UNIVERSIDADE DE SO PAULO Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Cincias Humanas

SHAKESPEARE NOW AND AFTER ALL

Charles Marlon Porfirio de Sousa

Prof. Dr. John Milton

So Paulo, maio de 2012

Marjorie Garber wrote some real interesting essays on Shakespeares plays; this paper, based on what we could learn by reading her texts, will discuss some aspects from two of the Bards plays, Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Nights Dream. The plays, both of them, from their very beginning present themselves to the readers showing whether they will be a tragedy or a comedy, from the first lines we are allowed to recognize the tone the plays will assume. Romeo and Juliet starts with a prologue, in which we learn about the sad and tragic events to come: Two households, both alike in dignity, In fair Verona, where we lay our scene, From ancient grudge break to new mutiny, Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean. From forth the fatal loins of these two foes A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life; Whose misadventured piteous overthrows Do with their death bury their parents' strife () (p. 2)

We can also feel that something is seriously out of order in the world framed by the play when we take a look at the forms used in it, the sonnet form, for example, is used, however it does not conform itself to the content of text. The sonnet form is so out of place in the play that it appears in the prologue to acts one, two and three and disappears in prologues four and five; the situation is so out of control that the Petrarchian form just cannot be anymore. During the whole play, there is only one sonnet that works out, and it appears in the precise moment Romeo and Juliet fall in love with each other, however, as the lovers cannot live too long their romance, since there is no room for love in the plays world, the sonnet form also disappears, since there is also no room for it in the lines from a story about that same world. In a Midsummer Nights Dream (AMND), we can also learn from the beginning that what we will see/read is not a tragedy, but a comedy THESEUS Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour Draws on apace; () (p.7)

A wedding is mentioned in the first lines, it is the first thing Theseus talks about and, as we learn with Garber, a weeding is the most canonical of all events in comedy (p.214). Although weddings usually happen in the end of the plays, in AMND marriage is mentioned in the first lines, and, one more time, Garber teaches us that in this play marriage is not only in the end because characters have something to learn. In Romeo and Juliet and in other Shakespearean texts, the plays occur so that some of the characters may, but not necessarily, learn something they do not know or do not perceive. Garber, in both essays, shows us many common or similar aspects found in the two plays, as well as in other ones, which may lead us to think that these common/similar features possibly reveal the way Shakespeare used to structure his plays, a kind of Shakespearean style. In both plays, disorder rules most of the time, and the absence of order can be noticed in many different ways; in Romeo and Juliet, we can easily note disorder emanating from strict and inflexible laws and customs, order is not present in the very first scene, there is a quarrel between Montagues and Capulets men, which happens due to the intolerance between the two families, all of these facts, and some other, will unchain all of the tragic events of the play. In AMND, disorder is mainly established by the uncontrollable desire which brought discord to the fairy world; this discord has consequences both in Theseus and in the workers world. Here an important aspect can be raised, although the origin of the disorder seems to lie on the actions taken place in the woods, real disorder does not come from the exterior world, but from within, even more, if we take in account that the fairies may be a reference to human subconscious and unconscious, as also suggested by Garber, we can affirm that desire is something we feel inside us, then, not only the exterior world is disordered, but also the interior one, maybe this disorder (from the inside) causes that one (from the outside); both disorders can be find in Romeo and Juliet. In the star-crossed lovers play, a case of internal disorder can be seen in Romeos and Juliets failure of self-knowledge; in the beginning, Romeo dotes Rosaline, who does not want him, nor anybody, to be her husband or something similar, since she intends to become a nun and Juliet is almost promised to become Paris wife, a man who she does not even know so well. Romeos confusion is gaudy in most of his initial acts and speeches, in the latter case, not only by the content of what he says but also in the form used; many times he uses the

Petrarchian formula in empty paradoxes and oxymorons, saying nothing and meaning less, as we can see in the following stanza ROMEOShe hath, and in that sparing makes huge waste, For beauty starved with her severity Cuts beauty off from all posterity. She is too fair, too wise, wisely too fair, To merit bliss by making me despair: She hath forsworn to love, and in that vow Do I live dead that live to tell it now. (p.24) Another element which also lead to confusion, which was vaguely mentioned before, is the presence of inflexible rulers. Some problems in Romeo and Juliet are caused by Escalus, who, from the own name, very similar to scale, therefore, related to numbers, precision and objectivity, we can infer, and actually conclude, is a person who ordains and enforces a law that is inflexible and will lead, potentially, to tragedy. (p.191). In AMND, in a parallel position to Escalus, we have the Duke. In an inferior position, in comparison to the public law, though as emphatic as the public one, there is fathers law. Egeus, from AMND, and Old Capulet, from Romeo and Juliet, try to match their daughters to husbands they selected, Demetrius and Paris, respectively, however, both Hermia and Juliet refuse to accept their fathers order and choose other lovers, with whom they plan to escape. Either in the comedy and in the tragedy fathers thread is the same: nunnery. The idea of learning can be seen as fundamental to the closure of the plays, the very end of them are highly influenced by the learning or by the lack of it. In AMND the rulers (the father and the Duke) learn that love breaks old rules and makes for new ones (p.215), then, in the end, there are no deaths, but dance, we have a comedy, not a tragedy. In Romeo and Juliet, the ones to learn are the two young lovers, however, from the beginning to the end of the story, the other characters, mainly the rulers, do not learn, not even after experiencing the tragedy of the facts; then, law and customs here are not broken, as they are in AMND, which lead the story to its tragic end. In a world strictly ruled by rules/good customs, politics and compromise there is no place for those who do not fit to it, thus, these rebel outlaws are excluded from it, and that is what happens with Romeo, Juliet, Mercutio and Tybalt, their exclusion is the total annihilation: death.

In Romeos and Juliets death, an aspect is very important, as Garber affirms, love and death are often versions of the same act, then, to die mean at the same time ceasing to live and achieving orgasm, which is crystallized in the scene called by her erotic suicides, since Romeo drinks death from a cup (symbol of the female) and Juliet kills herself by using a dagger (symbol for the male). In Shakespearean plays, as love and envy are showed a part of the same structure, sex generally brings an implicit idea of violence. One more interesting detail that can be added to the matter of learning is that, more visibly in Romeo and Juliet, it can also be noticed through the use of language. In the beginning of the play, Romeo speaks vainly and meaninglessly, as already proposed, by using empty paradoxes and oxymorons ROMEOO me! What fray was here? Yet tell me not, for I have heard it all. Here's much to do with hate, but more with love. Why, then, O brawling love! O loving hate! O any thing, of nothing first create! O heavy lightness! serious vanity! Mis-shapen chaos of well-seeming forms! Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health! Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is! This love feel I, that feel no love in this. Dost thou not laugh?. (p.20-1) And it is not difficult to understand why Benvolio laughs, Romeos speeches are so empty and exaggerate that it comes to be pathetic, he sounds just like a fool. Juliet, in her turn, first refuses to get married to Paris and she does that chocking herself against her fathers wish, which does not work, since it is not saying directly what she wants that she will get what she desires.

JULIET It is an honour that I dream not of. () I pray you, tell my lord and father, madam, I will not marry yet.(p.42)

After sometime, the knowledge/experience acquired by the lovers can be seen clearly through their new use of language; Juliet learns that is by indirect means and words that she can get what she wants and with no quarrel. CAPULET How now, my headstrong! where have you been gadding? JULIET Where I have learn'd me to repent the sin Of disobedient opposition To you and your behests, and am enjoin'd By holy Laurence to fall prostrate here, And beg your pardon: pardon, I beseech you! Henceforward I am ever ruled by you. (p.220) She says something, while what she intends to do is completely the opposite; she learns to dissociate what she says from what she really thinks. Romeo, we can affirm, learns less than Juliet, but he starts sounding at least less pathetic, and he himself affirms that this change has happened due to love: ROMEO By love, who first did prompt me to inquire; He lent me counsel and I lent him eyes. I am no pilot; yet, wert thou as far As that vast shore wash'd with the farthest sea, I would adventure for such merchandise. (p.84) Romeos lack of self-understanding in great extent is due to his doting on Rosaline, we can also learn that the opposition between doting and loving is really recurrent in both plays; doting is presented as the incapacity to understand love, and it is described as a shallow love, self-love, or the condition of being in love with love rather than with another person (p.227 AMND), that is the reason we can understand why is almost impossible to distinguish the lovers from AMND, and they themselves are also not able to make such distinction, changing couples a couple of times; from their very own name the idea of impossibility of distinction is present, Hermia and Helena

have the same meter and sound pretty much alike to each other. This similarity in names is also present in Romeo and Juliet, however the effect caused is different; the families names, Capulet and Montague, also have the same meter, which permit us to believe they are as interchangeable as Hermia and Helena; this interchangeability may attribute to the war between the families the quality of being senseless; they are so equal, including their structure (see chart 1) that it sounds as if they are fighting against themselves, or as if a person tries to fight against him/herself and gives him/herself a shoot, the result: suicide. Then, if we take both families as parts of a common body, the lovers suicide can be read as the suicide of this body (Montagues+Capulets), since they have no more daughter and son, their families cannot have a descendent, then the families will come to an end, as if also caught by deaths hand.

Montagues Mr. Motague Mrs. Motague Romeo Benvolio

Capulets Mr. Capulet Juliet Tybalt Mrs. Capulet

Chart 1- Families Structure

In Shakespearean plays, as already proposed things can be themselves and their contraries (or simply other things) at the same time, for example, love can be love and envy, sex can be sex and violence, dying can be ceasing to live and achieving orgasm, but they are often put in contrast with other things, mainly their opposite. One opposition/contrast which is very recurrent in the plays is the one between day and night (or between lightness and darkness). While daylight has to do with the world of law, of reason, of objectiveness, night-time has to do with the most crucial moments of the plays, usually moments when the law is broken or useless, moments of love and/or tragedy. Then, we can also notice that the night is when transformations and changes may and do occur, it is also during the night that dreams usually take place, representing an aspect of possibility and change, while during the day everything tends to be rigid, inflexible and associated with the word of law. This oppositional model also structures the conflicts which in each play are the seeds for disorder (AMND) and for tragedy (Romeo and Juliet). Two opposite powers clash against each other and as the result things go wrong. In AMND, we can learn, by reading Garbers essays that is possible to affirm that we witness a war between the sexes, since Oberon and Titania are disputing the changeling boy, and more

generically, the power to rule over the other, and it is precisely around this situation that disorder is established. In Romeo and Juliet, the conflict is not between sexes, besides the families brawl, what we witness is a war between generations. Mr. Capulet does not accept the fact that his daughter refuses to marry Paris, and as he thinks in old terms, according to which a daughter must obey her father no matter what; both Romeo and Juliet have older advisers, Friar Laurence and the nurse, their counsels do not completely match to the lovers needs, because they do not completely understand them, since they are from a different generation, then advice from older generation is inadequate to the tragic world of reality, of love and circumstance (p.197 R&J), in this case, all of these misunderstandings and disagreements do not lead the situation merely to confusion, but worse than that, they lead to tragedy and, finally, death. Many other aspects present in Shakespeares plays can learned by the reading of the two essays, for example, the recurrence of the very beautiful image of love as the lightning which comes so suddenly as it disappears, the contrast between gold, (negative and debasing), related to bad events and silver, (pleasant, combining love, sweet music and the moon), related to bad events. ROMEO It is my soul that calls upon my name: How silver-sweet sound lovers' tongues by night, Like softest music to attending ears! (p.90) ROMEO There is no world without Verona walls, But purgatory, torture, hell itself. Hence-banished is banish'd from the world, And world's exile is death: then banished, Is death mis-term'd: calling death banishment, Thou cutt'st my head off with a golden ax, And smilest upon the stroke that murders me. (p.166-7) Finally, we can mention the use of baudy language and double meaning speeches vastly present in Shakespeares work, usually with a strong sexual connotation, though this aspect is not so much found in AMND. Many other aspects could have been included in this brief paper, since both plays and both essays are very rich in details, even though many of them were presented up to this point, many more are absent, which might permit us to start writing everything again and creating a whole new text without

repeating any of the points discussed here, and which would also be, in its turn, incomplete, as the Prince proposes at the end of Romeo and Juliet: PRINCE A glooming peace this morning with it brings; The sun, for sorrow, will not show his head: Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things; () (p.286) We can assume that retelling is never too much, or even, necessary, for understanding is always incomplete; it is a work always in progress, to be done.

REFERENCES

Plays SHAKESPEARE, William. A Midsummer Nights Dream. In:http://shakespeare.mit.edu/midsummer/full.html. Last access: 05/21/2012.

________________________. Romeo and Juliet. In: http://shakespeare.mit.edu/romeo_juliet/full.html. Last access: 05/21/2012. ________________________. A Midsummer Nights Dream. New York: Simon & Schuster paperbacks, 2009. CROWTHER, John, ed. No Fear Romeo and Juliet. SparkNotes.com. SparkNotes LLC. 2005.

Essays GARBER, Marjorie. A Midsummer Nights Dream. In: Shakespeare After All. New York: Anchor books, 2004. From page 213 to 237.

__________________. Romeo and Juliet. In: Shakespeare After All. New York: Anchor books, 2004. From page 189 to 212.