Romeo and Juliet
William Shakespeare is known all across the world for his many plays and sonnets. He was dedicated to his work, which means he had a total of thirty-eight plays and one hundred and fifty-four sonnets. One of his most well-known plays is Romeo and Juliet. He wrote it around 1594-1596. Romeo and Juliet is one of William Shakespeare’s most tragic plays due to its portrayal of needless family rivalries and devastating, untimely deaths.
William Shakespeare was born on April 23, 1564, which was actually St. George’s Day, in Stratford on Avon, England. Shakespeare’s parents were John and Mary Shakespeare. His dad, John, was a glover and a leather maker. There is not a lot known about his early life; therefore his early years are known as “The Lost Years”. Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway in 1582. They had three children together: Susanna, and then twins, Hamnet and Judith. In the summer of 1596, on August 11, Hamnet, Shakespeare’s son, died. Hamnet was only 11 years old. Shakespeare produced a total of thirty-eights plays and one hundred and fifty-four sonnets. Shakespeare really changed the way we see English today. Most of his plays were based on a historical background or even other texts. He passed away on his birthday in 1616 at the age of 52 (William Shakespeare: A Life of Drama).
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It is based on a long poem by Arthur Brooke, The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet (1562). Romeo and Juliet has been variously dated from 1591 to 1596. Over the centuries it has been one of Shakespeare’s most successful plays. It was acted in 1662, soon after the reopening of the theatres. Thomas Otway borrowed from it for The History and Fall of Caius Marius (1679), which ousted Shakespeare’s play till 1744, when Theophilus Cibber revived an adaptation of it, retaining from Otway Juliet’s awakening before Romeo’s death for a last farewell (Wells