‘Tis but thy name that is my enemy;--
Thou art thyself though, not a Montague.
What’s Montague? It is nor hand, nor foot,
Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part
Belonging to a man. O, be some other name!
What’s in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;
So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call’d,
Retain that dear perfection which he owes
Without that title:--Romeo, doff thy name;
And for that name, which is no part of thee,
Take all myself.
-Juliet
Romeo And Juliet Act II, scene i, line 82
Well, since this is one of the most famous scenes in the history of drama, I gave you the whole paragraph, or whatever you want to call it. It’s where Romeo sneaks into the garden beneath Juliet’s balcony. He begins with But, soft! What light, yada yada. And then Juliet comes out on the balcony and does her O Romeo. Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo? bit. Romeo is still hiding in the shadows when she gives the speech above but then he steps out and answers,
Call me but love, and I’ll be
new baptized;
Henceforth I never will be
Romeo.
And then it goes on from there. I think it’s easy to see why this scene is so famous.
This balcony in Verona that has been declared Juliet's balcony. Of course, Will's play is a piece of fiction, but since it was set in Verona I guess they decided that they needed to have Juliet's balcony. And so here it is. What do you think of that?
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