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 me. I pleaded for anything but R & J. But as I worked through the lines with my actors, and saw the scenes slowly put together, I came to realize the power and the beauty of the play.

Yes, they are somewhat idiotic teenagers in lust: but the sweeping passion of adolescence, with all its power and impatience, is something worth looking at in itself.

I don't know why English classes always seem to assign R & J to teenagers- I think it's a play that is actually much better appreciated by those who are past their own early adolescence. Because now, I love it.