I was debating a professor of Shakespeare about the merits of Romeo being the villain and whether Shakespeare himself believed him as such. Let’s say that I was unsuccessful in turning him to the dark side. But my other soap box is just as juicy…
Romeo and Juliet is not a love story.
I think this is fairly obvious in that it is a tragedy. Love stories can end sad, sure. But Romeo and Juliet goes well out of its way to show Romeo as a flaky and fickle young man when it comes to love. And Juliet is chasing something else besides love in the play.
Romeo and Juliet is a heist!
That right, the play is a heist story. Juliet is our mastermind. The target is her very own marriage, which she intends to steal for herself. Romeo is either an unwitting accomplice or the mark. The nurse and friar are co-conspirators.
Juliet has a super big problem. She is going to be married off to Paris, who she has no interest in or intention of marrying. Her father wishes for Paris to get her consent, but he isn’t going take no for an answer. Juliet is stuck, but when Romeo shows up at her window professing his love, she comes up with a plan to steal that very marriage away from Paris and her father’s promises.
Religion is the Crux
One important aspect to note is that Juliet is extremely religious. She believes that a marriage made in front of God’s servants is binding and cannot be broken by man. She sets the plan in motion. Romeo is willing to get married, and Juliet should have been a wee bit skeptical of a man willing to marry someone he just met.
Still, she marries him, and then Romeo immediately messes her entire heist up by killing Tybalt. Now Juliet must make the best out of her situation before anyone finds out of her marrying the villain. Romeo is still her husband, no matter what a screw up he’s reveled to be, so she makes a plan to run away with him, even though her parents are sending assassins after him.
The marriage is still on, but she believes marrying Paris while being married to Romeo is a sin against God. She is running out of options and time. When the Friar suggest she take a poison to fake her death, so agrees. A simple solution to running away, but when she wakes to find Romeo dead, she makes a rash and terrible decision to end her own life instead of dealing with the alternatives, which the Friar told her was a nunnery or worse.
Ninth graders in the United States are often assigned Romeo and Juliet in English class, but many probably do not read it thoroughly, and most don’t understand it. Shakespeare was not giving us his tale of star-crossed lovers as a status symbol of love, but a tragedy of consequences. The lie the mainstream consciousness tells us is that Romeo and Juliet is the greatest love story ever told, but that misinterpretation fails the ninth graders and the rest of us. Indeed, Shakespeare’s play makes the opposite point, putting Romeo firmly in the seat of the big bad, or dare I say, the mustache-twirling VILLAIN!
“How is it possible?” you might say. Leonardo DiCaprio played the character in the 1996 version of the film! Yes, yes. Romeo is our dear, charming protagonist. But protagonists can be villains and are perhaps more memorable because of it. Famous villain protagonists include our favorite Scottish general, Macbeth, Walter White from Breaking Bad, and Julianne “Jules” Potter from My Best Friend’s Wedding (yes, Julia Roberts played a villain in a RomCom).
Villain is a social construct—a bad or evil person. Protagonists and Antagonists are story devices, opposing forces attempting to gain something in a story, but neither can attain it at the same time. But, but, but Romeo isn’t a black-hat-wearing evil doer, you might be saying, and there you would be wrong, again. But, like LaVar Burton with a book suggestion, you don’t have to take my word for it. We’ll go right to the source. Yes, to William Shakespeare himself—to the text.
Where shall we dine?
In a seemingly throwaway line, Romeo asks his friend which of their many options they could eat at. But this is Shakespeare we’re talking about and this is Romeo’s big introduction. Imagine for a moment, you are a groundling crowded into The Yard of the Globe theater. You paid a penny to get in, a penny that should have paid for that night’s dinner, but you chose to go there instead, to see what all the hype was about. A little hunger was worth getting a chance to see the new hotness.
Out strolls Romeo, half the play’s namesake, and like Robert Downey Jr. in his early 80’s douchebag roles, he spouts off an infamous line, “Where shall we dine?” A subtle hint to the groundlings that Romeo isn’t their hero, but a spoiled, rich kid with a lot of power to trample people like them. Also, Shakespeare uses the word “Villain” 17 times in Romeo and Juliet. What’s in a name? Upon inspection, 14 of those instances are directed at or reference Romeo, several of them coming from Juliet herself. What’s in a name indeed.
All the Single Ladies
Benvolio: Then [Rosaline] hath sworn that she will still live chaste? Romeo: She hath, and in that sparing makes huge waste
We begin our tale in Verona with a rich privileged boy of noble birth lamenting that the love of his short life, Rosaline, won’t have sex with him, calling her chastity a waste. The first two acts of our play are, indeed, about Romeo getting laid, at which he is ultimately successful. Here is a list of the villainous things Romeo does during this chase:
Sneaks into Capulet’s party to compare Rosaline against/ogle all the single ladies, which also happens to be Rosaline’s new theme song: Single Ladies (Put a ring on it) by Beyonce. Finds perhaps the youngest, and most desperate, girl (and cousin of Rosalin) to make out with, kissing her within moments of their first interaction, which is likely more a modern consent issue but is still creepy in context (more on Juliet later).
Upon learning Juliet is a Capulet, he still doesn’t give up, even though pursuing her will likely get them both into trouble (trouble being relative in a feud between families that often ends with people dying) Sneaks back (breaks) into the Capulet’s home after the party, hopping a wall (you know, normal hero stuff)
Peeps into Juliet’s bedroom like a creeper (she’s 13) Spies on Juliet, and perhaps worst of all, uses her words he overhears against her, to seduce her Quotes? You want quotes. I got ya quotes right here:
Goal 1: The hot list
Benvolio: 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. Romeo: I’ll go along, no such sight to be shown, But to rejoice in splendor of mine own.
Goal 2: Stolen kiss
Romeo: O then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do. They pray: grant thou, lest faith turn to despair. Juliet Saints do not move, though grant for prayers’ sake. Romeo: Them move not while my prayer’s effect I take. [he kisses her]
Goal 3: Breaking and Entering
Benvolio: He ran this way and leapt this orchard wall.
Goal 4: The Peeping
Romeo: O, speak again, bright angel, for thou art As glorious to this night, being o’er my head, Romeo: Shall I hear more, or shall I speak at this?
Goal 5: The Weaponizing of Words
Romeo: My name, dear saint, is hateful to myself Because it is an enemy to thee. Had I it written, I would tear the word.
Ah, young love. Girl asks how the boy got so close to her bedroom, and he spouts poetry, saying love brought him there. Thirteen-year-old finds eighteen-year-old boy charming. Sure, they kissed a few times at the party, but Juliet starts talking about marriage. Romeo is ok with that for some reason and does not question it.
Perhaps, you’ll excuse these two love birds for their horniness—love at first sight bullshit. Do Romeo’s actions in the first two acts actually make him a villain? Perhaps, but alas, we still have three acts to go. Juliet Concocts a Plan
Like any great mastermind, Juliet uses any resource at her disposal to pull off the grand heist. Whoa, pivot much, you may be thinking, but here me out. This leads right into my next point about Romeo. Again, context is everything, and what is Juliet stealing? Her marriage and perhaps her life. Her parents had promised her to Paris, a far older, but culturally appropriate and safe husband for her. Juliet is trapped, until a dumb, but handsome boy shows up out of nowhere and starts kissing her at a party. The fleeting moment ends and she finds out he’s Montague, two setbacks. But then he shows up at her window professing his love for her. He doesn’t even balk at getting married. Could you imagine that scene playing out in a modern teenage comedy?
Dude: “You’re so hot. I love you.” Girl: “Great. Wanna get married? Like, could you get a priest and come back tomorrow?” Dude: “Um. Sure. That sounds awesome.”
But what about all that feud nonsense? Here is the plan and the tragedy of the play: Juliet and Romeo plan to secretly get married, consummate the marriage, and afterwards make a grand announcement to their families, perhaps fusing and healing their families’ feud as the lovebirds cling to each other, forcing the issue of reconciliation. Juliet wouldn’t have to marry Paris, or some other aging gross dude. Romeo would get his nookie. And Verona just might have their two great families finally getting along.
Of course, Romeo had to immediately ruin everything.
Bandying in Verona Streets
With Juliet’s plan in place and nookie acquired, Romeo strolls out into the streets, happily lollygagging like a well-fed puppy. Tybalt finds him, and is still angry about Romeo crashing the party and probably for kissing on his 13-year-old cousin. Romeo sticks to the plan for half a minute saying:
“I do protest, I never injured thee, But love thee better than thou canst devise, Till thou shalt know the reason of my love:”
Yes, a smarmy thing to say to a guy who wants to stab you. Mercutio decides to fight Tybalt in Romeo’s place, and Romeo does his best to try to get them to stop, even to the point of jumping in the middle of the sword fight. He ends up stopping the fight by giving Tybalt a chance to strike under Romeo’s arm, sealing Mercutio’s fate.
All good protagonists have a moment where they get to choose: will they choose the better path or will they follow the path that leads to the dark side, to hate and suffering. Ever the hothead, Romeo in his anguish, throws Juliet’s grand plan and Juliet herself under the bus, the proverbial bus headed toward vengeance town. Juliet will either be married to an outlaw or will become a widow. Decision made. Time to act.
Romeo, had he taken a step back, might have noticed this moment could play out with Tybalt getting arrested and tried for murder as the fight was in front of a lot of witnesses (“We talk here in the public haunt of men:”). Tybalt wasn’t getting away with killing Mercutio, and Romeo could show he was trying to make peace with the Capulets, hoping to stop it from happening. If Juliet had been there, perhaps she could have reasoned with him, gave him a few of those kisses he had been stealing, and the plan could have still played out in their favor, perhaps even more so
O, I am fortune’s fool!
Romeo knows killing Tybalt would have consequences, perhaps even making Juliet a widow, but alas, Romeo flies into a bout of rage, even though his friend’s death was a little his fault for getting in the way, and he cuts Tybalt, and all remaining of his 9-lives, down. The consequences are thus:
The feud between the Montagues and Capulets is hotter than ever.
Romeo had to flee Verona for a couple of reasons: to avoid arrest by the prince and retaliation by the Capulets.
Since he was not arrested and able to be tried, Romeo was banished from Verona
Juliet was left behind, still engaged to Paris without an obvious way out, with a new looming wedding date a few days away.
Juliet, when the truth came out, would be seen as impure and perhaps unmarriable—fate of Ophelia anyone? A nunnery or worse, floating down the river.
O that deceit should dwell In such a gorgeous palace!
Romeo’s actions thus far in the play have driven the plot forward, into ruin. His actions were selfish, vengeful, lustful, criminal, and murderous. Perhaps Juliet could still find a way out of the mess he’d created. But she’d married the villain:
Juliet: Shall I speak ill of him that is my husband? Ah, poor my lord, what tongue shall smooth thy name, When I, thy three-hours wife, have mangled it? But, wherefore, villain, didst thou kill my cousin?
From her youthful vantagepoint, her only course, now, was to leap off the “battlements of yonder tower” or to flee with Romeo, a man she’d married she’s just met (where was Elsa?) and join in his banishment. Romeo’s plan was just to skewer himself on his sword, but the Friar steps in there as well.
Friar Laurence: Hold thy desperate hand: Art thou a man? thy form cries out thou art: Thy tears are womanish; thy wild acts denote The unreasonable fury of a beast:
[An aside about Shakespeare: In the text, our dear poet often describes weakness and emotion as “womanish” yet shows the women being smarter and better decision makers, more apt to deal with situations when the shit hits the fan. What did Shakespeare believe? Was he just playing to the audience of his time, or did he buy into his own irony?]
So, even before our fateful self-stabbing moment, these two newlyweds were ready to end their own lives, not because of heartbreak, but because they had wrecked their pretty, privileged lives and didn’t want to live with the shitty consequences. Ah, youth.
With a looming wedding date, Juliet, instead of confessing her wedding to Romeo, agrees to the Friar’s ill-timed escape plan, one Romeo never hears about.
Once he learns Juliet is dead, yet again Romeo’s choices are limited, knowing the truth about their marriage will come out. The Nurse and the Friar are both complicit and will likely reveal their secret. This will reinforce his villainy in the Capulets’ sorrowed eyes. The Prince will likely upgrade his banishment to a death sentence. And Juliet’s mother was already planning his assassination:
Lady Capulet: We will have vengeance for it, fear thou not: Then weep no more. I’ll send to one in Mantua, Where that same banish’d runagate doth live, Shall give him such an unaccustom’d dram, That he shall soon keep Tybalt company: And then, I hope, thou wilt be satisfied.
Romeo knows he has forfeited his privileged life. Without his dear Verona and his backup, Juliet, his youthful imagination sees nothing ahead but misery, so back to the sword plan he turns, but not before visiting Juliet’s grave and committing one more act of villainy. Paris, who is mourning his fiancée’s death, finds the “haughty Montague” who had murdered Juliet’s cousin, “which grief, it is supposed, the fair creature died.”
Romeo kills him, too, further cementing his future fate to imprisonment or death, or a life on the run. Romeo takes the coward’s path, and kills himself, not because of love or a broken heart, not because of Juliet, but because in the end, he is nothing but a villain in his own story with nowhere to turn. Juliet, upon waking up and finding Romeo dead, has now lost her only escape from the consequences of their actions. She could confess, and who would put fault upon a 13-year-old girl in this situation. She might end up in a nunnery, like the Friar suggests, or married off to a less-than-ideal situation, but she would likely be seen as the victim. Her life would have gone on, but Juliet, seeing few options, decides to take Romeo’s path instead.
Poor sacrifices of our enmity!
The tragedy of Romeo and Juliet is not a loss of love, but a loss of life. Two stupid kids tried to outwit their fate, but instead of mending a feud with their marriage, they mended the feud with their deaths, all because of Romeo’s impulsive and damning actions.
Romeo wasn’t the only bad actor in the play, but his actions drove the plot, caused all the problems, and drove them both to suicide. This play is given the moniker “the greatest love story ever told”, but it was never intended to be a love story. It was a warning. This Warning we make our 9th graders read, though we teach it poorly and constantly misinterpret the message. Perhaps it should be instead: The Greatest Love Story Ever Sold.
I put this image together to showcase some of my designs over the years. I did most of the line art in Illustrator, which I find interesting and fun to do. I’ve been contemplating on what I want to do with my life, again. I love writing. I enjoy technical writing. I love copywriting and graphic design.
I wanted to be a novelist. Do I still want that? Do I still want to work hard at something that feels like digging a hole only to have to fill it back up and dig it again. The thrill of writing is amazing. Finishing a project is amazing. I’ve even won some awards for my writing. But trying to sell a book, even though I already have sold two, seems daunting. Trying to land an agent seem insurmountable.
Do I want to put that much effort into all of the non-writing parts of the job? That’s what I have to figure out. I would love to get a job creating things that are then printed or posted and then used for good in a timely fashion.
As you can tell, I haven’t posted in a long time. Life sometimes comes at you pretty hard. With Covid, the world changed in many ways. My focus turned toward my family and work, hoping to come out the other side in a positive position respectively. I found a great tech writing job, which saw us through three tough years. My oldest daughter passed away. She was suffering through a degenerative neurological disorder, which finally claimed its prize.
Raising her for 18 years was a joy. She was my buddy and my princess. The final years saw her body and mental capacity decline severely. My heart still aches when I think about those final moments of her life, so I try to remember the great times. I miss the precocious little four-year-old who loved life and spread joy everywhere she went.
So, back to the present. I haven’t been writing much. I have a few works in progress all to some degree of completion, but the thought of finishing anything and attempting to get published or get an agent is daunting. I love the writing part. I love the learning part. I love the teaching part. I love the reading part. I even love the editing part. But publishing is a different animal than most people understand. You need to be a marketer, a salesperson, a social media manager, a publicist, and a business manager.
That’s a lot of extra skills, and the rewards did not come pouring in like in the Write a Book Fairy Tale.
So, I took a lot of pictures of sunsets over Ogden. I help my family. I enjoy the little things. And eventually, I will venture down the road to publishing again. The time must be right. My kids come first.
Also, my first two books are fun and great reads. One even won an award. Check them out.
The stage musical Hamilton is amazing in so many ways, but I stand in awe of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s use of rhyme among so many things. Rhyme is used throughout, but sometimes the rhyme is so clever that it just needs an ovation. Here are my favorite rhymes without context.
Shiny piece of coal > Unimpeachable
Abolitionists > Ammunition is
Tailor’s apprentice > In loco parentis
Hercules Mulligan > Ya mother said come again
Wittiest > City is > Insidious > Penniless > Any less
The convention is listless > Yo, who the f is this?
Devices > Indecisive > Crisis to crisis
Democracy > Socrates > Rocks at these > Mediocrities
Line of credit > Diuretic > You not get it
Horses > Of course > Intercourse > Four sets > Corsets
Relentlessly > Spendin’ Spree > Century > Parentheses > Mentions me > Sets us free > Ascendancy
I’m now officially an award-winning author. We Shall Be Monsters is the epic confrontation between the kids of Moreau High and Anika’s mad-scientist father. In order to succeed, the kids will have to become the very monsters they are trying to defeat.
Anika begins her adventure as a budding science prodigy, saving rats, winning awards she can’t keep, and running from the law with her mother. When her mother doesn’t come home, she learns that her father is alive, is a scientist, and lives in Florida, right in the middle of lightning alley.
He wants her to come live with him. In spite of her mother’s warning, Anika moves to the small town built around her father’s laboratory, but instead of getting to know him, she is ushered off to high school where she starts to notice strange things about the other students.
Anika is dropped into a world of mad scientist and the monsters they create, but with the strange abilities of her new friends, Anika is determined to learn the truth. What strange experiment is her father planning to do to her?
My book is available and ready for consumption. Check it out!
This is the sequel to Devil in the Microscope.
Living in the shadow of her father’s science laboratory might have been everything Anika dreamed of if only her father wasn’t planning to use her blood as his personal fountain of youth. The secret to his eternal life had been brewing in her veins for the last sixteen years.
Anika needs to change his mind or run for her life, but first, she has a mutant alligator to catch, her would-be boyfriend to save, a renegade principal to stop, and a monster to rescue.
Anika leverages her new friends and their strange abilities against the scientists and their creations. In order to survive, they will have to become the monsters they are trying to defeat.
You are cordially invited to help us celebrate the release of Ryan Decaria’s newest book, We Shall Be Monsters, the exciting sequel to his first book, Devil in the Microscope.
On September 24, 2019, come be one of the first to see the new book, hear Ryan share a few insights about Anika’s story, and hear him read a selection from the book. After, he will lead everyone in a fun mad science experiment.
Refreshments will be available. Come meet Ryan and the book’s cover designer, Monica Clark. We Shall Be Monsters will be available for purchase, which Ryan and Monica will be happy to sign.
This event is hosted by DaVinci Academy which is located at 2033 Grant Ave., Ogden, Utah, and will be held in Room 305. Please enter from the 20th street side and follow the signs to the 3rd floor.
We Shall Be Monsters is the sequel to Devil In The Microscope, and follows the adventures of Anika and her friends in Moreau, Florida, home to a modern laboratory full of mad scientist and their wayward science experiments. In order to survive, they might have to become like the monsters they are trying to defeat.
Today, for Rare Disease Day, I would love to introduce you all to my daughter, Bethy, and the terrible disease eating away at the person she is inside.
Gloomy, I know, but stay with me.
Bethany Grace has Juvenile Neuronal Ceroid Lipofuscinosisis (JNCL-3) or Batten Disease. Batten is a degenerative neurological disorder that affects an estimated 2-4 births per 100,000 in the U.S.
Bethy had a long history of heath challenges starting from before she was born, when we found out she had a stomach wall defect. But Bethy is a fighter and in her early years, she was a fairly normal and smart little kid.
Bethy loved stories and started reading early, in spite of her other developmental delays. She could read a short talk, clearly and with inflection, at four years old in front of the primary. Other parents told me they were a envious when comparing her with their own kids around the same age.
Today, she is fourteen and I can barely understand her in everyday conversations. Batten Disease is slowly taking away away so much of what made up who she is. At five, Bethy started going blind, stealing her ability to read traditionally. At the time, this was a huge blow, but now is the least of all the challenges she’s had to endure.
At eight, Bethany had her first seizure, which is a frightening experience to witness. Over the next few years, her seizures started getting more frequent, going from several months apart to multiples in a day. Today, if we do not control the seizures with medication, we would lose her to them.
Over the next six years, her cognitive ability decayed. Her speech eroded. Her mobility got shaky. Her sleep was disrupted. Batten Disease continues to chip away at the core of the fun-loving, story-obsessed little girl with a big heart and huge dreams.
Today, it’s hard for me to look at other 14-year-old kids and not be jealous of their potential. Bethy will never get the experience most children get of being a teenager. She won’t drive a car, go on a real date, have many real friends, or pursue her love of telling stories or being in plays.
Treatment options are minimal. Basically, we control the symptoms. Some progress is being made, but Bethy is too old and too far advanced to take much advantage of it. I wrote this post to share a little about one rare disease I’m intimately familiar with for #RareDiseaseDay. There are many rare diseases and so many families dealing with these special children who need a little extra kindness and a little more support from you.
If you ask them what you can do, they will likely not offer up any ideas. The reason is because they are tired and stressed. They do this everyday and have built their lives around their children and their situation. Adding another thing, even if it might be helpful, is hard and asking for favors is difficult. So don’t ask what you can do. Jump in. Bring them a meal. Take their children for an afternoon. Babysit an evening. Don’t offer without a date and time suggestion.
