My sister is finally reading Romeo & Juliet for her English class, & she's been screaming obscenities about how much she HATES having to memorize the Spoiler Prologue. And it made me remember how confused I was (& still am) about WHY R&J are considered the most romantic couple in history. I mean, if that story is the best romance, humanity is in trouble. Thoughts?
Oh god, do not even get me started on Dumbeo and Julidiot, I freaking hate that stupid play. First of all, I am firmly lodged in the camp that believes Shakespeare meant this story as a cautionary tale against the stupidity of teenagers. I mean, JULIET IS LIKE 14 WHEN ALL THIS GOES DOWN!
I swear to god, I am the sassy gay friend, you don’t understand. But actually the true reason I have so many problems with R&J(besides OMG BUT THAT PLOTLINE THO) is because it is SO OVERDONE in our society! Okay, sit down and get ready, I’m about to tell you a true story.
When I was in school (so many moons ago, but that’s beside the point), I swear to you, for probably FIVE YEARS IN A ROW, I was forced to read Romeo and Juliet and watch about NINE HUNDRED THOUSAND different adaptations in various classes, because either my teachers were freaking LAZY or they assumed that my generation was TOO DUMB to be able to assimilate anything but this ONE PLAY into our tiny, backwoods brain pans. Anywho, fast forward to my senior year in high school, I haven’t been forced to read Romeo and Juliet in two glorious years, it’s been a beautiful time in my life, and my senior English teacher gets this brilliant idea: “Hey kids, because I believe in the power of democracy, I’m going to allow YOU GUYS to pick the Shakespeare play that you would like to read for your last semester in this establishment of torture! Doesn’t that sound amazing, aren’t I a forward thinker, feel free to congratulate me after class, and also to submit your suggestions, kthxbai.”
See, the problem with this is, I know people. More specifically, I know HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS. I know how they think. I could practically FEEL the brain waves flowing through the air as the members of my class thought back on the Shakespeare play that we all knew so very, VERY well. And I KNEW that there were more students in need of an easy A than there were in search of higher learning or the prospect of expanding horizons in my classroom. I knew it in my bones, in my blood. I just KNEW I was going to be spending my last horrendous semester of high school painstakingly rehashing the SAME GODDAMN PLAY I HAD BEEN DISSECTING SINCE FREAKING MIDDLE SCHOOL.
And so, after class, I very calmly collected my things, approached my teacher, and explained to him in the most diplomatic way that I was capable of, as a 17-year-old, well-read student, that if he forced me to sit through an entire semester of Romeo and Juliet, then he in turn would be subjected to the blood spatter as I forcefully stabbed my eyes out with a pencil (#2, of course).
And that’s the story of how I convinced my Senior English teacher that we needed to read Macbeth and I got to read the part of Lady Macbeth aloud to the class and it was awesome :)
