Shakespeare's Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare (best book series to read txt) 📕
- Author: William Shakespeare
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you see?
Romeo. Ay, if I know the letters and the language.
Servant. Ye say honestly; rest you merry!
Romeo. Stay, fellow; I can read.
[Reads] 'Signior Martino and his wife and daughters;
County Anselme and his beauteous sisters; the
lady widow of Vitruvio; Signior Placentio and his
lovely nieces; Mercutio and his brother Valentine;
mine uncle Capulet, his wife and daughters; my fair 70
niece Rosaline; Livia; Signior Valentio and his
cousin Tybalt; Lucio and the lively Helena?'
A fair assembly; whither should they come?
Servant. Up.
Romeo. Whither?
Servant. To supper; to our house.
Romeo. Whose house?
Servant. My master's.
Romeo. Indeed, I should have ask'd you that before.
Servant. Now I'll tell you without asking. My 80
master is the great rich Capulet; and if you be not
of the house of Montagues, I pray, come and crush
a cup of wine. Rest you merry! [Exit.
Benvolio. At this same ancient feast of Capulet's
Sups the fair Rosaline whom thou so lov'st,
With all the admired beauties of Verona.
Go thither, and with unattainted eye
Compare her face with some that I shall show,
And I will make thee think thy swan a crow.
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Romeo. When the devout religion of mine eye
Maintains such falsehood then turn tears to fires;
And these, who often drown'd could never die,
Transparent heretics, be burnt for liars!
One fairer than my love! the all-seeing sun
Ne'er saw her match since first the world begun.
Benvolio. Tut! you saw her fair, none else being by,
Herself pois'd with herself in either eye;
But in that crystal scales let there be weigh'd
Your lady's love against some other maid
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That I will show you shining at this feast,
And she shall scant show well that now shows best.
Romeo. I'll go along, no such sight to be shown,
But to rejoice in splendour of mine own. [Exeunt.
Scene III.
A Room in Capulet's House
Enter Lady Capulet and Nurse
Lady Capulet. Nurse, where's my daughter? call her forth to me.
Nurse. Now, by my maidenhead at twelve year old,
I bade her come.—What, lamb! what, lady-bird!—
God forbid!—Where's this girl?—What, Juliet!
Enter Juliet
Juliet. How now! who calls?
Nurse. Your mother.
Juliet. Madam, I am here.
What is your will?
Lady Capulet. This is the matter:—Nurse, give leave awhile,
We must talk in secret.—Nurse, come back again;
I have remember'd me, thou's hear our counsel.
10
Thou know'st my daughter's of a pretty age.
Nurse. Faith, I can tell her age unto an hour.
Lady Capulet. She's not fourteen.
Nurse. I'll lay fourteen of my teeth,—
And yet, to my teen be it spoken, I have but four,—
She is not fourteen. How long is it now
To Lammas-tide?
Lady Capulet. A fortnight and odd days.
Nurse. Even or odd, of all days in the year,
Come Lammas-eve at night shall she be fourteen.
Susan and she—God rest all Christian souls!—
Were of an age; well, Susan is with God,
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She was too good for me; but, as I said,
On Lammas-eve at night shall she be fourteen;
That shall she, marry; I remember it well.
'Tis since the earthquake now eleven years;
And she was wean'd,—I never shall forget it,—
Of all the days of the year, upon that day,
For I had then laid wormwood to my dug,
Sitting in the sun under the dove-house wall;
My lord and you were then at Mantua,—
Nay, I do bear a brain;—but, as I said,
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When it did taste the wormwood on the nipple
Of my dug, and felt it bitter, pretty fool,
To see it tetchy and fall out with the dug!
Shake, quoth the dove-house; 'twas no need, I trow,
To bid me trudge.
And since that time it is eleven years,
For then she could stand alone; nay, by the rood,
She could have run and waddled all about.—
God mark thee to his grace!
Thou wast the prettiest babe that e'er I nurs'd;
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An I might live to see thee married once,
I have my wish.
Lady Capulet. Marry, that 'marry' is the very theme
I came to talk of.—Tell me, daughter Juliet,
How stands your disposition to be married?
Juliet. It is an honour that I dream not of.
Nurse. An honour! were not I thine only nurse,
I would say thou hadst suck'd wisdom from thy teat.
Lady Capulet. Well, think of marriage now; younger than you
Here in Verona, ladies of esteem,
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Are made already mothers. By my count,
I was your mother much upon these years
That you are now a maid. Thus then in brief:
The valiant Paris seeks you for his love.
Nurse. A man, young lady! lady, such a man
As all the world—why, he's a man of wax.
Lady Capulet. Verona's summer hath not such a flower.
Nurse. Nay, he's a flower; in faith, a very flower.
Lady Capulet. What say you? can you love the gentleman?
This night you shall behold him at our feast;
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Read o'er the volume of young Paris' face,
And find delight writ there with beauty's pen.
Examine every married lineament
And see how one another lends content;
And what obscur'd in this fair volume lies
Find written in the margent of his eyes.
This precious book of love, this unbound lover,
To beautify him, only lacks a cover;
The fish lives in the sea, and 'tis much pride
For fair without the fair within to hide.
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That book in many's eyes doth share the glory,
That in gold clasps locks in the golden story;
So shall you share all that he doth possess,
By having him making yourself no less.
Speak briefly, can you like of Paris' love?
Juliet. I'll look to like, if looking liking move;
But no more deep will I endart mine eye
Than your consent gives strength to make it fly.
Enter a Servant
Servant. Madam, the guests are come, supper
served up, you called, my young lady asked for,
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the nurse cursed in the pantry, and every thing in
extremity. I must hence to wait; I beseech you,
follow straight.
Lady Capulet. We follow thee.—[Exit Servant.] Juliet, the county stays.
Nurse. Go, girl, seek happy nights to happy days. [Exeunt.
Scene IV.
A Street
Enter Romeo, Mercutio, Benvolio, with five or six Maskers, Torch-bearers, and others
Romeo. What, shall this speech be spoke for our excuse?
Or shall we on without apology?
Benvolio. The date is out of such prolixity.
We'll have no Cupid hoodwink'd with a scarf,
Bearing a Tartar's painted bow of lath,
Scaring the ladies like a crow-keeper;
Nor no without-book prologue, faintly spoke
After the prompter, for our entrance
.
But let them measure us by what they will,
10
We'll measure them a measure, and be gone.
Romeo. Give me a torch; I am not for this ambling.
Being but heavy, I will bear the light.
Mercutio. Nay, gentle Romeo, we must have you dance.
Romeo. Not I, believe me. You have dancing shoes
With nimble soles; I have a soul of lead
So stakes me to the ground I cannot move.
Mercutio. You are a lover; borrow Cupid's wings,
And soar with them above a common bound.
Romeo. I am too sore enpierced with his shaft
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To soar with his light feathers, and, so bound,
I cannot bound a pitch above dull woe;
Under love's heavy burden do I sink.
Mercutio. And, to sink in it, should you burden love;
Too great oppression for a tender thing.
Romeo. Is love a tender thing? it is too rough,
Too rude, too boisterous, and it pricks like thorn.
Mercutio. If love be rough with you, be rough with love;
Prick love for pricking, and you beat love down.—
Give me a case to put my visage in; [Putting on a mask]
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A visor for a visor! what care I
What curious eye doth quote deformities?
Here are the beetle-brows shall blush for me.
Benvolio. Come, knock and enter; and no sooner in
But every man betake him to his legs.
Romeo. A torch for me; let wantons light of heart
Tickle the senseless rushes with their heels,
For I am proverb'd with a grandsire phrase:
I'll be a candle-holder and look on.
The game was ne'er so fair, and I am done.
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Mercutio. Tut, dun's the mouse, the constable's own word;
If thou art Dun, we'll draw thee from the mire
Of this sir-reverence love, wherein thou stick'st
Up to the ears.—Come, we burn daylight, ho!
Romeo. Nay, that's not so.
Mercutio. I mean, sir, in delay
We waste our lights in vain, like lamps by day.
Take our good meaning, for our judgment sits
Five times in that ere once in our five wits.
Romeo. And we mean well in going to this mask;
But 'tis no wit to go.
Mercutio.Why, may one ask?
Romeo. I dreamt a dream to-night.
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Mercutio. And so did I.
Romeo. Well, what was yours?
Mercutio.That dreamers often lie.
Romeo. In bed asleep, while they do dream things true.
Mercutio. O, then, I see Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman,
Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep;
Her waggon-spokes made of long spinners' legs,
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The cover of the wings of grasshoppers,
The traces of the smallest spider's web,
The collars of the moonshine's watery beams,
Her whip of cricket's bone, the lash of film,
Her waggoner a small grey-coated gnat,
Not half
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