Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare Made Easy)

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Summary: Romeo and Juliet, a truly love story
Review: Romeo and Juliet are the two most known lovers created by William Shakespeare. Their love story is one to be cried for, and it really shows the true meaning of what love is. Many people have claimed and agreed it is the most sad but romantic play ever written, and it really is.
They're a pair of star crossed lovers, who fall in love at first site. Their hopless love is denied from the very beginning: their families have an awful hatred towards each other which has been everlasting. They go through many tests for them to prove they really love each other: Romeo's best friend dying; Romeo's exile after murdering Mercutio, Juliet's cousin; and finally Romeo learning his dear lover's "death".
Although it has a tragic ending, many people say this story is actually happy, for they both die at the same time, and their love is kept together, for eternity.

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Summary: Romeo+Juliet
Review: We are from Argentina and learning English. Our teacher recommended the book Romeo + Juliet, we thought this book was going to increase our vocabulary and help us understand better the English language, but it didn't, instead it made it more difficult. Shakespeare used old English and played with words.
For those who aren't aware, "Romeo and Juliet" tells the tale of two "star-cross'" teenage lovers who secretly fall for each other and marry. Their families, the Montagues and Capulets, have been fierce enemies for decades, and, even as Romeo and Juliet say their wedding vows, new violence breaks out between the clans. In the end, their love is doomed. When Romeo mistakenly believes Juliet is dead, he poisons himself. And, when Juliet discovers that he is dead, she too commits suicide.
Shakespeare's writings are always beautiful but in this case he decorates with details a simple story, and that makes it boring and difficult to follow the plot.
The characters all have different personalities, for example the peaceful characters, hot-tempered, romantic, aggressive, impulsive, strict, etc. And that is what perhaps could make it interesting. In our opinion the best character is the nurse because she says always what she feels and not what is better for her.
In conclusion, we could only understand the story because as we continued reading, we also saw the film, which we recommend you to see.

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Summary: Italian Lovers
Review: This might be shakespeare's best. Its certainly more accessible than Hamlet. This doesn't really need another review at all. I write to inform the reader of another monumental book. This may be the most famous story of Italian Lovers. If you like Italy and/or love Stories, I recommend The Betrothed(I Promessi Sposi) by Alessandro Manzoni. Renzo and Lucia(from the book) are almost as famous as Romeo And Juliet. If Shakespeare and Leo Tolstoy ever wrote a book together, their book would look like The Betrothed. Yes, its THAT GREAT!

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Summary: An Undying Story
Review: I went throughout high school never reading this book. It's so well-known; everyone knows what it is about and how it ends. Movie after movie has come out depicting the events. However, I will honestly say that it is definitely worth the read. It's a beautiful story of two lovers who suffer from forbidden love. I hate sappy books. I despise them. But this one was different. I don't know if it was because it was fast paced or if it's the fact that people were always dueling, or what. However, I will say that Shakepeare is brillant. This, along with so many of his other stories are great. ROMEO AND JULIET is a brillant tale, and after reading it, I am more able to appreciate everything I have seen and heard about it. If nothing else, it's a wonderful play about honor, devotion, independence, and unification. And this edition is really helpful in understanding Shakespeare's language, for on each page, there are notations that tell what his words and phrases mean today...which is REALLY helpful.

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Summary: Boring
Review: What a boring love story - I wasn't impressed. Bizarre plot, long tedious read.

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Summary: best
Review: best story ever made. no other.. story touches this. its true love, they wooed, feel inlove, and died for love. Isn't that what we all want?

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Summary: teenagers!
Review: i read this book a few times while in high school and picked up on a few of the plays on words. then my high school did it as a play (as most other high schools do) and i was an usher/concession stand type person and had to sit through it many times. what it was truly about started to sink in after all of those viewings. in the play romeo is seventeen and juliet is fourteen. before they even meet romeo is lovesick over his dear rosalyn, but once he sees juliet at the party he immediately takes a liking to her. he bases all of his feelings on her physical beauty. they never really get to know eachother. they lust after one another and rebelliously marry eachother. then they kill themselves only as overdramatic teenagers, who think the world revolves around them and that they know everything, can. this is not a great love story. it's two teenagers who have crushes on one another taking it to the extreme.

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Summary: Romeo&Juliet's tragedy
Review: In Verona, an ancient grudge continues to throw new mutinies and violence between the Capulets and the Montagues.Through bad luck,Romeo and Juliet, the young descendents of those two prominent families fall in love at first sight.Believing that this holy relationship will end the feud,they decide to stay together, get secretly married and defy their own fate that will finaly lead to their tragic death.However, this death suceeds in making their love become the most known romance that the first,present and future generations will ever hear about.It's a romantic story with vast and profound meaning.It shows that the true love is the one that struck at first sight not the one that grows gradually.It also demonstrates how a person in this time could act to sacrifice and protect his love.Shakespeare's associations of romanticism are misunderstood,we can see that especialy between love and hate, a wonderful mixture that explaines the tragic end of The two lovers.He shows how much Romeo's passion is true and strong by creating a tension between his overhelming desire and his fear and worry about his soulmate's dignity and destiny.Juliet's thinking about the consequences of her love is more systematical than Romeo's.That doesn't mean that she is less romantic than him but simply more mature eventhough she is fourteen and he is seventeen.Shakespeare another time uses lot of foreshadowing like when Friar Lawrence says,"Just as healing herbs can kill love also can lead to death".I really fell in love with this sentence.During the whole time I spent reading this story,a big enigm was installed in my mind.I was asking myself about my real opinion about the story.The answer as much as it would look simple for other people as much as it looked hard for me to know.I don't appreciate the story.But I really like the writer's techniques and the way he expresses his personal feelings and thoughts even if they are not realistic at all and they are described with an exagerated pessimistic vision.I also like how he uses words and play with them.But I didn't feel this suspense we usually have in reading a story because I already knew what's going to happen.The story is so sad that we feel where in a continuous funeral.I don't like the age given to our two heroes,they are so young to be able to understand the real meaning of love.As a reader,I feel that the tragedy was due to a stupid reason or in other words an adolescents fantasm and not a strong exceptional love. Also,unlike in the 15th or 16th century a marriage between a fourteen year girl and a seventen year boy is today more common.
As a conclusion,the opinions differ in this kind of situations.Some people will agree with my critics and some people won't.The reason that influenced my opinion is that I prefer realistics stories . In my opinion, every romantic person with vast imagination should read this book .

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Summary: Prosaism
Review: A glorified cliche, this book does little justice to Shakespeare's writing ability as it isn't nearly his best work. Its marvellous dissemination and public love and recognition beffudles me. Superficial, lackluster, and diaphanous often foolish and loathsome compourtment and intelligence of the characters makes this book nothing more than a wonderful waste of valuable time. Never has Shakespeare created a work so imbued with cliches and idiocy. Basically, Romeo and Juliet is a story about two romantically-impaired "star crossed" lovers who have to avoid the obstacles presented by the feud between their families to realise and consummate their ephemeral marriage. They arent star crossed! They are inane idiots too immersed in "love" to recognize the imprudence of their actions. Their deaths were not the least bit pitiful, but risible. Cognitive, yes. Irritating, yes. Interesting? No. The utter folly of the characters is murderous, very uncharacteristic of Shakespeare who usually presents intelligent and philosophical personages. Do not base your opinion of Shakespeare on this pathetic work, he has created and transcended this one with a myriad of his other much more meaningful and enthralling plays. I d much rather recommend Midsummer Night's Dream or Hamlet.

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Summary: The title says it all
Review: Yes, a wonderful classic, but who wants to read in elizabethan english lol. Wonderful for aiding (cough cheating cough) if your reading it for school.