MADMEN HAVE NO EARS

 

It is the story of Romeo and Juliet as Shakespeare presented it, written in prose form, using language adjusted for four hundred years of discovery, commerce, industry and invention which have influenced the words we use and the way we use them.

 

The Story

 

Romeo, a passionate romantic besotted with Rosaline but rejected by her, meets Juliet. The two fall hopelessly in love before discovering their families are mortal enemies.

 

They marry in secret but when Juliet's cousin Tybalt insults Romeo and Romeo refuses to take the bait, his best friend challenges Tybalt and dies in the duel. Enraged, Romeo duels with Tybalt and kills him.

 

Banished from Verona for the slaying, and Juliet promised to another by her father, the lovers become desperate to be together or die.

 

A plot hatched by a friendly friar goes awry and Romeo believes the drugged Juliet is truly dead.  He journeys to her tomb and kills himself there so as to join her in paradise.

 

She awakes from her comatose state to discover Romeo dead and kills herself so as to join him in paradise.

 

What happens in between is Shakespearean.