Original Text |
Translated Text |
| Source: Folger Shakespeare Library |
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Enter Romeo. ROMEO
If I may trust the flattering truth of sleep,
My dreams presage some joyful news at hand.
My bosom’s lord sits lightly in his throne,
And all this day an unaccustomed spirit
Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts. 5
I dreamt my lady came and found me dead
(Strange dream that gives a dead man leave to
think!)
And breathed such life with kisses in my lips
That I revived and was an emperor. 10
Ah me, how sweet is love itself possessed
When but love’s shadows are so rich in joy! Enter Romeo’s man Balthasar, in riding boots. News from Verona!—How now, Balthasar?
Dost thou not bring me letters from the Friar?
How doth my lady? Is my father well? 15
How doth my Juliet? That I ask again,
For nothing can be ill if she be well. | In exile in Mantua, Romeo wakes up feeling good. He has just had a dream in which Juliet found him dead, but then kissed him back to life. (That sound you just heard was the anvil of foreshadowing.) |
BALTHASAR
Then she is well and nothing can be ill.
Her body sleeps in Capels’ monument,
And her immortal part with angels lives. 20
I saw her laid low in her kindred’s vault
And presently took post to tell it you.
O, pardon me for bringing these ill news,
Since you did leave it for my office, sir. | Romeo's servant Balthasar (ironically the name of a wise man in church tradition) arrives with the news from Verona. There's no good way to say this: Juliet's dead. |
ROMEO
Is it e’en so?—Then I deny you, stars!— 25
Thou knowest my lodging. Get me ink and paper,
And hire post-horses. I will hence tonight. BALTHASAR
I do beseech you, sir, have patience.
Your looks are pale and wild and do import
Some misadventure. 30 ROMEO Tush, thou art deceived.
Leave me, and do the thing I bid thee do.
Hast thou no letters to me from the Friar? BALTHASAR
No, my good lord. | Romeo goes wild. He demands paper and ink, and he wants Balthasar to get him some horses so he can fly off to Verona. Balthasar tries to calm him down—he doesn't want Romeo to do anything rash. Romeo tells Balthasar not to worry, just do what he's been told. He asks if the Friar has sent a message, but Balthasar doesn't have one for him. |
ROMEO No matter. Get thee gone, 35
And hire those horses. I’ll be with thee straight.
Balthasar exits.
Well, Juliet, I will lie with thee tonight.
Let’s see for means. O mischief, thou art swift
To enter in the thoughts of desperate men.
I do remember an apothecary 40
(And hereabouts he dwells) which late I noted
In tattered weeds, with overwhelming brows,
Culling of simples. Meager were his looks.
Sharp misery had worn him to the bones.
And in his needy shop a tortoise hung, 45
An alligator stuffed, and other skins
Of ill-shaped fishes; and about his shelves,
A beggarly account of empty boxes,
Green earthen pots, bladders, and musty seeds,
Remnants of packthread, and old cakes of roses 50
Were thinly scattered to make up a show.
Noting this penury, to myself I said
“An if a man did need a poison now,
Whose sale is present death in Mantua,
Here lives a caitiff wretch would sell it him.” 55
O, this same thought did but forerun my need,
And this same needy man must sell it me.
As I remember, this should be the house.
Being holiday, the beggar’s shop is shut.—
What ho, Apothecary! 60 Enter Apothecary. APOTHECARY Who calls so loud? | No message from the Friar? No problem. Romeo's not in the mood to wait. He sends Balthasar for the horses and then reveals his plan. He's going to go to Juliet's grave and commit suicide there. He just needs a way to do it. Conveniently, he knows an apothecary who lives nearby and who's so poor that Romeo is sure he'll be willing to sell him some poison, even though it's illegal. (Psst! "Apothecaries" are basically pharmacists—they sell medicine, some of it prescription and some not.) |
ROMEO
Come hither, man. I see that thou art poor.
He offers money.
Hold, there is forty ducats. Let me have
A dram of poison, such soon-speeding gear
As will disperse itself through all the veins, 65
That the life-weary taker may fall dead,
And that the trunk may be discharged of breath
As violently as hasty powder fired
Doth hurry from the fatal cannon’s womb. APOTHECARY
Such mortal drugs I have, but Mantua’s law 70
Is death to any he that utters them. | Romeo tells the apothecary what he needs. The apothecary confirms that he does, in fact, have some poison, but he could be put to death for selling it. |
ROMEO
Art thou so bare and full of wretchedness,
And fearest to die? Famine is in thy cheeks,
Need and oppression starveth in thy eyes,
Contempt and beggary hangs upon thy back. 75
The world is not thy friend, nor the world’s law.
The world affords no law to make thee rich.
Then be not poor, but break it, and take this. APOTHECARY
My poverty, but not my will, consents. ROMEO
I pay thy poverty and not thy will. 80 | Romeo observes the apothecary's sunken eyes and hollow cheeks and says that if he doesn't take the money, he'll starve to death. What's the point in obeying a law with a death penalty if obeying it will also result in death? He tells the apothecary to take the money so he can feed himself. The apothecary agrees to sell Romeo the poison, but only out of desperation. |
APOTHECARY, giving him the poison
Put this in any liquid thing you will
And drink it off, and if you had the strength
Of twenty men, it would dispatch you straight. ROMEO, handing him the money
There is thy gold, worse poison to men’s souls,
Doing more murder in this loathsome world 85
Than these poor compounds that thou mayst not
sell.
I sell thee poison; thou hast sold me none.
Farewell, buy food, and get thyself in flesh.
Apothecary exits.
Come, cordial and not poison, go with me 90
To Juliet’s grave, for there must I use thee. He exits. | The apothecary gives Romeo the poison and tells him how to use it. He also says there's enough there to take down about twenty men. Romeo hands over the cash and comments that money is a greater poison than any of the medicine the apothecary has on hand. He tells the apothecary to buy some food and put on some weight, then he heads off to Juliet's grave. |