, what is Tybalt?
Mercutio More than Prince of Cats.
7
O hes the courageous
:c+ : scrxr
;

+o
+
+ last night
: how he dares, being dared saying in what manner/means he undertakes,
having been challenged
peg/nail at the center of a target
split
by
o thick arrow used in target shooting
; (Tibert, in the Old French Renard the Fox [trans. Patricia Terry], is prince
of cats as Renard is princeof foxes; both the medieval tale and Romeo and
Juliet are brilliantly echoed in S.V. Benets story The King of the Cats)
captain
8
of compliments.
9
He ghts as you sing pricksong
10
keeps time, distance, and proportion:
11
rests me his minim
rests,
12
one, two, and the third in your bosom!
13
The very
butcher of a silk button,
14
a duelist, a duelist, a gentleman of
the very rst house,
15
of the rst and second cause.
16
Ah, the
immortal passado,
17
the punto reverso,
18
the hay!
19
Benvolio The what?
Mercutio The pox of
20
such antic, lisping, aecting
fantasticoes
21
these new tuners of accent!
22
By Jesu, a very
good blade! a very tall
23
man! a very good whore! Why, is
:c+ : scrxr
;o
:o
:
: chief, prince (in modern military usage, a general)
, dueling courtesies, Italian style
+o written music, as opposed to that sung from memory or by ear (pricks
musical notes set to paper; prick (verb) to stab, run through)
++ (+) metrical/musical rhythm/harmony, (:) melodic line
+: his minim rests takes/makes the shortest possible rests/pauses (minim in
Renaissance musical notation is what is today called a half note)
+ one, two, and the third in your bosom! (+) then its one, two, three and
all over!, or (:) he makes one feint, pauses, then another feint, pauses again,
and then runs you through!
+ butcher of a silk button so accurate that he can slice o a button
+ one whose life is governed by the rst of the twelve astrological houses, the
rst being the ascendant or most important of all
+o rst and second cause primary reasons for ghting a duel: rst, accusation
of serious crime, second, honor
+; immortal passado heavenly/famous thrust, sword and one foot moving
forward at the same time*
+: backhand thrust
+, hay! Italian hai (avere, to have),youve got it! exclaimed when a
thrust hits home
:o the pox of the plague on (in modern English,damn such . . .)
:+ antic, . . . aecting fantasticoes (some texts have phantasimes)
grotesque/bizarre/uncouth/ludicrous . . . full of aectation absurd/
irrational people
:: tuners of accent! adjusters of how we speak!
: active, proper, brave
not this a lamentable thing, grandsir,
24
that we should be thus
aicted with these strange ies,
25
these fashion mongers,
26
these pardon mes,
27
who stand so much on the new form
28
that they cannot sit at ease on the old bench?
29
O their
bones, their bones!
30
rx+rr Roxro
Benvolio Here comes Romeo, here comes Romeo!
Mercutio Without his roe,
31
like a dried herring. O esh, esh,
how art thou shied!
32
Now is he for
33
the numbers
34
that
Petrarch owed in.
35
Laura,
36
to
37
his lady,
38
was but a
kitchen wench marry, she had a better love
39
to berhyme
her
40
Dido a dowdy, Cleopatra a gypsy,
41
Helen and
:c+ : scrxr
;;
o

: grandfather
: insignicant insects/atterers
:o dealers, trackers
:; people who constantly excuse themselves, in the Continental (very un-En-
glish) manner
:: style, model (formalso bench)
:, old bench old style plain/hard wooden seat
o their bones! their delicate rear ends aching because of hard wood (there
may also be a reference to a link between fashionable men and the bone
ache,as venereal disease was known)
+ without his roe (+) deprived of his sperm, like a male sh (:) take the
letters r, o,and eout of Romeoand you get, more or less,meoor
o me,which are typical lovers cries
: dried out, after a night of sexual activity
ready for
poetry, then exclusively metrical (which means measurement)
owed in glided along in (see act +, scene +, note ;)
o Petrarchs beloved
; compared to
: Romeos lady, thought by Mercutio to be Rosaline
, lover
o Dido, Cleopatra, Helen, Hero, and Thisbe (THIZbee) are all compared to
Rosaline; gypsies were believed to have come from Egypt
+ cheating hussies, dark skinned to boot
Hero
42
hildings and harlots,
43
Thisbe
44
a gray eye or so,
45
but
not to the purpose.
46
(to Romeo) Signior Romeo, bon jour.
Theres a French salutation to your French slop.
47
You gave
us the counterfeit fairly
48
last night.
Romeo Good morrow to you both.What counterfeit did I give
you?
Mercutio The slip,
49
sir, the slip. Can you not conceive?
50
Romeo Pardon, good Mercutio. My business was great, and in
such a case as mine a man may strain
51
courtesy.
Mercutio Thats as much as to say, such a case as yours constrains a
man to bow in the hams.
52
Romeo Meaning, to curtsy.
Mercutio Thou hast most kindly
53
hit it.
Romeo A most courteous
54
exposition.
Mercutio Nay, I am the very pink
55
of courtesy.
Romeo Pink for ower.
Mercutio Right.
:c+ : scrxr
;:
o

: beloved of Leander (see Christopher Marlowes Hero and Leander)

hildings and harlots jades/baggages and whores
beloved of Pyramus; they both die
a gray eye or so all of them just females with gray eyes
o to the purpose relevant
; clothing
: gave us the counterfeit fairly really/fully deceived us
, (+) evasion/escape, (:) a counterfeit coin
o think/imagine it
+ contract, diminish, restrain
: limits/aicts a man in bowing the backs of his thighs/knees (your great
businesswas sexual, and your thighs/knees are weary from it)
(+) naturally, characteristically, (:) sympathetically, pleasantly
(curtsy-ess)
(+) decorative hole punched in clothing/shoes, (:) rapier thrust, () ower,
() nest example
Romeo Why, then is my pump
56
well owered.
Mercutio Sure
57
wit, follow me
58
this jest now till thou hast
worn out thy pump, that,
59
when the single
60
sole of it is
worn,
61
the jest may remain, after the wearing,
62
solely
singular.
63
Romeo O single soled
64
jest, solely singular
65
for the
singleness.
66
Mercutio Come between us,
67
good Benvolio! My wits faint.
68
Romeo Swits
69
and spurs,
70
swits and spurs, or Ill cry a match.
71
Mercutio Nay, if our wits run the wild goose chase,
72
I am
done,
73
for thou hast more of the wild goose in one of thy
wits
74
than, I am sure, I have in my whole ve.Was I with
75
:c+ : scrxr
;,
oo
o
o shoe
; steadfast
: me in
, so that
oo poor, contemptible, thin
o+ worn out
o: (+) being used, worn, (:) exhausting, wearing away
o solely singular (+) all alone, (:) a singular/unique sole
o single soled poor soled/souled
o solely singular only unique/superior
oo simplicity, navt
o; come between us help me by stopping these punning exchanges, as
would a second in a duel
o: wits faint brain gives way/swoons
o, switches, whips
;o use whips and spurs on your faltering mind/steed
;+ cry a match announce/claim that the match is over (I win!)
;: wild goose chase a follow the leader race that could lead anywhere, and
was therefore risky
; nished, used up, worn out
; faculties, senses (tasting, smelling, hearing, seeing, feeling)
; alongside, together with/equal to
you there for the goose?
76
Romeo Thou wast never with me for anything when thou wast
not there for the goose.
77
Mercutio I will bite thee by the ear
78
for that jest.
Romeo Nay, good goose,
79
bite not!
80
Mercutio Thy wit is a very bitter sweeting,
81
it is a most sharp
82
sauce.
83
Romeo And is it not, then, well served in to
84
a sweet goose?
Mercutio O heres a wit of cheveril,
85
that stretches from an inch
narrow to an ell
86
narrow to an ell broad.
Romeo I stretch it
87
out for that word broad,which, added to
the goose, proves thee far and wide a broad goose.
88
Mercutio (happily) Why, is not this
89
better now than groaning for
love? Now art thou sociable, now art thou Romeo, now art
thou what thou art, by art
90
as well as by nature. For this
driveling love is like a great natural
91
that runs lolling
92
up
:c+ : scrxr
:o
;o
;
:o
;o (+) the popular board game,fox and geese,(:) the eating of the prize
goose, after a contest
;; (+) eating the esh, (:) enjoying the prostitute
;: bite thee by the ear nibble aectionately on your ear
;, simpleton
:o nay, good goose, bite not a mock cry:Oh spare me, terrible creature!
:+ (+) sweetness, sweet avoring, (:) type of apple often eaten with goose
:: (+) keen, (:) cutting, () pungent, caustic
: (+) sauce, (:) sauciness, impertinence
: well served in to properly served with (since sweet dishes go best with
pungent sauces)
: of cheveril made of kid leather, pliant and easily stretched
:o inches
:; my wit
:: broad goose plain/obvious/outstanding/vulgar/indecent simpleton
:, this contest of wits
,o skill, learning*
,+ half-wit, born fool/idiot
,: lazily
and down to hide his bauble
93
in a hole.
94
Benvolio Stop there, stop there!
Mercutio Thou desirest me to stop
95
in my tale
96
against the
hair.
97
Benvolio Thou wouldst else have made thy tale large.
98
Mercutio O thou art deceived! I would have made it short,
99
for
I was come to the whole depth
100
of my tale, and meant
indeed to occupy the argument
101
no longer.
Romeo Heres goodly gear!
102
rx+rr Nursr :xi nrr x:x Pr+rr, :+ +nr orrosi+r
rxi or +nr s+:cr
Mercutio A sail, a sail!
103
Benvolio Two, two.A shirt and a smock.
104
Nurse Peter.
Peter Anon.
Nurse My fan, Peter.
Mercutio
105
Good Peter, to hide her face, for her fans the fairer
:c+ : scrxr
:+
:
,o
,
, toy, worthless/paltry object/thing
, (+) by burying it, (:) by inserting his thing/penis in a womans vagina
, (+) cease, (:) plug, stu (verb)
,o (+) tale, (:) tail/penis
,; against the hair (+) contrary to my inclination/its natural direction, (:)
up against female genital hair
,: tale large (+) story long, (:) tail/penis large, () licentious, improper, gross
,, (+) a short tale, (:) a small tail/penis
+oo (+) tales profundity, sagacity, (:) tail/peniss depth
+o+ occupy the argument take possession of the subject/woman
+o: heres goodly gear either (+) this kind of talk is rst-class stu, or (:) (of
the Nurse and Peter) here come good toys/stu/doings
+o the Nurse, a large woman, appears on the horizon like an approaching ship
+o a shirt and a smock a man and a woman
+o (it is not clear whether this is an aside, to his friends, or is spoken aloud for
Peter and the Nurse to hear)
face
106
of the two.
Nurse God ye good morrow, gentlemen.
Mercutio God ye good den, fair gentlewoman.
Nurse Is it good den?
107
Mercutio Tis no less, I tell ye, for the bawdy
108
hand of the dial is
now upon the prick
109
of noon.
Nurse Out upon you.
110
What
111
a man are you?
Romeo One, gentlewoman, that God hath made, Himself to
mar.
112
Nurse By my troth,
113
it is well said.For himself to mar,
quoth
114
a? Gentlemen, can any of you tell me where I may
nd the young Romeo?
Romeo I can tell you, but young Romeo will be older when
you have found him than he was when you sought him. I am
the youngest of that name, for fault
115
of a worse.
Nurse You say well.
Mercutio Yea, is the worst well? Very well took,
116
i faith.
Wisely, wisely.
Nurse If you be he, sir, I desire some condence
117
with you.
Benvolio She will endite
118
him to some supper.
:c+ : scrxr
::
+oo
+o
++o
++
+oo (fans often bore painted faces)
+o; is it good den? is it evening?
+o: (+) soiled, dirty, (:) lewd, obscene
+o, (+) mark on a dial, (:) penis
++o out upon you (modern usage) come on!
+++ what kind of
++: God hath made, Himself to mar God created man in his image, and man
spoils that image
++ by my troth by my faith
++ says
++ lack
++o understood, grasped
++; (+) condential communication? (:) uneducated mistake for conference?
++: deliberate mistake for invite: Benvolio thinks/wants to think
condence(see note ++;) is an error
Mercutio A bawd, a bawd, a bawd!
119
So ho!
120
Romeo (to Mercutio) What hast thou found?
Mercutio No hare, sir, unless a hare, sir, in a lenten pie,
121
that is
something stale and hoar
122
ere it be spent.
123
nr v:iks i. +nrx :xi sixcs
An old hare hoar,
124
And an old hare hoar,
Is very good meat in Lent,
But a hare that is hoar
Is too much for a score
125
When it hoars
126
ere it be spent.
127
Romeo, will you come to your fathers? Well to dinner
thither.
Romeo I will follow you.
Mercutio Farewell, ancient lady. Farewell, (singing) lady, lady,
lady.
128
rxrux+ Mrrcu+io :xi Brxvoiio
:c+ : scrxr
:
+:o
+:
+o
++, (+) dialect word for hare,(:) a procurer/whorehouse proprietor
+:o expression used in hunting hares, when a hare is located
+:+ (in which there should be no meat)
+:: something stale and hoar rather stale and aged (because Lent lasts forty
days and a hare pie would be long since moldy, if kept unrefrigerated
for any longish period)
+: consumed, used up
+: (+) gray haired, (:) whore (homonym)
+: for a score (+) excessive, unreasonable, (:) a record of drinks served, in an
ale house (bar, saloon)
+:o ages
+:; be spent (+) is used up/exhausted, (:) results in an orgasm
+:: (refrain from The Ballad of Constant Susanna:A woman fair and
virtuous / Lady, lady . . .See Percy, Reliques of Ancient English Poetry,
+::o,+o)
Nurse Marry, farewell! I pray you, sir, what saucy merchant
129
was this that was so full of his ropery?
130
Romeo A gentleman, Nurse, that loves to hear himself talk and
will speak more in a minute than he will stand to
131
in a
month.
Nurse An a speak anything against me, Ill take him down,
132
an a were lustier
133
than he is, and twenty such jacks.
134
And
if I cannot, Ill nd those that shall. Scurvy knave!
135
I am
none of his irt gills,
136
I am none of his skains mates.
137
(to
Peter) And thou must stand by, too, and suer
138
every knave
to use me at his pleasure!
139
Peter I saw no man use
140
you at his pleasure. If I had, my
weapon
141
should quickly have been out, I warrant you. I
dare draw as soon as another man, if I see occasion
142
in a
good quarrel,
143
and the law on my side.
Nurse Now, afore God, I am so vexed that every part about me
quivers. Scurvy knave! (to Romeo) Pray you, sir, a word, and as
:c+ : scrxr
:
+
+o
+
+o
+:, shopkeeper, tradesman (insulting, when applied to a gentleman)
+o knavery, tricks
++ stand to act upon
+: take him down (+) rebuke, reprimand, (:) humiliate (take him down a
peg)
+ (+) stronger, (:) more condent
+ low fellows, knaves
+ scurvy knave worthless/contemptible/low/badmannered rascal/
rogue*
+o irt gills women of loose/light behavior
+; skains mates cut-throat companions (skainlong Irish knife)
+: allow, tolerate
+, at his pleasure as he pleases
+o have sexual intercourse with
++ (+) sword, (:) penis
+: (+) favorable circumstances, good reason, (:) pretext, excuse
+ cause, reason
I told you, my young lady bid me enquire you out.What she
bid me say, I will keep to myself, but rst let me tell ye, if ye
should lead her into a fools paradise, as they say, it were a very
gross kind of behavior, as they say; for the gentlewoman is
young, and therefore, if you should deal double with her,
truly it were an ill thing to be oered to any gentlewoman,
and very weak dealing.
144
Romeo Nurse, commend me to thy lady and mistress. I protest
unto thee
Nurse Good heart, and I faith I will tell her as much. Lord,
Lord, she will be a joyful woman.
Romeo What wilt thou tell her, Nurse? Thou dost not mark
145
me.
Nurse I will tell her, sir, that you do protest,
146
which, as I take
it, is a gentlemanlike oer.
147
Romeo Bid her devise
148
Some means to come to shrift this afternoon,
And there she shall at Friar Laurence
149
cell
Be shrived
150
and married. Here is
151
for thy pains.
Nurse No, truly, sir; not a penny.
Romeo Go to! I say you shall. (she takes the oered gratuity)
Nurse This afternoon, sir? Well, she shall be there.
:c+ : scrxr
:
+
+oo
+o
+;o
+ weak dealing feeble, immoral business
+ pay attention to*
+o declare/arm/vow in solemn terms
+; proposal of marriage
+: plan, think out, contrive*
+, (the original printed texts of the play agree on Friar Laurence cell.
Modern editors add an apostrophe after Laurence: Laurence .This
preserves the prosody but introduces a form unknown in English)
+o given penance and absolution, after confession
++ is something
Romeo And stay, good Nurse, behind the abbey wall.
Within this hour my man shall be with thee
And bring thee cords
152
made like a tackled stair,
153
Which to the high topgallant
154
of my joy
Must be my convoy
155
in the secret night.
Farewell. Be trusty,
156
and Ill quit
157
thy pains.
Farewell. Commend me to thy mistress.
Nurse Now God in heaven bless thee. Hark
158
you, sir.
Romeo What sayst thou, my dear Nurse?
Nurse Is your man secret? Did you neer hear say,
Two may keep counsel, putting one away?
159
Romeo I warrant thee my mans as true as steel.
Nurse Well, sir, my mistress is the sweetest lady. Lord, Lord!
When twas
160
a little prating
161
thing O there is a
nobleman in town, one Paris, that would fain lay knife
aboard,
162
but she, good soul, had as lief
163
see a toad, a
very
164
toad, as see him. I anger her sometimes, and tell her
that Paris is the properer
165
man, but Ill warrant you, when I
:c+ : scrxr
:o
+;
+:o
+:
+,o
+: ropes
+ tackled stair ladder made of ropes
+ the top of a ships tallest mast
+ guidance, protection
+o trustworthy, reliable
+; reward, repay
+: listen
+, putting one away removing/getting rid of/sending away one of the two
+oo she was
+o+ chattering
+o: lay knife aboard set his weapon (sexual allusion) on her
+o as lief rather
+o honest to God
+o more worthy, better looking
say so, she looks as pale as any clout
166
in the versal
167
world.
Doth not rosemary and Romeo begin both with a letter?
Romeo Ay, Nurse.What of that? Both with an R?
Nurse Ah, mocker! Thats the dogs name. R
168
is for the No,
I know. It begins with some other letter, and she hath the
prettiest sententious
169
of it, of you and rosemary, that it
would do you good to hear it.
Romeo Commend me to thy lady.
170
Nurse Ay, a thousand times.
rxi+ Roxro
Peter!
Peter Anon.
Nurse Before, and apace.
171
rxrux+
:c+ : scrxr
:;
+,
:oo
+oo scrap of cloth, rag
+o; whole, universal
+o: sound of a dog growling?
+o, aphoristic (terse, proverbial) way of speech
+;o (a polite dismissal)
+;+ before, and apace go in front of me, and quickly
s cr xr
Capulets orchard
rx+rr Juiir+
Juliet The clock struck nine when I did send the Nurse;
In half an hour she promised to return.
Perchance
1
she cannot meet
2
him.Thats not so.
O she is lame.
3
Loves heralds
4
should be thoughts,
Which ten times faster glide than the suns beams
Driving back shadows over lowering
5
hills.
Therefore do nimble-pinioned
6
doves draw Love,
7
And therefore hath
8
the wind-swift
9
Cupid wings.
Now is the sun upon the highmost hill
Of this days journey, and from nine till twelve
Is three long hours,
10
yet she is not come.
Had she aections
11
and warm youthful blood
She would be as swift in motion as a ball.
My words would bandy
12
her to my sweet love,
And his to me.
:c+ : scrxr
::

+o
+
+ perhaps
: nd
inrm, halting, crippled
messengers
dark, threatening (bisyllabic; the rst syllable rhymes with outor ouch)
o nimble-pinioned quick/agile/light-winged
; draw Love pull the chariot of Venus
: likewise/also has
, wind-swift (compound adjective) swift as wind
+o (bisyllabic: OWerz)(again, rhymes with FLOWerz)
++ feelings, emotions, passions
+: strike, hit (from tennis)*
But old folks, many feign as
13
they were dead
Unwieldy, slow, heavy and pale as lead.
rx+rr Nursr :xi Pr+rr
O God, she comes! O honey Nurse, what news?
Hast thou met with him? Send thy man away.
Nurse Peter, stay at the gate.
rxi+ Pr+rr
Juliet Now, good sweet Nurse O Lord, why lookst thou sad?
Though news be sad, yet tell them
14
merrily.
If good, thou shamest the music of sweet news
By playing it
15
to me with so sour a face.
Nurse I am aweary, give me leave
16
awhile.
Fie, how my bones ache! What a jaunce
17
have I!
Juliet I would thou hadst my bones, and I thy news.
Nay, come, I pray thee speak. Good, good Nurse, speak.
Nurse Jesu, what haste! Can you not stay awhile?
Do you not see that I am out of breath?
Juliet How art thou out of breath when thou hast breath
To say to me that thou art out of breath?
The excuse that thou dost make in this delay
Is longer than the tale thou dost excuse.
18
Is thy news good or bad? Answer to that.
:c+ : scrxr
:,
:o
:
o

+ feign as act as if they believe themselves, pretend to be

+ (newsplural)
+ (the music)
+o give me leave please leave me alone
+; prancing (like a horse obliged to do tricks)
+: decline/beg o from doing, with apologies/explanations
Say either, and Ill stay the circumstance.
19
Let me be satised: ist good or bad?
Nurse Well, you have made a simple
20
choice.You know not
how to choose a man. Romeo? No, not he.Though his face
be better than any mans, yet his leg excels all mens, and for
a hand and a foot, and a body, though they be not
21
to be
talked on, yet they are past compare. He is not the ower of
courtesy, but Ill warrant him as gentle as a lamb. Go thy ways,
wench.
22
Serve God.What, have you dined at home?
Juliet No, no. But all this did I know before.
What says he of our marriage? What of that?
Nurse Lord, how my head aches! What a head have I!
It beats as
23
it would fall in twenty pieces.
My back o t other side ah, my back, my back!
Beshrew
24
your heart for sending me about
To catch my death with jauncing up and down.
Juliet I faith, I am sorry that thou art not well.
Sweet, sweet, sweet Nurse, tell me, what says my love?
Nurse Your love says, like an honest gentleman, and a courteous,
and a kind, and a handsome, and, I warrant, a virtuous
Where is your mother?
Juliet Where is my mother? Why, she is within.
Where should she be? How oddly thou repliest!
Your love says, like an honest gentleman,
Where is your mother?
:c+ : scrxr
,o
o

+, details of time, place, manner, and so on

:o dismal, worthless, stupid
:+ not worthy, poor, dismal, silly, foolish
:: girl
: as if
: hang, a curse on*
Nurse O Gods Lady dear!
Are you so hot?
25
Marry come up,
26
I trow.
27
Is this the poultice for my aching bones?
Henceforward do your messages yourself.
Juliet. Heres such a coil!
28
Come, what says Romeo?
Nurse. Have you got leave
29
to go to shrift to-day?
Juliet. I have.
Nurse. Then hie
30
you hence to Friar Laurence cell.
There stays a husband to make you a wife.
Now comes the wanton
31
blood up in your cheeks:
Theyll be in scarlet straight
32
at any news.
Hie you to church, I must
33
another way
To fetch a ladder, by the which your love
Must climb a birds nest soon when it is dark.
I am the drudge, and toil
34
in your delight,
But you shall bear the burden
35
soon at night.
36
Go, Ill to dinner. Hie you to the cell.
Juliet Hie to high fortune! Honest Nurse, farewell.
rxrux+
:c+ : scrxr
,+
oo
o
;o
;
: feverish, excited, lustful
:o marry come up well, hoity toity
:; it seems to me
:: confusion, fuss
:, permission
o hurry
+ (+) wild, skittish, (:) lascivious, lewd
: without delay, immediately
must go/proceed
work hard
load: (+) the work, (:) have the weight of a man on you
o at night tonight, this night
s cr xr o
Friar Laurences cell
rx+rr Fri:r L:urrxcr :xi Roxro
Friar So smile the heavens upon this holy act
That afterhours
1
with sorrow chide us not.
Romeo Amen, amen. But come what
2
sorrow can,
3
It cannot countervail
4
the exchange of joy
5
That one short minute gives me in her sight.
Do thou but close
6
our hands with holy words,
Then love-devouring death do what he dare
It is enough I may but call her mine.
Friar These violent
7
delights have violent ends
And in their triumph die, like re and powder,
8
Which, as they kiss, consume.The sweetest honey
Is loathsome in his own deliciousness
And in the taste confounds
9
the appetite.
Therefore love moderately. Long love doth so.
Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow.
rx+rr Juiir+
Here comes the lady. O, so light a foot
Will neer wear out the everlasting int.
10
:c+ : scrxr o
,:

+o
+
+ hours yet to come, the future
: whatever
can do
match, equal
exchange of joy mutual joy, joy given and received
o unite, bind (verb)
; vehement, very strong/intense
: gunpowder
, destroys, ruins
+o ground paved with stone
A lover may bestride the gossamer
11
That idles
12
in the wanton summer air,
And yet not fall, so light
13
is vanity.
14
Juliet Good even to my ghostly confessor.
15
Friar Romeo shall thank thee,
16
daughter, for us both.
Roxro kissrs nrr
Juliet As much to him,
17
else is his thanks too much.
Juiir+ kissrs Roxro
Romeo Ah, Juliet, if the measure
18
of thy joy
Be heaped like mine, and that
19
thy skill be more
To blazon
20
it, then sweeten with thy breath
21
This neighbor
22
air, and let rich musics tongue
Unfold
23
the imagined
24
happiness that both
Receive in either
25
by this dear encounter.
26
Juliet Conceit
27
more rich in matter than in words
:c+ : scrxr o
,
:o
:
o
++ lmy spiderwebs
+: lazes (verb)
+ inconsequential, of no importance, of very little weight
+ foolishness, worldly pleasure (which are the same, to Friar Laurence)
+ (CONfesSOR)
+o with a kiss
+; as much to him I must give as much to him
+: measuring utensil/cup
+, if
:o (+) depict, paint, (:) boast of, proclaim
:+ sweeten with thy breath speak words in
:: nearby, adjoining, surrounding
: disclose, make clear
: prospective, future
: both receive in either we both of us receive
:o dear encounter glorious/noble meeting
:; idea, conception*
Brags of his substance,
28
not of ornament.
They are but beggars that
29
can count their worth.
But my true love is
30
grown to such excess
I cannot sum up sum
31
of half my wealth.
Friar Come, come with me, and we will make short work,
For, by your leaves,
32
you shall not stay
33
alone
Till Holy Church incorporate two in one.
rxrux+
:c+ : scrxr o
,

:: his substance its reality

:, those who
o has
+ sum up sum sum up (verb) the sum (noun)
: by your leaves with the permission of you both
remain, be left
Act

s cr xr +
A public place
rx+rr Mrrcu+io, Brxvoiio, :xi Mrx
Benvolio I pray thee, good Mercutio, lets retire.
1
The day is hot, the Capulets abroad,
2
And if we meet, we shall not scape
3
a brawl,
For now, these hot days, is the mad
4
blood stirring.
Mercutio Thou art like one of these fellows that, when he enters
the connes of a tavern, claps me
5
his sword upon the table
and says God send me
6
no need of thee!and by the
operation
7
of the second cup
8
draws him
9
on the drawer,
10
+ leave, withdraw
: are out and about
escape
mad blood frenzied, foolish, extravagantly reckless emotions
sets/bangs noisily
o God send me may God not send me
; working
: drink
, draws him draws his weapon
+o tapster, bar man
when indeed there is no need.
Benvolio Am I like such a fellow?
Mercutio Come, come, thou art as hot a jack
11
in thy mood as
any in Italy; and as soon moved to be moody,
12
and as soon
moody to be moved.
Benvolio And what to?
Mercutio Nay, an there were two such, we should have none
shortly,
13
for one would kill the other.Thou! Why, thou wilt
quarrel with a man that hath a hair more or a hair less in his
beard than thou hast.Thou wilt quarrel with a man for
racking nuts, having no other reason but because thou hast
hazel
14
eyes.What eye but such an eye would spy out
15
such a
quarrel? Thy head is as full of quarrels as an egg is full of
meat,
16
and yet thy head hath been beaten as addle
17
as an
egg for quarreling.Thou hast quarreled with a man for
coughing in the street, because he hath wakened thy dog that
hath lain asleep in the sun. Didst thou not fall out with a
tailor for wearing his new doublet
18
before Easter,
19
with
another for tying his new shoes with an old riband?
20
And yet
thou wilt
21
tutor
22
me from quarreling!
:c+ scrxr +
,o
+o
+
:o
:
++ man
+: (+) haughty, stubborn, angry, (:) melancholy, sullen
+ speedily, quickly
+ the reddish brown color of a ripe hazelnut
+ spy out discover, seek out
+o edible matter, food
+; crazy, confused
+: close-tting body garment, ancestor of modern coats and jackets
+, (the fashion season began at Easter)
:o ribbon
:+ want to
:: teach, instruct (verb)
Benvolio An I were so apt
23
to quarrel as thou art, any man
should buy the fee simple
24
of my life for an hour and a
quarter.
25
Mercutio The fee simple? O simple!
26
rx+rr T.i:i+ :xi o+nrrs
Benvolio By my head, here come the Capulets.
Mercutio By my heel,
27
I care not.
Tybalt (to other Capulets) Follow me close, for I will speak to
them.
Gentlemen, good den.A word with one of you.
Mercutio And but one word with one of us? Couple it with
something, make it a word and a blow.
Tybalt You shall nd me apt enough to that, sir, an you will
give me occasion.
Mercutio Could you not take some occasion without giving?
28
Tybalt Mercutio, thou consortest
29
with Romeo.
Mercutio Consort? What, dost thou make us minstrels?
30
An
thou make minstrels of us, look to hear nothing but
discords.
31
(indicates his sword) Heres my ddlestick,
32
heres
:c+ scrxr +
,;
o

: ready, prepared, prompt*

: fee simple complete and unconditional ownership (usually of land)
: for an hour and a quarter for the brief period my life, were I that
quarrelsome, could be expected to last
:o O simple! what an awful/pitiful metaphor
:; foot (scornful)
:: without giving without being given one
:, associate, keep company
o musicians
+ dissonances, quarrels
: ddlestick violin bow
that
33
shall make you dance. Zounds,
34
consort!
Benvolio We talk here in the public haunt
35
of men.
Either withdraw unto some private place
And reason coldly
36
of your grievances,
Or else depart. Here all eyes gaze on us.
Mercutio Mens eyes were made to look, and let them gaze.
I will not budge for no
37
mans pleasure.
rx+rr Roxro
Tybalt Well, peace be with you, sir. Here comes my man.
38
Mercutio But Ill be hanged,
39
sir, if he wear
40
your livery.
Marry, go before to eld,
41
hell be your follower.
42
Your worship
43
in that sense may call him man.
Tybalt Romeo, the love I bear thee can aord
44
No better term than this: thou art a villain.
Romeo Tybalt, the reason that I have to love thee
Doth much excuse the appertaining
45
rage
To such a greeting.Villain am I none.
Therefore farewell. I see thou knowest me not.
:c+ scrxr +
,:
o

oo
that which
Gods wounds (imprecation)
place
o reason coldly discuss/converse/argue calmly
; any
: (+) the man Im looking for, (:) servant
, Ill be hanged Ill be damned
o wears
+ go before to eld if you lead the way to the dueling eld
: be your follower (+) hell follow you, (:) then hell be your servant(do
the courteous thing)
your worship a gentleman/man of high honor like you (sarcastic)
supply, furnish (since he in fact feels no love for Romeo)
proper, appropriate
Tybalt Boy, this shall not excuse the injuries
That thou hast done me.Therefore turn and draw.
Romeo I do protest I never injured thee,
But love thee better than thou canst devise,
46
Till thou shalt know the reason of my love.
And so good Capulet, which name I tender
47
As dearly as mine own, be satised.
Mercutio O calm, dishonorable, vile submission!
Alla stoccata
48
carries it away. (he draws)
Tybalt, you ratcatcher,
49
will you walk?
50
Tybalt What wouldst thou have
51
with me?
Mercutio Good King of Cats, nothing but one of your nine lives.
That I mean to make bold withal and, as
52
you shall use
53
me
hereafter, dry beat
54
the rest of the eight.Will you pluck
55
your sword out of his pilcher
56
by the ears?
57
Make haste, lest
mine be about
58
your ears ere it be out.
Tybalt I am for you. (he draws)
Romeo Gentle Mercutio, put thy rapier up.
:c+ scrxr +
,,
o
;o
;
:o
o conceive, imagine
; cherish, regard
: alla stoccata fencing thrust: that is,Tybalt (Italian dueling term: stoccata
stab, thrust)
, (as cats are ratcatchers)
o step aside, withdraw (to ght a duel)
+ do (though Mercutio chooses to understand it, literally, as have)
: according to how
deal with, behave toward
dry beat beat soundly/severely*
pull, snatch (negative usage)
o scabbard (contemptuous)
; hilt (which protrudes on either side more or less like ears: a contemptuous
metaphor)
: all around
Mercutio (to Tybalt) Come, sir, your passado!
+nr. ricn+
Romeo Draw, Benvolio, beat down their weapons.
Gentlemen, for shame! Forbear
59
this outrage!
60
Tybalt, Mercutio! The Prince expressly hath
Forbid this bandying in Verona streets.
Hold,Tybalt! Good Mercutio!
T.i:i+ uxirr Roxros :rx s+:is Mrrcu+io
:xi riirs vi+n nis Foiiovrrs
Mercutio I am hurt.
A plague
61
o both your houses. I am sped.
62
Is he gone and hath nothing?
Benvolio What, art thou hurt?
Mercutio Ay, ay, a scratch, a scratch. Marry, tis enough.
Where is my page? (to Page) Go, villain, fetch a surgeon.
63
rxi+ P:cr
Romeo Courage, man.The hurt cannot be much.
Mercutio No, tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church
door, but tis enough, twill serve.Ask for me tomorrow, and
you shall nd me a grave man. I am peppered,
64
I warrant, for
this world. A plague o both your houses. Zounds, a dog, a rat,
:c+ scrxr +
+oo
:
,o
,
, give up, cease, abstain from
oo rashness, foolhardiness, mad/passionate behavior, insolence
o+ curse, divine punishment
o: nished, killed
o medical man
o ruined, killed
a mouse, a cat, to scratch
65
a man to death.A braggart, a
rogue, a villain, that ghts by the book of arithmetic.Why the
devil came you between us? I was hurt under your arm.
Romeo I thought all for the best.
Mercutio Help me into some house, Benvolio,
Or I shall faint.A plague o both your houses.
They have made worms meat of me. I have it,
66
And soundly too.Your houses!
rxi+, surror+ri i. Brxvoiio
Romeo This gentleman, the Princes near ally,
67
My very friend, hath got this mortal hurt
In my behalf my reputation stained
With Tybalts slander
68
Tybalt, that an hour
69
Hath been my kinsman. O sweet Juliet,
Thy beauty hath made me eeminate
And in my temper
70
softened valors steel.
71
rx+rr Brxvoiio
Benvolio O Romeo, Romeo, brave
72
Mercutios dead,
That gallant
73
spirit hath aspired
74
the clouds,
Which too untimely here did scorn
75
the earth.
:c+ scrxr +
+o+
+oo
+o
++o
o (+) injure with claws/nails, (:) skirmish, ght without doing serious harm
oo (modern usage:Ive had it)
o; kindred, relation (alLY)
o: insult, malicious defamation/falsehood
o, that an hour who for one hour
;o (+) character, temperament, (:) the tempering/hardening of steel
;+ valors steel the toughness of courage/manliness
;: noble, splendid
; excellent, ne
; risen/soared/mounted to
; deed, disdained
Romeo This days black fate
76
on moe days
77
doth depend.
78
This
79
but begins the woe others
80
must end.
rx+rr T.i:i+
Benvolio Here comes the furious
81
Tybalt back again.
Romeo Alive in triumph, and Mercutio slain?
Away to heaven respective lenity,
82
And re-eyed fury be my conduct
83
now!
Now,Tybalt, take the villainback again
That late thou gavest me, for Mercutios soul
Is but a little way above our heads,
Staying for thine to keep him company.
Either thou or I, or both, must go with him.
Tybalt Thou wretched boy, that didst consort him
84
here,
Shalt with him hence.
Romeo (drawing his sword) This shall determine that.
+nr. ricn+. T.i:i+ r:iis
Benvolio Romeo, away, be gone.
The citizens are up,
85
and Tybalt slain.
Stand not amazed.
86
The Prince will doom thee
87
death
:c+ scrxr +
+o:
++
+:o
+:
;o what is destined to happen, destiny
;; moe days more days, later times
;: doth depend (+) is contingent upon, (:) will follow from
;, this day
:o other days
:+ raging, violent
:: respective lenity courteous/careful /civil mildness/gentleness
: guidance
: with him
: are up have risen, are excited/roused
:o bewildered, stunned
:; doom thee sentence* you to (verb)
If thou art taken.
88
Hence, be gone, away!
Romeo O I am fortunes fool.
Benvolio Why dost thou stay?
rxi+ Roxro
rx+rr Ci+izrxs
Citizen Which way ran he that killed Mercutio?
Tybalt, that murderer, which way ran he?
Benvolio There lies that Tybalt.
Citizen Up,
89
sir, go with me.
I charge
90
thee in the Princes name obey.
rx+rr Prixcr, :++rxiri, Oii Mox+:cur, C:ruir+,
+nrir Wivrs, :xi o+nrrs
Prince Where are the vile beginners of this fray?
Benvolio O noble Prince, I can discover
91
all
The unlucky manage
92
of this fatal brawl.
There lies the man, slain by young Romeo,
That slew thy kinsman, brave Mercutio.
Lady Capulet Tybalt, my cousin. O my brothers child!
O Prince, O husband, O the blood is spilled
Of my dear kinsman. Prince, as thou art true,
For blood of ours shed blood of Montague.
O cousin, cousin.
Prince Benvolio, who began this bloody fray?
:c+ scrxr +
+o
+o
+
+o
+
:: caught, captured, seized*
:, come
,o command
,+ make known, disclose
,: actions, conduct
Benvolio Tybalt, here slain, whom Romeos hand did slay.
Romeo, that spoke him fair,
93
bid him bethink
94
How nice
95
the quarrel was, and urged withal
96
Your high displeasure.
97
All this utterd
98
With gentle breath, calm look, knees humbly bowed
Could not take truce
99
with the unruly spleen
100
Of Tybalt, deaf to peace, but that he tilts
101
With piercing steel at bold Mercutios breast,
Who, all as hot, turns
102
deadly point to point,
And, with a martial scorn, with one hand beats
Cold death aside and with the other sends
It
103
back to Tybalt, whose dexterity
Retorts
104
it. Romeo he cries
105
aloud,
Hold, friends! Friends, part!and swifter than his tongue
His agile arm beats down their fatal points
And twixt them rushes, underneath whose arm
An envious thrust from Tybalt hit the life
Of stout
106
Mercutio, and then Tybalt ed,
But by and by comes back to Romeo,
:c+ scrxr +
+o
+o
+
+oo
+o
, courteously
, remember
, foolish, senseless, trivial*
,o in addition, besides
,; high displeasure exalted/grave anger
,: your HIGH disPLEAsure ALL this UTterED
,, take truce make peace
+oo unruly spleen disorderly/ungovernable hot/irritable/capricious temper
+o+ thrusts/strikes at
+o: returns, sends back
+o cold death (his own sword point)
+o replies/returns in kind
+o Romeo he cries Romeo cries
+oo proud, brave, formidable
Who had but newly entertained
107
revenge,
And tot
108
they go like lightning, for, ere I
Could draw
109
to part them, was stout Tybalt slain
And as he fell did Romeo turn and y.
110
This is the truth, or let Benvolio die.
Lady Capulet He is a kinsman to the Montague.
Aection
111
makes him false, he speaks not true.
Some twenty of them fought in this black
112
strife,
And all those twenty could but kill one life.
I beg for justice, which thou, Prince, must give.
Romeo slew Tybalt; Romeo must not live.
Prince Romeo slew him, he slew Mercutio.
Who now the price
113
of his dear
114
blood doth owe?
Montague Not Romeo, Prince. He was Mercutios friend.
His fault concludes but what the law should end,
The life of Tybalt.
Prince And for that oense
Immediately we do exile him hence.
I have an interest in your hates proceeding,
My blood
115
for your rude brawls doth lie ableeding.
But Ill amerce
116
you with so strong
117
a ne
:c+ scrxr +
+o
+;o
+;
+:o
+:
+o; considered
+o: tot (to it) set to it, attack, ght
+o, draw his sword
++o ee
+++ (+) kind feeling, (:) bias, partiality
++: foul
++ payment, cost
++ precious
++ my blood my familys blood, Mercutio being his kinsman
++o punish
++; powerful, massive, severe, heavy
That you shall all repent the loss of mine.
I will be deaf to pleading and excuses;
Nor
118
tears nor prayers shall purchase out
119
abuses.
Therefore use none. Let Romeo hence
120
in haste,
Else, when he is found, that hour
121
is his last.
Bear hence
122
this body, and attend
123
our
124
will.
Mercy but murders, pardoning
125
those that kill.
rxrux+
:c+ scrxr +
+oo
+,o
++: neither
++, purchase out redeem
+:o go away (go hence)
+:+ (bisyllabic:AWer)
+:: away
+: pay heed to
+: my (the royal we)
+: PARDning
s cr xr :
Capulets orchard
rx+rr Juiir+
Juliet Gallop apace,
1
you ery-footed
2
steeds,
Towards Phoebus lodging.
3
Such a wagoner
4
As Phaeton
5
would whip you to the west
And bring in cloudy night immediately.
Spread thy close
6
curtain, love-performing
7
night,
That runaway
8
eyes may wink,
9
and Romeo
Leap to these arms untalked of and unseen.
Lovers can see to do their amorous rites
By their own beauties, or, if love be blind,
It best agrees with
10
night. Come, civil
11
night,
Thou sober-suited
12
matron, all in black,
And learn me how to lose a winning match,
13
Played for a pair
14
of stainless
15
maidenhoods.
:c+ scrxr :
+o;

+o
+ swiftly
: ery-footed glowingly hot-footed (as the horses of Phoebus, the sun
god, properly are)
dwelling (back to their stable, so it will be night)
driver (merry, light tone)
(sun gods wild-driving son)
o (+) secret, (:) snug
; love-performing (compound adjective)
: gadding about? night wandering?
, close
+o best agrees with is most harmonious with, most favorable to
++ polite, well governed, sober
+: sober-suited dressed soberly
+ lose a winning match lose virginity but win (+) a husband/mate, (:) the
contest
+ ( Juliet and Romeo are both virgins)
+ unblemished, pure
Hood
16
my unmanned
17
blood, bating
18
in my cheeks,
With thy black mantle,
19
till strange
20
love, grown bold,
21
Think true love acted simple modesty.
22
Come, night. Come, Romeo. Come, thou day in night,
23
For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night
Whiter than new snow upon a ravens back.
Come, gentle night. Come, loving, black-browed night,
Give me my Romeo.And when I shall die
24
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so ne
That all the world will be in love with night
And pay no worship to the garish
25
sun.
26
O I have bought
27
the mansion
28
of a love
But not possessed it, and though I am sold,
29
Not yet enjoyed. So tedious is this day
:c+ scrxr :
+o:
+
:o
:
+o cover (as young, untrained falcons/hawks are hooded to keep them calm)
+; (+) untrained, not broken in, (:) not subjected to/occupied/possessed by a
man
+: uttering, beating
+, (+) loose, sleeveless cloak, (:) blanket
:o unknown, unfamiliar
:+ (+) fearless, (:) without shame
:: think true love acted simple modesty thinks genuine love performed/
represented innocent purity/chastity (strange loveis the subject of
think)
: day in night brightness in darkness
: (the Elizabethan meaning, sexual climax/orgasm, is plainly most on her mind)
: gaudy, vulgar, ostentatious
:o (Take him . . . the garish sun: these four lines make no sense unless
Romeo is understood to dieexactly as Juliet expects to; the verb take
which can mean captivateas well as capture,and also has the meaning
of sexually possessing then has as its subject the glories that night will
bring them)
:; by marriage (both a sacrament and a contract)
:: splendid human body (as the mansion houseinhabited by the soul)
:, I am sold I, too, as Romeo is, have been sold/acquired in this mutual rite
of acquisition
As is the night before some festival
To an impatient child that hath new robes
30
And may not wear them. O here comes my Nurse.
rx+rr Nursr, vi+n i:iirr or coris
And she brings news, and every tongue that speaks
But Romeos name speaks heavenly eloquence.
Now, Nurse, what news? What hast thou there? The cords
That Romeo bid thee fetch?
Nurse Ay, ay, the cords.
snr +nrovs +nrx iovx
Juliet Ay me, what news? Why dost thou wring thy hands
Nurse Ah, weraday!
31
Hes dead, hes dead, hes dead!
We are undone,
32
lady, we are undone.
Alack the day! Hes gone, hes killed, hes dead.
Juliet Can heaven be so envious?
33
Nurse Romeo can,
Though heaven cannot. O Romeo, Romeo,
Who ever would have thought it? Romeo!
Juliet What devil art thou that dost torment me thus?
This torture should be roared in dismal hell.
Hath Romeo slain himself ? Say thou but Ay,
And that bare vowel Ayshall poison more
Than the death darting
34
eye of cockatrice.
35
I am not I, if there be such an Ay,
:c+ scrxr :
+o,
o

o clothes
+ welladay, alas*
: ruined, destroyed
spiteful, malicious, full of ill will
shooting
poisonous monster/serpent that can kill by a glance
Or those eyes
36
shut that make thee answer Ay.
If he be slain, say Ay,or if not,no.
Brief
37
sounds determine of
38
my weal
39
or woe.
Nurse I saw the wound, I saw it with mine eyes,
(God save the mark!)
40
here on his manly breast.
A piteous corse,
41
a bloody piteous corse,
Pale, pale as ashes, all bedaubed
42
in blood,
All in gore
43
blood. I swounded
44
at the sight.
Juliet O break,
45
my heart. Poor bankrupt, break at once.
To prison, eyes, neer look on liberty.
Vile earth,
46
to earth resign,
47
end motion
48
here,
And thou and Romeo press
49
one heavy bier.
50
Nurse O Tybalt,Tybalt, the best friend I had.
O courteous Tybalt. Honest gentleman,
That ever I should live to see thee dead.
Juliet What storm is this that blows so contrary?
Is Romeo slaughtered, and is Tybalt dead?
My dear loved cousin, and my dearer lord?
:c+ scrxr :
++o
o

oo
o
o those eyes Romeos eyes
; (+) short, (:) hasty, quick*
: either
, happiness, success
o God save the mark! God help/preserve us!
+ corpse
: spattered
thick, congealing blood (adjective)
fainted (swooned)
(which can also mean to ruin nancially, to bankrupt)
o her body
; to earth resign to the grave surrender
: movement (life)
, weigh down
o the stand on which cons are set
Then, dreadful
51
trumpet, sound the general doom,
52
For who is living, if those two are gone?
Nurse Tybalt is gone, and Romeo banishd.
Romeo that killed him, he is banishd.
Juliet O God! Did Romeos hand shed Tybalts blood?
Nurse It did, it did, alas the day, it did.
Juliet O serpent heart, hid with a owering face.
Did ever dragon keep
53
so fair a cave?
Beautiful tyrant,
54
end angelical,
Dove feathered raven, wolvish ravening lamb!
Despisd substance of divinest show!
55
Just opposite
56
to what thou justly
57
seemst:
A damnd saint, an honorable villain!
O nature, what hadst thou to do in hell
When thou didst bower
58
the spirit of a end
In mortal paradise of such sweet esh?
Was ever book containing such vile matter
So fairly bound? O that deceit should dwell
In such a gorgeous palace.
Nurse Theres no trust,
No faith, no honesty in men, all perjured,
All forsworn,
59
all naught, all dissemblers.
:c+ scrxr :
+++
;o
;
:o
:
+ awe-inspiring
: general doom Last Judgment
(+) live in, (:) guard
desperado, ruan, villain (in its modern sense)
outside appearance
o just opposite substance exactly opposite
; with good reason
: shelter, enclose
, liars, breakers of their oaths
Ah, wheres my man? Give me some aqua vitae.
60
These griefs, these woes, these sorrows make me old.
Shame come to Romeo.
Juliet Blistered be thy tongue
For such a wish. He was not born to shame.
Upon his brow shame is ashamed to sit,
For tis a throne where honor may be crowned
Sole monarch of the universal earth.
O what a beast was I to chide at him.
Nurse Will you speak well of him that killed your cousin?
Juliet Shall I speak ill of him that is my husband?
Ah, poor my lord,
61
what tongue shall smooth
62
thy name
When I, thy three hours wife, have mangled it?
But wherefore, villain, didst thou
63
kill my cousin?
That villain cousin would have killed my husband.
Back, foolish tears, back to your native spring,
64
Your tributary drops
65
belong to woe,
Which you, mistaking, oer up to joy.
My husband lives, that
66
Tybalt would have slain,
And Tybalts dead, that would have slain my husband.
All this is comfort.Wherefore weep I then?
Some word there was, worser than Tybalts death,
That murdered me. I would forget it fain,
:c+ scrxr :
++:
,o
,
+oo
+o
oo brandy, whiskey (Latin:water of life)*
o+ poor my lord my poor lord
o: clear, polish
o Romeo
o native spring original/natural place of origin/source
o tributary drops drops that pay tribute/ swell some larger stream
oo who
But O it presses to
67
my memory
Like damnd guilty deeds to sinners minds.
Tybalt is dead, and Romeo banishd.
That banishd,that one word,banishd,
Hath slain ten thousand Tybalts.Tybalts death
Was woe enough, if it had ended there,
Or if sour woe delights in fellowship
68
And needly
69
will be ranked
70
with other griefs,
Why followed not, when she said Tybalts dead,
Thy father,or thy mother nay, or both,
Which modern lamentation might have moved?
71
But with a rearward
72
following Tybalts death,
Romeo is banishd to speak that word
Is father, mother,Tybalt, Romeo, Juliet,
All slain, all dead.Romeo is banishd:
There is no end, no limit, measure,
73
bound,
74
In that words death, no words can that woe sound.
75
Where is my father and my mother, Nurse?
Nurse Weeping and wailing over Tybalts corse.
Will you go to them? I will bring you thither.
Juliet Wash they his wounds with tears? Mine shall be spent,
When theirs are dry, for Romeos banishment.
:c+ scrxr :
++
++o
++
+:o
+:
+o
o; presses to forces itself on, attacks/assails/harasses
o: company
o, necessity
;o wishes to be joined/positioned with
;+ modern lamentation might have moved might have provoked/caused
ordinary lamentation
;: later/subsequent addition (literally:rearguard)
; quantity
; boundary
; reach to the bottom of
Take up those cords. Poor ropes, you are beguiled,
Both you and I, for Romeo is exiled.
76
He made you for a highway to my bed,
But I, a maid, die maiden widowd.
Come, cords, come, Nurse. Ill to my wedding bed,
And death, not Romeo, take my maidenhead.
Nurse Hie to your chamber. Ill nd Romeo
To comfort you. I wot
77
well where he is.
Hark ye, your Romeo will be here at night.
Ill to him. He is hid at Laurence cell.
Juliet O nd him! Give this ring to my true knight
And bid him come to take his last farewell.
rxrux+
:c+ scrxr :
++
+
+o
;o (exILED)
;; know
s cr xr
Friar Laurences cell
rx+rr Fri:r L:urrxcr
Friar Romeo, come forth, come forth, thou fearful
1
man.
Aiction is enamored of thy parts,
2
And thou art wedded to calamity.
rx+rr Roxro
Romeo Father, what news? What is the Princes doom?
What sorrow craves acquaintance at my hand
That I yet know not?
Friar Too familiar
Is my dear son with such sour company.
I bring thee tidings of the Princes doom.
Romeo What less than doomsday is the Princes doom?
Friar A gentler judgment vanished
3
from his lips:
Not bodys death, but bodys banishment.
Romeo Ha, banishment? Be merciful, say death,
For exile hath more terror in his look,
Much more than death. Do not say banishment.
Friar Hence from Verona art thou banishd.
Be patient, for the world is broad and wide.
Romeo There is no world without
4
Verona walls,
But purgatory, torture, hell itself.
Hence banishd is banished from the world,
:c+ scrxr
++

+o
+
+ frightened, terrorized
: personal qualities/attributes*
fell (and then disappeared, as spoken words necessarily do)
outside
And worlds exile
5
is death.Then banishment
Is death mis-termed. Calling death banishment
6
Thou cutst my head o with a golden axe
And smilest upon the stroke that murders me.
Friar O deadly sin, O rude unthankfulness.
Thy fault our law calls death, but the kind Prince,
Taking thy part, hath rushed
7
aside the law
And turned that black word death to banishment.
This is dear mercy, and thou seest it not.
Romeo Tis torture, and not mercy. Heaven is here
Where Juliet lives, and every cat and dog
And little mouse, every unworthy
8
thing,
Live here in heaven and may look on her,
But Romeo may not. More validity,
9
More honorable
10
state,
11
more courtship
12
lives
In carrion ies than Romeo.They
13
may seize
On the white wonder of dear Juliets hand
And steal immortal blessing from her lips,
Who, even in pure and vestal modesty,
Still blush, as thinking their own kisses sin,
But Romeo may not, he is banishd.
:c+ scrxr
++o
:o
:
o

o
(exILE)
o is DEATH misTERMED. CALLing death BANishMENT
; forced, driven
: worthless, undeserving
, (+) force, strength, eectiveness, (:) value, worth
+o (HONorABle)
++ manner of existence
+: courtliness
+ there are those who (theyseems not to refer back, as modern pronouns
tend to do, but forward, to who blush . . . thinking . . .: can we suspect
iesof existing in pure and vestal modesty?)
Flies
14
may do this, but I from this must y.
They are
15
free men, but I am banishd.
And sayest thou yet that exile is not death?
Hadst thou no poison mixed, no sharp ground knife,
No sudden mean
16
of death, though neer so mean,
17
But banishdto kill me
18
banishd?
O friar, the damnd use
19
that word in hell:
Howling attends
20
it. How hast thou the heart,
Being a divine,
21
a ghostly confessor,
22
A sin absolver, and my friend professed,
23
To mangle me with that word banishd?
Friar Thou fond
24
mad man, hear me a little speak.
Romeo O thou wilt speak again of banishment.
Friar Ill give thee armor to keep o that word,
Adversitys sweet milk, philosophy,
To comfort thee, though thou art banishd.
Romeo Yet banishd? Hang up philosophy.
25
Unless philosophy can make a Juliet,
Displant
26
a town, reverse a princes doom,
:c+ scrxr
++;

+ not only men, but even ies

+ are like?
+o means
+; poor, inferior, debased
+: (the syntax is hadst thou no poison [etc.] . . . to kill me)
+, damnd use: noun verb
:o follows, accompanies (in hell)
:+ clergyman, priest
:: (CONfesSOR)
: declared, self-acknowledged, ostensible
: foolish, silly
: hang up philosophy philosophy be hanged
:o substitute for
It helps not, it prevails
27
not.Talk no more.
Friar O then I see that madmen have no ears.
Romeo How should they, when that
28
wise men have no eyes?
Friar Let me dispute
29
with thee of thy estate.
30
Romeo Thou canst not speak of that
31
thou dost not feel.
Wert thou as young as I, Juliet thy love,
An hour but married,Tybalt murderd,
Doting like me, and like me banishd,
Then mightst thou speak, then mightst thou tear thy hair,
And fall upon the ground, as I do now,
Taking the measure
32
of an unmade
33
grave. ( falls at full
length)
kxock
Friar Arise, one knocks. Good Romeo, hide thyself.
Romeo Not I, unless the breath of heartsick groans
Mist-like
34
enfold me from the search
35
of eyes.
kxock
Friar Hark, how they knock! Whos there? Romeo, arise,
Thou wilt be taken. (to the person knocking) Stay awhile!
(to Romeo) Stand up,
:c+ scrxr
++:
oo
o
;o
;
:; succeeds, avails
:: when that when
:, debate, discuss, argue
o condition, fortune
+ what
: taking the measure measuring
not yet made
mist-like like mist
scrutiny, examination
kxock
run to my study. (to the person knocking) By and by! (to
Romeo) Gods will,
What simpleness
36
is this. (to the person knocking) I come,
I come.
kxock
Who knocks so hard? Whence come you? Whats your will?
Nurse (within) Let me come in, and you shall know my errand.
I come from Lady Juliet.
Friar Welcome then.
rx+rr Nursr
Nurse O holy friar, O tell me, holy friar,
Where is my ladys lord, wheres Romeo?
Friar There on the ground, with his own tears made drunk.
Nurse O he is even in my mistress case,
Just in her case. O woeful sympathy,
Piteous predicament.
37
Even so lies she,
Blubbring and weeping, weeping and blubbering.
Stand up, stand up! Stand, an you be a man.
For Juliets sake, for her sake, rise and stand!
Why should you fall into so deep an O?
38
Romeo (rising) Nurse
Nurse Ah sir, ah sir, deaths the end of all.
Romeo Spakst thou of Juliet? How is it with her?
:c+ scrxr
++,
:o
:
,o
o foolishness
; state, situation (usually dangerous)
: so deep an O so deep a state of lamentation/groaning
Doth not she think me an old
39
murderer,
Now
40
I have stained the childhood of our joy
With blood removed
41
but little from her own?
Where is she? And how doth she? And what says
42
My concealed
43
lady to our canceled love?
Nurse O she says nothing, sir, but weeps and weeps,
And now falls on her bed, and then starts up,
And Tybalt calls, and then on Romeo cries,
And then down falls again.
Romeo As if that name,
44
Shot from the deadly level
45
of a gun,
Did murder her, as
46
that names cursd hand
Murdered her kinsman. O tell me, friar, tell me,
In what vile part of this anatomy
Doth my name lodge?
47
Tell me, that I may sack
48
The hateful mansion.
49
nr ir:vs nis i:ccrr
Friar Hold thy desprate hand.
Art thou a man? Thy form cries out thou art,
:c+ scrxr
+:o
,
+oo
+o
, practiced, experienced
o now that
+ distant in relationship
: where IS she AND how DOTH she AND what SAYS
secret (CONcealed)
that name: Romeo
aiming
o just as
; reside, dwell
: plunder, despoil
, (his own body)
Thy tears are womanish, thy wild acts denote
50
The unreasonable
51
fury of a beast.
Unseemly
52
woman in a seeming
53
man,
Or ill beseeming beast in seeming both!
Thou hast amazed me. By my holy order,
54
I thought thy disposition
55
better tempered.
56
Hast thou slain Tybalt? Wilt thou slay thyself
And slay thy lady, that
57
in thy life lives,
By doing damnd hate upon thyself ?
Why railst
58
thou on thy birth, the heaven, and earth,
Since birth and heaven and earth all three do meet
In thee at once, which thou at once wouldst lose.
59
Fie, e, thou shamst thy shape,
60
thy love, thy wit,
Which, like a usurer,
61
aboundst in all,
62
And usest
63
none in that true use
64
indeed
Which should bedeck
65
thy shape, thy love, thy wit.
:c+ scrxr
+:+
++o
++
+:o
+:
o indicate
+ irrational
: unbecoming, indecent
a seeming an apparent
by my holy order: an exclamation/oath
nature, temperament, inclination
o better tempered more elastic, balanced
; who
: speak abusively about
, which thou at once wouldst lose if you killed/want to kill yourself
oo human and manly
o+ a grasping man who lends money at high rates of interest
o: aboundst in all fairly teems in you (and in all men?)
o you use (like a usurer, who illicitly by church doctrine charges interest
for the useof his money)
o true use:holy use, as opposed to a usurers illicit use
o adorn
Thy noble shape is but a form of wax
66
Digressing
67
from the valor of a man;
Thy dear love sworn
68
but hollow perjury,
69
Killing that love which thou hast vowed to cherish;
Thy wit, that ornament to shape and love,
Misshapen
70
in the conduct of them both,
Like powder
71
in a skilless soldiers ask,
72
Is set are by thine own ignorance
And thou dismembered
73
with thine own defense.
74
What, rouse thee, man! Thy Juliet is alive,
For whose dear sake thou wast but lately
75
dead.
There
76
art thou happy.Tybalt would kill thee,
But thou slewst Tybalt.There art thou happy too.
The law, that threatened death, becomes thy friend
And turns it to exile.There art thou happy.
A pack
77
of blessings light upon thy back;
Happiness courts thee in her best array;
78
But like a misbehaved and sullen wench
Thou pouts upon thy fortune and thy love.
:c+ scrxr
+::
+o
+
+o
oo a form of wax a waxen shape
o; swerving, diverging
o: (adjective modifying love)
o, hollow perjury empty falsehod
;o distorted, deformed
;+ like powder as gunpowder
;: gunpowder case, made of horn, leather, or metal
; ripped apart
; that which should defend you, in Romeos case reason, intellect
; not long since
;o in that/her
;; bundle
;: attire, dress
Take heed, take heed, for such
79
die miserable.
Go get thee to thy love, as was decreed,
80
Ascend her chamber hence, and comfort her.
But look
81
thou stay
82
not till the watch
83
be set,
84
For then thou canst not pass
85
to Mantua,
Where thou shalt live till we can nd a time
To blaze
86
your marriage, reconcile your friends,
Beg pardon of the Prince, and call thee back
With twenty hundred thousand times more joy
Than thou wentst forth in lamentation.
87
Go before, Nurse. Commend me to thy lady,
And bid her hasten all the house to bed,
Which heavy sorrow makes them apt unto.
Romeo is coming.
Nurse O Lord, I could have stayed here all the night
To hear good counsel. O what learning is.
(to Romeo) My lord, Ill tell my lady you will come.
Romeo Do so, and bid my sweet prepare to chide.
Nursr s+:r+s +o ir:vr, +nrx +urxs i:ck
Nurse Here is a ring she bid me give you, sir.
Hie you, make haste, for it grows very late.
rxi+ Nursr
:c+ scrxr
+:
+
+o
+
+oo
;, such people
:o resolved, decided, arranged
:+ be careful, make sure
:: linger
: sentinels, guards (police)*
: set in place (for the night), posted
: get through
:o proclaim and publicize
:; LAmenTAtiON
Romeo How well my comfort
88
is revived by this.
Friar Go hence, good night and here stands all your state:
Either be gone before the watch be set,
Or by the break of day, disguised, from hence.
Sojourn in Mantua. Ill nd out your man,
89
And he shall signify
90
from time to time
Every good hap
91
to you that chances here.
Give me thy hand. Tis late. Farewell, good night.
Romeo But that a joy past joy calls out on me,
It were a grief so brief to part
92
with thee.
Farewell.
rxrux+
:c+ scrxr
+:
+o
+;o
+;
:: enjoyment, pleasure
:, servant
,o make known
,+ good chance/fortune
,: so brief to part to leave even for such a brief period
s cr xr
Capulets house
rx+rr Oii C:ruir+, L:i. C:ruir+, :xi P:ris
Capulet Things have fallen out
1
, sir, so unluckily
That we have had no time to move
2
our daughter.
Look you, she loved her kinsman Tybalt dearly,
And so did I.Well, we were born to die.
Tis very late; shell not come down tonight.
I promise you, but for your company,
I would have been abed an hour ago.
Paris These times of woe aord no times to woo.
Madam, good night. Commend me to your daughter.
Lady Capulet I will, and know
3
her mind early tomorrow.
Tonight shes mewed up to
4
her heaviness.
Capulet Sir Paris, I will make a desprate
5
tender
6
Of my childs love. I think she will be ruled
7
In all respects by me. Nay more, I doubt it not.
Wife, go you to her ere you go to bed.
Acquaint her here of my son
8
Paris love
And bid her (mark you me?) on Wednesday next
But, soft.What day is this?
:c+ scrxr
+:

+o
+
+ fallen out chanced to happen
: persuade, solicit, propose
I will know
mewed up to shut in with her
somewhat reckless and unsure
o oer
; controlled, guided
: son-in-law to be, which then meant sonand was often used in advance of
actual marriage
Paris Monday, my lord.
Capulet Monday! Ha, ha! Well,Wednesday is too soon.
Thursday let it be, a
9
Thursday, tell her
She shall be married to this noble earl.
10
(to Paris) Will you be ready?
11
Do you like this haste?
Well keep
12
no great ado,
13
a friend or two,
For hark you,Tybalt being slain so late,
14
It may be thought we held him
15
carelessly,
Being our kinsman, if we revel much.
Therefore well have some half a dozen friends,
And there an end. But what say you to Thursday?
Paris My lord, I would that Thursday were tomorrow.
Capulet Well, get you gone.A Thursday be it then.
(to Lady Capulet) Go you to Juliet ere you go to bed.
Prepare her, wife, against
16
this wedding day.
(to Paris) Farewell, my lord. (to Servant) Light to
17
my
chamber, ho!
Afore me.
18
It is so very late that we
May call it early by and by. Good night.
rxrux+
:c+ scrxr
+:o
:o
:
o

, on
+o (that is,count)
++ willing
+: observe
+ fuss
+ recently, lately
+ held him esteemed/regarded him
+o with regard to*
+; light to bring light for my going to
+: (+) (if spoken to a servant): go/walk in front/in advance of me, (:) (if
spoken to Paris) O my (in my very sight/in the presence of God)
s cr xr
Capulets orchard
rx+rr Roxro :xi Juiir+ :ior+, :+ +nr vixiov
Juliet Wilt thou be gone? It is not yet near day.
It was the nightingale, and not the lark,
That pierced the fearful
1
hollow of thine ear.
Nightly she sings on yond pomgranate tree.
2
Believe me, love, it was the nightingale.
Romeo It was the lark, the herald of the morn,
No nightingale. Look, love, what envious streaks
Do lace
3
the severing
4
clouds in yonder east.
Nights candles are burnt out, and jocund
5
day
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops.
I must be gone and live, or stay and die.
Juliet Yond light is not daylight,
6
I know it, I.
It is some meteor
7
that the sun exhales
To be to thee this night a torchbearer
8
And light thee on the way to Mantua.
Therefore stay yet, thou needst not to be gone.
Romeo Let me be taen, let me be put to death.
I am content, so thou wilt have it so.
Ill say yon gray is not the mornings eye,
:c+ scrxr
+:;

+o
+
+ apprehensive, full of fear
: (NIGHTly she SINGS on YOND pomGRANate TREE)
embroider, thread
separating, parting
mirthful, light-hearted
o (dayLIGHT)
; aring light thought to be gaseous vapors from the sun (MEETyor)
: TORCHbearER
Tis but the pale reex
9
of Cynthias brow.
10
Nor that is not the lark whose notes do beat
The vaulty
11
heaven so high above our heads.
I have more care
12
to stay than will to go.
Come, death, and welcome. Juliet wills it so.
How ist, my soul?
13
Lets talk, it is not day.
Juliet It is, it is. Hie hence, be gone, away.
It is the lark that sings so out of tune,
Straining
14
harsh discords
15
and unpleasing sharps.
16
Some say the lark makes sweet division.
17
This
18
doth not so, for she divideth us.
Some say the lark and loathd toad change
19
eyes.
O now I would they had changed voices too,
Since arm from arm
20
that voice doth us aray,
21
Hunting thee hence with Hunts up
22
to the day.
O now be gone, more light and light it grows.
Romeo More light and light, more dark and dark our woes.
rx+rr Nursr
:c+ scrxr
+::
:o
:
o

, reection
+o Cynthias brow the moons forehead
++ arched like a vault
+: concern, solicitude, desire
+ my soul Juliet
+ constricting its throat to produce, forcing
+ dissonances
+o shrill, high-pitched notes
+; melody, song (diVISiON)
+: this particular lark
+, exchanged (toads having large and lovely eyes, larks small and uninteresting
eyes)
:o arm from arm each others arms
:+ disturb, frighten
:: (song calling sleepers to wake and join the hunt)
Nurse Madam.
Juliet Nurse?
Nurse Your lady mother is coming to your chamber.
The day is broke, be wary, look about.
rxi+
Juliet Then, window, let day in, and let life out.
Romeo Farewell, farewell. One kiss, and Ill descend.
23
nr cors iovx
Juliet Art thou gone so, love
24
lord, ay husband friend?
25
I must hear from thee every day in the hour,
For in a minute there are many days.
O by this count I shall be much in years
Ere I again behold my Romeo.
Romeo Farewell.
I will omit no opportunity
That may convey my greetings, love, to thee.
Juliet O thinkst thou we shall ever meet again?
Romeo I doubt it not, and all these woes shall serve
For sweet discourses
26
in our time to come.
Juliet O God, I have an ill-divining
27
soul!
Methinks I see thee, now thou art below,
As one dead in the bottom of a tomb.
:c+ scrxr
+:,
o

: (using his rope ladder)

: (some texts follow lovewith a comma)
: love lord compound noun; husband friend compound noun, though
friend lover (texts vary a great deal)
:o conversations
:; ill-divining foreseeing evil (compound adjective)
Either my eyesight fails, or thou lookst pale.
Romeo And trust me, love, in my eye so do you.
Dry
28
sorrow drinks our blood.Adieu, adieu.
rxi+
Juliet O Fortune, Fortune! All men call thee ckle.
If thou art ckle, what dost thou with him
That is renowned for faith? Be ckle,
29
Fortune,
30
For then I hope thou wilt not keep him long
But send him back.
Lady Capulet (within) Ho, daughter.Are you up?
Juliet Who ist that calls? It is my lady mother.
Is she not down
31
so late, or up so early?
What unaccustomed cause procures
32
her hither?
rx+rr L:i. C:ruir+
Lady Capulet Why, how now, Juliet?
Juliet Madam, I am not well.
Lady Capulet Evermore weeping for your cousins death?
What, wilt thou wash him from his grave with tears?
An if thou couldst,
33
thou couldst not make him live.
Therefore have done. Some
34
grief shows much of love,
35
But much of grief shows still some want
36
of wit.
:c+ scrxr
+o
oo
o
;o
:: thirsty
:, ckle with him
o Fortuna, a goddess
+ gone to bed
: induces, brings, urges
wash him from his grave
a certain amount of
much of love much love
o (noun)
Juliet Yet let me weep for such a feeling
37
loss.
Lady Capulet So shall you feel the loss, but not the friend
38
Which you weep for.
Juliet Feeling so the loss,
I cannot choose but ever weep the friend.
39
Lady Capulet Well, girl, thou weepst not so much for his death
As that the villain lives which slaughtered him.
Juliet What villain, madam?
Lady Capulet That same villain Romeo.
Juliet (aside) Villain and he be many miles asunder.
40
(to Lady Capulet) God pardon him: I do, with all my heart,
And yet no man like
41
he doth grieve my heart.
Lady Capulet That is because the traitor murderer lives.
Juliet Ay, madam, from the reach of these my hands.
Would none but I might venge my cousins death.
Lady Capulet We will have vengeance for it, fear thou not.
Then weep no more. Ill send to one
42
in Mantua,
Where that same banished runagate
43
doth live,
Shall give him such an unaccustomed dram
44
That he shall soon keep Tybalt company;
And then I hope thou wilt be satised.
Juliet Indeed I never shall be satised
45
With Romeo till I behold him dead
:c+ scrxr
++
;
:o
:
,o
; emotional, heartfelt (adjective)
: friendalso means lover(though Lady Capulet does not so intend it)
, friend lover (and Juliet does so intend it)
o separated, apart
+ in the same way, as much as
: someone, some person
runaway, fugitive
unaccustomed dram strange potion/drink*
sexually satised (which Lady Capulet did not mean to say)
Is my poor heart
46
so
47
for a kinsman vexed.
48
Madam, if you could nd out but a man
To bear a poison, I would temper
49
it,
That
50
Romeo should, upon receipt
51
thereof,
Soon sleep
52
in quiet.
53
O how my heart abhors
To hear him named and cannot
54
come to him,
55
To wreak
56
the love I bore my cousin Tybalt
Upon his body
57
that
58
hath slaughtered him.
Lady Capulet Find thou the means, and Ill nd such a man.
But now Ill tell thee joyful tidings, girl.
Juliet And joy comes well in such a needy time.
What are they, I beseech your ladyship?
:c+ scrxr
+:
,
+oo
+o
o Lady Capulet hears till I behold [Romeo] dead.But Juliet, who is
deceiving her mother all through the scene, means till I behold [Romeo],
dead is my poor heart . . .Pausing before and after deadis the key.
; thus, in that way
: a kinsman vexed a relative (as Romeo is to her, by marriage, though
Lady Capulet does not know Juliet is married) troubled/harassed/grieved
(as Romeo certainly is and as Tybalt can no longer be, since he is past all
feeling)
, (+) mix, add to (which Lady Capulet understands), (:) make it suitable/
proper, reduce/modify/moderate (which Juliet in fact means)
o so that
+ (+) ingesting (which Lady Capulet understands), (:) receiving (which Juliet
means)
: (+) die (as Lady Capulet understands), (:) sleep (as Juliet means)
in quiet (+) lifeless (which Lady Capulet understands), (:) peacefully (as
Juliet means)
and cannot when I cannot
come to him (+) get at him (which Lady Capulet understands), (:) be
with him (as Juliet means)
o (+) force (which Lady Capulet understands), (:) press (which Juliet means)
; upon his body (+) against his body (which Lady Capulet understands), (:)
with his body that is, sexually (as Juliet means)
: he who
Lady Capulet Well, well, thou hast a careful
59
father, child,
One who, to put thee from
60
thy heaviness,
Hath sorted out
61
a sudden
62
day of joy
That thou expects not nor I looked not for.
Juliet Madam, in happy time.
63
What day is that?
Lady Capulet Marry,
64
my child, early next Thursday morn
The gallant, young, and noble gentleman,
The County Paris, at Saint Peters Church,
Shall happily make thee there a joyful bride.
Juliet Now by Saint Peters Church, and Peter
65
too,
He shall not make me there a joyful bride.
I wonder at
66
this haste, that I must wed
Ere he
67
that should
68
be husband
69
comes to woo.
I pray you tell my lord and father, madam,
I will not marry yet, and when I do, I swear
70
It shall be Romeo, whom you know I hate,
Rather than Paris.These are news indeed.
Lady Capulet Here comes your father.Tell him so yourself,
And see how be will take it at your hands.
:c+ scrxr
+
++o
++
+:o
+:
, considerate, solicitous
oo put thee from remove/divert you from*
o+ sorted out ordained, ordered, arranged
o: (+) unexpected, (:) speedy
o in happy time excellent! very good!
o (an exclamation, not a verb: originally an ejaculatory evocation of the
Virgin Mary, but by Shakespeares time virtually devoid of its original
signicance)
o by Saint Peter
oo wonder at am surprised by
o; the man
o: ought to, must
o, my husband
;o (a hexameter line)
rx+rr C:ruir+ :xi Nursr
Capulet When the sun sets the air doth drizzle dew,
71
But for the sunset
72
of my brothers son
It rains downright.
73
How now? A conduit,
74
girl? What, still in tears?
Evermore showering? In one little body
Thou counterfeitst
75
a bark,
76
a sea, a wind:
For still thy eyes, which I may call the sea,
Do ebb and ow with tears; the bark thy body is,
Sailing in this salt ood; the winds, thy sighs,
77
Who raging
78
with thy tears, and they with them,
79
Without
80
a sudden calm will overset
81
Thy tempest-tossd
82
body. How now, wife?
Have you delivered
83
to her our decree?
84
Lady Capulet Ay, sir, but she will none,
85
she gives you thanks.
I would the fool were married to her grave.
Capulet Soft.Take me with you,
86
take me with you, wife.
:c+ scrxr
+
+o
+
+o
;+ doth drizzle dew: as if weeping for the departure of the sun
;: death
; coming down perpendicularly, out and out
; fountain, water pipe
; imitate, simulate
;o small-sized sailing vessel
;; the winds, thy sighs the winds are (in Capulets metaphor) your sighs
;: which, if they (the winds) behave wildly/violently
;, and they with them and vice versa
:o unless there is
:+ overthrow, overcome, capsize
:: hurled, disordered
: (+) given, (:) spoken
: decision
: will none wants no part of it (wishes not at all)
:o take me with you let me understand you
How? Will she none? Doth she not give us thanks?
Is she not proud?
87
Doth she not count her
88
blest,
Unworthy
89
as she is, that we have wrought
90
So worthy a gentleman to be her bridegroom?
Juliet Not proud
91
you have, but thankful
92
that you have.
Proud
93
can I never be of what I hate,
94
But thankful even for hate
95
that is meant
96
love.
Capulet How, how, how, how, chop logic?
97
What is this?
Proud,and I thank you,and I thank you not,
And yet not proud? Mistress minion
98
you,
Thank me no thankings, nor proud me no prouds,
But fettle
99
your ne joints
100
gainst
101
Thursday next
To go with Paris to Saint Peters Church,
Or I will drag thee on a hurdle
102
thither.
Out, you green sickness
103
carrion!
104
Out, you baggage!
105
:c+ scrxr
+
+
+o
+
:; honored, gratied, pleased
:: herself
:, undeserving
,o produced
,+ pleased
,: grateful
, pleased
, of what I hate by what I am averse to
, aversion
,o meant to be
,; hair splitter, sophist (some texts have chopped logic)
,: hussy, over-dainty
,, prepare, make ready
+oo ne joints perfect/elegant/delicate body (bones)*
+o+ toward, in preparation for (against)
+o: wooden sledge (on which criminals were conveyed to their place of
execution)
+o green sickness adolescent, immature (compound adjective)
+o carcass (nothing more than worthless esh)
+o (+) rubbish, trash, dirt, (:) slut, whore
You tallow
106
face!
Lady Capulet (to Capulet) Fie, e.What, are you mad?
Juliet Good father, I beseech you on my knees,
Hear me with patience but to speak a word.
snr kxrris
Capulet Hang thee, young baggage, disobedient wretch!
I tell thee what. Get thee to church a
107
Thursday
Or never after look me in the face.
Speak not, reply not, do not answer me.
My ngers itch.Wife, we scarce
108
thought us blest
That God had lent us but this only child,
But now I see this one is one too much,
And that we have a curse in having her.
Out on her, hilding.
109
Nurse God in heaven bless her.
You are to blame,
110
my lord, to rate
111
her so.
Capulet And why, my Lady Wisdom? Hold your tongue,
Good Prudence. Smatter
112
with your gossips, go.
Nurse I speak no treason.
Capulet O God i god en!
113
Nurse May not one speak?
:c+ scrxr
+o
+oo
+o
+;o
+oo wax (adjective)
+o; on
+o: barely, hardly (scarcely)
+o, wretch, jade, baggage
++o wrong (to be blamed)
+++ scold/reprove angrily
++: chatter, prate
++ God i god en for Gods sake (may God give her a good evening that
is, get rid of her)
Capulet Peace, you mumbling fool!
Utter your gravity
114
oer a gossips bowl,
115
For here we need it not.
Lady Capulet You are too hot.
Capulet Gods bread,
116
it makes me mad. Day, night, late,
early,
At home, abroad, alone, in company,
Waking or sleeping, still my care
117
hath been
To have her matched.
118
And having now provided
A gentleman of princely parentage,
Of fair demesnes,
119
youthful, and nobly trained,
120
Stued, as they say, with honorable parts,
Proportioned
121
as ones thought would wish a man
And then to have a wretched puling
122
fool,
A whining mammet,
123
in her fortunes tender,
124
To answer Ill not wed, I cannot love,
I am too young, I pray you pardon me!
But, an you will not wed, Ill pardon you.
Graze
125
where you will, you shall not house
126
with me.
:c+ scrxr
+;
+;
+:o
+:
++ grave/serious/weighty remarks
++ drinking vessel
++o Gods bread consecrated wafer (an oath)
++; attention, concern
++: married
++, possessions, estates (dehMEENZ)
+:o educated
+:+ composed (physically)
+:: whining, wailing
+: doll, puppet
+: in her fortunes tender when good fortune is oered to her
+: feed, pasture
+:o dwell (verb)
Look tot, think ont, I do not use to
127
jest.
Thursday is near, lay hand on heart,
128
advise.
129
An you be mine,
130
Ill give you to my friend
An you be not, hang!
131
Beg! Starve! Die in the streets!
For, by my soul, Ill neer acknowledge
132
thee,
Nor what
133
is mine shall never do thee good.
Trust tot. Bethink you. Ill not be forsworn.
134
rxi+
Juliet Is there no pity sitting in the clouds
That sees into the bottom of my grief?
O sweet my mother, cast me not away.
Delay this marriage for a month, a week,
Or if you do not, make the bridal bed
In that dim monument where Tybalt lies.
Lady Capulet Talk not to me, for Ill not speak a word.
Do as thou wilt, for I have done with thee.
rxi+
Juliet O God! O Nurse, how shall this be prevented?
My husband is on earth, my faith in heaven.
How shall that faith return again to earth
:c+ scrxr
+:
+,o
+,
:oo
:o
+:; do not use to am not in the habit of
+:: lay hand on heart think seriously/carefully/deeply
+:, consider (verb)
+o an you be mine if you are truly/really my daughter
++ go to the devil (go and be hanged so you can go where you belong, to
hell)
+: show any recognition/acknowledgment of
+ what property/funds
+ be forsworn obliged to break my word
Unless that husband send it me
135
from heaven
By leaving earth?
136
Comfort me, counsel me.
Alack, alack, that heaven should practice stratagems
137
Upon so soft
138
a subject
139
as myself.
What sayst thou? Hast thou not a word of joy?
Some comfort, Nurse.
Nurse Faith, here it is.
Romeo is banished, and all the world to nothing
140
That he dares neer come back to challenge
141
you,
Or if he do, it needs must be by stealth.
Then, since the case so stands as now it doth,
I think it best you married with the County.
O hes a lovely gentleman.
Romeos a dishclout
142
to him.An eagle, madam,
Hath not so green,
143
so quick, so fair an eye
As Paris hath. Beshrew my very heart,
I think you are happy in this second match,
For it excels your rst, or if it did not,
Your rst is dead or twere as good he were
As living here and you no use of
144
him.
Juliet Speakst thou this from thy heart?
Nurse And from my soul too, else beshrew them both.
:c+ scrxr
+,
:+o
:+
::o
::
+ to me
+o leaving earth dying
+; practice stratagems play tricks, work schemes
+: quiet, mild, docile
+, person
+o all the world to nothing the chances are a million to one
++ nd fault with, accuse
+: dish cloth
+ (hazel-green eyes were considered handsome)
+ use of prot from (especially sexual prot)
Juliet Amen.
Nurse What?
Juliet Well, thou hast comforted me marvelous much.
Go in, and tell my lady I am gone,
Having displeased my father, to Laurence cell,
To make confession and to be absolved.
Nurse Marry, I will, and this is wisely done.
rxi+
Juliet Ancient damnation!
145
O most wicked end,
Is it more sin to wish me thus forsworn,
146
Or to dispraise my lord with that same tongue
Which she hath praised him with
147
above compare
148
So many thousand times? Go, counselor.
Thou and my bosom henceforth shall be twain.
149
Ill
150
to the friar to know his remedy.
151
If all else fail, myself have power to die.
rxi+
:c+ scrxr
+o
:o
:
:o
+ ancient damnation! damned old devil!
+o perjured
+; which she hath praised him with with which she has praised him
+: above compare beyond comparison
+, parted, separated, estranged
+o Ill go
++ help, relief *
Act

++

s cr xr +
Friar Laurences cell
rx+rr Fri:r L:urrxcr :xi Coux+. P:ris
Friar On Thursday, sir? The time is very short.
Paris My father Capulet will have it so,
And I am nothing slow
1
to slack
2
his haste.
Friar You say you do not know the ladys mind.
Uneven
3
is the course.
4
I like it not.
Paris Immoderately she weeps for Tybalts death,
And therefore have I little talked of love,
For Venus smiles not in a house
5
of tears.
Now sir, her father counts it dangerous
6
+ I am nothing slow I myself am not at all/in no way inclined
: to slack making less active/vigorous
irregular
path
(not a human place of dwelling but an astrological position)
o hurtful, injurious
That she do give her sorrow so much sway,
7
And in his wisdom hastes
8
our marriage
9
To stop the inundation
10
of her tears,
Which, too much minded
11
by herself alone,
12
May be put from her by society.
13
Now do you know the reason of this haste.
Friar (aside) I would I knew not why it should
14
be slowed.
Look, sir, here comes the lady toward my cell.
rx+rr Juiir+
Paris Happily met, my lady and my wife.
Juliet That may be, sir, when I may be a wife.
Paris That may be must be, love, on Thursday next.
Juliet What must be shall be.
Friar Thats a certain
15
text.
Paris Come you to make confession to this father?
Juliet To answer that, I should confess to you.
Paris Do not deny to him that you love me.
Juliet I will confess to you that I love him.
Paris So will ye,
16
I am sure, that you love me.
Juliet If I do so, it will be of more price,
17
:c+ scrxr +
+:
+o
+
:o
:
; inuence, power of command
: (verb)
, (MAriAGE)
+o overowing, ooding, superuous abundance
++ thought of, focused on
+: when alone
+ companionship
+ ought
+ xed, settled
+o so will ye so too will you confess to him
+; value, worth
Being spoke behind your back, than to your face.
Paris Poor soul, thy face is much abused
18
with tears.
Juliet The tears have got small victory by that,
For it was bad enough before their spite.
19
Paris Thou wrongst it more than tears with that report.
20
Juliet That is no slander, sir, which is a truth,
And what I spake, I spake it to my face.
21
Paris Thy face is mine, and thou hast slandered it.
Juliet It may be so, for it is not mine own.
22
Are you at leisure, holy father, now,
Or shall I come to you at evening mass?
Friar My leisure serves me,
23
pensive
24
daughter, now.
(to Paris) My lord, we must entreat
25
the time alone.
Paris God shield
26
I should disturb
27
devotion.
Juliet, on Thursday early will I rouse ye.
Till then, adieu, and keep this holy kiss.
rxi+
Juliet O, shut the door, and when thou hast done so
Come weep with me past hope, past cure, past help!
Friar Ah, Juliet, I already know thy grief.
:c+ scrxr +
+
o

+: misused, worn out

+, injury, harm
:o statement
:+ (pun on saying things to a persons face and, here, literally saying it to a face
her face)
:: (that is, it belongs to the man who is already her husband, Romeo)
: serves me is my servant/helper (obeys me)
: (+) thoughtful, serious, (:) anxious, apprehensive
: ask for
:o prevent
:; trouble, interfere with
It strains
28
me past the compass
29
of my wits.
I hear thou must and nothing may prorogue
30
it
On Thursday next be married to this County.
Juliet Tell me not, friar, that thou hearst of this,
Unless thou tell me how I may prevent it.
If in thy wisdom thou canst give no help,
Do thou but call my resolution
31
wise
And with this knife Ill help
32
it presently.
33
God joined my heart and Romeos, thou
34
our hands,
And ere this hand, by thee to Romeos sealed,
35
Shall be the label
36
to another deed,
37
Or my true heart with treacherous revolt
38
Turn to another, this shall slay them both.
39
Therefore, out of thy long experienced time,
40
Give me some present
41
counsel, or behold,
Twixt my extremes
42
and me this bloody knife
Shall play the umpire, arbitrating
43
that
:c+ scrxr +
+
o

oo
:: distresses, aicts, presses hard upon
:, limits, bounds
o delay, postpone
+ solution, answer
: do what is needed, bring it to pass
speedily, without delay, right now*
you joined
fastened, tied
o ribbon to which a documentary seal is attached
; (+) action, (:) written document of a legal nature
: rebellion
, hand and heart
o years, life
+ quick, immediate, instant*
: twixt my extremes between my utterly opposed/harsh/severe/
intolerable circumstances
deciding, determining
Which
44
the commission
45
of thy years and art
Could to no issue
46
of true honor bring.
Be not so long to speak. I long to die
If what thou speakst speak not of remedy.
Friar Hold, daughter. I do spy a kind of hope,
Which craves as desperate an execution
47
As that is desperate which we would prevent.
If, rather than to marry County Paris
Thou hast the strength of will to slay thyself,
Then is it likely thou wilt undertake
A thing like death to chide
48
away this shame,
That copst
49
with death himself to scape from it.
And if thou darst, Ill give thee remedy.
Juliet O bid me leap, rather than marry Paris,
From o the battlements
50
of yonder tower,
Or walk in thievish ways,
51
or bid me lurk
52
Where serpents are. Chain me with roaring bears,
Or shut me nightly in a charnel house,
53
Oercovered quite
54
with dead mens rattling bones,
:c+ scrxr +
+
o
;o
;
:o
that which what
authority
o end, termination, way out, exit
; carrying into eect, fulllment (which CRAVES as DESprit an
EXeCUtiON)
: drive
, (+) barters, bargains, (:) encounters, faces
o tops of the walls
+ thievish ways (+) dishonest paths, (:) paths/roads where thieves
congregate
: live, hide
charnel house funeral parlor
completely
With reeky shanks
55
and yellow chapless
56
skulls,
Or bid me go into a new-made grave
And hide me with a dead man in his shroud
Things that, to hear
57
them told, have made me tremble
And I will do it without fear or doubt,
To live an unstained
58
wife to my sweet love.
Friar Hold,
59
then. Go home, be merry, give consent
To marry Paris.Wednesday is tomorrow.
Tomorrow night look that thou lie alone.
Let not the Nurse lie with thee in thy chamber.
Take thou this vial,
60
being then
61
in bed,
And this distilling
62
liquor drink thou o,
When presently through all thy veins shall run
A cold and drowsy humor,
63
for no pulse
Shall keep his native progress,
64
but surcease,
65
No warmth, no breath, shall testify thou livest,
The roses in thy lips and cheeks shall fade
To wanny ashes,
66
thy eyes windows
67
fall
:c+ scrxr +
+o
:
,o
,
+oo
reeky shanks blackened leg bones
o jawless
; to hear even/just to hear
: spotless, pure, unblemished, untarnished
, continue, stay as you are, carry on
oo small glass bottle
o+ being then when you are
o: concentrated, puried
o state of being (humorsconcerned both matters physiological and
psychological)
o native progress natural march/onward movement
o stop
oo wanny ashes pale as ashes (some texts have wany,or paly,or many,or
mealy)
o; eyes windows eyelids
Like death when he shuts up
68
the day
69
of life.
Each part, deprived of supple government,
70
Shall sti and stark
71
and cold appear, like death,
And in this borrowed likeness of shrunk
72
death
Thou shalt continue two and forty hours
And then awake as from a pleasant sleep.
Now when the bridegroom in the morning comes
To rouse thee from thy bed, there art thou dead.
Then as the manner of our country is,
In thy best robes, uncovered on the bier,
Thou shalt be borne to that same ancient vault
73
Where all the kindred of the Capulets lie.
In the meantime, against thou shalt awake,
Shall Romeo by my letters know our drift,
And hither shall he come, and he and I
Will watch thy waking, and that very night
Shall Romeo bear thee hence to Mantua.
And this shall free thee from this present shame,
If no inconstant toy
74
nor womanish fear
Abate
75
thy valor in the acting it.
Juliet Give me,
76
give me! O tell not me of fear.
:c+ scrxr +
+;
+o
++o
++
+:o
o: shuts up closes
o, light (daylight)
;o supple government control/management of the exibility of body and
limbs
;+ hard, rigid
;: contracted, shrunken
; burial chamber
; inconstant toy ckle/changeable whim/foolish fancy
; (+) destroy, demolish, (:) beat back, diminish, reduce
;o give me give it to me
Friar Hold. Get you gone, be strong and prosperous
77
In this resolve.
78
Ill send a friar with speed
To Mantua, with my letters to thy lord.
Juliet Love give me strength, and strength shall help aord.
79
Farewell, dear father.
rxrux+
:c+ scrxr +
+:
+:
;; successful
;: (+) decision, solution, (:) rmness of purpose
;, help aord aord (give, furnish) help
s cr xr :
Capulets house
rx+rr C:ruir+, L:i. C:ruir+, Nursr,
:xi +vo or +nrrr Srrvixcxrx
Capulet (to Servingman) So many guests invite as here are
writ.
rxi+ Srrvixcx:x
Sirrah, go hire me twenty cunning
1
cooks.
Servingman . You shall have none ill,
2
sir, for Ill try
3
if they can
lick their ngers.
Capulet How canst thou try them so?
Servingman . Marry, sir, tis an ill cook that cannot lick his own
ngers.
4
Therefore he that cannot lick his ngers goes not
5
with me.
Capulet Go, begone.
6
rxi+ Srrvixcx:x :
We shall be much unfurnished
7
for this time.
What, is my daughter gone to Friar Laurence?
Nurse Ay, forsooth.
Capulet Well, he may chance to do some good on
8
her.
:c+ scrxr :
+,

+o
+ skillful, expert
: of inferior quality
test
(because a bad cook knows the food does not taste good)
goes not (+) does not travel/join, (:) wont be successful
o leave
; unprepared
: to
A peevish
9
self willed harlotry
10
it is.
rx+rr Juiir+
Nurse See where she comes from shrift with merry look.
Capulet How now, my headstrong?
11
Where have you been
gadding?
12
Juliet Where I have learnt me to repent the sin
Of disobedient opposition
13
To you and your behests,
14
and am enjoined
15
By holy Laurence to fall prostrate here
To beg your pardon. (she kneels) Pardon, I beseech you.
Henceforward I am ever ruled by you.
Capulet Send for the County. Go tell him of this.
Ill have this knot
16
knit up tomorrow morning.
Juliet I met the youthful lord at Laurence cell
And gave him what becoming love
17
I might,
Not stepping oer the bounds of modesty.
Capulet Why, I am glad ont.This is well. Stand up.
This is ast should be. Let me see the County.
Ay, marry, go, I say, and fetch him hither.
Now, afore God, this reverend holy friar,
All our whole city is much bound
18
to him.
:c+ scrxr :
+o
+
:o
:
o
, silly, foolish
+o obscene behavior/talk
++ willful/stubborn one
+: wandering
+ (of DISoBEEDyent OPoSItiON)
+ commands
+ directed, instructed
+o union, tie (marriage)
+; becoming love suitable/proper reverence/aection
+: obliged, grateful
Juliet Nurse, will you go with me into my closet
To help me sort
19
such needful ornaments
20
As you think t to furnish me
21
tomorrow?
Lady Capulet No, not till Thursday.There is time enough.
Capulet Go, Nurse, go with her.Well to church tomorrow.
rxrux+ Juiir+ :xi Nursr
Lady Capulet We shall be short in our provision.
22
Tis now near night.
Capulet Tush, I will stir about,
23
And all things shall be well, I warrant thee, wife.
Go thou to Juliet, help to deck up
24
her.
Ill not to bed tonight, let me alone.
Ill play the housewife for this once. (calls for servants) What,
ho!
(to Lady Capulet) They are all forth.
25
Well, I will walk myself
To County Paris, to prepare him up
Against
26
tomorrow. My heart is wondrous light,
Since this same wayward
27
girl is so reclaimed.
28
rxrux+
:c+ scrxr :
++

+, choose, decide on
:o attire, trappings (clothing of a decorative nature)
:+ furnish me provide for myself
:: household arrangements/supplies
: stir about busy myself
: deck up clothe/adorn/outt
: out, away
:o prepare him up against ready him for
:; disobedient, wrongheaded, self-willed, stubborn
:: brought/called back, reformed
s cr xr
Juliets chamber
rx+rr Juiir+ :xi Nursr
Juliet Ay, those attires
1
are best. But, gentle Nurse,
I pray thee leave me to myself tonight,
For I have need of many orisons
2
To move the heavens to smile upon my state,
3
Which, well thou knowest, is cross
4
and full of sin.
rx+rr L:i. C:ruir+
Lady Capulet What, are you busy, ho? Need you my help?
Juliet No, madam.We have culled
5
such necessaries
As are behoveful
6
for our state tomorrow.
So please you, let me now be left alone,
And let the Nurse this night sit up with you,
For I am sure you have your hands full all
7
In this so sudden business.
Lady Capulet Good night.
Get thee to bed, and rest, for thou hast need.
rxrux+ Mo+nrr :xi Nursr
Juliet Farewell. God knows when we shall meet again.
:c+ scrxr
+:

+o
+ dresses
: prayers
condition (state of mind)
unfavorable
chosen, gathered, picked*
o useful, proper
; (+) all completely, (:) all of you (you all have your hands full)
I have a faint
8
cold fear thrills
9
through my veins
That almost freezes up the heat of life.
Ill call them back again to comfort me.
Nurse! What should she do here?
My dismal scene
10
I needs must act alone.
Come, vial.
What if this mixture do not work at all?
Shall I be married then tomorrow morning?
No, no! This shall forbid
11
it. (speaks to her dagger) Lie thou
there.
i:.s i:ccrr iovx
What if it be a poison which the friar
Subtly
12
hath ministered
13
to have me dead,
Lest in this marriage he should be dishonored
Because he married me before to Romeo?
I fear it is.And yet methinks it should not,
14
For he hath still been tried
15
a holy man.
I will not entertain
16
so bad a thought.
How if, when I am laid into the tomb,
I wake before the time that Romeo
Come to redeem
17
me? Theres a fearful point.
:c+ scrxr
+
+
:o
:
o
: (+) sickly, (:) cowardly
, trickling
+o dismal scene sinister/terrible/miserable activity/episode
++ stop it, make it impossible
+: (+) cleverly, artfully, (:) treacherously
+ furnished, supplied
+ should not should not be
+ still been tried always been proven
+o admit, consider
+; free, recover
Shall I not then be stied in the vault,
To whose foul mouth no healthsome air breathes in,
And there die strangled ere my Romeo comes?
Or, if I live, is it not very like
18
The horrible conceit of death and night,
Together with the terror of the place,
As in
19
a vault, an ancient receptacle
20
Where for this many hundred years the bones
Of all my buried ancestors are packed
21

Where bloody Tybalt, yet but green in earth,

22
Lies festring
23
in his shroud where, as they say,
At some hours in the night spirits resort.
24
Alack, alack, is it not like that I,
So early waking, what with loathsome smells,
And shrieks like mandrakes
25
torn out of the earth,
That living mortals, hearing them, run mad
O if I wake, shall I not be distraught,
Environd with
26
all these hideous fears,
And madly play with my forefathers joints,
27
And pluck
28
the mangled
29
Tybalt from his shroud,
:c+ scrxr
+

o
+: likely, probable
+, as in since I will be in
:o repository
:+ pressed together in a mass, stued, crammed
:: green in earth newly buried
: rotting
: come
: mandragora: a split-rooted, humanlike plant that was thought, when pulled
up, to give a maddening shriek
:o environd with beset by
:; (MY foreFATHers JOINTS)
:: pull, remove, drag
:, mutilated
And, in this rage,
30
with some great kinsmans bone
As with a club dash out my desprate brains?
O look, methinks I see my cousins ghost
Seeking out Romeo, that
31
did spit
32
his body
Upon a rapiers point. Stay,Tybalt, stay!
Romeo, Romeo, Romeo, heres drink! I drink to thee.
33
snr irixks :xi r:iis urox nrr iri
:c+ scrxr
+

o madness, t
+ who
: thrust through, pierce (to out on a spit)
(ROmeo ROmeo ROmeo heres DRINK i DRINK to THEE)
s cr xr
Capulets house
rx+rr L:i. C:ruir+ :xi Nursr
Lady Capulet Hold,
1
take these keys and fetch more spices,
Nurse.
Nurse They call for dates and quinces in the pastry.
2
rx+rr C:ruir+
Capulet Come, stir, stir, stir!
3
The second cock hath
crowed,
The curfew bell hath rung, tis three oclock.
Look to the baked meats,
4
good Angelica.
5
Spare not
6
for cost.
Nurse Go, you cot queen,
7
go,
Get you to bed. Faith, youll be sick tomorrow
For
8
this nights watching.
Capulet No, not a whit.
9
What, I have watched ere now
All night for lesser cause,
10
and neer been sick.
Lady Capulet Ay, you have been a mouse hunt
11
in your time,
:c+ scrxr
+o

+o
+ here
: in the pastry kitchen (possibly, but less likely, in the pastries themselves)
move, keep busy
baked meats meat pies (pastries)
the Nurses name
o spare not dont hold back
; cot queen a man meddling in womens business
: on account/because of
, least little bit
+o motive, reason, purpose
++ mouse hunt night prowler (like a cat, a hunter of mice; a woman, in slang,
was a mouse)
But I will watch you from
12
such watching now.
rxrux+ L:i. C:ruir+ :xi Nursr
Capulet A jealous hood,
13
a jealous hood!
rx+rr +nrrr or rour Srrvixcxrx, vi+n sri+s,
+
iocs, :xi i:skr+s
Now, fellow, what is there?
Servingman : Things for the cook, sir, but I know not what.
Capulet Make haste, make haste.
rxi+ Srrvixcx:x +
(to Servingman .) Sirrah,
fetch drier logs.
Call Peter, he will show thee where they are.
Servingman . I have a head, sir, that will nd out logs
And never trouble Peter for
15
the matter.
Capulet Mass,
16
and well said. A merry whoreson,
17
ha.
Thou shalt be loggerhead.
18
rxi+ Srrvixcx:x :
Good faith, tis day.
The County will be here with music,
19
straight,
:c+ scrxr
+;
+
:o
+: watch you from be alert/on guard to keep you from
+ (exact meaning uncertain, but the general sense seems clear:youre jealous
of my former exploits!)
+ sharp rods, metal or wood, to be pierced through meat for roasting over a re
+ about
+o by the Mass (exclamation)
+; slangy praise (a merry s.o.b.)
+: blockhead: a bad pun on using his headand being the headof the hunt
for logs
+, musicians
For so he said he would.
xusic
I hear him near.
Nurse! Wife! What, ho! What, Nurse, I say!
20
rx+rr Nursr
Go waken Juliet, go and trim
21
her up.
Ill go and chat with Paris. Hie, make haste,
Make haste! The bridegroom he is come already:
Make haste, I say.
rxrux+
:c+ scrxr
+:
:
:o (NURSE WIFE what HO what NURSE i SAY)
:+ (+) dress, (:) support, comfort, () strengthen, () get ready
s cr xr
Juliets chamber
rx+rr Nursr
Nurse Mistress! What, mistress! Juliet! Fast,
1
I warrant her, she.
Why, lamb, why, lady! Fie, you slug-abed!
Why, love, I say! Madam! Sweetheart! Why, bride!
What, not a word? You take your pennyworths
2
now.
Sleep for a week for
3
the next night, I warrant,
The County Paris hath set up his rest
4
That you shall rest but little. God forgive me!
5
Marry, and amen. How sound is she asleep!
I needs must wake her. Madam, madam, madam!
Ay, let the County take you
6
in your bed,
Hell fright you up, i faith.Will it not be?
7
snr ir:vs iri cur+:ixs :siir
What, dressed, and in your clothes, and down
8
again?
I must needs wake you. Lady! Lady! Lady!
Alas, alas! Help, help! My ladys dead!
O weraday that ever I was born!
:c+ scrxr
+,

+o
+
+ fast asleep
: small bits of sleep
because
set up his rest resolved/determined (based on usages from card playing)
(for her bawdiness)
o take you catch/nd (with the added meaning of takeas sexual
possession)
; will it not be? (+) isnt that the way it will be? or (:) wont you ever wake
up?
: lying down
Some aqua vitae, ho! My lord! My lady!
rx+rr L:i. C:ruir+
Lady Capulet What noise
9
is here?
Nurse O lamentable
10
day!
Lady Capulet What is the matter?
Nurse Look, look! O heavy
11
day!
Lady Capulet O me, O me! My child, my only life!
Revive,
12
look up,
13
or I will die with thee!
Help, help! Call help!
rx+rr C:ruir+
Capulet For shame, bring Juliet forth, her lord is come.
Nurse Shes dead, deceased.
14
Shes dead! Alack the day!
Lady Capulet Alack the day, shes dead, shes dead, shes dead!
Capulet Ha! let me see her. Out alas.
15
Shes cold,
Her blood is settled
16
and her joints are sti.
Life and these lips have long been separated.
Death lies on her like an untimely frost
Upon the sweetest ower of all the eld.
Nurse O lamentable day!
Lady Capulet O woeful time!
Capulet Death, that hath taen her hence to make me wail,
:c+ scrxr
+oo
:o
:
o
, shouting, loud cries
+o (LAmenTAble)
++ grievous, distressful
+: (+) return to consciousness, (:) return to life
+ look up open your eyes
+ (not then an uncommon word in ordinary vocabularies,deceasedcarried
the sense of recentlydead)
+ out alas exclamation of lamentation
+o stagnant, coagulated, not owing
Ties up my tongue and will not let me speak.
rx+rr Fri:r L:urrxcr :xi +nr Coux+. P:ris,
vi+n Musici:xs
Friar Come, is the bride ready to go to church?
Capulet Ready to go, but never to return.
(to Paris) O son, the night before thy wedding day
Hath Death
17
lain with thy wife. See, there she lies,
Flower as she was, deowered
18
by him.
Death is my son in law, Death is my heir.
My daughter he hath wedded. I will die
And leave him all. Life living all is Deaths.
Paris Have I thought long to see
19
this mornings
face,
20
And doth it give me
21
such a sight as this?
Lady Capulet Accursed, unhappy, wretched, hateful day!
Most miserable hour that eer time saw
In lasting labor
22
of his pilgrimage!
23
But one, poor one, one poor and loving child,
But one thing to rejoice and solace in,
And cruel Death hath catched
24
it from my sight!
Nurse O woe! O woeful, woeful, woeful day!
Most lamentable day, most woeful day
:c+ scrxr
+o+

o
+; Death: masculine, in English (though feminine in most European languages)
+: her virginity taken
+, thought long yearned, waited wearily/impatiently
:o mornings face dawn
:+ give me bestow on me, put before me
:: lasting labor enduring/permanent/long-continuing work/task/exertion
: long journey
: driven, chased
That ever, ever I did yet behold!
O day, O day, O day! O hateful day!
Never was seen so black a day as this.
O woeful day! O woeful day.
Paris Beguiled,
25
divorcd,
26
wrongd, spited,
27
slain.
28
Most detestable
29
Death, by thee beguiled,
By cruel,
30
cruel thee quite overthrown.
31
O love! O life not life, but love in death!
Capulet Despised,
32
distressd,
33
hated, martyred, killed.
Uncomfortable
34
time, why camst thou now
To murder,
35
murder our solemnity?
36
O child, O child! My soul, and not my child,
Dead art thou.Alack, my child is dead,
And with my child my joys are burid.
Friar Peace, ho, for shame! Confusions cure
37
lives not
In these confusions.
38
Heaven and yourself
Had part
39
in this fair maid. Now heaven hath all,
And all the better is it for the maid.
:c+ scrxr
+o:

oo
o
: deceived, cheated
:o a marriage cut/broken o
:; treated maliciously
:: slaughtered
:, (DEEtesTABle)
o (bisyllabic)
+ vanquished
: unvalued, treated with contempt/scorn
aicted, exhausted, crushed
unconsoling, empty of comfort (unCOMforTAble)
kill with premeditated/deliberate malice
o specially important/observed ritual occasion
; confusions cure the remedy for destruction/ruin
: agitated/uttering disorderly displays
, a share (parents create the body; God creates and then takes back the
soul)
Your part in her you could not keep from death,
But heaven keeps his part in eternal life.
The most you sought was her promotion,
40
For twas your heaven
41
she should be advanced
And weep ye now, seeing she is advanced
Above the clouds, as high as heaven itself ?
O in this
42
love, you love your child so ill
43
That you run mad, seeing that she is well.
44
Shes not well married that lives married long,
But shes best married that dies married young.
45
Dry up your tears and stick your rosemary
46
On this fair corse, and, as the custom is,
In all her best array bear her to church.
For though fond
47
nature bids us all lament,
Yet natures tears are reasons
48
merriment.
Capulet All things that we ordaind
49
festival
Turn from their oce
50
to black funeral,
Our instruments
51
to melancholy bells,
52
:c+ scrxr
+o
;o
;
:o
:
o elevation/advance/progression to a higher rank (from maidto wife)
(proMOtiON)
+ (their heaven, but not Gods, the only true heaven)
: this kind of
wrongfully, sinfully, wickedly
fortunate, happy (with a pun on wellas not sick in body)
(again, Juliet is considered already married to Paris: the wedding solemnizes
the prior fact)
o evergreen leaves, signifying remembrance (ROSEmaRY)
; insipidly/foolishly tender/loving
: reason the ordered/logical/reasonable/believable teaching of religion
, prepared, arranged, made ready
o duty, employment, obligation*
+ (of celebratory music making)
: (funeral church bells)
Our wedding cheer
53
to a sad burial feast,
Our solemn hymns
54
to sullen
55
dirges
56
change,
Our bridal owers serve for a buried corse,
And all things change them
57
to the contrary.
Friar Sir, go you in, and madam, go with him,
And go, Sir Paris. Everyone prepare
To follow this fair corse unto her grave.
The heavens do lowr
58
upon you for some ill:
59
Move them no more by crossing
60
their high will.
rxrux+ :ii iu+ Musici:xs :xi Nursr
Musician : Faith, we may put up our pipes and be gone.
Nurse Honest good fellows, ah, put up, put up!
For well you know this is a pitiful case.
61
rxi+ Nursr
Musician : Ay, by my troth, the case
62
may be amended.
63
rx+rr Pr+rr
Peter Musicians, O, musicians,Hearts ease,
64
Hearts
:c+ scrxr
+o
,o
,
+oo
mirth, joy
(in praise)
gloomy, dismal, melancholy
o (prayers/rituals in memoriam)
; themselves
: frown, scowl (spelled louror lower)
, morally wrong action/conduct
oo thwarting, opposing
o+ situation
o: the case in which his musical instrument is carried
o improved, repaired
o popular song, the words to which are lost; an earlier poem,Death the Port
of Peace,supplies the customary message: Here is the rest of all your
ease! O an you will have me live, play Hearts ease.
Musician : Why Hearts ease?
Peter O, musicians, because my heart itself plays My heart
is full of woe.O, play me some merry dump
65
to comfort
me.
Musician : Not a dump we! Tis no time to play now.
Peter You will not then?
Musician : No.
Peter I will then give it you soundly.
66
Musician : What will you give us?
Peter No money, on my faith, but the gleek.
67
I will give
you the minstrel.
68
Musician : Then will I give you the serving creature.
Peter Then will I lay
69
the serving creatures dagger on
your pate.
70
I will carry no crotchets.
71
Ill re
72
you, Ill fa
you. Do you note
73
me?
Musician : An you re us and fa us, you note us.
74
Musician . Pray you put up your dagger, and put out
75
your wit.
:c+ scrxr
+o
+o
++o
++
busyness, / Here is the port of peace and restfulness(normalized from
Religious Lyrics of the Fifteenth Century, ed. Carleton Brown [Oxford: Oxford
University Press, +,,], :,)
o tune, melody
oo thoroughly, properly, to the full (with a pun on soundlyas by means of
sounds)
o; jest, mockery
o: buoon, clown
o, bring/beat down, deposit, apply
;o head
;+ carry no crotchets endure no (+) perverse/cranky whims, (:) musical
notes (as one carriesa tune)
;: (do, re, me, fa, so Italian words for the notes of the musical scale)
; (+) mark, pay attention to, (:) set musical notes to words, () play music
; note us (+) put musical notes on us, (:) pay close attention to us
; put/give forth, utter, show
Peter Then have at you with my wit. I will dry beat you
with an iron wit, and put up
76
my iron dagger.Answer me
like men:
When griping
77
grief the heart doth wound,
And doleful dumps
78
the mind oppress,
Then music with her silver sound
79
Why silver sound? Why music with her silver sound?
What say you, Simon Catling?
80
Musician : Marry, sir, because silver hath a sweet sound.
Peter Pretty.
81
What say you, Hugh Rebeck?
82
Musician . I say silver soundbecause musicians sound
83
for
silver.
Peter Pretty too.What say you, James Soundpost?
84
Musician , Faith, I know not what to say.
Peter O I cry you mercy.
85
You are the singer.
86
I will say
87
for you. It is music with her silver soundbecause musicians
have no gold for sounding:
88
:c+ scrxr
+oo
+:o
+:
+o
+
;o put up sheathe
;; painful, distressing
;: low/heavy spirits, ts of melancholy/depression
;, Richard Edwards (+:?+oo),A Song to the Lute in Musicke,in Percy,
Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, +:+:;:,
:o catling cat gut for the strings of musical instruments
:+ clever, ingenious
:: early form of the ddle
: make sounds, play music
: wooden peg beneath the bridge of violins, etc., connecting the instruments
back and belly
: I cry you mercy I beg your pardon (here ironic)
:o (all you can do is sing/play music)
:; speak (which you as a singerplainly cannot be expected to do)
:: jingling in their purses
Then music with her silver sound
With speedy help doth lend redress.
rxi+ Pr+rr
Musician : What a pestilent
89
knave is this same.
90
Musician . Hang him, Jack. Come, well in here, tarry
91
for the
mourners, and stay
92
dinner.
rxrux+
:c+ scrxr
+o;
+o
:, annoying, troublesome
,o same/identical man
,+ delay, linger, wait for
,: stay to
Act

+o:

s cr xr +
Mantua. A street
rx+rr Roxro
Romeo If I may trust the attering
1
truth of sleep
My dreams presage
2
some joyful news at hand.
3
My bosoms lord
4
sits lightly
5
in his throne,
6
And all this day an unaccustomed
7
spirit
Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts.
I dreamt my lady came and found me dead
Strange dream that gives a dead man leave
8
to think!
And breathed
9
such life with kisses in my lips
+ promising, pleasing
: predict/foreshadow (by supernatural means)
at hand near, close by
bosoms lord love
easily, cheerfully
o his heart
; unaccustomed spirit unusual/strange/unfamiliar emotion/feeling
: permission
, breathed into me
That I revived and was an emperor.
Ah me, how sweet is love itself
10
possessed,
When but loves shadows
11
are so rich in joy.
rx+rr B:i+n:s:r, Roxros x:x, vr:rixc riiixc ioo+s
News from Verona! How now, Balthasar?
12
Dost thou not bring me letters from the friar?
How doth my lady? Is my father well?
How fares my Juliet?
13
That I ask again,
For nothing can be ill if she be well.
Balthasar Then she is well, and nothing can be ill.
Her body sleeps in Capels monument,
14
And her immortal part with angels lives.
15
I saw her laid low
16
in her kindreds vault
And presently took post
17
to tell it you.
O pardon me for bringing these ill news,
Since you did leave it for my oce, sir.
Romeo Is it een
18
so? Then I defy
19
you, stars!
20
(to Balthasar) Thou knowest my lodging. Get me ink and
paper
:c+ scrxr +
+o,
+o
+
:o
:
+o in and of itself
++ paler/fainter images/traces
+: (BALthaSAR)
+ ( JULyet)
+ sepulcher, tomb
+ (verb)
+o under the ground
+; took post hurried, by means of hiring horses to be available at stages in his
journey
+: really, truly, indeed
+, repudiate, challenge*
:o astrologically determined fate
And hire posthorses.
21
I will hence
22
tonight.
Balthasar I do beseech you, sir, have patience.
23
Your looks are pale and wild and do import
24
Some misadventure.
25
Romeo Tush, thou art deceived.
Leave me and do the thing I bid thee do.
Hast thou no letters to me from the friar?
Balthasar No, my good lord.
Romeo No matter. Get thee gone
And hire those horses. Ill be with thee straight.
rxi+ B:i+n:s:r
Well, Juliet, I will lie with thee tonight.
Lets see for means. O mischief,
26
thou art swift
To enter in the thoughts of desperate men.
I do remember an apothecary,
27
And hereabouts a dwells, which
28
late I noted
In tattered weeds,
29
with overwhelming
30
brows,
Culling of simples.
31
Meager
32
were his looks,
:c+ scrxr +
+;o
o

o
:+ (see note +;, just above)
:: leave
: have patience be calm/move slowly
: indicate, predict
: bad luck/fortune
:o evil, misfortune, calamity
:; dealer in/maker of drugs
:: who
:, clothes
o overhanging, jutting (because lack of food has caused his eyes to seem
sunken?)
+ simples herbs/leaves/roots
: lean, emaciated
Sharp
33
misery had worn him to the bones,
And in his needy
34
shop a tortoise hung,
An alligator stued, and other skins
Of ill-shaped shes, and about his shelves
A beggarly account
35
of empty boxes,
Green earthen
36
pots, bladders,
37
and musty
38
seeds,
Remnants of packthread,
39
and old cakes of roses
40
Were thinly
41
scattered to make up a show.
42
Noting this penury,
43
to myself I said,
An if a man did need a poison now,
Whose sale is present death in Mantua,
Here lives a caiti
44
wretch would sell it him.
45
O this same thought did but forerun
46
my need,
And this same needy man must
47
sell it me.
As I remember, this should be the house.
Being holiday, the beggars shop is shut.
What, ho! Apothecary!
:c+ scrxr +
+;+

keen, piercing, severe

poor
beggarly account poverty-stricken number/sum/amount
o clay
; taken from dead animals and used, much like plastic bags, as containers
(especially of liquids)
: moldy
, twine, cord
o cakes of roses compacted rose petals, used for their scent
+ sparsely
: make up a show produce/represent/constitute the appearance of a
mercantile display
extreme poverty
miserable, piteous (from captive)
to him
o anticipate
; (+) could, (:) should (is likely to), () needs/is obliged to
rx+rr Aro+nrc:r.
Apothecary Who calls so loud?
Romeo Come hither, man. I see that thou art poor.
Hold, there is forty ducats.
48
Let me have
A dram of poison, such
49
soon-speeding gear
50
As will disperse
51
itself through all the veins
That the life-weary
52
taker may fall dead,
And that
53
the trunk
54
may be discharged
55
of breath
As violently as hasty
56
powder red
Doth hurry from the fatal
57
cannons womb.
Apothecary Such mortal
58
drugs I have, but Mantuas law
Is death to any he
59
that utters
60
them.
Romeo Art thou so bare
61
and full of wretchedness
And fearest to die? Famine is in thy cheeks,
Need and oppression
62
starveth
63
in thine eyes,
Contempt
64
and beggary hangs upon thy back.
:c+ scrxr +
+;:
oo
o
;o
: gold coins
, such a
o soon speeding gear quick-moving (+) stu, (:) corrupt/foul matter
+ distribute, circulate, spread
: life-weary (compound adjective)
and that so that
body
freed, emptied, relieved
o rapid, speedy
; fateful, ruinous, deadly
: deadly, destructive
, person
oo sells
o+ deprived, poverty-stricken, destitute
o: misfortune, distress
o suer most intensely, wither
o dishonor, disgrace
The world is not thy friend, nor the worlds law.
The world aords
65
no law to make thee rich.
Then be not poor, but break it
66
and take this.
Apothecary My poverty but not my will consents.
Romeo I pay thy poverty and not thy will.
Apothecary Put this in any liquid thing you will
67
And drink it o,
68
and if you had the strength
Of twenty men, it would dispatch
69
you straight.
Romeo There is thy gold worse poison to mens souls,
Doing more murder in this loathsome world,
Than these poor compounds that thou mayst not sell.
I sell
70
thee poison; thou hast sold me none.
Farewell. Buy food and get thyself in esh.
(to the poison) Come, cordial
71
and not poison, go with me
To Juliets grave, for there must I use thee.
rxrux+
:c+ scrxr +
+;
;
:o
:
o gives, supplies, grants
oo the law
o; wish to
o: drink it o drink all of it
o, kill
;o give/hand/deliver to
;+ restorative
s cr xr :
Verona. Friar Laurences cell
rx+rr Fri:r Jonx
John Holy Franciscan friar, brother, ho!
rx+rr Fri:r L:urrxcr
Friar (entering) This same should be the voice of Friar John.
(seeing Friar John) Welcome from Mantua.What says Romeo?
Or, if his mind
1
be writ, give me his letter.
John Going
2
to nd a barefoot brother out,
3
One of our order, to associate me,
4
Here in this city visiting the sick,
And nding him, the searchers of the town,
5
Suspecting that we both were in a house
6
Where the infectious pestilence
7
did reign,
8
Sealed up the doors, and would not let us forth,
9
So that my speed
10
to Mantua there was stayed.
11
Friar Who bore my letter, then, to Romeo?
John I could not send it here it is again
Nor get a messenger to bring it thee,
:c+ scrxr :
+;

+o
+
+ thought, intention
: after going
nd a barefoot brother out search for a barefoot brother
associate me join with me (friars not being allowed to travel alone)
searchers of the town public ocials who located plague sites
o religious house (monastery or convent)
; plague
: did reign ourished, was prevalent
, go away, come out
+o swift progress
++ halted
So fearful were they of infection.
Friar Unhappy fortune!
12
By my brotherhood,
The letter was not nice,
13
but full of charge,
14
Of dear import,
15
and the neglecting it
16
May do much danger.
17
Friar John, go hence,
Get me an iron crow
18
and bring it straight
Unto my cell.
John Brother, Ill go and bring it thee.
rxi+
Friar Now must I to the monument alone.
Within this three hours will fair Juliet wake.
She will beshrew me much that Romeo
Hath had no notice of these accidents,
19
But I will write again to Mantua,
And keep her at my cell till Romeo come
Poor living corse, closed
20
in a dead mans tomb!
rxi+
:c+ scrxr :
+;
:o
:
+: unhappy fortune! wretched/miserable/unlucky chance/accident
+ foolish, trivial
+ weight, importance
+ dear import grievous signicance
+o neglecting it failure to do it
+; harm, damage
+: crowbar
+, occurrences, events (especially of an unfortunate nature)
:o shut, conned
s cr xr
Verona. A churchyard. The monument of the Capulets
rx+rr P:ris :xi nis P:cr vi+n riovrrs :xi : +orcn
Paris Give me thy torch, boy. Hence,
1
and stand aloof.
2
Yet put it
3
out, for I would not
4
be seen.
Under yond yew tree
5
lay thee all along,
6
Holding thine ear close to the hollow
7
ground,
So shall no foot upon the churchyard tread,
Being
8
loose, unrm, with
9
digging up of graves,
But thou shalt hear it.Whistle then to me,
As signal that thou hearst something approach.
Give me those owers. Do as I bid thee, go.
Page (aside) I am almost afraid to stand alone
Here in the churchyard, yet I will adventure.
nr rr+irrs
Paris Sweet ower,
10
with owers thy bridal bed I strew
O woe, thy canopy
11
is dust and stones
Which with sweet
12
water nightly I will dew,
13
:c+ scrxr
+;o

+o
+ go o/away
: (+) at some distance, (:) apart from whatever happens
the burning torch
would not do not wish
yew tree: associated with sadness, perhaps for its very dark green foliage;
often planted in churchyards
o all along lengthwise, at full length
; excavated (dug up for graves)
: the churchyard being
, from, because of
+o Juliet
++ covering over a ceremonial procession
+: fragrant, scented
+ (verb)
Or wanting
14
that, with tears distilled
15
by moans.
The obsequies
16
that I for thee will keep
Nightly shall be to strew thy grave and weep.
P:cr vnis+irs
The boy gives warning something doth approach.
What cursd foot wanders this way tonight
To cross
17
my obsequies and true loves rite?
What, with a torch? Mue
18
me, night, awhile.
rr+irrs
rx+rr Roxro :xi B:i+n:s:r vi+n : +orcn,
: x:++ock,
19
:xi :x irox crovi:r
Romeo Give me that mattock and the wrenching
20
iron.
Hold, take this letter. Early in the morning
See thou deliver it to my lord and father.
Give me the light. Upon thy life I charge thee,
Whateer thou hearest or seest, stand all aloof
And do not interrupt me in my course.
Why I descend into this bed of death
Is partly to behold my ladys face,
But chiey to take thence from her dead nger
A precious ring, a ring that I must use
In dear employment.
21
Therefore hence, be gone.
:c+ scrxr
+;;
+
:o
:
o
+ failing, lacking
+ puried, concentrated
+o funeral rites/ceremonies
+; oppose, thwart
+: conceal, envelop
+, tool for digging in hard ground (similar to a pick-axe)
:o used for twisting: the crowbar
:+ dear employment important/honorable matters/business
But if thou, jealous,
22
dost
23
return to pry
24
In what I farther
25
shall intend to do,
By heaven, I will tear thee joint by joint
And strew this hungry
26
churchyard with thy limbs.
The time and my intents are savage wild,
27
More erce and more inexorable
28
far
Than empty
29
tigers or the roaring sea.
Balthasar I will be gone, sir, and not trouble you.
Romeo So
30
shalt thou show me friendship.
31
( gives him
money) Take thou that.
Live, and be prosperous, and farewell, good fellow.
Balthasar (aside) For all this same,
32
Ill hide me hereabout.
His looks I fear, and his intents I doubt.
33
rr+irrs
Romeo Thou detestable
34
maw,
35
thou womb
36
of death,
Gorged
37
with the dearest
38
morsel
39
of the earth,
:c+ scrxr
+;:

:: mistrustful, doubtful, suspicious

: do
: spy, peer, observe more closely
: in addition
:o hungry: a burial place is hungryfor corpses
:; savage wild horribly erce
:: relentless (inEXorABle)
:, unfed, hungry
o thus
+ a friendly act/favor/assistance
: for all this same despite what he says/has given me
mistrust, suspect
(DEEtesTAble)
throat, stomach
o belly-like cavity
; stued, glutted
: most glorious/beloved/precious
, a choice dish/snack/small meal
Thus I enforce
40
thy rotten jaws to open,
And in despite
41
Ill cram
42
thee with more food.
43
Roxro orrxs +nr +oxi
Paris This is that banished haughty Montague
That murdered my loves cousin with which grief
It is supposd the fair creature died
And here is come to do some villainous shame
44
To the dead bodies. I will apprehend
45
him.
(to Romeo) Stop thy unhallowed toil,
46
vile Montague.
Can vengeance be pursud further than death?
Condemnd villain, I do apprehend thee.
Obey, and go with me, for thou must die.
Romeo I must indeed, and therefore came I hither.
Good gentle youth, tempt not a desperate man.
Fly hence and leave me.Think upon these gone,
47
Let them aright thee. I beseech thee, youth,
Put not another sin upon my head
By urging
48
me to fury. O be gone.
By heaven, I love thee better than myself,
For I come hither armed against myself.
Stay not, be gone. Live, and hereafter say
:c+ scrxr
+;,
o

oo
o
o force, compel
+ contempt, scorn, deance
: stu (verb)
more food an additional meal (himself )
villainous shame wicked/depraved/vile indecency, disgraceful/oensive
deed
seize, arrest
o unhallowed toil profane/wicked/impious labor
; these gone the corpses in the tomb (now displayed)
: pressing, pushing, spurring
A madmans mercy bid thee run away.
Paris I do defy thy conjuration
49
And apprehend thee for a felon
50
here.
Romeo Wilt thou provoke me? Then have at thee, boy!
+nr. ricn+
Page O Lord, they ght! I will go call the watch.
rxi+ P:cr
P:ris r:iis
Paris O I am slain! If thou be merciful,
Open the tomb, lay me with Juliet.
nr iirs
Romeo In faith, I will. Let me peruse
51
this face.
Mercutios kinsman, noble County Paris!
What said my man
52
when my betossd
53
soul
Did not attend him as we rode? I think
He told me Paris should have
54
married Juliet.
Said he not so? Or did I dream it so?
Or am I mad, hearing him talk of Juliet
To think it was so? (to Paris) O give me thy hand,
One writ with
55
me in sour misfortunes book.
:c+ scrxr
+:o
;o
;
:o
, (+) appeal, solemn charge, (:) trick (CONjurAtiON)
o (+) wretch, villain, (:) convicted criminal
+ inspect, examine
: what said my man what did my servant say
agitated, disturbed
should have was supposed to have
writ with recorded/inscribed (written) along with
Ill bury thee in a triumphant
56
grave.
A grave? O no, a lantern,
57
slaughtered youth,
For here lies Juliet, and her beauty makes
This vault a feasting presence
58
full of light.
Death, lie thou there, by a dead man interred.
59
i:.s P:ris ix +nr +oxi
(to and of himself ) How oft when men are at the point of
death
Have they been merry! Which their keepers
60
call
A lightning
61
before
62
death. O how may I
Call this a lightning? (to Juliet) O my love, my wife,
Death that hath sucked the honey of thy breath
Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty.
Thou art not conquered. Beautys ensign
63
yet
Is crimson in thy lips and in thy cheeks,
And deaths pale ag is not advancd
64
there.
Tybalt, liest thou there in thy bloody sheet?
65
O what more favor can I do to thee
Than with that hand
66
that cut thy youth in twain
67
:c+ scrxr
+:+
:
,o
,
o victors, conquerors
; (+) transparent case, enclosing and illuminated by a light, (:) top of a
lighthouse, () structure with glazed light-admitting apertures/windows
: feasting presence banqueting/celebratory place
, deposited, buried
oo custodians, guards
o+ revival (lightening)
o: BEEfore
o sign, ag, emblem
o raised, lifted
o burial shroud (winding sheet)
oo his own hand
o; two
To sunder
68
his that was thine enemy?
Forgive me, cousin.
69
Ah, dear Juliet,
Why art thou yet so fair? Shall I believe
That unsubstantial
70
Death is amorous,
And that the lean abhorrd monster keeps
Thee here in dark to be his paramour?
71
For fear of that I still will stay with thee
And never from this palace
72
of dim night
Depart again. Here, here will I remain
With worms
73
that are thy chambermaids. O here
Will I set up my everlasting rest
And shake
74
the yoke of inauspicious stars
75
From this world-wearied esh.
76
(to himself ) Eyes, look your
last.
Arms, take your last embrace! (embracing Juliet) And lips,
O you
The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss
A dateless bargain to engrossing Death.
77
(kisses Juliet)
(to the poison) Come, bitter conduct,
78
come, unsavory
79
guide,
:c+ scrxr
+::
+oo
+o
++o
++
o: put an end to, cut o
o, Tybalt (cousin by marriage)
;o without body/material substance
;+ lady love, mistress
;: (+) storehouse, (:) palatial/stately mansion
; with worms together with the worms/maggots
; ee, be free of
; yoke of inauspicious stars fetters/chains of ill omened/malign
astrological inuences
;o this world-wearied esh this esh (himself ) tired of the living world
;; dateless bargain to engrossing Death eternal sale (of himself ) to all-
purchasing/greedy
;: bitter conduct painful/grievous/aicting escort
;, disagreeable, unpleasant, distasteful, oensive
Thou desperate pilot, now at once run on
The dashing
80
rocks thy seasick weary bark.
81
Heres to my love! (drinks) O true apothecary!
Thy drugs are quick.Thus with a kiss I die.
nr r:iis
rx+rr Fri:r L:urrxcr, vi+n i:x+rrx,
crovi:r, :xi sr:ir
Friar Saint Francis be my speed.
82
How oft tonight
Have my old feet stumbled at
83
graves.Whos there?
Balthasar Heres one, a friend, and one that knows you well.
Friar Bliss
84
be upon you.Tell me, good my friend,
What torch is yond
85
that vainly
86
lends his light
To grubs
87
and eyeless skulls? As I discern,
88
It burneth in the Capels monument.
Balthasar It doth so, holy sir, and theres my master,
89
One that you love.
Friar Who is it?
Balthasar Romeo.
Friar How long hath he been there?
Balthasar Full half an hour.
Friar Go with me to the vault.
Balthasar I dare not, sir.
:c+ scrxr
+:
+:o
+:
+o
:o violently splashed
:+ (himself: like a ship, he is bearing/carrying the poison)
:: help, assistance (see 1 Henry IV .+.+:,,Good manners be your speed!)
: on
: felicity, joy
: that one over there (yonder)
:o pointlessly, uselessly
:; maggots
:: as I discern as well as I can see/tell
:, theres my master in there is my master
My master knows not but
90
I am gone hence,
And fearfully
91
did menace me with death
If I did stay to look on his intents.
92
Friar Stay, then, Ill go alone. Fear comes upon me.
O much I fear some ill unthrifty
93
thing.
Balthasar As I did sleep under this yew tree here,
I dreamt my master and another fought,
And that my master slew him.
Friar Romeo!
94
Alack, alack, what
95
blood is this which stains
The stony
96
entrance of this sepulcher?
What mean
97
these masterless
98
and gory swords
To lie discolored by this place of peace?
99
rx+rrs +nr +oxi
Romeo! O pale! Who else? What, Paris too?
And steeped
100
in blood? Ah, what an unkind
101
hour
Is guilty of this lamentable chance?
102
The lady stirs.
Juiir+ risrs
:c+ scrxr
+:
+
+o
+
,o knows not but thinks/believes that
,+ dreadfully, terribly
,: plans, projects, purposes
, harmful, wasteful
, exclamation of surprise/shock (hearing what Romeo has done)
, whose
,o stone
,; what mean what does it mean that
,: without a master/owner
,, eternal peace, not worldly
+oo soaked
+o+ unnatural
+o: accident, mishap
Juliet O comfortable
103
friar, where is my lord?
I do remember well where I should
104
be,
And there I am.Where is my Romeo?
Friar I hear some noise. Lady, come from that nest
Of death, contagion,
105
and unnatural sleep.
A greater power than we can contradict
Hath thwarted our intents. Come, come away.
Thy husband in thy bosom
106
there lies dead,
And Paris too. Come, Ill dispose of
107
thee
Among a sisterhood of holy nuns.
Stay not to question, for the watch is coming.
Come, go, good Juliet. I dare no longer stay.
Juliet Go, get thee hence, for I will not away.
rxi+ Fri:r
Whats here? A cup, closed in my true loves hand?
Poison, I see, hath been his timeless
108
end.
O churl.
109
Drunk all, and left no friendly drop
To help me after?
110
I will kiss thy lips.
Haply
111
some poison yet doth hang on them
To make me die with a restorative.
112
:c+ scrxr
+:
+o
+
+oo
+o
+o reassuring, cheering (COMforTAble)
+o am supposed to
+o sickness, plague
+oo in thy bosom lying against your body
+o; dispose of place (verb)
+o: premature, badly timed
+o, (+) rude/uncouth person, (:) miser
++o come after you
+++ perhaps
++: with a restorative from/by means of a repayment/restitution (for his not
having left any poison for her)
kissrs nix
Thy lips are warm!
Watchman : (within) Lead, boy. Which way?
Juliet Yea, noise? Then Ill be brief. O happy
113
dagger.
sx:+cnrs Roxros i:ccrr
This
114
is thy sheath.There rest, and let me die.
snr s+:is nrrsrir :xi r:iis ox Roxros ioi.
rx+rr P:cr :xi W:+cnx:x
Page This is the place.There, where the torch doth burn.
Watchman : The ground is bloody. Search about the churchyard.
Go, some of you.Whoeer you nd attach.
115
rxrux+ soxr or +nr W:+cn
Pitiful sight! Here lies the County slain,
And Juliet bleeding, warm, and newly dead,
Who here hath lain this two days burid.
Go tell the Prince, run to the Capulets,
Raise up the Montagues. Some others search.
rxrux+ o+nrrs or +nr W:+cn
We see the ground
116
whereon these woes
117
do lie,
But the true ground
118
of all these piteous woes
:c+ scrxr
+:o
+;o
+;
++ lucky, opportune, appropriate
++ her body
++ arrest, seize
++o earth
++; (+) miseries, misfortunes, (:) miserable/unfortunate bodies/corpses
++: foundation, basis, explanation
We cannot without circumstance
119
descry.
120
rx+rr soxr or +nr W:+cn, vi+n B:i+n:s:r
Watchman . Heres Romeos man.We found him in the
churchyard.
Watchman : Hold him in safety
121
till the Prince come hither.
rx+rr Fri:r L:urrxcr :xi :xo+nrr W:+cnx:x
Watchman , Here is a friar that trembles, sighs, and weeps.
We took this mattock and this spade from him
As he was coming from this churchyard side.
122
Watchman : A great suspicion.
123
Stay the friar too.
rx+rr +nr Prixcr, vi+n A++rxi:x+s
Prince What misadventure
124
is so early up,
125
That calls our person
126
from our morning rest?
rx+rr C:ruir+ :xi L:i. C:ruir+, vi+n o+nrrs
Capulet What should
127
it be, that they so shriek
abroad?
128
Lady Capulet The people in the street cry Romeo,
Some Juliet,and some Paris,and all run,
:c+ scrxr
+:;
+:o
+:
+,o
++, context, causes, reasons
+:o discover, detect, perceive
+:+ close/secure custody
+:: this churchyard side this side of the churchyard
+: great suspicion large/weighty ground for suspicion
+: bad fortune
+: (+) out of bed, risen, (:) started, stirring, in progress
+:o our person me
+:; might, must
+:: shriek abroad cry out/scream everywhere/all over
With open outcry,
129
toward our monument.
Prince What fear is this which startles
130
in our ears?
Watchman : Sovereign, here lies the County Paris slain,
And Romeo dead, and Juliet, dead before,
Warm and new killed.
Prince Search, seek, and know how this foul murder
comes.
Watchman : Here is a friar, and slaughtered Romeos man,
131
With instruments
132
upon them t to open
133
These dead mens tombs.
Capulet O heavens! O wife, look how our daughter
bleeds!
134
This dagger hath mistaen,
135
for, lo, his house
136
Is empty on the back
137
of Montague,
138
And it missheathd in my daughters bosom.
Lady Capulet O me! this sight of death is as a bell
That warns
139
my old age to
140
a sepulcher.
rx+rr Mox+:cur, vi+n o+nrrs
Prince Come, Montague, for thou art early up
:c+ scrxr
+::
+,
:oo
:o
+:, open outcry general/universal/uncontrolled hue and cry
+o starts up, shocks, stuns
++ slaughtered Romeos man servant of dead Romeo
+: tools
+ t to open suitable for opening
+ (as bodies dead for some while do not bleed)
+ made an error/mistake
+o his house the daggers housing/sheath
+; on the back: swords were worn on the side, daggers at the belt, in back
+: Romeo
+, (+) informs, makes known to, (:) describes, () instructs, teaches
+o of, about
To see thy son and heir more early down.
141
Montague Alas, my liege,
142
my wife is dead tonight.
143
Grief of
144
my sons exile hath stopped her breath.
What further woe conspires against mine age?
145
Prince Look, and thou shalt see.
Montague (to Romeo) O thou untaught!
146
What
147
manners is
in this,
To press
148
before thy father to a grave?
Prince Seal up the mouth
149
of outrage
150
for a while,
Till we can clear these ambiguities
151
And know their spring,
152
their head,
153
their true
descent,
154
And then will I be general
155
of your woes
And lead you, even to death.
156
Meantime forbear,
And let mischance be slave to patience.
157
:c+ scrxr
+:,
:+o
:+
::o
++ fallen
+: lord
+ is dead tonight died last night
+ grief of the grief of, grief for
+ old age
+o ignorant, unenlightened
+; what sort/kind of
+: thrust, push
+, the mouth tomb opening
+o violent/passionate lamentation
++ doubts, uncertainties
+: source (as of a stream)
+ origin (conception, as of an idea)
+ derivation, line of descent (as of a lineage proceeding from generation to
generation)
+ person in charge
+o the death of whoever is responsible
+; mischance be slave to patience disaster/calamity be subject to/
dominated by patience
Bring forth the parties of suspicion.
158
Friar I am the greatest,
159
able to do least,
Yet most suspected, as the time and place
Doth make
160
against me, of this direful murder,
And here I stand, both to impeach and purge
161
Myself condemnd
162
and myself excused.
163
Prince Then say it once
164
what thou dost know in this.
Friar I will be brief, for my short date of breath
165
Is not so long as is a tedious tale.
Romeo, there dead, was husband to that Juliet,
And she, there dead, that Romeos faithful wife.
I married them, and their stoln
166
marriage day
Was Tybalts doomsday,
167
whose untimely death
Banished the new made bridegroom from this city,
For whom and not for Tybalt Juliet pined.
168
(to Capulet) You, to remove that siege
169
of grief from her,
Betrothed and would have married her perforce
To County Paris.Then comes she to me
And with wild looks bid me devise some mean
170
:c+ scrxr
+,o
::
:o
:
+: parties of suspicion suspected persons
+, principal one
+oo produce/cause suspicion
+o+ impeach and purge accuse and clear
+o: called guilty
+o freed from blame
+o once and for all, in short
+o date of breath time/length of life
+oo secret
+o; death day
+o: grieved, suered, longed for
+o, period of illness/diculty
+;o way (means)
To rid
171
her from this second marriage,
Or in my cell there
172
would she kill herself.
Then gave I her, so tutored
173
by my art,
A sleeping potion, which so
174
took eect
As I intended, for it wrought
175
on her
The form
176
of death. Meantime I writ to Romeo
That he should hither come as
177
this dire night
To help to take her from her borrowed grave,
Being the time the potions force should cease.
But he which
178
bore my letter, Friar John,
Was stayed by accident, and yesternight
Returned
179
my letter back.Then all alone
At the prexd
180
hour of her waking
Came I to take her from her kindreds vault,
Meaning to keep her closely
181
at my cell
Till I conveniently
182
could send
183
to Romeo.
But when I came, some minute ere the time
Of her awaking, here untimely lay
The noble Paris and true Romeo dead.
:c+ scrxr
+,+
:o
:
:o
:
+;+ free
+;: in that case, then (then and there)
+; taught, instructed
+; accordingly, thus, then
+; worked
+;o visible appearance/likeness
+;; precisely/exactly on (at the time of )
+;: who
+;, brought
+:o appointed, previously set
+:+ privately, secretly
+:: properly, appropriately
+: send a message/messenger
She wakes,
184
and I entreated
185
her come
186
forth
And bear this work
187
of heaven with patience.
But then a noise did scare me from the tomb,
And she, too desperate, would not go with me,
But, as it seems, did violence on herself.
All this I know,
188
and to the marriage
Her nurse is privy.
189
And if aught in this
Miscarried
190
by my fault, let my old life
Be sacriced, some hour before his
191
time,
Unto
192
the rigor
193
of severest law.
Prince We still have known thee for a holy man.
Wheres Romeos man? What can he say in this?
Balthasar I brought my master news of Juliets death,
And then in post he came from Mantua
To this same place, to this same monument.
This letter he early
194
bid me give his father,
And threatened me with death, going
195
in the vault,
If I departed not
196
and left him there.
Prince Give me the letter. I will look on
197
it.
:c+ scrxr
+,:
:oo
:o
:;o
:;
+: woke
+: asked, begged
+:o to come
+:; act, deed
+:: (he has knowledge, as opposed to mere belief )
+:, (+) cognizant, aware, (:) intimately acquainted/involved
+,o came to harm, went wrong
+,+ its
+,: according to, to the limit of
+, strictness, harshness
+, at the beginning/the start
+, should I go
+,o departed not did not leave
+,; at
Where is the Countys page that raised
198
the watch?
(to Page) Sirrah, what made your master
199
in this place?
Page He came with owers to strew his ladys grave,
And bid me stand aloof, and so I did.
Anon comes one with light to ope
200
the tomb,
And by and by my master drew
201
on him,
And then I ran away to call the watch.
Prince This letter doth make good the friars words,
Their course of love, the tidings
202
of her death,
And here he writes that he did buy a poison
Of
203
a poor pothecary,
204
and therewithal
205
Came to this vault to die, and lie with Juliet.
Where be these enemies? Capulet, Montague,
See what a scourge
206
is laid upon
207
your hate,
That heaven nds means to kill your joys with love.
And I, for winking at your discords too,
Have lost a brace
208
of kinsmen. All are punished.
Capulet O brother Montague, give me thy hand.
This is my daughters jointure,
209
for no more
Can I demand.
210
:c+ scrxr
+,
::o
::
:,o
:,
+,: roused, called
+,, what made your master what was your master doing
:oo open
:o+ drew his sword
:o: news
:o from
:o apothecary
:o (+) with that, (:) in addition
:oo whip, lash, punishment
:o; laid upon brought down/put on, applied to
:o: pair
:o, sum left to wife if husband predeceases her
:+o claim
Montague But I can give thee more,
For I will raise
211
her statue
212
in pure gold,
That whiles
213
Verona by that name is known
There shall no gure
214
at such rate
215
be set
As that of true and faithful Juliet.
Capulet As rich shall Romeos
216
by his ladys lie,
217
Poor sacrices of our enmity.
218
Prince A glooming
219
peace this morning with it brings.
The sun for sorrow will not show his head.
Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things.
Some shall be pardoned, and some punishd,
For never was a story of more woe
Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.
rxrux+ oxxrs
:c+ scrxr
+,
oo
o
+o
:++ set up, build, construct
:+: image, egy
:+ during the time, as long as
:+ (+) persons appearance, (:) image/representation (statue) of a persons
appearance
:+ value
:+o Romeos statue
:+; be located/situated, remain (in modern usage, statues stand: these however
are images, egiesand planned to be horizontal, not vertical)
:+: (ENmiTY the nal syllable pronounced like modern tie)
:+, sullen, melancholy, dark
:x rs s :. i. n:roii iioox

+,
S
hakespeares rst authentic tragedy has sometimes been
critically undervalued, perhaps because of its popularity.
Though Romeo and Juliet is a triumph of dramatic lyricism,
its tragic ending usurps most other aspects of the play and aban-
dons us to unhappy estimates of whether, and to what degree, its
young lovers are responsible for their own catastrophe. Harold
Goddard lamented that the Prologues A pair of star-crossd
lovers take their life had surrendered this drama to the astrol-
ogers, though more than the stars in their courses are to blame
for the destruction of the superb Juliet. Alas, half a century after
Goddard, the tragedy more frequently is surrendered to commis-
sars of gender and power, who can thrash the patriarchy, including
Shakespeare himself, for victimizing Juliet.
Thomas McAlindon in his refreshingly sane Shakespeares Tragic
Cosmos (+,,+) traces the dynamics of conict in the dramatist
back to the rival worldviews of Heraclitus and Empedocles, as re-
ned and modied in Geoffrey Chaucers The Knights Tale. For
Heraclitus, all things owed, as Empedocles visualized a strife be-
tween Love and Death. Chaucer, rather than Ovid or Christopher
Marlowe, was the ancestor of Shakespeares greatest originality,
that invention of the human. Chaucers ironic yet amiable version
of the religion of love, more perhaps in his Troilus and Criseyde than
in The Knights Tale, is the essential context for Romeo and Juliet.
Times ironies govern love in Chaucer, as they will in Romeo and
Juliet. Chaucers human nature is essentially Shakespeares: the
deepest link between the two greatest English poets was tempera-
mental rather than intellectual or sociopolitical. Love dies or else
lovers die: those are the pragmatic possibilities for the two poets,
each of them experientially wise beyond wisdom.
Shakespeare, somewhat unlike Chaucer, shied away from de-
picting the death of love rather than the death of lovers. Does
anyone, except Hamlet, ever fall out of love in Shakespeare?
Hamlet denies anyway that he ever loved Ophelia, and I believe
him. By the time the play ends, he loves no one, whether it be the
dead Ophelia or the dead father, the dead Gertrude or the dead
Yorick, and one wonders if this frightening charismatic ever
could have loved anyone. If there were an act o to Shakespeares
comedies, doubtless many of the concluding marriages would ap-
proximate the condition of Shakespeares own union with Anne
Hathaway. My observation, of course, is nonsensical if you would
have it so, but most of the Shakespearean audiencethen, now,
and alwaysgoes on believing that Shakespeare uniquely rep-
resented realities. Poor Falstaff never will stop loving Hal, and
the admirably Christian Antonio always will pine for Bassanio.
Whom Shakespeare himself loved we do not know, but the Son-
nets seem more than a ction and, at least in this aspect of life,
Shakespeare evidently was not so cold as his Hamlet.
There are mature lovers in Shakespeare, most notably Antony
and Cleopatra, who cheerfully sell each other out for reasons of
state, yet return to each other in their suicides. Both Romeo and
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
+,o
Antony kill themselves because they falsely think their beloveds
are dead (Antony bungles the suicide, as he does everything else).
The most passionate marriage in Shakespeare, the Macbeths,
subtly appears to have its sexual difculties and ends in madness
and suicide for Queen Macbeth, prompting the most equivocal
of elegiac reections by her usurping husband.Yet Edmund was
belovd, the icy villain of King Lear overhears himself saying,
when the bodies of Goneril and Regan are brought in.
The varieties of passionate love between the sexes are endlessly
Shakespeares concern; sexual jealousy nds its most amboyant
artists in Othello and Leontes, but the virtual identity of the tor-
ments of love and jealousy is a Shakespearean invention, later to
be rened by Nathaniel Hawthorne and Marcel Proust. Shake-
speare, more than any other author, has instructed the West in the
catastrophes of sexuality, and has invented the formula that the
sexual becomes the erotic when crossed by the shadow of death.
There had to be one high song of the erotic by Shakespeare, one
lyrical and tragicomical paean celebrating an unmixed love and
lamenting its inevitable destruction. Romeo and Juliet is unmatched,
in Shakespeare and in the worlds literature, as a vision of an un-
compromising mutual love that perishes of its own idealism and
intensity.
There are a few isolated instances of realistic distincts in Shake-
speares characters before Romeo and Juliet: Launce in The Two
Gentlemen of Verona, the Bastard Faulconbridge in King John,
Richard II, self-destructive king and superb metaphysical poet.
The fourfold of Juliet, Mercutio, the Nurse, and Romeo out-
number and overgo these earlier breakthroughs in human inven-
tion. Romeo and Juliet matters, as a play, because of these four exu-
berantly realized characters.
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
+,;
It is easier to see the vividness of Mercutio and the Nurse than
it is to absorb and sustain the erotic greatness of Juliet and the
heroic effort of Romeo to approximate her sublime state of being
in love. Shakespeare, with a prophetic insight, knows that he must
lead his audience beyond Mercutios obscene ironies if they are to
be worthy of apprehending Juliet, for her sublimity is the play and
guarantees the tragedy of this tragedy. Mercutio, the scene stealer
of the play, had to be killed off if it was to remain Juliets and
Romeos play; keep Mercutio in acts and , and the contention
of love and death would have to cease.We overinvest in Mercutio
because he insures us against our own erotic eagerness for doom;
he is in the play to some considerable purpose. So, in an even
darker way, is the Nurse, who helps guarantee the nal disaster.
The Nurse and Mercutio, both of them audience favorites, are
nevertheless bad news, in different but complementary ways.
Shakespeare, at this point in his career, may have underestimated
his burgeoning powers, because Mercutio and the Nurse go on
seducing audiences, readers, directors, and critics. Their verbal
exuberances make them forerunners of Touchstone and Jacques,
rancid ironists, but also of the dangerously eloquent manipulative
villains Iago and Edmund.
Shakespeares greatness began with Loves Labours Lost (+,,,
revised +,;) and Richard II (+,), superb achievements respec-
tively in comedy and in history.Yet Romeo and Juliet (+,,o)
has rightly overshadowed both, though I cannot quite place it for
eminence with A Midsummer Nights Dream, composed simulta-
neously with Shakespeares rst serious tragedy. The permanent
popularity, now of mythic intensity, of Romeo and Juliet is more
than justied, since the play is the largest and most persuasive cel-
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
+,:
ebration of romantic love in Western literature.When I think of
the play, without rereading and teaching it, or attending yet one
more inadequate performance, I rst remember neither the tragic
outcome nor the gloriously vivid Mercutio and the Nurse. My
mind goes directly to the vital center, act :, scene :, with its in-
candescent exchange between the lovers:
Romeo Lady, by yonder blessd moon I swear,
That tips with silver all these fruit-tree tops
Juliet O swear not by the moon, th inconstant moon,
That monthly changes in her circled orb,
Lest that thy love prove likewise variable.
Romeo What shall I swear by?
Juliet Do not swear at all,
Or if thou wilt, swear by thy gracious self,
Which is the god of my idolatry,
And Ill believe thee.
Romeo If my hearts dear love
Juliet Well, do not swear. Although I joy in thee,
I have no joy of this contract tonight.
It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden,
Too like the lightening, which doth cease to be
Ere one can say It lightens.Sweet, good night.
This bud of love, by summers ripening breath,
May prove a beauteous ower when next we meet.
Good night, good night. As sweet repose and rest
Come to thy heart as that within my breast.
Romeo O wilt thou leave me so unsatised?
Juliet What satisfaction canst thou have tonight?
Romeo Th exchange of thy loves faithful vow for mine.
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
+,,
Juliet I gave thee mine before thou didst request it,
And yet I would it were to give again.
Romeo Wouldst thou withdraw it? For what purpose, love?
Juliet But to be frank and give it thee again.
And yet I wish but for the thing I have.
My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep.The more I give to thee,
The more I have, for both are innite.
[:.:.+o;]
The revelation of Juliets nature here might be called an epiph-
any in the religion of love. Chaucer has nothing like this, nor does
Dante, since his Beatrices love for him transcends sexuality.
Unprecedented in literature (though presumably not in life),
Juliet precisely does not transcend the human heroine.Whether
Shakespeare reinvents the representation of a very young woman
(she is not yet fourteen) in love, or perhaps does even more than
that, is difcult to decide. How do you distance Juliet? You only
shame yourself by bringing irony to a contemplation of her con-
sciousness.William Hazlitt, spurred by a nostalgia for his own lost
dreams of love, caught better than any other critic the exact tem-
per of this scene: He has founded the passion of the two lovers
not in the pleasures they had experienced, but on all the pleasures
they had not experienced.
It is the sense of an innity yet to come that is evoked by Juliet,
nor can we doubt that her bounty is as boundless as the sea.
When Rosalind in AsYou Like It repeats this simile, it is in a tonal-
ity that subtly isolates Juliets difference:
Rosalind O coz, coz, coz, my pretty little coz, that thou didst
know how many fathoms deep I am in love! But it cannot
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:oo
be sounded. My affection hath an unknown bottom, like
the Bay of Portugal.
Celia Or rather bottomless, that as fast as you pour
affection in, it runs out.
Rosalind No.That same wicked bastard of Venus, that was
begot of thought, conceived of spleen and born of
madness, that blind rascally boy that abuses everyones eyes
because his own are out, let him be judge how deep I am
in love.
[.+.+,:o]
This is the sublimest of female wits, who one imagines would
advise Romeo and Juliet to die by attorney, and who knows
that women, as well as men, have died from time to time and
worms have eaten them, but not for love.Romeo and Juliet, alas,
are exceptions, and die for love rather than live for wit. Shake-
speare allows nothing like Rosalinds supreme intelligence to in-
trude upon Juliets authentic rapture. Mercutio, endlessly ob-
scene, is not qualied to darken Juliets intimations of ecstasy.
The play has already made clear how brief this happiness must be.
Against that context, against also all of his own ironic reserva-
tions, Shakespeare allows Juliet the most exalted declaration of
romantic love in the language:
Juliet But to be frank and give it thee again;
And yet I wish but for the thing I have.
My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep: The more I give to thee
The more I have, for both are innite.
[:.:.++]
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:o+
We have to measure the rest of this play against these ve lines,
miraculous in their legitimate pride and poignance. They defy
Dr. Johnsons wry remark on Shakespeares rhetorical extrava-
gances throughout the play:his pathetick strains are always pol-
luted with some unexpected depravations.Molly Mahood, not-
ing that there are at least +; puns and allied wordplays in Romeo
and Juliet, nds them appropriate to a riddling drama where
Death has long been Romeos rival and enjoys Juliet at the last,
an appropriate nale for doom-eager lovers.Yet little in the drama
suggests that Romeo and Juliet are in love with death, as well as
with each other. Shakespeare stands back from assigning blame,
whether to the feuding older generation, or to the lovers, or to
fate, time, chance, and the cosmological contraries. Julia Kristeva,
rather too courageously not standing back, rushes in to discover
a discreet version of the Japanese Realm of the Senses,a baroque
sadomasochistic motion picture.
Clearly Shakespeare took some risks in letting us judge this
tragedy for ourselves, but that refusal to usurp his audiences free-
dom allowed ultimately for the composition of the nal high
tragedies. I think that I speak for more than myself when I assert
that the love shared by Romeo and Juliet is as healthy and nor-
mative a passion as Western literature affords us. It concludes in
mutual suicide, but not because either of the lovers lusts for death,
or mingles hatred with desire.
Mercutio is the most notorious scene stealer in all of Shakespeare,
and there is a tradition (reported by John Dryden) that Shake-
speare declared he was obliged to kill off Mercutio, lest Mercutio
kill Shakespeare and hence the play. Dr. Johnson rightly com-
mended Mercutio for wit, gaiety, and courage; presumably the
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:o:
great critic chose to ignore that Mercutio also is obscene, heart-
less, and quarrelsome. Mercutio promises a grand comic role, and
yet disturbs us also with his extraordinary rhapsody concerning
Queen Mab, who at rst seems to belong more to A Midsummer
Nights Dream than to Romeo and Juliet:
Mercutio O then I see Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies midwife, and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate stone
On the forenger of an alderman,
Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart mens noses as they lie asleep
Her wagon spokes made of long spinners legs;
The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers;
Her traces, of the smallest spiders web,
Her collars, of the moonshines watry beams;
Her whip, of crickets bone; the lash, of lm;
Her wagoner, a small gray-coated gnat,
Not half so big as a round little worm
Pricked from the lazy nger of a maid;
Her chariot is an empty hazelnut,
Made by the joiner squirrel or old grub,
Time out o mine the fairies coachmakers.
And in this state she gallops night by night
Through lovers brains, and then they dream of love;
Oer courtiers knees, that dream on curtsies straight;
Oer lawyers ngers who straight dream on fees;
Oer ladies lips, who straight on kisses dream,
Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues
Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are.
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:o
Sometimes she gallops oer a courtiers nose,
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit;
And sometime comes she with a tithe pigs tail
Tickling a parsons nose as a lies asleep,
Then dreams he of another benece.
Sometimes she driveth oer a soldiers neck
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
Of healths ve fathom deep; and then anon
Drums in his ear, at which he starts and wakes,
And being thus frighted swears a prayer or two
And sleeps again.This is that very Mab
That plats the manes of horses in the night
And bakes the elocks in foul sluttish hair,
Which once untangled much misfortune bodes.
This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs,
That presses them and learns them rst to bear,
Making them women of good carriage.
This is she
[+..,]
Romeo interrupts, since clearly Mercutio never stops once
started. This mercurial vision of Queen Mabwhere Queen
probably means a whore, and Mab refers to a Celtic fairy, who fre-
quently manifests as a will-o-the-wispis anything but out of
character. Mercutios Mab is the midwife of our erotic dreams,
aiding us to give birth to our deep fantasies, and she appears to
posses a childlike charm for much of the length of Mercutios de-
scription. But since he is a major instance of what D. H. Lawrence
was to call sex-in-the-head, Mercutio is setting us up for the
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:o
revelation of Mab as the nightmare, the incubus who impregnates
maids. Romeo interrupts to say:Thou talkst of nothing,where
nothingis another slang term for the vagina. Mercutios bawdy
obsessiveness is splendidly employed by Shakespeare as a reduc-
tion of Romeo and Juliets honest exaltation of their passion. Di-
rectly before their rst rendezvous, we hear Mercutio at his most
obscenely exuberant pitch:
If love be blind, love cannot hit the mark.
Now will he sit under a medlar tree
And wish his mistress were that kind of fruit
As maids call medlars when they laugh alone.
O Romeo, that she were, O that she were
An open arse, and thou a poprin pear!
[:.+.:]
Mercutios reference is to Rosaline, Romeos beloved before he
falls,at rst glance,in love with Juliet,who instantly reciprocates.The
medlar,rotten with ripeness,popularly was believed to have the like-
ness of the female genitalia, and to meddlemeant to perform sex-
ual intercourse. Mercutio happily also cites a popular name for the
medlar, the open arse, as well as the poprin pear, at once pop-her-in
her open arse, and the slang name for a French pear, the Poperingle
(named for a town near Ypres).This is the antithetical prelude to a
scene that famously concludes with Juliets couplet:
Good night, good night. Parting is such sweet sorrow
That I shall say good night till it be morrow.
[:.:.+:+:o]
Mercutio at his best is a high-spiritual unbeliever in the reli-
gion of love, reductive as he may be:
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:o
Benvolio Here comes Romeo, here comes Romeo!
Mercutio Without his roe, like a dried herring. O esh, esh,
how art thou shied! Now is he for the numbers that
Petrarch owed in. Laura, to his lady, was but a kitchen
wench marry, she had a better love to berhyme her
Dido a dowdy, Cleopatra a gypsy, Helen and Hero hildings
and harlots,Thisbe a gray eye or so, [. . .]
[:..o]
Obsessed as he may be, Mercutio has the style to take his death
wound as gallantly as anyone in Shakespeare:
Romeo Courage, man, the hurt cannot be much.
Mercutio No, tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church
door, but tis enough, twill serve. Ask for me tomorrow
and you shall nd me a grave man. I am peppered, I
warrant, for this world. A plague o both your houses.
[.+.,+,]
That indeed is what in his death Mercutio becomes, a plague
upon both Romeo of the Montagues and Juliet of the Capulets,
since henceforward the tragedy speeds on to its nal double ca-
tastrophe. Shakespeare is already Shakespeare in his subtle pat-
terning, although rather overlyrical still in his style.The two fatal
gures in the play are its two liveliest comics, Mercutio and the
Nurse. Mercutios aggressivity has prepared the destruction of
love, though there is no negative impulse in Mercutio, who dies
by the tragic irony that Romeos intervention in the duel with
Tybalt is prompted by love for Juliet, a relationship of which Mer-
cutio is totally unaware. Mercutio is victimized by what is most
central to the play, and yet he dies without knowing what Romeo
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:oo
and Juliet is all about: the tragedy of authentic romantic love. For
Mercutio, that is nonsense: love is an open arse and a poprin pear.
To die as loves martyr, as it were, when you do not believe in the
religion of love, and do not even know what you are dying for, is
a grotesque irony that foreshadows the dreadful ironies that will
destroy Juliet and Romeo alike as the play concludes.
Juliets Nurse, despite her popularity, is altogether a much darker
gure. Like Mercutio, she is inwardly cold, even toward Juliet,
whom she has raised. Her language captivates us, as does Mercu-
tios, but Shakespeare gives both of them hidden natures much at
variance with their exuberant personalities. Mercutios incessant
bawdiness is the mask for what may be a repressed homoeroti-
cism, and like his violence may indicate a ight from the acute
sensibility at work in the Queen Mab speech until it too trans-
mutes into obscenity.The Nurse is even more complex; her ap-
parent vitalism and her propulsive ood of language beguile us in
her rst full speech:
Even or odd, of all days in the year,
Come Lammas Eve at night shall she be fourteen.
Susan and she (God rest all Christian souls)
Were of an age.Well, Susan is with God,
She was too good for me. But as I said,
On Lammas Eve at night shall she be fourteen.
That shall she. Marry, I remember it well.
Tis since the earthquake now eleven years,
And she was weand (I never shall forget it),
Of all the days of the year, upon that day.
For I had then laid wormwood to my dug,
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:o;
Sitting in the sun under the dovehouse wall.
My lord and you were then at Mantua.
Nay, I do bear a brain. But as I said,
When it did taste the wormwood on the nipple
Of my dug and felt it bitter, pretty fool,
To see it tetchy and fall out with the dug!
Shake, quoth the dovehouse! Twas no need, I trow,
To bid me trudge.
And since that time it is eleven years.
For then she could stand high lone. Nay, by th rood,
She could have run and waddled all about;
For even the day before she broke her brow,
And then my husband God be with his soul,
A was a merry man took up the child.
Yea,quoth he,dost thou fall upon thy face?
Thou wilt fall backward when thou hast more wit,
Wilt thou not, Jule?And, by my holidam,
the pretty wretch left crying, and said Ay.
To see now how a jest shall come about.
I warrant, an I should live a thousand years
I never should forget it.Wilt thou not, Jule?quoth he,
And, pretty fool, it stinted and said Ay.
[+..+o:]
Her speech is shrewd and not so simple as rst it sounds, and
comes short of poignance, because already there is something an-
tipathetic in the Nurse. Juliet, like her late twin sister, Susan, is too
good for the Nurse, and there is an edge to the account of the
weaning that is bothersome, since we do not hear the accents of
love.
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:o:
Shakespeare delays any more ultimate revelation of the Nurses
nature until the crucial scene where she fails Juliet.The exchanges
here need to be quoted at length, because Juliets shock is a new ef-
fect for Shakespeare.The Nurse is the person who has been closest
to Juliet for all the fourteen years of her life, and suddenly Juliet re-
alizes that what has seemed loyalty and care is something else.
Juliet O God, O Nurse, how shall this be prevented?
My husband is on earth, my faith in heaven.
How shall that faith return again to earth
Unless that husband send it me from heaven
By leaving earth? Comfort me, counsel me.
Alack, alack, that heaven should practice stratagems
Upon so soft a subject as myself.
What sayst thou? Hast thou not a word of joy?
Some comfort, Nurse.
Nurse Faith, here it is.
Romeo is banished, and all the world to nothing
That he dares neer come back to challenge you,
Or if he do, it needs must be by stealth.
Then, since the case so stands as now it doth,
I think it best you married with the County.
O hes a lovely gentleman.
Romeos a dishclout to him. An eagle, madam,
Hath not so green, so quick, so fair an eye
As Paris hath. Beshrew my very heart,
I think you are happy in this second match,
For it excels your rst, or if it did not,
Your rst is dead or twere as good he were
As living here and you no use of him.
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:o,
Juliet Speakst thou from thy heart?
Nurse And from my soul too, else beshrew them both.
Juliet Amen.
Nurse What?
Juliet Well, thou hast comforted me marvelous much.
Go in, and tell my lady I am gone,
Having displeased my father, to Laurence cell,
To make confession and to be absolved.
Nurse Marry, I will, and this is wisely done.
rxi+
Juliet Ancient damnation! O most wicked end,
Is it more sin to wish me thus forsworn,
Or to dispraise my lord with that same tongue
Which she hath praised him with above compare
So many thousand times? Go, counselor.
Thou and my bosom henceforth shall be twain.
Ill to the friar to know his remedy.
If all else fail, myself have power to die.
[..:o]
The more-than-poignant:that heaven should practice strat-
egems / Upon so soft a subject as myself is answered by the
Nurses astonishing comfort:it excels your rst, or if it did not,
/Your rst is dead.The Nurses argument is valid if convenience
is everything; since Juliet is in love, we hear instead an over-
whelming rejection of the Nurse, proceeding from the eloquent
amen on to the dry:Well, thou hast comforted me marvelous
much. The Nurse indeed is Ancient damnation! O most wicked
fiend, and we will hardly hear from her again until Juliet dies
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:+o
her rst death in this play. Like Mercutio, the Nurse moves us at
last to distrust every apparent value in the tragedy except the
lovers commitment to each other.
Juliet, and not Romeo, or even Brutus in Julius Caesar, dies her
second death as a preguration of Hamlets charismatic splendor.
Romeo, though he changes enormously under her inuence, re-
mains subject to anger and to despair, and is as responsible as Mer-
cutio and Tybalt are for the catastrophe. Having slain Tybalt,
Romeo cries out that he has become Fortunes fool. We would
wince if Juliet called herself Fortunes fool,since she is as nearly
awless as her situation allows, and we recall instead her wry
prayer: Be ckle, Fortune. Perhaps any playgoer or any reader
remembers best Romeo and Juliets aubade after their single
night of fulllment:
Juliet Wilt thou be gone? It is not yet near day.
It was the nightingale, and not the lark,
That pierced the fearful hollow of thine ear.
Nightly she sings on yond pomgranate tree.
Believe me, love, it was the nightingale.
Romeo It was the lark, the herald of the morn,
No nightingale. Look, love, what envious streaks
Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east.
Nights candles are burnt out, and jocund day
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops.
I must be gone and live, or stay and die.
Juliet Yond light is not daylight, I know it, I.
It is some meteor that the sun exhales
To be to thee this night a torchbearer
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:++
And light thee on thy way to Mantua.
Therefore stay yet, thou needst not to be gone.
Romeo Let me be taen, let me be put to death.
I am content, so thou wilt have it so.
Ill say yon gray is not the mornings eye,
Tis but the pale reex of Cynthias brow.
Nor that is not the lark whose notes do beat
The vaulty heaven so high above our heads.
I have more care to stay than will to go.
Come, death, and welcome. Juliet wills it so.
How ist, my soul? Lets talk. It is not day.
Juliet It is, it is. Hie hence, be gone, away.
It is the lark that sings so out of tune,
Straining harsh discords and unpleasing sharps.
Some say the lark makes sweet division.
This doth not so, for she divideth us.
Some say the lark and loathd toad change eyes.
O now I would they had changed voices too,
Since arm from arm that voice doth us affray,
Hunting thee hence with Hunts upto the day.
O now be gone, more light and light it grows.
Romeo More light and light, more dark and dark our woes.
[..+o]
Exquisite in itself, this is also a subtle epitome of the tragedy of
this tragedy, for the entire play could be regarded as a dawn song
that, alas, is out of phase.A bemused audience, unless the director
is shrewd, is likely to become skeptical that event after event ar-
rives in the untimeliest way possible. Romeo and Juliets aubade is
so disturbing precisely because they are not courtly love sophisti-
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:+:
cates working through a stylized ritual. The courtly lover con-
fronts the possibility of a real-enough death if he lingers too long,
because his partner is an adulterous wife. But Juliet and Romeo
know that death after dawn would be Romeos punishment, not
for adultery, but merely for marriage.The subtle outrageousness
of Shakespeares drama is that everything is against the lovers:
their families and the state, the indifference of nature, the vagaries
of time, and the regressive movement of the cosmological con-
traries of love and strife. Even had Romeo transcended his anger;
even if Mercutio and the Nurse were not quarrelsome busybod-
ies, the odds are too great against the triumph of love.That is the
aubades undersong, made explicit in Romeos great outcry
against the contraries:More light and light, more dark and dark
our woes.
What was Shakespeare trying to do for himself as a playwright
by composing Romeo and Juliet? Tragedy did not come easily to
Shakespeare, yet all this plays lyricism and comic genius cannot
hold off the dawn that will become a destructive darkness.With
just a few alterations, Shakespeare could have transformed Romeo
and Juliet into a play as cheerful as A Midsummer Nights Dream.
The young lovers, escaped to Mantua or Padua, would not have
been victims of Verona, or of bad timing, or of cosmological con-
traries asserting their sway.Yet this travesty would have been in-
tolerable for us, and for Shakespeare: a passion as absolute as
Romeos and Juliets cannot consort with comedy. Mere sexuality
will do for comedy, but the shadow of death makes eroticism the
companion of tragedy. Shakespeare, in Romeo and Juliet, eschews
Chaucerian irony, but he takes from The Knights Tale Chaucers
intimation that we are always keeping appointments we havent
made. Here it is the sublime appointment kept by Paris and
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:+
Romeo at Juliets supposed tomb, which soon enough becomes
both her authentic tomb and their own.What is left on stage at
the close of this tragedy is an absurd pathos: the wretched Friar
Laurence, who fearfully abandoned Juliet; a widowed Montague,
who vows to have a statue of Juliet raised in pure gold; the Capu-
lets vowing to end a feud already spent in ve deaths those of
Mercutio,Tybalt, Paris, Romeo, and Juliet.The closing curtain of
any proper production of the play should descend upon these -
nal ironies, presented as ironies, and not as images of reconcilia-
tion. As is Julius Caesar after it, Romeo and Juliet is a training ground
in which Shakespeare teaches himself remorselessness and pre-
pares the way for his ve great tragedies, starting with the Hamlet
of +ooo+oo+.
:x rss:. i. n:roii iioox
:+
r ur+nrr rr:ii xc

:+
This is not a bibliography but a selective set of starting places.
Texts
Shakespeare,William. The Complete Works. Edited by Stanley Wells and
Gary Taylor, with Introductions by Stanley Wells. Oxford: Clarendon
Press, +,:o.
. The First Folio of Shakespeare. :d ed. Prepared by Charlton
Hinman, with a new Introduction by Peter W. M. Blayney. New
York: Norton, +,,o.
. The Most Excellent and Lamentable Tragedie of Romeo and Juliet:
A Critical Edition. Edited by George Walton Williams. Durham,
N.C.: Duke University Press, +,o.
. Romeo and Juliet:A New Variorum Edition. Edited by Horace
Howard Furness. New York: Lippincott, +:;+. Reprint, New York:
Dover Books, +,o.
. Romeo and Juliet: Four Editions of First and Second Quartos.
Edited by P.A. Daniel. London: New Shakspere Society, +:;.
Reprint, n.p.: Kraus Reprint Service, +,o.
. The Tragedie of Romeo and Juliet: Applause First Folio Editions.
Edited by Neil Freeman. New York: Applause, +,,:.
Language
The Oxford English Dictionary: Second Edition on CD-ROM, version ,.o.
New York: Oxford University Press, :oo:.
Houston, John Porter, The Rhetoric of Poetry in the Renaissance and
Seventeenth Century. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press,
+,:.
. Shakespearean Sentences: A Study in Style and Syntax. Baton
Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, +,::.
Kermode, Frank. Shakespeares Language. New York: Farrar, Straus and
Giroux, :ooo.
Lanham, Richard A. The Motives of Eloquence: Literary Rhetoric in the
Renaissance. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, +,;o.
Marcus, Leah S. Unediting the Renaissance: Shakespeare, Marlowe, Milton.
London: Routledge, +,,o.
Ronberg, Gert. A Way with Words: The Language of English Renaissance
Literature. London: Arnold, +,,:.
Trousdale, Marion. Shakespeare and the Rhetoricians. Chapel Hill:
University of North Carolina Press, +,::.
Culture
Bindo, S.T. Tudor England. Baltimore: Penguin, +,o.
Bradbrook, M. C. Shakespeare: The Poet in His World. New York:
Columbia University Press, +,;:.
Brown, Cedric C., ed. Patronage, Politics, and Literary Tradition in England,
::::. Detroit, Mich.: Wayne State University Press, +,,.
Buxton, John. Elizabethan Taste. London: Harvester, +,o.
Cowan, Alexander. Urban Europe, :oo:,oo. New York: Oxford
University Press, +,,:.
Finucci, Valeria, and Regina Schwartz, eds. Desire in the Renaissance:
Psychoanalysis and Literature. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University
Press, +,,.
Fumerton, Patricia, and Simon Hunt, eds. Renaissance Culture and the
Everyday. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, +,,,.
Halliday, F. E. Shakespeare in His Age. South Brunswick, N.J.:Yoselo,
+,o.
Harrison, G. B., ed. The Elizabethan Journals: Being a Record of Those
Things Most Talked of During theYears :::,. Abridged ed. : vols.
New York: Doubleday Anchor, +,o.
rur+nrr rr:iixc
:+o
Harrison,William, The Description of England: The Classic Contemporary
[:,,] Account of Tudor Social Life. Edited by Georges Edelen.
Washington, D.C.: Folger Shakespeare Library, +,o:. :d ed., New
York: Dover, +,,.
Jardine, Lisa. Reading Shakespeare Historically. London: Routledge, +,,o.
. Worldly Goods: A New History of the Renaissance. London:
Macmillan, +,,o.
Jeanneret, Michel. A Feast of Words: Banquets and Table Talk in the
Renaissance. Translated by Jeremy Whiteley and Emma Hughes.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, +,,+.
Lockyer, Roger. Tudor and Stuart Britain. London: Longmans, +,o.
Rose, Mary Beth, ed. Renaissance Drama as Cultural History: Essays from
Renaissance Drama, :,,::,. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern
University Press, +,,o.
Tillyard, E. M.W. The Elizabethan World Picture. London: Chatto and
Windus, +,. Reprint, Harmondsworth: Penguin, +,o.
Willey, Basil. The Seventeenth Century Background: Studies in the Thought
of the Age in Relation to Poetry and Religion. New York: Columbia
University Press, +,. Reprint, New York: Doubleday, +,.
Wilson, F. P. The Plague in Shakespeares London. :d ed. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, +,o.
Wilson, John Dover. Life in Shakespeares England: A Book of Elizabethan
Prose. :d ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, +,+. Reprint,
Harmondsworth: Penguin, +,.
Zimmerman, Susan, and Ronald F. E.Weissman, eds. Urban Life in the
Renaissance. Newark: University of Delaware Press, +,:,.
Dramatic Development
Cohen,Walter. Drama of a Nation: Public Theater in Renaissance England
and Spain. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, +,:.
Dessen, Alan C. Shakespeare and the Late Moral Plays. Lincoln:
University of Nebraska Press, +,:o.
Fraser, Russell A., and Norman Rabkin, eds. Drama of the English
Renaissance. : vols. Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice Hall, +,;o.
Happ, Peter, ed. Tudor Interludes. Harmondsworth: Penguin, +,;:.
rur+nrr rr:iixc
:+;
Laroque, Franois. Shakespeares Festive World: Elizabethan Seasonal
Entertainment and the Professional Stage. Translated by Janet Lloyd.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, +,,+.
Norland, Howard B. Drama in Early Tudor Britain, :,:::. Lincoln:
University of Nebraska Press, +,,.
Theater and Stage
Doran, Madeleine. Endeavors of Art: A Study of Form in Elizabethan
Drama. Milwaukee: University of Wisconsin Press, +,.
Gurr, Andrew. Playgoing in Shakespeares London. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, +,:;.
. The Shakespearian Stage, :,,:,.. d ed. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, +,,:.
Harrison, G. B. Elizabethan Plays and Players. Ann Arbor: University of
Michigan Press, +,o.
Holmes, Martin. Shakespeare and His Players. New York: Scribners, +,;:.
Ingram, William. The Business of Playing: The Beginnings of the Adult
Professional Theater in Elizabethan London. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell
University Press, +,,:.
Salgado, Gamini. Eyewitnesses of Shakespeare: First Hand Accounts of
Performances, :o::o. New York: Barnes and Noble, +,;.
Thomson, Peter. Shakespeares Professional Career. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, +,,:.
Weimann, Robert. Shakespeare and the Popular Tradition in the Theater:
Studies in the Social Dimension of Dramatic Form and Function. Edited
by Robert Schwartz. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press,
+,;:.
Yachnin, Paul. Stage-Wrights: Shakespeare, Jonson, Middleton, and the
Making of Theatrical Value. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania
Press, +,,;.
Biography
Honigmann, F. A. J. Shakespeare: The Lost Years. :d ed. Manchester:
Manchester University Press, +,,:.
Schoenbaum, Samuel. Shakespeares Lives. New ed. Oxford: Clarendon
Press, +,,+.
rur+nrr rr:iixc
:+:
. William Shakespeare: A Compact Documentary Life. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, +,;;.
General
Bergeron, David M., and Geraldo U. de Sousa. Shakespeare: A Study and
Research Guide. d ed. Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, +,,.
Bradbey,Anne, ed. Shakespearian Criticism, ::,. London: Oxford
University Press, +,o.
Colie, Rosalie L. Shakespeares Living Art. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton
University Press, +,;.
Grene, David. The Actor in History: Studies in Shakespearean Stage Poetry.
University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, +,::.
Goddard, Harold C. The Meaning of Shakespeare. : vols. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, +,+.
Kaufmann, Ralph J. Elizabethan Drama: Modern Essays in Criticism. New
York: Oxford University Press, +,o+.
McDonald, Russ. The Bedford Companion to Shakespeare: An Introduction
with Documents. Boston: Bedford, +,,o.
Ricks, Christopher, ed. English Drama to :,:o. Rev. ed.
Harmondsworth: Sphere, +,:;.
Siegel, Paul N., ed. His Innite Variety: Major Shakespearean Criticism Since
Johnson. Philadelphia: Lippincott, +,o.
Sweeting, Elizabeth J. Early Tudor Criticism: Linguistic and Literary.
Oxford: Blackwell, +,o.
Van Doren, Mark. Shakespeare. New York: Holt, +,,.
Weiss,Theodore. The Breath of Clowns and Kings: Shakespeares Early
Comedies and Histories. New York:Atheneum, +,;+.
Wells, Stanley, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare Studies.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, +,:o.
rur+nrr rr:iixc
:+,
::+
r i xii xc ii s +

Repeated unfamiliar words and meanings, alphabetically arranged, with

act, scene, and footnote number of rst occurrence
a +..:
about +.+.++:
adventure :.:.o
affections +.+.+:
against ..+o
an +.+.::
anon +..+o:
apt .+.:
aqua vitae .:.oo
art :..,o
attend +.prologue.:
bandy :..+:
beshrew :..:
brief .:.;
but +.+.o,
chide :..;o
conceit :.o.:;
counsel +.+.+o
course +..+o
cousin +.+.+o
crave +..+o,
cull ..
dear :.:.o
defy .+.+,
desperate +.:.
devise :..+:
doom .+.:;
draw +.+.:,
dry beat .+.
else +.+.+,
envious +.+.+
ere +.+.++
fain :.:.;
fair +.prologue.
:::
fearful +.prologue.+:
feast +.:.+
fond :.:.oo
gentle +.+.+o;
God den +.:.
hold +..,
honest +..+::
humor +.+.+;
livery :.:.
look to +..;
maid +..:
mark :..+
marry +.+.
matter +..;
means +.+.+,
measure +..+o
morrow +.+.+o:
moved +.+.o
naught +.prologue.:+
neer +.:.;+
ofce ..o
parts ..:
perforce +..:
passing +.+.::
present .+.+
presently .+.
put from ..oo
remedy ..++
rough +.+.+o,
rude +..+
ruled +.+.::;
saucy +..;
seeming +.+.+;:
sirrah +.:.:
slave +.+.
stay +.:.
steal +.+.+:,
still +.+.:
straight +..:o
substance +..++,
taken .+.::
true :.:.o,
very +..o:
villain +.+.:o
want :.:.+o+
warrant +..
watch ..:
weraday .:.+
wherefore +..oo
wit(s) +.+.:++
rixiixc iis+