Bővebb ismertető
A WORD TO THE READER
A story of two young lovers caught in the crossfire of a senseless family feud, The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet is Shakespeare's comment on the "generation gap." The teenage lovers and their parents don't seem to understand each other at all. In fact, they don't even communicate. Juliet's father doesn't ask her if she wants to be married. He treats her like a piece of property, something to be handed over to the highest bidder. Romeo never asks his parents for help when he gets into trouble. He turns instead to an understanding outsider — Friar Laurence.
Shakespeare was about 30 years old when he wrote Romeo and Juliet, but his sympathies were with the young and loving. The foolish pride and senseless hatred that keeps the feud blazing between the Montagues and Capulets seems to have angered and disgusted him. He puts these feelings into Mercutio's dying words: "A plague on both your houses!"
The story of Romeo and Juliet was popular long before Shakespeare turned it into a play. He borrowed the plot and characters from "The Tragicall Historye of Romeus and Juliet," a long poem written in 1562 by Arthur Brooke. Brooke himself had gotten the idea for his poem from an old Italian story. By literary