![]() ![]() Romeo and Juliet is a story driven by passion, in all its sexual, physical, and "embodied" aspects. ![]() That turns his death into a minor side plot rather than a tragedy that spurs much of the play's violence. Mercutio, for example, could barely appear at all in such a version. Some pettifoggers had decided that the play's boisterous sexuality, raunchy puns, and panting young lovers needed to be toned down for the students who would be reading it.Īs my father pointed out, cutting all that material renders the play exceptionally dull and, in some places, barely comprehensible. We had been given a textbook version of Romeo and Juliet-an expurgated, shortened, made-appropriate-for-schoolchildren version. The look of irritation on his face as I passed him the book is something I'll never forget. You'll have to imagine my excitement as I took the book home to show it to my father, a professor of American literature. We'd read some Charles Dickens and a little John Steinbeck. As a longtime literature geek even at the age of 14, I was thrilled to be entering the big leagues. In ninth grade, like high school freshmen all over America, I was assigned Romeo and Juliet to read for my English class. ![]()
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