Here’s a classic English love story for you:
Romeo and Juliet
Act I, Scene I
In a public place in Verona, the Capulets and Montagues are feuding.
Mercutio
What’s Montague about, that he will be so forward
To break the peace of the two households with his love?
Does he think within his heart that he can win me
To be a process of his violent love?
Tybalt
He that I spurn with baseless pride,
Doth be my enemy, for I have spurned him.
An enemy I am to him, and he to me,
And I’ll be found thus far, afeard to fight him.
Romeo
O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I
That I am stabb’d with the love of a woman!
I am asham’d to be seen with thee,
For thou art a FeND to me.
Didst thou think I would let thee take my part
In this? By heaven, I rather die
Than be thus beaten with disease of love,
Which I am sure doth kill a man.
Juliet
My only love sprung from my only hate!
Too early seen unknown, and known too late!
Love look’d not with such reverent eye
Before thou hadst disarmed it of its pow’r,
But by love’s gentle love doth prove
The truth of all his tongue.
Romeo
My lips, my heart, are mine own true pleasures,
Feast therefore on my lips, my heart’s best treasure.
Act II, Scene II
In a quiet garden, Romeo and Juliet meet and fall in love.
Juliet
O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo?
Deny thy father and refuse thy name,
Or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,
And I’ll no longer be a Capulet.
Romeo
Thus with a gentle brow thou wilt win my love,
And when I shall die, I shall be twine
With thee in death. More than that love can wish,
For thus from death thou shalt escape with me,
And die a thousand times before the sword
Of Envy be my death.
Juliet
I’ll rather die than thus be forsworn.
O, happy night! We will be married in a moonlight.
Act III, Scene I
The Capulets and Montagues have a reconciliation, but Tybalt is killed in a duel.
Romeo
My life is free, my love is bound to thee,
But thy life is my sin, when I am gone.
Juliet
I’ll rather die than live thus wretchedly.
Act IV, Scene III
Juliet takes a potion that will make her appear dead, so she can be buried with Romeo.
Juliet
Thus with a kiss I die.
Act V, Scene III
Romeo discovers Juliet’s “death” and takes his own life in despair.
Romeo
Thus with a kiss I die.
The story ends with the reconciliation of the two families and the burial of Romeo and Juliet together.
This is a tragic love story by William Shakespeare, one of the most famous love stories in English literature.
