Oxford School Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet - Softcover

Shakespeare, William

Softcover

ISBN 10: 019832166X ISBN 13: 9780198321668

Publisher: OUP Oxford, 2008

Synopsis

Oxford School Shakespeare is an acclaimed edition especially designed for students, with accessible on-page notes and explanatory illustrations, clear background information, and rigorous but accessible scholarly credentials. This edition of Romeo and Juliet includes illustrations, preliminary notes, reading lists (including websites) and classroom notes. Romeo and Juliet is a set text for KS3 in England, and remains one of the most popular texts for study by secondary students the world over.
This title is suitable for all exam boards and for the most recent GCSE specifications.

About this title

Review

This is undoubtedly the greatest love story ever written, spawning a host of imitators on stage and screen, including Leonard Bernstein's smash musical West Side Story, Franco Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet filmed in 1968, and Baz Luhrmann's postmodern film version Romeo + Juliet. The tragic feud between "Two households, both alike in dignity/In fair Verona", the Montagues and Capulets, which ultimately kills the two young "star-crossed lovers" and their "death-marked love" creates issues which have fascinated subsequent generations. The play deals with issues of intergenerational and familial conflict, as well as the power of language and the compelling relationship between sex and death, all of which makes it an incredibly modern play. It is also an early example of Shakespeare fusing poetry with dramatic action, as he moves from Romeo's lyrical account of Juliet--"she doth teach the torches to burn bright!" to the bustle and action of a 16th-century household (the play contains more scenes of ordinary working people than any of Shakespeare's other works). It also represents an experimental attempt to fuse comedy with tragedy. Up to the third act, the play proceeds along the lines of a classic romantic comedy. The turning point comes with the death of one of Shakespeare's finest early dramatic creations--Romeo's sexually ambivalent friend Mercutio, whose "plague o' both your houses" begins the play's descent into tragedy, "For never was a story of more woe/Than this of Juliet and her Romeo". --Jerry Brotton

Review

An excellent book, far superior to the one supplied by school for GCSE study, it had all we needed to complete tasks set by the teacher...if I had the money I would buy a set of the Oxford School Shakespere and donate it to the school in question (5 star Amazon review)

About this edition

• Publisher: OUP Oxford
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 019832166X
• ISBN 13: 9780198321668
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 176