A Beautiful Scene in Act Two of Romeo & Juliet

The book Romeo and Juliet is getting interesting. It is really fun and pleasing to watch two teenage lovers' growing love. As I read through Act 1 and 2 of this book, I now get the sense of how the story goes. At first, Shakespeare's use of complex poetic unusual language was very confusing. Now, however, after I learned many from my English class and the book's kind summary and word notes, I feel like I know pretty well about the parts that I have read through (It would have been better if I had the child version of this book which Joseph took). In this week and probably next week too, my class will learn and talk about Act 2, so I want take some time to talk about Act 2 now. It will be specifically about the scene that I liked in Act 2.

The scene that I liked in Act 2 was truly one of the most famous scenes according to Ms. Guarino. The reason why I liked it was not only because it is famous scene, but also actually because this scene has some beautiful expressions which show their true emotions and it also has a brilliant setting. First, Romeo says this quote when Juliet enters to the balcony "It is the East, and Juliet is the sun. Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, who is already sick and pale with grief". This quote shows that Romeo's use of metaphor between sun and Juliet. Juliet's beauty, which equals to sun's brightness, killed the moon's brightness. Romeo praises Juliet's beauty and shows his pure love to her. He also says "See how she leans her cheek upon her hand. O, that I were a glove upon that hand, that I might touch that cheek!". This is a little bit corny but this is the way Romeo express his mind. He wishes that he was a glove that Juliet wears. These quotes indicate Romeo's young love because both are complimenting Juliet's body and appearance, but we can see that he is very serious about Juliet too. In response, Juliet says without knowing Romeo is down by her balcony "O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo? Deny thy father and refuse thy name, or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love, and I'll no longer be a Capulet". What a lucky Romeo! Juliet shows her love to Romeo but she didn't know that he is listening. She asks Romeo to abandon his name and be no longer an enemy, and then my favorite part said by Juliet comes out "What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other word would smell as sweet. So Romeo would, were he not Romeo called. Retain that dear perfection which he owes without that title. Romeo, doff thy name, and, for thy name, which is no part of thee, take all myself". This quote suggests Romeo to change his name saying that name is just a name; it does not do anything with inner part of a person. This quote is not only shows her wish but also makes me think of what name means. Name is just a cover of someone which will not change any of the person's inborn personality. Her love of Romeo was also as sincere as Romeo's love of Juliet. All of these quotes and situations were possible all because of the brilliant setting which was balcony in the middle of the night. The fact that only Romeo could hear Juliet made this scene really romantic and clandestine.

All the beautiful scenes especially scene 2 has made me really curious about how their true, pure
, and young love will go on and end eventually.

In-class writing

A script is obviously less than a play, while a production is more. --from how to read a play
What does this mean to you?
A script is a direction that should be followed but shouldn't be thoughtlessly followed because the significant part of a play is a production which has a lot more important factors which cannot be directed through the script such as emotions and ad-lips if necessary.
What do you think about it?
I think it makes sense because actor's true task is to express not to read their scripts.
How does it relate to you/ this class?
Our class' title is literature&"performance" class so it relates to our class in a way that we should know how to express our emotions. 

Tragedy of Teenage Lovers

Honestly, I have never read Romeo and Juliet before. Although I have watched the old film version of it like 7 years ago, I don't really remember and I didn't understand at the time too as there was no subtitle. (Maybe a little bit about the incredible handsomeness of Leonardo DiCaprio?) What I know about the story of Romeo and Juliet is just a lot of good reputations which basically talk about how awesome and influential it is and there are a lot of adaptations of this. It is considered as a crucial masterpiece of Shakespeare himself too. Even for people who don't know Shakespeare well, they do probably know Romeo and Juliet. It is truly a world widely well known play. (It is not a novel!!) Also, what I think as a good thing about this piece is that Romeo and Juliet is tragic story that is loved by a lot of people. Usually what people would like to listen, see, or feel is happy ending, and it is a pretty basic principle that the story with happy ending gets more love than one without. And this piece is not what the readers and the audiences want, it is rather tragic enough to disappoint them. In spite of it, this piece still gets lots of attention and love, which is impressive for me. That made me think that Shakespeare's ability to play with fancy and poetic language had been really great that it even made tragic story line beautiful.

When I actually sat on my chair and got to read Romeo and Juliet, it was tragic for me. I have never seen these kinds of English. Order of the words, vocabulary, and grammar were so confusing and difficult to understand, and they naturally led me to look at the summary of the chapter as well as
vocabulary guide. From what I have read, there were a few characters I want to talk about: Romeo and Juliet. First, Romeo is a boy from Montague family. He is very emotional and easily change his mind. He was depressed because of his lovesick to Rosaline who is his teenage crush. He said "O, she is rich in beauty, only poor. That, when she dies, with beauty dies her store" (ebook, 110). It shows how romantic and poetic he is. Also he said "I'll go along, no such sight to be shown, but to rejoice in splendor of mine own" (ebook, 117), which shows that his superficial and naive characteristic because he decided to go to feast by looking his love's name, Rosaline. Second, Juliet is a young girl from Capulet family she is 14 years old. She is very conforming, careful, and polite to her family. She said "It is an 'honor' that I dream not of" (ebook, 121) which shows her being very careful about word choice to her family. And she said "I'll look to like, if looking liking move" (ebook, 123) which shows she is sort of obeying her family though she is not fully obeying.

Brief Summary

In scene one, two servants from Caplet and Montage family (Samson and Gregory) met and had a conflict. They were very hostile to each other. This conflict got bigger as more people joined like Benvolio and Prince. 

In scene two, there was a party and Paris wanted prince to marry to Juliet (Capulet family). They asked their servant to make an invitation but he cannot read. Romeo saw Rosaline's name and decided to go there. 

Essay

There is a novel that is nationally famous called The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night Time. As the novel has gained popularity, people started modifying this novel into a different form; it has a play version. One of its play versions which I will talk about is featured by National Theater and played on Broadway. I watched the video about it "Working on the Spectrum: The Making of Curious   Incident of the Dog in the Night Time" and I found a few things that the directorial team employed as their own methods and I am going to talk about them. In the Broadway production of The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night Time, the directorial team chose to develop the story in Christopher's perspective and lack the stage directions and settings but instead, use a lot of movements.

First, the Broadway production developed the storyline based on the Christopher's perspective. This would make the audiences fully see and feel like Christopher. In the novel, Christopher has an autism which is a mental disorder that impairs one's communication and interaction ability. This makes it necessary for the audiences to understand the story in that perspective and necessary for the castings to perfectly express that perspective. Therefore the directorial team emphasize on this aspect. As a result, they hired an autism expert to teach actors about how it feels like being autistic person and the actor himself who has the role of Christopher visited actual autistic people to learn about it, so that every single actor can express the feeling well. The team's thorough analysis about autism would let the audiences put themselves in the play. For example, because he hates to be touched, he even does high-five by touching fingers stretched, and when policeman grabs him to arrest him, he screams loudly. This shows Christopher's extreme autistic characteristic and the team might emphasize on this kind of scenes. I think the team's choice of developing Christopher's view is really great. This will enable the active interaction between the audience and the actors as well as deepen the understanding of the audience. 

Secondly, the directorial team intentionally used the lack of stage directions and settings which were suggested on the script. These include, for example, the sound effect, audience seat which is around the stage, and structural settings. These will open all the possible interactions between castings and the audience instead of just showing what is happening on the stage. The audience will think about each scene and breath the same air with the actors. However, instead of not using very sophisticated stage settings, this play uses a lot of technical and complex movements as the way of expression. This helps show the complexity and confusion inside of Christopher's head and somehow can fill the emptiness created due to lack of stage settings. I think this choice is really creative. I did not even think of not using what we are supposed to use. They basically broke my stereotype about directing a performance. Also I think using a lot of movements instead would create a different kind of entertainment to the audiences. 

Critical Comparison

Let's discuss about the similarities and differences between literature and performance and then between a play and a novel. Firstly, about literature and performance, the dictionary.com says that literature is "writings in which expression and form, in connection with ideas of permanent and universal interest, are characteristic or essential features, as poetry, novels, history, biography, and essays", and performance is "a musical, dramatic, or other entertainment presented before an audience". By reading the definitions, we can see that they are pretty much different as literature is in a written form whereas performance is a production in front of audience which actually has an action. The things we have to look closely are, I think, the similarities. Fortunately, the definitions have already spoken about one of the similarities which is that they both are artistic, emotional, and entertaining. Usually literature is basically conveying one's (writer's and character's) emotion change throughout the plot in a artistic way to entertain the readers, and performance is delivering one's (actor's and character's) emotion through his or her action to entertain the audiences, so we can say in a big picture, they have a fundamental similarity. However, if we go under little more, we might be able to see another similarities. When we think literature and performance are both not real, and when we think about performance is usually based on some specific literature piece, now we are at the point. In my opinion, I would say literature is wider concept than performance. It is a little funny because they also have differences although performance is a component (I would say) of literature, but when we regard both as a fiction and performance usually is based on literature. It can be seen as a truth. 
Next, between a play and a novel, I also would like to see the dictionary.com definitions. Play is "a dramatic composition of piece" and novel is "a fictitious prose narrative of considerable length and complexity, portraying characters and usually presenting a sequential organization of action and scenes". The definition for novel was a little fancy but I would say it is just a really long fiction. And though I like the short and simple definition for play but I would add that it is designed specifically for performance. Their difference is pretty similar to the difference between literature and performance, which novel is in a written form and play is in a form of literally "play". Now for the similarities, if we take a look at the definitions that I have found so far, we can see the word "dramatic" more than once. Even if we cannot see that word, the definition is implying it. What the dictionary tried to say was, I think, all of them, which are literature, performance, play, and novel, are in the extension of each other. What I mean by this is all of each has its own characteristic that is pretty unique and makes itself special, but in the big picture, they are in the same line. 

Source
Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com, n.d. Web. 09 Sept. 2015.