Romeo and Juliet (SparkNotes No Fear Shakespeare)

by William Shakespeare

book data

57672 ratings, 3.79 average rating, 1468 reviews (more data...)

rating	frequency	%
5		27%
4		34%
3		28%
2		7%
1		1%

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published

April 15th 2003 by SparkNotes

binding

Paperback, 304 pages

isbn

1586638459 (isbn13: 9781586638450)

description

No Fear Shakespeare gives you the complete text of Romeo and Juliet on the left-hand page, side-by-side with an easy-to-understand translation ...more

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Matt rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

03/02/07

Read in September, 2006

recommends it for: Honestly, who doesn't like a love story?

How someone can go and get two degrees in English and not read Romeo and Juliet, I have absolutely no idea. Why I would take it upon myself to read Shakespeare when I’m under no obligation, I’m afraid only fellow writers and lit geeks will understand.

It’s among the best-known stories in history, even for people who’ve never come within a mile of the Bard’s plays. Two lovers are kept apart by their feuding families. They must thus pursue their love in secret. But it’s not c...more

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Colva rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

10/25/07

Read in January, 2000

recommends it for: romantics of every description

I was told I could learn everything I needed to know about life from "Romeo and Juliet". The play doesn't stand out in my mind in terms of plot or motivation, however the whole thing is worth paying a great deal of attention to because of a handful of speeches. Most notably, Mercutio's "queen mab" speech,

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 fore-finger of an alderman,
Drawn wit...more

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Nate rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

08/27/08

I'm not sure what annoys me more - the play that elevated a story about two teenagers meeting at a ball and instantly "falling in love" then deciding to get married after knowing each other for one night into the most well-known love story of all time, or the middle schools that feed this to kids of the same age group as the main characters to support their angst-filled heads with the idea that yes, they really are in love with that guy/girl they met five minutes ago, and no one can st...more I'm not sure what annoys me more - the play that elevated a story about two teenagers meeting at a ball and instantly "falling in love" then deciding to get married after knowing each other for one night into the most well-known love story of all time, or the middle schools that feed this to kids of the same age group as the main characters to support their angst-filled heads with the idea that yes, they really are in love with that guy/girl they met five minutes ago, and no one can stop them, especially not their meddling parents!

Keep in mind that Juliet was THIRTEEN YEARS OLD. (Her father states she "hath not yet seen the change of fourteen years" in 1.2.9). Even in Shakespeare's England, most women were at least 21 before they married and had children. It's not clear how old Romeo is, but either he's also a stupid little kid who needs to be slapped, or he's a child molester, and neither one is a good thing.

When I was in middle school or high school, around the time we read this book, I remember a classmate saying in class that when her and her boyfriends' eyes met across the quad, they just knew they were meant to be together forever. How convenient that her soulmate happened to be an immensely popular and good-looking football player, and his soulmate happened to be a gorgeous cheerleader! That's not love at first sight, that's lust at first sight. If they were really lucky, maybe as time went on they would also happen to "click" very well, that lust would develop into love (it didn't), and they would end up together forever (they didn't). But if they saw each other at a school dance, decided they were "like, totally in love," and then the next day decided to run off and get married, we shouldn't encourage that as a romantic love story, we should slap the hell out of them both to wake them up to reality.

For what it's worth, my cynicism doesn't come from any bitterness towards life or love. I met my wife when we were 17, and we've now been together almost 10 years, married for a little over 2. Fortunately for me, she turned out to be awesome. If we had decided the day after meeting each other that we were hopelessly in love and needed to get married immediately, we would have been idiots, and I hope someone who I trusted and respected would have slapped me, hard. If we were 13 at the time, that would be even worse. Enlightened adults injecting this into our youth as a classic love story for the generations, providing further support for their angst-filled false ideas of love and marriage, is probably worst of all....less

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Sally rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

05/25/08

Read in May, 2006

recommended to Sally by: Stepheine Meyer!
recommends it for: all

Let's talk for a minute about why I would give 5 stars to this awful story. I just need to step back 25 years. I first read this when I was in junior high (just the age of our star-crossed lovers), and I absolutely loathed it. Unfortunately, I didn't just simmer quietly about it--I loathed this LOUDLY, openly in my English class. Everyone got to hear about just how stupid these people were.

Being their age, I would never have behaved so badly--meet, marry, suicide in a weekend? Puh-leez....more

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Michele rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

04/21/08

Read in January, 1999

If you haven't read this yet...I just don't understand why not!

Like this review? yes (2 people liked it)

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Matt is currently reading it (review of isbn 0743477111)

10/14/08

bookshelves: currently-reading

Uh....I'm reading one of these editions of Romeo and Juliet, by one of those publishers. I am switch hitting at work, this and "I" by Stephen Dixon.

It's been since college since I've read any Shakespeare. Thankfully this wasn't too long ago.

When a somewhat uneducated co-worker asked me what I was reading, I started to pimp Shakespeare, saying he was sick as hell because he wrote in iambic pentameter.

"I-uh what?"
"Iambic pentameter. Meaning every line he wrote had ...more

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Megan rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

03/25/08

I had to think a bit about Laura's question regarding whether I like this story because it's Shakespeare or if there was more to it.

This was my introduction to Shakespeare, so that is surely part of it. But I also love the stories that stick with me and, although I'm not one for suicide over lost love - I've never been that melodramatic, even in my most melodramatic of heart wrenching teenage years - I definitely remember what it was like to have hormones intensifying every emotional expe...more

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♥♥yayi♥jazmine♥♥ rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

02/10/08

Read in February, 2008

recommended to ♥♥yayi♥jazmine♥♥ by: Own choise and school
recommends it for: to poetry wrighters and any one willing to take there time to understand the languge

rushing into thing is never does any good. Think things thru. Listen to your gut !and when u have a philosophy on life u should fallow it! Life is like ying-&-yang there is balancey . Dont love hard or too soft.(5th time reading the play and NOW I'm starting to understand!)

ignore the rest(paper for zkool)
`````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````
Their deadly love
by: yazmin m. cora
dummer 2nd hour
02~04~08

There are 32,622 young adults ...more rushing into thing is never does any good. Think things thru. Listen to your gut !and when u have a philosophy on life u should fallow it! Life is like ying-&-yang there is balancey . Dont love hard or too soft.(5th time reading the play and NOW I'm starting to understand!)

ignore the rest(paper for zkool)
`````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````
Their deadly love
by: yazmin m. cora
dummer 2nd hour
02~04~08

There are 32,622 young adults that commit suicides every year, these young adults or teens think that killing themselves is the only way to solve their problems, when they haven’t thought things through, much like Romeo and Juliet. This paper will be about how things are fickle or preventable, if someone would have changed something or wouldn’t have done one thing, because even the smallest thing could have saved Romeo and Juliet, things could have been different. In the play The tragedy of Romeo and Juliet, the main characters are Romeo and Juliet. This play is about how their deaths are preventable. The play is set around Romeo and Juliet and how they fall in love, and that their love leads them to their deaths. After a series of unfortunate events that lead to their deaths, not only their choice affects the play but other characters choices and their own fate.
This paragraph is about some of Romeo's and Juliet's choices that lead to their own deaths. If they would have thought things through the play wouldn't have ended the way it did. For example, if Romeo would have listed to himself and didn’t go to the party, the play wouldn't carry on like it did, he had like a sixth sense about something bad starting to happen at that party, "And my mind misgives some consequnce yet hanging in the stars shall bitterly begin this fearful date...And expire the term of a dispised life."
Another example would be that Romeo's and Juliet's families where enemies, if they would completely realized and understood that, the play wouldn't have end in death. Juliet partly realized this and said, "My only love sprung from my only hate." Romeo also said, “My life is my foe's debt." Romeo’s and Juliet’s impetuous decisions affected the play a great deal; Juliet said this by telling Romeo, “Too rash, too unadvised, too sudden… it’s too like lightening that ceases to exist ere you can say it lightens.” Making better disions would have allowed Romeo and Juliet not to die the way they did, but other people choices still affects their life and this play.
Romeo and Juliet are not the only ones who do things that cause their own down fall. Other characters also contributed to the events that cause the play to end in the suicide-deaths. If Friar Lawrence didn’t marry Romeo and Juliet, things wouldn’t have gone down like they did. The only reason the Friar married them both was because he thought he could fix the feud between the two families with Romeo’s and Juliet’s love, to show this Friar Lawrence says “In one respect I’ll they assistant be; For this alliance may so happy prove to turn your households’ rancor to pure love.” Another person that effects the play is Tybalt, if Tybalt grew up and takes responsibility then he isn’t looking for Romeo and doesn’t get killed , but Tybalt holds it in vain and says “ I will withdraw but this intrusion now seeing sweet shall turn to bitterest gale." And Tybalt still blames Romeo, for his own embarrassment at Lord Capulet's party and says again "Boy this shall not excuse the injuries thou hast done me; therefore turn and draw.", after Romeo tries to make up and say sorry to Tybalt. My last example is if Lord Capulet would have married off Juliet off to Paris earlier, Juliet would have more of a chance she wouldn’t have meet Romeo, and things would have been different. These characters also are responsible for the play's ending the way it does. However there is one more element that the plays a part: fate. The prologue tells us these are "star-crossed" lovers and Juliet’s begs fortune to be fickled, unfortunately fate is too fickle and changes for the worse.
There are three dispoining signs that fate isn’t on Romeo's and Juliet's side, one is when Friar John couldn’t deliver the letter to Romeo saying that Juliet’s death is staged. The reason Friar John couldn’t deliver the letter, was because health officials of Verona wouldn’t let him Friar John leave Verona because they thought he was carrying a deadly desises. Friar John tells this to Friar Lawrence," I could not send it. Here it is again." The second example is when Balthasar see's Juliet "lied low" but Balthasar doesn’t know Juliet is faking her death for 42 hours to run away with Romeo, "Then she is well and nothing can be ill. Her body sleeps in Capels' Monumenty and her immortal part with the angels lives. I saw her laid low in her Kindrd's vault." the last example is: timing. If Romeo would have listened to Balthasar and waited till fore there notice, he wouldn’t have bought the poison and later drank it so quickly! Or even if he was a couple minutes or seconds late he would have more of a chance not killing himself. Or when he noticed that Juliet looked alive with her lips and cheeks"(quote)" But nothing worked, Romeo drank the poison seconds before Juliet woke up.
In this paper we talked about how the suicides of Romeo and Juliet was fickle and it their fate and their own and others action to cause it all, and that it all was fickle or preventable. If Romeo listed to his gut and didn’t go to the party then he wouldn’t have meet Juliet and Friar Lawrence wouldn’t have married them both and Romeo wouldn’t have bought the poison to kill himself moments before Juliet wakes to then kill herself. One can tell that suicides can be prevented and that if someone did something, this all wouldn’t have happened. Not doing or doing something in ones life is all the matter. Prevent at least one of those 32,622 teens that commits suicide every year.

(^:! The End !:^)

...less

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Isiscaughey rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

06/14/07

bookshelves: classics, plays

Read in October, 1996

The first time I read Romeo and Juliet (my freshman year of high school), I hated it. I had always heard it built up as a great love story, a great romance- and I didn't see it at all. To me, it seemed a pretty pointless story about a couple of idiotic teenagers in lust. The ridiculous essays I was forced to compose about it certainly didn't help.

My senior year of high school, however, my drama teacher selected it as our spring play. I was stage manager, and I was horrified when he told ...more

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Kelly rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

04/19/07

Read in September, 1998

Problem D
Romeo & Juliet !
Input: Standard Input
Output: Standard Output
Time Limit: 2 seconds

In this problem we will discuss the problems of a modern Romeo and a modern Juliet. You are asked to solve their problems so that they don’t have to be a tragic pair like that of Shakespeare’s. As usual the family of Romeo and Juliet have hostile relationships and so they are locked up in two different places M and N. Two cannons are placed in location A and two cannons are placed i...more

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Stephanie rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

05/21/08

Read in January, 1978

Like most people, I read it in junior high school and pretty much hated it. Ugh, what horrid memories it brings back - having to listen to other adolescents who really have no background knowledge or interest read aloud from the text with no cadence or feeling (other than "thank God that's over" when the teacher calls on someone else) But it is really fun to go back to these pieces now and have the time and experience and understanding to look at all the wonderful layers Shakespeare wo...more

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Sarah rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

06/06/08

bookshelves: plays

Wha, wha, wha. Get over yourselves! A classic, perhaps, but I have no patience for lovesick teenagers (more specifically, for teenagers in general.) It bothers me that Shakespeare relies so heavily on the timing element. I sit there sweating, lamenting the fact that, were it not for a few minutes more, the outcome would be far less tragic.

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Celeste rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

04/02/08

I know that most People see this as a tradey and everything. But i think that its quite funny how everything went down. I think that Romeo is quite a funny character. All the crazy stuff he says is quite entertaining. And juliet is funny to. Together they make a funny couple.

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Danielle rated it:

(review of isbn 0764120859)

07/09/07

Read in June, 2007

recommends it for: EVERYONE

beautiful and so... tragic. at first, i was completely confused when trying to read and comprehend old english. as time passed, i found myself reading the old english like it was normal english and thinking that romeo and juliet was so interesting.

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Apol added it (review of isbn 0743477111)

09/08/07

Has a copy to sell/swap — Read in February, 1996

recommends it for: jenny

i've learned that when you are in love,you can do everything!even it looks like impossible,nothing and no one can stop you from loving and seeing the person you love...love conquers all...

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Tasia rated it:

(review of isbn 0743477111)

11/11/08

Sharpest of wit, incredible fight scenes, human failings,Hideously Tragic and yet utterly peacfull

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