Understanding Romeo & Juliet, pt 2A

Hi, Understanding Romeo and Juliet, Part 2A. OK, before I get to the play, let me tell you a true story. In 1971, the 26th Amendment was passed, giving 18 year olds the right to vote. Previously, you had to be 21. But the Vietnam War was going on and 18 year olds were getting drafted and sent off to war, and some of those 18 year olds said -- hey, wait a minute -- if I'm old enough to give my life for my country, why am I not old enough to vote for or against the people who are sending me to war? And as a consequence, the voting age was lowered to 18. Basically, the question the government faced was, at what point are you an adult with all the rights and responsibilities that come with being an adult? The government decided that you're an adult on your 18th birthday. But that's an arbitrary number. You don't instantly start behaving like an adult on your 18th birthday. It might happen earlier, or later. Your brain's prefrontal cortex isn't fully developed until around age 25. We all know some adults who've never grown up and who make really immature choices. And you may also know someone who is still legally a minor, but who is more mature, more responsible, more adult than a lot of adults around them. So I ask you: where on this spectrum do Romeo and Juliet fall? Juliet was just short of her 14th birthday. Shakespeare doesn't say how old Romeo is. Do you think they're still kids, unready for adult responsibilities? Or are they adults, with the right to make decisions that have lifelong consequences? Have they started out as children and matured into adults over the course of the first three Acts? How do you know? What evidence do you have? This video is about Acts II and III of Romeo and Juliet. If you haven't read them yet, please read them before going on. Page and line numbers will vary depending on the book you're using, but mine come from this one. Let's start with Juliet. 14 is pretty young, I think we'll all agree. But age alone can't be the measure of who's an adult. So, the answer must be not in her chronological age, but in her behavior, in her choices. So, that's what we'll be looking at. When Juliet first appears back in Act I, scene 3, she's the good daughter. She's all: I'll do whatever you want me to do, mom. I'll try to feel however you want me to feel. That's what obedient children are supposed to do. They do what they're told, or they do what they think will please their parents. Their parents make the decisions for them, because they aren't ready to make their own decisions yet. So when Juliet first appears, I think she's still a kid. It would hard to argue that at this point that she is an adult. OK, now let's look at Romeo when we first meet him. Look at Act I, scene 1, around line 137. According to his father, Romeo is lovesick and depressed. He goes to his room and locks the door. He closes the window shades and sits in the dark, moping and spouting bad poetry. And in the first video, we determined that his supposed love for Rosaline is really just a pose. He's merely infatuated. He doesn't know what love is yet. Does that sound like a grown-up to you or someone who's still a kid? OK, that's all in Act I. But in the two Acts you've just read, a lot has happened. They get married without asking permission of their families. Romeo kills Tybalt. Romeo is banished. Capulet arranges for Juliet to be married to Paris. Those are the most important events. Let's start with Romeo this time. The biggest things he does are get secretly married and kill Tybalt. We'll talk about the getting-secretly-married part in more detail when we get to Juliet, so let's focus on the killing of Tybalt. A lot of students are pretty harsh judges of Romeo here. They say that a real man would have walked away from the fight. And that's true. But remember, he did walk away from the fight. Look at Act III, scene 1, lines 63-73. Tybalt calling Romeo a villain is an insult, a clear provocation. The expected response among Elizabethan men would be to fight. But Romeo walks away. "...farewell. I see thou knowest me not." "...be satisfied," he says. In other words, I have no beef with you. I never injured you and you never injured me. In fact, I can even say I love you ...oh, I dunno...almost as if we were family by marriage now because I married your cousin. Let's forget it, he says. So Romeo does walk away. But then Tybalt and Mercutio fight and Mercutio is killed. Mercutio is Romeo's best friend. A man in that society is honor-bound to avenge his friend. That's what an adult man in 1595 is expected to do. To not do so might be considered cowardly. It's his responsibility to avenge Mercutio's killing. And that isn't so foreign to our world today. There are neighborhoods today with a lot of crime and gangs, where you are expected to fight if someone disrespects you. And if you're in a gang and an opposing gang kills one of your fellow gang members, as Tybalt killed Mercutio? You might believe that you are honor-bound to avenge him. This could be happening today. It is happening today. I'm not saying that's good, because it isn't. I'm just saying that Romeo's predicament is not so hard for people today to understand. So, in the eyes of his society, Romeo has done what a man is expected to do, regardless of the fact that Tybalt is Juliet's cousin. He has fulfilled an adult responsibility. It's a no-win situation. If he does nothing, he may feel he has abdicated his manhood. If he avenges his best friend, he will break Juliet's heart and may lose his one true love. Or did Romeo have options that he, in the heat of the moment, just didn't think of? Now, in your eyes, do you think that Romeo is an adult after killing Tybalt? Or do you think he's just impulsive and that that's a mark of his immaturity? A good argument could be made for either side. If you wanted to say he was still a kid, you should look at Act III, scene iii, when Romeo is wallowing in self-pity. You could argue that that's a childish behavior. But there's no reason that a person couldn't be wobbling back and forth across the boundary between childhood and adulthood. People do that all the time. What about Juliet? We'll talk about her in the second half. To continue, please watch Understanding Romeo and Juliet, Part 2B.