Today we finished up 1.1 by reviewing some famously oxymoronic lines from Romeo:

Alas, that love, whose view is muffled still,
Should, without eyes, see pathways to his will!
Where shall we dine? O 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?

We started by examining the hidden stage instructions implied in “Where shall we dine? O me! What fray was here?” before looking at the oxymorons in the later portion:

Students will be looking for an echo of this later in the play.

To prepare students for how Shakespeare likes to echo characters in the play, we turned to Capulet’s instructions in 1.2 for Paris:

To begin with, we saw how revolutionary Capulet is being with Juliet: it is well within his rights of the period simply to instruct Juliet to marry Romeo, but he’s looking out for her well-being and wants to make sure it’s a good match, so he insists that Paris win her heart.

We saw that Capult is echoing himself (“earth-treading stars” and “fresh female buds”) as he warns Paris to make sure Juliet falls in love with him, and we saw the echo of Benvolio’s words to Romeo:

We’ll continue with 1.3 tomorrow.

Homework

• English 8 Studies: none.
• English I Honors: 
  • complete the study-guide for 1.2 as necessary;
  • read 1.3;
  • begin the study-guide for 1.3.