The film “Shakespeare in Love” is not a historical account of William Shakespeare’s life - and more importantly, love - by any means, but it does bring a fresh face to the kind of love immortalized by Romeo and Juliet. Winning the much-coveted Oscar for Best Picture the year it was shown, the writers of the film succeeded in portraying the all-too human emotion without the sugary-sweet, nauseating tones of the usual love story. It was “Romeo and Juliet” all over again, minus the literal death of the two lead characters.
I would like to think that the writers of “Shakespeare in Love” were inspired by the “Romeo and Juliet” quote shown above.The movie, like the play, is bittersweet; actually, it is more bitter than sweet, as there is no greater sorrow than that of two lovers who cannot spend their lives together. If one were to analyze the quote, Romeo is saying that the idea that love is a “tender” thing is inaccurate, for in real life there is no sugar-coating of love, and love does not always equate to happiness. Such a morose picture of love is painted so vividly in both Shakespeare’s work and in the film. “Romeo and Juliet”, to start with, ends with the tragic death of Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare in Love”, on the other hand, ends in a similar note, with the love affair of Will and Lady Viola depicted as doomed from its inception, as both of them are committed to somebody else.
The film closes with Will incorporating the character of Lady Viola into his next play – which turns out to be “Twelfth Night” – and Lady Viola accompanying Lord Wessex – with whom she was entered into a marriage agreement by her father – to a settlement in Virginia. Another facet of the quote that was brought to life in both the play and the film is captured by the phrase “Love… pricks like a thorn.The thorn here can be seen as signifying love as a bringer of pain – emotional, and perhaps, even physical pain, as seen in “Romeo and Juliet”. The film takes a less dramatic turn in this instance, as there is no physical pain (i. e. , death), but the emotional turmoil that the lead characters were subjected to can be imagined as unbearable.
I have always been fascinated with the depiction that love is “boisterous”. Currently the word means lively if taken in a positive light; negatively, it is equivalent to the word “noisy”.I would like to think that since the quote itself is not a happy one, the definition of the word boisterous is the latter. Allow me to be poetic in this regard. In my interpretation, that love is “boisterous” is equivalent to saying that love that is not proclaimed does not remain unknown for long.
This can be seen, again, in both the film and the play. In the film, not only does Lord Wessex later on learn of the whereabouts of Lady Viola; the queen herself eventually puts the pieces together and solves the puzzle. As for the play, Romeo and Juliet’s love for each other did not remain a secret for long, either.Gwyneth Paltrow’s character in the film, Lady Viola, called her life a “disillusioned love”. This phrase pretty much sums up the love story in the film, and is very much related to the quote I have chosen.
Perhaps more than Will, Viola is in deep sorrow and pain. Love for her came at a time when she cannot do anything about it, as she is bound by the laws brought about by her social status. It is my belief that everybody, at one point in their life, will experience love at its worst (as poetically described in the quote) for love is a fickle thing that can change directions in an instant, and nobody is immune from it.I have not experienced love to the degree that Romeo, Juliet, Will, and Viola have experienced it, but looking back at the relationships I’ve had, I can say that my life is a testimony to the pain and the joy that comes with loving and being loved. We were asked, if we are not currently in love, what our ideal of love would be. On my part, I have always thought that the highest form of human love is the kind that transcends the usual boundaries: time, race, distance.
In all likelihood I may not be able to experience love of this sort; hence, I am prepared to content myself with love that is filled with trust for each other.Trust, I believe, is the greatest gift you can ever give the person you love, and it is the one thing that can keep you together for the rest of your lives. Despite the tragic ending in both the film and the play, the trust the characters had for each other is a key element that not only made their love grow but likewise made them put their lives on the line for each other. The question of whom to love first – yourself or your beloved (that is, another person) - is rarely tackled in Shakespearean plays. Perhaps the notion of loving oneself first was verbalized only during recent times.
The very popular Dr. Phil McGraw recently published a book that’s all about love and the issues related to it, and although I have yet to see what’s inside, the mere fact that the discussions in his show more often than not center on this emotion is a good indicator of how popular the concept of “love” still remains, and how befuddled most of us are with it until now. I’m going to take a blind leap and say that Dr. Phil might have expanded on his usual love advice of “love yourself first”. As I’ve mentioned, the idea of self-love is foreign to Shakespeare’s work, and perhaps to most literature at that time.
Let me qualify my statement. By “self-love” here I mean, of course, not narcissistic love but the kind that heals and nurtures. Loving yourself means never compromising your dignity, and not letting somebody else rule your life. The way I see it, what Dr. Phil is ultimately saying is that love is not a one-way street – a phrase we all know so well but we haven’t taken the time to understand. In defense of the story in the film, the absence of self-love is, I believe, more a product of the time within which the film is framed.
Lady Viola and Will were, in a sense, bound by the period within which their love transpired: a period that not only frowned upon such a union as theirs but deemed it an immoral act and is therefore punishable. Come to think of it, even if the film “Shakespeare in Love” was set today, self-love (of the sort Dr. Phil encourages) might not have come into the picture at all. Will and Viola were too enamored by each other – never mind the fact that they cannot be together – to think of saving themselves from the pain brought by forbidden love.
