《罗密欧与朱丽叶》书评

What's in a name? That which we call a rose

What's in a name? That which we call a roseBy any other word would smell as sweet.—— Juliet, Romeo and Juliet by ShakespeareThe first time I saw Romeo and Juliet, I was 12.Like all the other girls at the age of 12, I had a strong affection of reading romances no matter they are classics or modern fictions. I loved to envision those romantic scenarios of what I read in my head, and usually I got satisfied with my envisioning because the stories I used to read were all ended with a happy ending—— before I encountered Romeo and Juliet. When I first read Romeo and Juliet, all I understood about it was just "It's a love tragedy which makes me sad". Though as a 12-year-old kid my understandings were really shallow, I was right about one thing: it's different. At that time the reason it was different to me merely because it didn't give me an ending which I'd be willing to see. Now, from that moment nearly six years have passed, and Romeo and Juliet had definitely become my favorite Shakespeare's work. During the six years I've read the whole play at least five times, watched at least three different versions of the movie, and saw the French opera performed in 2002 and even can remember the lines......Finally, I got to understand why it is so different, why I like it, and why it is so great and immortal. The words I quoted were said by Juliet, right after she passionately fell in love with Romeo but then accidentally got to know that Romeo was her enemy's son. In modern language what she meant was simply "Roses are roses that even if they are not called 'roses' they would smell fragrant and sweet." The meaning behind the sentence is "Name is nothing; what matters is what something is, not what it is called. "Exactly. For Juliet, she loves Romeo, the person himself, not the name "Romeo Montague". I remember she even told Romeo that she would be very willing to change her family name "Capulet" as long as she would be allowed to stay with him. There's another sentence talking about the name: "I know not how to tell thee who I am. my name, dear saint, is hateful to myself, because it is an enemy to thee." I remember when I was watching the movie acted by Leonardo DiCaprio in 1996, when I saw Juliet's beautiful but sorrowful face, when I heard her artlessly speaking these words, I felt my heart melt. These words soon became my favorite line in the whole play.Juliet was right. However ironically her parents and Romeo's parents didn't understand the truth that names are nothing. At their time all the men who were "Montague"s were "Capulet"s' enemies. The names "Montague" and "Capulet" became the first labels tagged on the men. Even for those people who had neither "Montague" nor "Capulet" as their last names had to choose a side to stand. Today we don't judge people only by their names any more, of course, because that is ridiculous. However people in the play chose to hate or like someone only by checking their names. What's worse is that the people in the play were more willing to be around by hatred rather than love. As Romeo once said, "My only love sprung from my only hate; too early unknown and known too late." Therefore, the love between Juliet and Romeo under such a condition meant to be dead.Love and hatred are always Shakespeare's favorite topics. However, personally speaking, one of the greatness of Shakespeare is that he knew how to symbolize something not concrete, like hatred. In Romeo and Juliet, he used names to represent people's hatred of each other, while in Hamlet, he used masks to show people's hypocrisy. I think because of his talent to use these techniques, he is so different and more successful than others.No wonder Karl Marx once said: "Shakespeare is the greatest writer of all time."