When Shakespeare sat down to write Romeo and Juliet around 1596, he wasn’t staring at an empty page. He didn’t suck the end of his quill, look out of his Elizabethan window and think: Now, how can I follow up Richard III?
Instead, he had open in front of him a copy of a tedious three thousand line narrative poem by Arthur Brooke called “The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet.” By then it had been knocking around the book stalls in London for over thirty years.
Literary critics have described Brooke’s tome as:”prolix,” “leaden,” and “wearisome”. It was based on a French poem, which was based on an Italian story which was itself inspired by Luigi da Porto’s Giulietta e Romeo in 1530.
So how did Shakespeare turn this dross into gold?
One important step was to introduce a ticking clock. He gave Brooke’s ponderous story a sense of urgency.
Brooke’s poem has Romeo meet Juliet at the Capulet’s feast and then drearily pass by Juliet’s window “a weeke or two in vayne” before he speaks to her. But soft, what light from yonder window breaks: Shakespeare has his impetuous lovers meet, fall in love and resolve to marry all in the same night.
Brooke gives Romeus and his new paramour a honeymoon in Hawaii and time to look for a flat; Shakespeare turns over the egg timer right from the afterglow. Their first and only night together is intensified by the prelude to murder.
With Juliet’s cousin Tybalt dead at his hand, Romeo flees to Mantua. Immediately Juliet’s father insists on an arranged marriage to an aristocratic suitor, Paris, threatening to disown his daughter if she doesn’t marry by Thursday.
Pressure; dilemma; conflict; drama.
Shakespeare also restructured the beginning to reveal the true conflict that underpins the story; Romeo and Juliet opens with a brawl between the Montagues and the Capulets. The theme is expressed in exciting action.
Tybalt doesn’t appear in Brooke’s laborious poem until his fight with Romeo. Epic fail. Shakespeare introduces him in the very first scene, sword drawn; he is seen again at the Capulet’s feast, where he wants to attack Romeo on sight. By the time he enters in the third act we already know he hates the Montagues so much it makes his teeth ache, so there’s only one way this can end, right?
The second scene, in which Capulet invites Juliet’s suitor Paris to the feast is another Shakespeare invention; Brooke doesn’t introduce him until after Tybalt’s death.
And in “Romeus and Juliet,” Mercutio only appears very briefly as one of the guests at Capulet’s feast. But Shakespeare saw that Romeo needed a foil, a wit to offset his relentlessly earnest demeanor, a cynic to contrast his idealism, someone we might more easily love than Romeo himself. He knew that on his own Romeo is a bit of … well, he’s a bit of a twit, really. We love him because of Mercutio.
So Mercutio’s death is another Shakespeare invention and is critical to the dramatic success of the play; it motivates Romeo to murder Tybalt and catapults the action forward at precisely the time it might otherwise have bogged down.
(Mercutio may also have been the reason why Shakespeare changed Romeus’ name to Romeo; it rhymes.)
But perhaps Shakespeare’s greatest change was to the log line. Brookes, in the preface, condemns the lovers for indulging their unwholesome lusts and ‘for neglecting the authority and advice of parents and friends.’ Shakespeare turned the entire concept around; his play became instead an anthem to unbridled passion, one that has echoed down through the centuries as a paean to romantic love.
We can grow dewy-eyed over Shakespeare’s use of language; because of this, his absolute mastery of solid story-telling technique is sometimes overlooked. Shakespeare plied his craft in the hardest school of them all; if he failed, he wouldn’t just get one star on Amazon, he’d have cabbages hurled at his head and then been sent back to play off off Broadway with the sheep in Stratford. So he learned very quickly what an audience needed to keep them involved and entertained.
If he was alive today, he would have been Spielberg.
Arthur Brooke didn’t live to see the play his poem inspired. He drowned at sea one year after publishing “Romeus and Juliet.” Perhaps it’s just as well; he would have disproved of Will’s take on the material and he may have found its resounding success distasteful.
Or perhaps he would have learned something about the craft of writing, from a genius of the dramatic form, as we now all have the opportunity to do. Because if you think Romeo was good - start breaking down Hamlet …
From the snow-hushed winter streets of Nazi Bavaria, to the burned hills of Palestine, from the Alte Post to the Dome of the Rock, romance and terror collide in a novel of forbidden loves and ancient hatreds.
This is the first book in the Jerusalem series, charting the birth of modern Israel in just fifteen tumultuous years. It is the story behind the scenes that you see every night on the evening news.
July 25, 2012 at 12:17 pm
Awesome as ever Colin. However, I must whine a little. I have often been criticized for the “love at first sight” theme and Old Willy gets famous for it. I wish to object…. tee hee
July 25, 2012 at 7:56 pm
Write yours in Olde English Pru, then people will spend far too much time cussing at the language to realize that your characters fell in love at first sight. Shame too, I love the language of Shakespeare
July 27, 2012 at 1:58 am
I guess it’s timing, Prudence! No one had thought romance as a subject for theatre until he came along. Ruined it for everyone!! He wouldn’t get away with some of those things now, of course … I guess it’s looking at how to tune his basic principles to today’s audience?
July 25, 2012 at 1:40 pm
Agree with Prudence. If we did this today the readers would state “unbelievable premise!” But Ye Old Willy managed with no problem. I wonder, though…perhaps a potion that causes love to bloom immediately with weird results? Wait, that’s Midsummer Night’s Dream. Drat, scooped again.
July 27, 2012 at 2:03 am
You and Prudence are absolutely right, Amy. And Will had trouble convincing his audience even then, when a love story on stage was an innovation - that’s what Mercutio was all about, to play the role of cynic. But it’s interesting to think about how Shakespeare would have applied these same principles to today’s audience …
July 25, 2012 at 4:30 pm
Intelligent, insightful, wonderfully written. Plan to read more of your work. Thanks!
July 27, 2012 at 2:03 am
Thanks Pat!
July 25, 2012 at 7:54 pm
I have broken down Hamlet a number of times, and refuted far to many critics to count. That is one of my all time favorite plays.
July 27, 2012 at 2:05 am
Mine too. And Hamlet was an even older piece of tat that he turned right around. He was an amazing script doctor, among many other things.
July 27, 2012 at 2:22 pm
Intriguing post, Colin. It amazes me how much time period effects work style and appreciation. “To be or not to be…” would probably BE considered a passive, lame opening to many nowadays. As a side note, where were you when I read and studied Shakespeare as a kid?!?
July 30, 2012 at 2:44 pm
Thanks August. I was fortunate to have a bloke called Basher Briggs as my English teacher; even old school friends who went on to work on the stockmarket or in banking still rave about him, saying he was the one that gave them their passion for reading their whole lives. What he did was help us realize how Shakespeare played in 16th century Shoreditch, not how it looked to a 20th century schoolboy. God bless his cotton socks.
July 27, 2012 at 5:12 pm
Fascinating! Shakespeare wrote compelling stories - or rewrote boring ones into compelling ones. 🙂 I disagree with August about ‘To be or not to be . . .” being a passive, lame opening. It is an intriguing question. A question that begs an answer. It wouldn’t be phrased exactly the same way in today’s language, but I think, if one researched it, one can find at least one similar first line in today’s popular fiction and entertainment. Alas, I have no time to research, I’m already playing hookie from studying. Great post, Colin!
July 30, 2012 at 2:52 pm
Thanks Lynette … the the thing with To Be or Not To Be, was its positioning in the structure - Shakespeare actually started with his father’s ghost. He was great at getting the attention of his audience - fight scene in Romeo and Juliet, the witches in MacBeth. Today you could fit the credits and commercial break perfectly after his opening scene. We must talk more about Shakespeare! He was a very smart man.
July 28, 2012 at 4:29 pm
Great post, Colin!
I had no idea that Shakespeare took the story from an earlier source… and what he did with it!
Never mind the whole ‘love at first sight’ thing, even today we can easily imagine 14-year olds coming to a similar bad end!
July 30, 2012 at 2:54 pm
Even 44 year olds. Yes, there’s a lot we can learn from Shakespeare - Hamlet was also a very old play, his theatre company tried to dissuade him from writing it, they thought it was too hackneyed for Hackney even in 1600. He reinvigorated it, the very same way. Genius.
July 29, 2012 at 8:56 pm
I’m glad we’ve moved from cabbages to stars. Although some of the mean internet trolls out there hurl verbal you-know-what around, which is pretty ugly to see! You hit on all those necessities of a great story - it’s a great reminder as I’m plotting my new novel!
July 30, 2012 at 2:56 pm
At least the groundlings who hurled the cabbages had the guts to be seen and not do it anonymously! Good luck with your new novel, Lara.
July 31, 2012 at 1:42 am
Great article. I love Shakespeare, even though I have to work to stop myself talking in his old English afterwards. His reworking of existing material is a bit like the Beatles who used folk tunes for their early inspiration - guess even the best are a product of their influences.
Cheers!
July 31, 2012 at 12:39 pm
Thanks Nigel - and I think it’s not just ‘even the best are a product of their influences’ but ‘ALL the best’ are. From art (Dali) to music (Keith Richard and Lennon/McCartney, as you point out) to writing (Shakespeare) those who have soared highest have always been very clear and very frank about their influences. Interesting.
July 31, 2012 at 7:31 pm
I loved learning about the earlier sources of Romeo & Juliet. Shakespeare was a master of polishing old stories and making his version shine.
August 3, 2012 at 9:56 am
Great post! Mercutio is indeed more loveable than Romeo, but you have to wonder. There’s that scene where Romeo, having met Juliet, is in a good mood and swapping dirty jokes with Mercutio, who expresses his relief that Romeo is back to normal…
August 5, 2012 at 2:45 pm
Yes Mercutio was apparently created to represent the cynicism of the audience - that’s also why he has to die the way he does. He was a clever lad, Willy.
July 2, 2013 at 2:51 am
Er - Colin, the above comment is spam, in case you hadn’t noticed the advertising at the end. Ghu, I HATE spammers! They need to get a life, and friends who aren’t on line.
Yes, Shakespeare does great stuff with his sources. The Winter’s Tale is another one better than its source, Pandosto. And it’s odd, really; very few novel-inspired movies can say that, can they?;-)
As you say, he had to know how to grip his audiences, and having a character come on stage with a placard saying,”Two Weeks Later” wouldn’t do it!
July 4, 2013 at 2:21 am
Thanks Sue. The spam filter is usually pretty good on WordPress but they missed that one! I had to delete manually. (sigh) Does spam really work for anyone? Incredible.