Bővebb ismertető
Introduction
The plot of Romeo and Juliet is a familiar one. It is anticipated by many stories of doomed love; Samson and Delilah, Paris and Helen and Abelard and Heloise spring to mind. It is the age-old story of love reaching across the barriers of family and convention, in which young Romeo Montague falls in love with Lord Capulet's daughter Juliet. These two foremost families of Verona are bitter rivals, and the scandalous liaison causes a deadly quarrel in which members of both houses are killed. The lovers contrive to marry and spend a blissful night in each other's arms, but after an enforced parting a series of misunderstandings result in the suicides of both Romeo and Juliet. Their tragic deaths reconcile the Montagues and the Capulets, and peace is restored to Verona.
In the bad quarto of 1597, the play is entitled 'An excellent conceited Tragedie of Romeo and Juliet' and it is Shakespeare's first romantic tragedy (cf Troilus and Cressida 1602). It is easy to see the play as a banal expression of the romantic love that was fashionable towards the end of the 16th century, and which is characterised by the sonnet craze of the 1590's. The play derives from the Italian short story conventions of Bandello and Salemitano, and is based on Arthur Brooke's Tragical Histoiy ofRomeus and Juliet (1562) but it succeeds in rising above the traditional tale of adolescent love by its moving language which, for all its grandeur of expression, is basically simple. Because of the timelessness of the plot, it is one of the most approachable of Shakespeare's plays, and the attractions of the story have found expression in opera and ballet as well as in some of the more glutinous offerings of Hollywood.
Details of William Shakespeare's early life are scanty. He was the son of a prosperous merchant of Stratford upon Avon, and tradition has it that he was born on 23rd April 1564; records show that he was baptized three days later. It is likely that he attended the local Grammar School, hut he had no university education. Of his early career there is no record, though John Aubrey states that he Mm a countiy schoolmaster. How he became involved with the stage is equally uncertain, but he was sufficiently established as a playwright by 1592 to be criticized in print. He was a leading member of