Jayla Gray-Thomas
Mr. Williams
3A English
5/16/15
Should Romeo and Juliet be taught in 9th grade? “Art is not a form of propaganda; it is a form of truth. For art establishes the basic human truth which must serve as the touchstone of our judgement.” (K. Spacey) Currently, Romeo and Juliet is taught in the 9th grade curriculum. This has caused a huge division in opinion as to whether or not Romeo and Juliet should be taught in schools. Most kids dread the thought of having to read anything by Shakespeare but the lessons they take away from it is a lot more important than just not wanting to read something from 400 years ago. Romeo and Juliet should be taught in schools because it is full of themes and lessons that can be applied to your own life, it has both figurative and literal dimensions that can help
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In Kentucky, for example, inmates find themselves in Shakespeare’s many plays. Matt Wallace, the man directing the program of inmates performances says, “The themes that are in these plays resonate so deeply in these guys. Through these plays they are digging up some of the most painful and horrific parts of their lives.” This shows that even convicted felons, people serving from four years to life without parole for multiple crimes including robbery, murder, and more, can link their own life and experiences to those found in a lot of Shakespeare’s plays. Romeo and Juliet is the perfect collection of themes like infatuation, lust, jealousy, rivalry, etc. Maybe students haven’t experienced every one of these things, but these themes and lessons are very important things they should learn because learning about it can help prevent you from repeating it. For example, by teaching how tragic rash decisions can be, even if it is very dramatic, Romeo and Juliet can prevent kids from making life changing decisions without really thinking about it
Explained in Depth: My Photo Essay In Act 1, Scene 1, another fight breaks out between the Capulets and the Montagues. It states in the Prologue: “From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,” –Prologue, Line 3.
The students read Romeo and Juliet and do not see the love story that society would have them see. Instead they examine what lies beyond this. They see a story of secrecy, sex, murder, suicide, and disease. All of these things are found within the play, but are masked by poetry and romance. For example, these students see Romeo and Juliet as a story of "whispering, tiptoeing, making love, and (children) driven mad in the dark." To the "normal" reader this is romantic. It is viewed as a story about the most amazing kind of love imaginable - true love ending in tragedy.
Even though, Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet over 500 years ago the struggles and social pressures portrayed in the play are still present in the cutthroat society of high school. Two perfect themes that are shown tremendously throughout Shakespeare’s time and our modern times are; “Love” and “Fate”. These are constantly running through people’s minds all day as they try to unravel them. No matter the time period there will always be similarities especially between the teenager years.
The theme of the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare is entertainment. This is proven thought the play through use of comedy, drama, romance, and conflict. This style brought people of all ages, mindsets, and social classes to see the play since it used the mixture instead of just a single genre of entertainment. The result was Romeo and Juliet being very entertaining, profitable, and generally succeeding in its purpose.
A tragedy imitates the emotional events of life by showing instead of telling. It does not have to be an exact replication of life, but instead have some realistic aspects to it. This type of play is special because an event in the plot is caused by a preceding choice or action performed by the character. Therefore, unlike a story where occurrences are caused by coincidences, a tragedy must have events that inescapably connect to one another as a result of the characters’ choices. Consequently, this idea of cause and effect must direct the plot of the play until the protagonists have an unfortunate end. Thus, the audience watching the tragedy will experience fear and pity for the characters since their actions will lead to their dramatic downfall. Similarily, William Shakespeare’s, Romeo and Juliet, conveys these fundamental ideas, but it mainly emphasizes on certain tragic concepts. These components, explained by Aristotle, certainly make this play a quintessence of tragedy. They support the chain of events in Romeo and Juliet by using character traits and majors events to connect the plot and illustrate how the characters create their own ending. For this reason, Romeo and Juliet is a genuine tragedy because of its use of significant, tragic elements; tragically-flawed protagonists; and inevitable fate.
What would the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet be if Romeo and Juliet were only a few ages older and not teens? Well, there are a conglomerate of possibilities starting with their impulse control, if Romeo and Juliet met when they were, at the very least, twenty-five they may have not acted as impulsive as they did. Maybe Romeo wouldn’t have kissed Juliet during their first meeting and instead would have courted her. Or maybe if Romeo didn’t propose on their second meeting they could have had a long marriage that united their families, and maybe if Romeo didn’t slay Tybalt he wouldn’t have been banished and wouldn’t have brought about his own demise. As teenagers the two star-crossed
Through the flaws in the characterization of his characters, Shakespeare allows their weakness to manipulate and cloud their judgment. This fundamentally leads to the outcome of Romeo and Juliet, with each weakness presenting a conflict that alters the characters fate. Being especially true with the star-crossed lovers, William Shakespeare leads their perfect love into tragedy with these conflicts. In Romeo and Juliet, Juliet, Friar Lawrence, and Tybalt all contribute to conflicts that enhance the plot. From destructive flaws in their characterizations, Juliet, Friar Lawrence, and Tybalt are all consequently controlled by their weakness, therefore affecting the outcome of the play.
Romeo and Juliet is arguably the most famous story about love in literature. This is in part because of the tension caused by the look the different characters have towards what love means and its role in life. These views were very important for the progression of the story. Their different views collided and caused much grief and sorrow for the characters throughout play. Many important events that propelled the story forward would not have happened without the various feelings towards love the characters have and how they felt of and reacted to the other characters’ view on love.
Of these, one of them is it’s use of suicide to influence the actions of it’s characters and how loss or the threat of loss can drive someone to end their lives. The second is it’s use of human recklessness to also drive the plot, and how recklessness almost never ends well for those involved, just look at Tybalt. The final one is it’s use of violence and revenge, the wish for vengeance on someone, like recklessness, can be horrible for everyone partaking in it; with Romeo this is when he gets revenge on Tybalt for killing Mercutio and he gets himself banished, one step closer to his grim fate. In conclusion, The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet remains relevant to the modern day person through it’s use of themes about suicide, the recklessness of human beings, and our potentially vengeful
In the the play ‘Romeo and Juliet’ written by William Shakespeare the character Romeo is used to help the readers understand an important message of the destruction that is caused when passion overrides reason. Shakespeare uses Romeo to highlight an important message is shown several times throughout the course of the play. Shakespeare uses the character Romeo to help readers understand this important message when Romeo sneaks into the Capulet's’ garden to see Juliet in act 2, scene 2. He is also used to show an important message in act 3, scene 5 when Romeo kills himself once finding out about Juliet’s apparent death.
Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare is often referred to as a classic love story. It is a story of love at first sight and fighting between families. The classic is a true tragedy because of the way it is created. Romeo and Juliet is an Aristotelian tragedy because it clearly follows the model shown by Aristotle. All aspects of the plot and characters perfectly follow way Aristotle defined. The plot follows the events that need to occur and the main characters have a flaw. Pity and fear is felt for the characters throughout the play. Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare is a true Aristotelian tragedy because of the characters, plot, and the fact that it triggers pity and fear.
William Shakespeare wrote 37 plays in his life, with his best and most famous being Romeo and Juliet. This play is over 450 years old and since then has been made into a movie over 25 times and performed all around the world. Through the wide variety of themes, Romeo and Juliet still appeals to teenagers in the 21st century. Adolescents can still relate to 3 themes in Romeo and Juliet: relationships, parental control, and bullying, which applies to teenagers in the 16th century and the 21st century.
Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo and Juliet is a film that converts Shakespeare’s famous play into a present-day setting. The film transforms the original texts into modern notions, whilst still employing Shakespearean language. Compared to Franco Zeffirelli’s adaptation of Romeo and Juliet, Luhrmann’s picture is easier for a teenage audience to understand and relate to because of his modernisations. Despite the passing of four centuries Shakespeare’s themes of love, hate, violence, family and mortality remain the same regardless of the setting.
'Romeo and Juliet' is a play written by William Shakespeare that teaches current and future generations important lessons about love and vengeance. Hatred and revenge is a key theme throughout the play as everyone is blinded by pessimistic opinions and ideas about their enemies. Although their pride and passion for violence is extremely overpowering and demeaning, there is a small seed of hope and love (Romeo and Juliet) beginning to grow in the immense darkness. By analysing these themes, it helps to enlighten and strengthen your knowledge of the consequences of forbidden love and assists the reader in becoming more optimistic.
There are two types of advice: positive advice, and poor advice. Both kinds of advice can be taken in different directions. The good advice will be taken in the positive direction. Meanwhile the poor advice can be taken into the negative direction. In the play, Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, a lot of poor advice is given to the characters. The poor advice given to Romeo and Juliet ultimately affected the way they behaved, thus making them responsible for their deaths.