Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet: Prologue

Shakespeare is not only famous for his plays but also his poetry. He is famous for writing
sonnets which are 14 line poems that follow the rhyming scheme as seen in the prologue
to Romeo and Juliet.

This prologue is kind of an introduction to the play. A person acting as a narrator would
have come out on the stage at the beginning of the play and stated the following
introduction in sonnet form. The prologue not only tells you all of the major characters
involved in the play, but where it takes place, and how the story is going to end. There
are surprises in Romeo and Juliet, but the end is no surprise, it’s not a happy one.

Read the prologue below and use the question sheet provided to dissect the meaning of
each of Shakespeare’s lines.

Also note the rhyming pattern!

Chorus
1 Two households, both alike in dignity,
2 In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
3 From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
4 Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
5 From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
6 A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;
7 Whose misadventured piteous overthrows
8 Do with their death bury their parents' strife.
9 The fearful passage of their death-mark'd love,
10 And the continuance of their parents' rage,
11 Which, but their children's end, nought could remove,
12 Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage;
13 The which if you with patient ears attend,
14 What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.

Name: Class Period:

Date:

Romeo and Juliet: Understanding the Prologue

Directions: Read the prologue one line at a time. See what meaning you can make of it.
Answer the questions below by putting your answer and the line number(s) where you
found your answer.

1. How many families are feuding?

2. How are the families alike, what does this mean?

3. Where is the play taking place?

4. What word in line 3 tell you how long the families have been feuding?

5. Where are the families fighting, amongst whom?

6. “From forth the fatal loins of these two foes,” tells you where the two main characters
are from. Where are they from or whom are they related to?

7. What does “star-crossed” mean?

8. What do the star-crossed lovers do?

9. What happens with the parents after the “star-crossed lovers” take their life?

10. What’s the only thing that could’ve ended the families’ feud?

11. What is going to happen on the stage?

12. What are the actors going to do?