Defying the Stars: Tragic Love as the Struggle for Freedom in "Romeo and Juliet"

Author(s): Paul A. Kottman

Source: Shakespeare Quarterly , Spring 2012, Vol. 63, No. 1 (Spring 2012), pp. 1-38
Published by: Oxford University Press

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/41350167

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Positions

Defying the Stars:

Tragic Love as the Struggle for Freedom
in Romeo and Juliet
Paul A* Kottman

For freedom is this: to be with oneself in the other*

- G* W* F* Hegel

Is it e'en so? Then I defy you, stars!

- Romeo and Juliet, 5*1*24*

Shakespeare's
documentdocument
of love inofthelove Romeo
West"2 Likeinnothe
otherWest"2
work, and Julietheightens
the play Like noour(1592) other is work, arguably the play "the heightens preeminent our
desire for a tragic love story that we still seek in many forms - in novellas, nov-
els, films, musicals, and operas» There are familiar explanations for Shakespeare's
love tragedy* Some regard Shakespeare's lovers as victims of bad timing or acci-
dental misfortune; others maintain that Romeo and Juliet are in the throes of
young love and come to ruin because of their intemperance* But because these
accounts reduce the action to a particular circumstance, they do not adequately
explain the myth's "universal" appeal*
The most common interpretation of the myth is that it exposes a conflict
between the lovers' individual desires and the reigning demands of family, civic,
and social norms in relation to which those desires are formed* In this sense,
Romeo and Juliet is a paradigm of modern tragedy, which in Hegel's definition
of Shakespearean drama "takes for its proper subject matter * * * the subjective
inner life of the character who is not, as in classical tragedy, a purely individual

1 G* W. F. Hegel, Enzyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften im Grundwisse in Werke,

vol. 8, section 24a, ed* E, Moldenhauer and К* Michelet (Frankfurt Surhkamp arn Main, 1970)
quoted in Robert Pippin/' What Is the Question for Which Hegel's Theory of Recognition Is
the Answer?" European Journal of Philosophy 8 (2000), 156* All citations from Romeo and Juliet
are taken from Brian Gibbons's edition (London: Metheun, 1980) and cited in the text by act,
scene, and line*
Dympna Callaghan, ed*, "Introduction," in Romeo and Juliet : Texts and Contexts (New York:
Bedford / St* Martins Press, 2003), 1*

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2 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

embodiment of ethical powers *"3 Even the familiar

fates as a kind of Liebestod , by which "their death
intensity of their devotion to one another" offers a
flict*4 Because the lovers desires cannot be reconcile
or society from which they spring, they must exti
vindicates a society's demands so much as the lovers
The contours of this critical paradigm have been t
ways*6 But the formal structure of this dialectical
individual desires, on the one hand, and some partic
ial, or civic life, on the other, remains the critica
understanding of Romeo and Juliet » Feminist schol
Adelman, as well as their critic Jonathan Goldberg,
of "love" in Shakespeares play is an ideological const
ist, homosocial, and so forth) and hence "social" thr
not a transcendent state of otherworldly bliss but a
identities entail sociohistorical conditions of possibil
identities are not static but transformable and subje
the level of social practice* However, granting all of
the critical-interpretive paradigm at issue here, whi
irreducible to the social norms by which they are sh

3 Hegel mentions Romeo and Juliet alongside Hamlet as exem

also describes Romeo and Juliet as "the tragic transience of so
by the crazy calculations of a noble and well-meaning clevern
Poetry," in Philosophers on Shakespeare, ed, Paul A, Kottman
80-81.

4 Maurice Charney, Shakespeare on Love and Lust (New York: Columbia UP, 2000), 80*
5 Here we could compare Shakespeare's play to the "love -suicide" dramas of Japanese pla
wright Chikamatsu Monzaemon (1653-1725), where the love affair conflicts with social o
familial duties, economic interests, or obligations С giri" in Japanese). Or we might think
Denis de Rougements well-known thesis that passionate love is a heretically nihilistic oppo
sition to Christian love or feudal marriage* "Unawares and in spite of themselves," writes De
Rougement in a classic formulation, "the lovers have never had but one desire - the desire fo
death!" See Love in the Western World (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1983), 46.
6 Dympna Callaghan observes "a certain formation of desiring subjectivity attendant upo
Protestant and especially Puritan ideologies of marriage and the family required by, or at lea
very conductive to the emergent economic formation of, capitalism" Although Callaghan
approach is meant to be narrowly historicist, her essay nevertheless makes clear, in its invocation
of emergent forms of capitalism, how this formation of desire continues throughout cultur
transformations in the modern era. See "The Ideology of Romantic Love: The Case of Rom
and Juliet ," in Romeo and Juliet : Contemporary Critical Essays, ed. R. S. White (New York: P
grave, 2001), 85-115, esp. 85.
Goldbergs debate with Kahn and Adelman over the way in which "love" is idealized or
"ideologized" in their interpretations of Romeo and Juliet only redoubles the search for, and pre-
supposition of, a critical edge in "forbidden desires" with respect to the social. We see this in t

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DEFYING THE STARS 3

Taking an even broader view, we can

continues to have such explanatory f
desires of individuals and prevailing soci
forms of life to satisfy individuals, fo
modern subjectivity; In Shakespeares
on our view of Shakespeare), recall a fa
Discontents : "On the one hand, love c
civilization; on the other, civilization
tions"9 Stated more historically, a gr
and individual desires - the so-called "
beings in the wake of scientific, econ
the fundamental processes "as the result
world" - is by now a familiar trope in m
My goal is not to spirit us away to a b
to mind the stakes implied by our pa
Juliet * We see our loves, aims, and des
never fully reconciled to, whatever our
bonds demand of us* Romeo and Juli
individual subjects and social "reality" to
does so, unforgettably, by showing sex
conflict, searing our vision of love to o
struggles for freedom and self-realizat
the plays critical reception, as well as i
and relevance*

way that Kahn reads the play as affording the

patriarchy And although he criticizes Kahns
"to put pressure on the heterosexualizing ideal
arrives at over the corpses of the young lovers
that really do call patriarchal arrangements in
Goldbergs own perception of a conflict betwee
patriarchal) configuration of the social, the ver
assumption beneath our understanding of the m
(Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 2002), 271,
8 To cite a recent example, in his new book St
is Shakespeare's lovers who encounter again an
to the most exalted and seemingly unconfined
comedies is that love's preciousness and intens
but rather enhanced." See Shakespeare's Freedo
Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Disconten
1961), 58.
Alexandre Koyre, From the Closed World to the Infinite Universe (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins
UP, 1957), 2." World- alienation" is the phrase Hannah Arendt used to describe the same process
in The Human Condition (Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1958), 248-57.

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4 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

However, this interpretive paradigm leaves some trou

the play unresolved» The lovers suicides, for a start, st
("Go hence and have more talk of these sad things' [5»3
spective account of the events convince us that their "st
led necessarily to Romeos banishment, Juliets betrotha
the apothecary, much less to the double suicide» The na
by the Friar (1L 228-68) is just that: a summation of di
dents, not a tragic mythos of consequential actions, reve
Moreover, we have borne witness to what the Friar s o
missed» We heard the balcony scene and the aubade,
piness and their self-destruction» We know full well
ignores - practically everything that matters to us! Lik
the objective outcome - civic peace - stands removed fr
dramatic investment» We did not really care whethe
could be reconciled to one another; indeed, for Cap
"glooming peace this morning with it brings" (1» 304) i
Objectively and affectively, it is Romeos and Juliets sor
followed and that we continue to talk about» "For ne
woe / Than this of Juliet and her Romeo" (11» 308-9)» T
their woe and the social outcome (peace between the fam
strained, unsatisfying, unconvincing,"Poor sacrifices of
short, it turns out that our paradigmatic interpretation
cal tension between the lovers desires and the deman
cannot plausibly account for the play s outcome or the
which strain this dialectic past its breaking point»
In his Lectures on Fine Art , Hegel sensed that Sh
something like a nondialectical conception of tragedy»
anxiety about Shakespearean drama: "Since now it is not
in these spheres [of family, state, church, and so on] wh
of individuals, their aims are broadly and variously par
detail that what is truly substantial can often glimmer
very dim way»"11 In short, the conundrum that Shakes
Hegel is the one I just noted» In Shakespeare's drama
individual actions and the demands of culture or the cl
to a point at which the dialectic can no longer tighten it

11 Hegel's discussion of Shakespeare comes at the very end of a leng

art/' as if he were somewhat flummoxed by the works that he se
culmination of human artistic production ("Dramatic Poetry," 7
Shakespeare in the context of Hegel's reflections on art, see my "
Shakespeare and the Self-dissolution of Drama," in Shakespeare an
Jennifer Bates (Albany: State University of New York Press, forth

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DEFYING THE STARS 5

Modern philosophers since Schelling

Heidegger to Adorno and Benjamin, h
tial to understanding the fate of moder
drama is an important object of their
(above all, that of Sophocles) that fur
dialectics»12 Remarkably, our interpreta
our paradigmatic interpretation of Rom
cal tradition whose primary model of t
social duties, not sexual love» It is Soph
In the present essay, my aim is to r
of Romeo and Juliet with a different u
freedom and to present Shakespeares
our "tragic" subjectivity» My purpose i
for a philosophical argument that could
play, but to present Shakespeares play
modern subjectivity as "tragic lovers" -
enact Romeo and Juliet rather than, say,
of elements of Romeo and Juliet that
the medicinal remedy and the suicides»
pretation of the play yields a deeper un
and self-realization as lovers» Contest
our modern subjectivity is rooted in
the reigning demands of family, civic,
I contend that Shakespeares play show
subjects through acts of mutual self-re
acts constitute a love affair»

Romeo and Juliet is the drama of a st

realization, and this drama has a tragic
our self-realization springs not from o
or natural necessities but from the daw
mortality, separates or individuates us
and Juliet to the realization that, if they

12 For more on Shakespeare's importance to th

Kottman, "Introduction," in Philosophers on S
"tragic" as dialectic in German philosophy, see
Stanford UP, 2002).
13 Attic writers did not take sexual love as a p
de Rougement, for the Greeks, "love raises pro
duty. It is not a problem in itself. One may ki
wounded, but one cannot die of love (the metap
on the Myths of Love (New York: Pantheon, 19

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6 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

must somehow actualize their separateness for themselv

Their love affair is not the story of two individuals w
is thwarted by "A greater power than we can contradic
the story of two individuals who actively claim their se
own freedom, in the only way that they can - through
affair demonstrates that their separateness or individu
external necessity, but the operation of their freedom
show this, they will stake their lives*

II

We'll not carry coals*

-1*1*1

The men of two families prepare to fight to the death* "Naked" weapons on
display, each seethes for domination over the other, "for the weakest goes to the
wall" (1*1*33, 12-13)* Because there is no clear distinction between master and
servant, even those who are ostensibly servants fight for mastery* Since each side
recognizes the other as gripped by the same desire, a fight is in the air*
But what does each wish to gain in the fight? Why the need for a fight at all?
We can quickly dismiss a traditional answer to these questions - that the men
fight because they happen to be Capulets or Montagues, as if they were obliged
to do so by an "ancient grudge" (Prologue, 1* 3) between their respective houses*14
Because such grudges merely offer occasions for quarreling, they cannot serve as
the proper aim of the fight*15
The brawl in Romeo and Juliet gives each the chance to prove his manhood*16
But what is meant by "manhood" is not some desired social standing, masculine
virtue, or "manliness," like the "man at arms" in Castiglione s Book of the Courtier
Such a standing may be desirable in certain contexts and obtained in some cir-
cumstances by prevailing in violent conflict* However, because violent conflict

14 This is why West Side Story is much less gripping than its Shakespearean source* There, the
fight to the death is essential to a broader ethnic tribal struggle or gang war, in which the lovers
are caught up and by which they are defeated* Hence, Tony and Marias fate is not "tragic," but
merely wretched, regrettable, and pathetic - as if the lovers merely had the misfortune of bein
in the wrong place at the wrong time among the wrong people.
As Gregory and Sampsons opening exchange makes clear, no one fights on behalf of his
"house" or for glory and honor* "The quarrel is between our masters and us their men / 'Tis al
one" (1*1*18-19). Mercutio playfully acknowledges this in his and Benvolios desire to quarrel
no matter the reason or occasion: "Why, thou wilt quarrel with a man that hath a hair more or
a hair less in his beard than thou hast" (3*1*1-27, esp* 11* 16-18)*
16 There is no use denying that a display of sexual prowess motivates the men ("I will push
Montague's men from the wall, and thrust his maids to the wall" [1*1*15-17])» But "sexua
prowess" is not only a form of social prestige but also a struggle for self-realization*

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DEFYING THE STARS 7

is not absolutely necessary for the acqu

in Shakespeares Verona, one's civic sta
peace - the desire to be recognized by o
"Capulet") does not explain the necessity
to the death that we must explain; som
I risk my life in a battle to the death -
act of tribal duty or animal aggression ; bu
(mere instinct) does not drive me absolu
" I " am more than my desire to live * My
me; biological life is not a higher "good"
measure of my own life by risking it.
If I cannot stake this claim , then no soci
can be meaningful for me}7
This is the atmosphere in which Tybalt
he announces what is truly at stak
destruction of the other ("Turn thee,
But Tybalts dream of independence is s
is not defeated by his foe, the Montagu
oppose not the quarreling men but "i
lious subjects, enemies to peace" [1* 79]
weapons to the ground" before the P
back into civic life (1* 85)*18 By quarrel
own deaths* "If ever you disturb our str
of the peace" (11* 94-95)* Where life-
death for all combatants, the very mean

17 This is exactly how Hegel describes the mo

W. E Hegel, The Phenomenology of Spirit, tr
(paragraph 187).
18 As Northrop Frye notes, "In view of Tud
of duels and brawling, [Shakespeare's] play wou
on Shakespeare (New Haven: Yale UP, 1985), 1
Kwame Anthony Appiah explores the demise
honor and standing are bestowed. We might th
as staging this same demise. See The Honor C
Norton, 2010), 1-52.
19 Of course, one might still seek to make a l
when death is the certain outcome. This is wha
all hope of leaving the battle alive, he refuses
And damned be him that first cries 'Hold, eno
first audiences perhaps remembered better tha
the highest animals who struggle even when do
stake; I cannot fly, / But bearlike I must figh
Muir (Walton-on-Thames, UK: Thomas Nels

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8 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
makes bondsmen of them all The men ask themselves if
much as a defiant bite of the thumb: "Thou shalt not st
(L 78)* This is the opening statement of Romeo and Julie
by staking ones life can one come to know what is wort
measure of ones own life, that which one loves absolut
very being*
Many philosophers regard the duel as the elemental scene in the struggle for
human self-realization*20 First, this is because obvious external necessities form
the duels horizon, especially that we will all die* Not only will you and I die, but
you and I will die in such a way that we cannot see each other dead* Our separ-
ateness has the structure of a duel because it shows mortality to be the horizon
of our otherness to one another* It is the factual separateness at the heart of all
our relationships*21 Second, because mortality is plainly unavoidable, it seems to
be the most essential horizon for any self-realization to which we can aspire*22
That I will eventually die, no matter what I do, is not only a dreary reminder of
my tmfreedom; my mortality makes me conscious of my freedom, since I now
stand in relation to my own mortality and not to some indifferent end point*
In a duel, I stake my life with heightened attention to the very real possibility
that I will not survive* Third, the duel lays bare the way in which my heightened
attention to my finitude entails my keen awareness of another who will either
survive me or be survived by me* In the duel, my mortality is not made pressing
by some fact of the matter (danger, illness, age, frailty) but because I recognize
that someone is trying to kill me*23 This means that the conditions and limits
of my freedom, in the full acknowledgment of my mortality or my constitutive
finitude, can only be "mine" through a relation to another*
In making the point that "it is only through risking one s life that freedom is
won," Hegel shows that this risk entails seeing ones self through an enemy who

20 The significance of the duel for modern self-consciousness is given its fullest elaboration in
the passages from Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit to which I have already referred. But there are
antecedents, for example, the bellum omnium contra omnes, which in Hobbes Leviathan (1651)
characterizes the "state of nature" from which the institutionally inheritable life of the "com-
monwealth" springs.
For an elaboration of this same thought with respect to Romeo and Juliet, see Jacques Der-
rida, "Aphorism, Countertime," in Philosophers on Shakespeare, ed* Paul A* Kottman (Stanford:
Stanford UP, 2009), 170-83, esp. 174*
22 Although I locate this claim in Hegel's depiction of the life -and- death struggle in The Phe-
nomenology of Spirit, it can be found in the work of other philosophers, perhaps most famously
in Heidegger's notion of Daseins being-toward-death. See Martin Heidegger, " Sein zum Tode"
in Being and Time, trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson (New York: Harper and Row,
1962), 247.
23 In Hegel's words, "Just as each stakes his own life, so each must seek the other's death"
(Phenomenology of Spirit, 114 [paragraph 187]).

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DEFYING THE STARS 9

seeks ones death* It is not enough for m

for God and country, to save the life of
struggle to the death with another, I r
being who seeks my death* Indeed, I m
I am to "risk" my life in the struggle* I
not stake my life; I will simply be sla
"self- externality" is Hegels focus*24 Ye
us that, while not inescapable, the life-
less dramatically compelling than the lo
battle of Romeo and Juliet does not en
tionship that might be historically reif
of life, like the master and slave to wh
rise*26 It is as if Shakespeare prescient
philosophers) when he set the stakes as
dom and self-realization* But it is as if
dramatic movement must be laid out ra
fully grasped* Subverting the philosop
struggles, Shakespeare begins his love t

III

But Montague is bound as well as I,

* * * and 'tis not hard I think
For men so old as we to keep the peace*
-1*2*1-3

As bondsmen to the Prince, both Montague and Capulet readily ackn

edge that they must find ways other than fighting to pass the time* They a
and want nothing more than to live out their lives with some measure of g
fication* To this end, they hold feasts to mark the coming of spring and arr
marriages* Capulet seeks fulfillment not in the quality of the work he can
accomplish but in the relative mastery he might demonstrate by playing m
nanimous host and deciding his daughters worldly fate: "Earth hath swa

24 Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, 114 (paragraph 187).

25 I present the full demonstration of this claim, that Shakespearean drama shows "due
be of secondary significance in the drama of human freedom, for a forthcoming essay, "
in Early Modern Theatricality : Oxford Twenty -First Century Approaches to Literature, ed. H
S. Turner (Oxford: Oxford UP, forthcoming).
If anything, Shakespeare's drama displays dissolutions of our inherited forms of com
nal life and their attendant practices - the fracturing of civic ties, familial bonds, and p
allegiances. See Paul A. Kottman, Tragic Conditions in Shakespeare : Disinheriting the
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2009).

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io SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

all my hopes but she; / She is the hopeful lady of my e

all, Capulet still commands servants; he still rules h
believes» Although we have to ask: can the household, or
provide sufficient occasion for individuals to seek their
For his part, having gladly missed the "fray," young R
to pass the time: "Ay me, sad hours seem long" (1.1.115,
sadness that "lengthens Romeo s hours" is not mysterious
truth straightway»

benvolio What sadness lengthens Romeo's

romeo Not having that which, having, makes them
benvolio In love?
ROMEO Out»
BENVOLIO Of love?
romeo Out of her favour where I am in love»
(11» 161-66)

That "love" here means sexual appetite is obvious enough; Romeo desires to
"have" Rosalind (11» 206-14)» This is why Rosalind need not take the stage;
she is a mere lack, as Romeo says, a "not having»" At this juncture, Romeo is
nothing other than this desiring "emptiness": "Tut, I have lost myself, I am not
here / This is not Romeo, he's some other where" (11» 195-96)» Worse, because
Rosalind appears to Romeo as forever lacking, he regards himself as condemned
to an existence of unsatisfied longing»27

» » » she'll not be hit

With Cupid's arrow, she hath Dian's wit,
And in strong proof of chastity well arm'd
From love's weak childish bow she lives uncharm'd»
(11» 206-9)

Were he to "have" her, she would lose her independent status and become a
conquered thing, a filling for his lack» She (Rosalind) is not what Romeo is really
missing here; what he desires is a state of fullness» So long as he remains gripped
by this unsatisfiable desire, Romeo lives emptily, as if dead: "She hath forsworn
to love, and in that vow / Do I live dead, that live to tell it now" (11» 221-22)»

27 When Mercutio later quips that Romeo speaks "the numbers that Petrarch flowed in/' he
reminds us of the Petrarchan pedigree of both this rhetoric and its understanding of desire
(2A39-40). "Desire" is depicted more or less as Jacques Lacan describes it, as not "the lack of
this or that, but the lack of being whereby [a] being exists" See Jacques Lacan, Seminar II: The
Ego in Freuds Theory and in the Theory of Pscyhoanalysis, ed» J» Alain Miller, trans» S» Tomaselli
(New York: Norton, 1991), 223« "Numbers" refer to the metrical measure of a love poem» For
more on Petrarch in relation to Romeo and Juliet, see Heather Dubrow, Echoes of Desire : English
Petrarchism and Its Counterdiscourses (Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1995), 263-67»

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DEFYING THE STARS 1 1

According to Benvolio, all that is requ

(L 223ff») and come to desire another*
happen on its own, then Romeos desire s
rul'd by me," Benvolio says, "forget to think
223, 226), What Benvolio fails to see is th
conscious "I," apart from the sexually des
to master his own desire, no way for his d
this direction only redouble his awarenes

Show me a mistress that

What doth her beauty ser
Where I may read who pass'
Farewell, thou canst not t
(11 232-35)

But Benvolio s larger argument is this: as long as one is alive to the world and
to others, even if only halfheartedly, then one lack can always be replaced with
another* If Romeo's desire were truly limited to Rosalind, then it would signal
the end of his life* "Black and portentious must this humour prove / Unless
good counsel may the cause remove" (1L 139-40)» Romeo will get over Rosalind
as soon as he finds himself once again subjected to desire's promiscuity»28 To feel
the resuscitated arousal of desire for another - "some other maid / That I will
show you shining at this feast" (1»2»99-100) - is to be thrown back into life,
willingly or not»

Tut man, one fire burns out another's burning

One pain is lessen'd by another's anguish » » »
Take thou some new infection to thy eye
And the rank poison of the old will die»
(11» 45-46, 49-50)

Such are the enjoyments of the "life" to which Benvolio and Mercurio seek
to return young Romeo» It is thus no accident that they arrive as masquers;
a masque is a sufficiently pleasing way to formalize conditions under which a

28 In his later seminars, Lacan describes "drive" as finding some satisfaction in "substitutes"
for the fullness of being, or for "being perfectly full" See Jacques Lacan, Seminar XI: The Four
Fundamental Concepts of Psychoanalysis, ed. Jacques-Alain Miller, trans» Alan Sheridan (New
York: Norton, 1977), and Seminar XX: Encore , On Feminine Sexuality , The Limits of Love and
Knowledge, ed» Jacques-Alain Miller, trans» Bruce Fink (New York: Norton, 1998)» See also
Alenka Zupančič, Ethics of the Real: Kant, Lacan (New York: Verso, 2000); and Joan Copjec,
Imagine There's No Woman: Ethics and Sublimation (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003)» For a
Lacanian critique of Petrarchism, see Joel Fineman, Shakespeare's Perjured Eye (Berkeley: U of
California P, 1986).

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12 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

veritable parade of substitutable objects of desire migh

("On, lusty gentlemen' [1*4*113])* The masque is more tha
In the absence of "quarreling" or duels, the masque has now
so to speak, of Veronas social world*29 Where living is gr
substitution of one desire for another, revelry is the most
to which one might aspire: "A visor for a visor' (L 30)*
As a celebration of desires promiscuity, the masque sho
no less dramatic than the waxing and waning of appetites*
significant or consequential word or deed; only dancing, fl
liking* Anxiety should arise merely from an attentive conc
a full glass* The time spends itself in the satiation of app
farewell: "let s to bed* / * * * it waxes late, / I'll to my rest" (

IV

Too early seen unknown, and known too late*

-1*5*138

Although Juliet desires no particular other when she enters the play, she is,
like Romeo and his companions, aware of herself as a sexually desiring being*
With news of her betrothal to Paris, Juliet approaches the masquerade ready
to be moved by eros : "I'll look to like, if looking liking move" (1*3*97)* She thus
encounters Romeo in the spirit in which he encounters her* Moved by a desire
for one another that replaces all others ("Did my heart love till now? Forswear
it, sight / For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night" [1*5*51-52]), they swiftly
progress from looking to speaking to caressing to kissing (11* 92-109)* I take
this moment to be a sexual consummation, or as close as Shakespeare can get
to showing the lovers having full sexual relations on stage: "You kiss by th'book"
(1* 109)* I mention this partly to explain why I do not think that Juliet's later
insistence on marriage has anything to do with concerns on her part about
legitimating sexual relations between them* (I will provide my understanding of
their marriage shortly*) Be fitting the spirit of the masque, this is still an anony-
mous, replaceable desire* Both are probably masked when they meet*30 Nothing
at this point distinguishes Romeo and Juliet's encounter from the seduction of
any other Capulet by Benvolio or Mercurio*
From what, then, does the ensuing drama between Romeo and Juliet arise?
The answer turns out to be rather simple: Romeo and Juliet are not satisfied

29 I understand this to be the reason that Capulet turns to masques after nearly thirty years
of fighting (1,5.30-40) and forbids Tybalt to fight with Romeo: "Show a fair presence and put
off these frowns, / An ill-beseeming semblance of a feast" (1.5*72-73).
30 Recall Tybalt s comment, "This by his voice should be a Montague . . . Come hither, cover d
with an antic face" (1.5.53, 55). It is not clear that Juliet ever examines Romeo's face by the light
of day until their marriage by the Friar.

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DEFYING THE STARS 13

with the "satisfaction" ' offered by the m

dissatisfaction is sufficient to spur the s
sort* Or, to put the question as Juliet do
tonight?" (2.2.126).
For a start, Romeo and Juliet do not
another* Benvolio and Mercurio, by cont
able at the masque* They remain revelers
ther estranged from Romeo, whose actio
founding: "let [the ladies] measure us by
measure and be gone" (1*4*9-10)* Romeo
satisfying sexual relations often imply th
sexually ("O trespass sweetly urgd* / G
there is more to Romeo s turnaround and
sexual urges; at the minimum, both want
I go forward when my heart is here? / Tu
out" [2*1*1-2])* This is the decisive turni
to "know," to single out, whom they desir
generates a new problem: how are they t

What is yond gent

-1*5*126

Who is Juliet? And who is Romeo? Are they recognizable to themselves

others as individuals? In at least one sense, Romeo and Juliet are already identi
fied as particular "individuals" Within their respective households, Romeo and
Juliet are neither faceless citizens nor nameless masquers; in the bosom of thei
families, they are deemed individuals* Family life is the means by which their
singularity is acknowledged* Romeo and Juliet are identifiable only inasmu
as they belong "individually" to a house, tribe, or family* "Is she a Capulet
(l*5*116)*"His name is Romeo, and a Montague" (1* 135)*
Moreover, the families recognize the "particularity" of Romeo and Julie
being; they attach an absolute value to this individuality, no matter what Rom
and Juliet actually do, no matter how they behave* The first indication of thi
absolute value is marked by their proper names, their distinctive appellatio
within the family*31 But a deeper indication of their absolute value to their fam
lies is seen in the "love" shown to them after their deaths* When Juliets parent
mourn her death after her ingestion of the potion or at the plays end, we per

31 This should explain why the lovers' critique of the "name/' to the point of "doffing"
entirely, must apply to "Capulet" and "Montague" and to "Romeo" and "Juliet" ("Call me b
'love' and I'll be new baptized!" [2.2*50]).

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14 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

ceive that they acknowledge Juliets particular value to the

does or has done*
This kind of love, as Alexandre Kojève reminds us, "is w
by the ancient Family/'32 Kojève explains what such "lov
Love does not depend on the acts , on the activity of the
ended by his very death * By loving man in his inaction , one
were dead* Hence death can change nothing in the Love,
by the Family* And that is why Love and the worship
place in the pagan Family"33 In the ancient family, love
form of caring for the dead* Not only does Juliets death
family's recognition of her particular value, her death af
was treasured as an individual inasmuch as she was, to th
("life, living, all is Death's" [4*5*40])*
Just as parents often look upon their children with th
and appreciation when they are asleep, so too Juliet's (fir
"a pleasant sleep" (4*1*106) in order to trigger the family
loving care* Juliet s last words to her mother refuse her
"I pray thee, leave me to myself tonight, * * * / So please
alone / And let the Nurse this night sit up with you" (4*3
tude facilitates her secret ingestion of the potion, but the
upon the confusion of the sleeping child with the dead ch
uncover'd on the bier / Thou shalt be borne to that same
all the kindred of the Capulets lie" (4*1*110-12)*

32 The phrase "ancient Family" is Kojève s gloss of Hegel's discussi

mordial need for familial or kinship organization - a need that Heg
dead. So although there are of course many differences between an
say, modern bourgeois nuclear families, the term "ancient" here is le
designation than a philosophical-anthropological one, meant to ex
task of the family lies primordially in the organization of ritual activi
facts - the birth and death of individuals - into human deeds, lik
invoking Kojèves gloss of Hegel in the following pages, I mean to in
this broad philosophical-anthropological sense, namely, as that form
with responding to the need to care for individuals in their very be
stand Shakespeare's depiction of the Capulet clan - in particular,
response to Juliet's (first) death, and the centrality of the Capule
of the ancient family in Kojèves sense* For more on the importanc
human sociality, see my discussion of Hegel and Hamlet in my Tragi
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2009), 44-77*
33 Alexandre Kojève, Introduction to the Reading of Hegel, trans* Jam
Bloom (Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1980), 61*

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DEFYING THE STARS 15

VI

Death is my son-in-law, Death is my heir*

My daughter he hath wedded* I will die,
And leave him all: life, living, all is Death's»
- 4.538-40

Is the struggle for freedom and self-realization wholly condition

constitutive mortality? Can we claim our fate as our own, and thereb
very lives as something more than a debt owed to mortality, nature,
ily? Such are the questions that haunt Romeo and Juliets predicament
predicament is particularly stark in this regard, since Romeo's gender
give him a relative freedom of movement in Verona* Within the mor
restrictions of the Capulet household, Juliet is a mere extension of h
actions, as witnessed by her betrothal to Paris*34 When Juliet seeks
the demand that she marry Paris ("Hear me with patience but to spea
[3*5*159]), her father will have none of it*

Mistress minion you, * * *

* * * fettle your fine joints gainst Thursday next
To go with Paris to Saint Peter's Church,
Or I will drag thee on a hurdle thither*
* * * get thee to church a Thursday
Or never after look me in the face*
Speak not, reply not, do not answer me*
(11* 151, 153-155, 161-63)

Because she cannot even "speak" the word "no" to her family, Juliet
that her life is valued by her family only because she is, to them, alre
as dead," as we hear in Lady Capuleťs chilling words: "I would the
married to her grave" (1* 140)* "Talk not to me," she tells her daughter
speak a word / Do as thou wilt, for I have done with thee" (3*5*202-3
If the ancient family loves individuals as if they were "as good as d
viding conditions only for corporeal sustenance/nursing," and well-bei
such care is inadequate to a living individual who seeks to claim her f
own* The family looks like a "womb of death" (5*3*45)* By the very s

34 After Tybalts death, Capulet appears to suggest to Paris that the marriage is
upon Juliet's approval: "Things have fallen out, sir, so unluckily / That we have h
move our daughter" (3*4*1-2)* All the same, Capulet offers Juliet no alternative w
the matter to her directly*
35 Juliets Nurse, perhaps the "household" figure par excellence, ultimately sides
logical family as well, urging Juliet to consider her life only in terms of the condition
its biological necessities ( 3*5*212-27)* Juliet sees the Nurse, finally, as "Ancient d
235)* As well, consider how the Nurse raises Juliet to see herself as a beautiful cor
start: "Thou wast the prettiest babe that e'er I nurs'd" (1*3*60).

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16 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

however, the ancient family also turns itself into an occasi

her life as her own, by showing her exactly what she mu
really live* The stakes are clear - Juliet must subvert her
as well as the very source of that authority: the claims of
sociality* Juliet must refuse something of this debt if her
This is why Juliet finally seeks her freedom by undertaking "
That cop'st with death himself to scape from it" (4*1*
and why, for the same reason, the lovers eventually "take
nowhere but in the family tomb (Prologue, 1* 6)*

VII

Prodigious birth of love*

-1*5*139

Only by showing that the ancient family is opposed to and thus separable
from the claims of the living individual can Juliet see herself as truly living her
life* But this can happen only from within the life of the family, since the indi-
vidual cannot as yet regard herself as free to seek her own life outside the family*
How might this come about? Actually, very little is required; nothing more than
a hospitable gesture* It is enough for the family to admit within its fold, for a
time, some guests from the larger community*

TYBALT Uncle, this is a Montague, our foe:

A villain that is hither come in spite
To scorn at our solemnity this night* * * *
CAPULET Content thee, gentle coz, let him alone, * * *
He shall be endur'd*
(1*5*60-62, 64, 75)

This seemingly innocuous admittance of a "foe" shows that the ancient family
easily, even routinely, acknowledges individual lives for whom it need not care
("Young Romeo is it?" [1*5*63])* Because Romeo does not appear at the feast
as an external enemy, but as a "virtuous and well-governd youth" about whom
"Verona brags" (11* 67, 66), his presence bears witness to openness within the
ancient family that, like the chink in the wall between the houses of Pyramus
and Thisbe, had been there all along*
The occasion provides Juliet and Romeo with all they require - a chance to
encounter one another within family without needing to relate to one another as
family*36 "Thus I enforce thy rotten jaws to open, / And in despite I'll cram thee

36 That Romeo and Juliet are by rank, age, title, and Capulets own admission (1*5*63-66)
eligible marriage partners for one another is additional support for my claim that the lovers are

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DEFYING THE STARS 17

with more food" (5*3*47-48)* When Ro

which the other belongs, they do not desp
the possibilities that have been opened:

My only love sprung from my only hat

Too early seen unknown, and known to
Prodigious birth of love it is to me
That I must love a loathed enemy
(1*5*137-40)

Given such a chance, then, how is one to claim ones life as ones own? What
will count as a freely lived life? "What satisfaction canst thou have tonight?"
(2*2*126)*
One traditional answer to this question is that a free life is one that can
pursue, or move toward, whatever it desires*37 To be sure, there is no point in
denying Romeo and Juliets desire for sexual knowledge of one another ("O that
I were a glove upon that hand, / That I might touch that cheek" [11* 24-25])*
However, does the "satisfaction" of which the lovers talk in the balcony scene
bespeak anything other than an anticipated sexual encounter - anything aside
from hauling oneself across the keel of eros , lack and fulfillment, desire and satis-
faction? Is there anything more desirable for human beings than the unimpeded
motion of their limbs? Which means asking: what, finally, do Romeo and Juliet
want with one another?

VIII

And what love can do, that dares love attempt*

-2*2*68

We are now in a position to return to the questions raised at the outset*

There, we saw that claiming my life and my freedom as my own requires both
that I risk my life and that I find myself in another* But we saw that Shakespeare
in contrast to Hegel, does not regard the "duel" as the most elemental scene for
this struggle* We asked, How does the struggle for freedom and self realization
begin, if not as a duel ? We can now put the question another way: is the horizon

not divided by insuperable social obstacles* The household (or "womb of death" [5*3*45]) now
looks capable of giving "birth" to a life - of gestating a love life - that is not just "good-as-dead
37 This is probably the most recognizable definition of freedom in the modern liberal tradi-
tion, with its origins in Hobbess famous definition of freedom as "the absence of opposition
[or] external impediments " "A Freeman" Hobbes writes, "¿s he that, in those things which by hi
strength and wit he is able to do, is not hindered to do what he has a will to!' See Leviathan, ed* A.
R Martinich (Ontario: Broadview, 2002), 190»

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18 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

of all enmity - the fact that one of us will see the other
not avoidable? Can external necessity - the "given" fact of
separateness - be regarded as internal to free acts of mut
Shakespeares wager will not surprise us* Romeo and J
their lives, but not as mortal foes. They "take their lives" a
fate, as a double suicide wherein each sees the other dead,
structure of the duel, the externality of enmity: "Look t
am proof against their enmity" ( 2.2.72-73 )* Romeo denie
necessity upon his life (he seeks his freedom) not by a stru
a foe, but by revealing this necessity (for example, the his
let and Montague, or our constitutive finitude as huma
pretext for risking his life for something else entirely: namely
"My life were better ended by their hate / Than death pr
thy love" (1L 77-78). He denies that enmity is the only ext
realization, finding these grounds instead in Juliet ("Alac
in thine eye / Than twenty of their swords" [1L 71-72])*
To strive for recognition as a lover is to find a moment o
be regarded as having bypassed the need for a fight-to-the
eliminated its possibility* In fact, this is just how Romeo a

Juliet How camst thou hither, tell me, and where

The orchard walls are high and hard to climb,
And the place death, considering who thou art,
If any of my kinsmen find thee here*
romeo With loves light wings did I oerperch these
For stony limits cannot hold love out,
And what love can do, that dares love attempt:
Therefore thy kinsmen are no stop to me*
Juliet If they do see thee, they will murder thee*
romeo Alack, there lies more peril in thine eye
Than in twenty of their swords* Look thou but
And I am proof against their enmity*
(11* 62-73)

More generally, the lovers seek a different reckoning with

the lovers are not denying mortality as such, as in the Chr
Gods love for the world is shown through Christs vi
dying, or as in Dantes depiction of Beatrice, where am
vision of posthumous love, the alta fantasia of the belove
view, Dantes Christian "fantasies" are not a metaphysical
of the beloveds mortal embodiment* Rather, they expres
mystified, awareness that the love relation, the struggle

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DEFYING THE STARS 19

not wholly determined by the hard trut

development of a love affair has an inst
to the poetic invention depicting it» All
fantasies of life after death»
We do not deny deaths inevitability , sa
are not immortal We do not challenge the
But what we utterly refuse to accept is th
sity - something we passively suffer as our "
We defy all transcendent powers - inclu
If we fail in this defiance , then we are not
In fact, we will stake our lives to show tha
sity to which we are slavishly subjected , ir
Quite the contrary! Our actions shall sh
immanently our own »

IX

It is my lady, О it is my love!
О that she knew she were!
- 2,2»10-11

So, let us ask again: what satisfaction can the lovers have tonight? Shakes
answer is straightforward enough: recognition» The lover seeks recognitio
lover "in life" from the only other one capable of bestowing this nontransf
prestige: the beloved» This means that the beloved appears neither as an ex
object of sexual desire (as Rosalind had previously appeared to Romeo)
someone to be conquered (like the"foe" in the life-and-death struggle)» On th
trary, because Romeo cannot possess or conquer Juliet she has become as ess
to him as he is to her» "[H] er I love now," Romeo confesses to the Friar," Doth g
for grace and love for love allow» / The other [Rosalind] did not so" (2»3»81-
The beloved is a living subject on whose reciprocal recognition the
depends in order to be, or to become, a lover»38 As Orlando learns in the Fo
Arden, no external sign (no poetry hung upon a tree, no oath, no protesta
can gain him recognition as Rosalind / Ganymedes "lover" until she herself
inexpressive she," recognizes him» Orlando cannot even "know" her - that

38 Because Rosalind was merely an object of Romeo's desire - someone to be a conquest

did not need to recognize Romeo in order to be desirable to him, any more than a glass o
needs to recognize a thirsty person in order to be thirsted after. If Rosalind only existed
as something to be made his or not his, then she was not truly a free individual in rela
him; and if she was not seen by Romeo as truly free, then Romeo could not be freely re
by her as free himself

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20 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

cannot even recognize her as his "very Rosalind" - until h

ognition that he is her loven To make one s love for anoth
being recognized by her as her loven39
This requires acknowledging her as a free, self-consc
merely naming her as the object of ones affections» What
act of mutual self- recognition: "Dost thou love me? I know
And I will take thy word" (2»2»90-91)» Moreover, becau
as a moment of such mutual self-recognition, the momen
duly appear to be freely performed* Accordingly, the lov
necessity impinging on its free development ("for stony
out" [L 67] )♦ Luck, chance, nature, and objective realities h
scene entirely, but they now appear on the world stage t
by the lovers» The space separating the orchard from the
between this night and tomorrow are given over to the lo
party mediates» There is no matchmaker, ritual occasio
sity» Nothing compels Juliet to her window; she speaks t
accord» Romeo does not accidentally stumble upon Juliet
purposefully sought her out»
Speaking first, in "the numbers that Petrarch flowe
rhapsodizes the sight of Juliets singular body: "The br
would shame those stars / As daylight doth a lamp"
propriateness of epideictic speech is immediately appar
to be part of Shakespeares deep critique of Petrarchism
could regard Juliet only as an object of sight, she could n
"acknowledged," as Stanley Cavell would say - through
or speaker of words»41 Hence, when the beautiful apparit
(1» 25) - Romeo is forced to halt his rhapsody and to reco
agent: "She speaks / О speak again bright angel" (11» 2
speaks freely - to herself at night, under no external oblig
tener - it is her own free actions, her freedom, that Rom
he is to recognize her at all»
Romeo thus confronts Juliet - her thinking, her questi
ding actualization of her individual freedom» To utter
to discover that there is nothing that one might not thin

39 As You Like It, ed» Juliet Dusinberre (London: Thomson Learn

40 For a discussion of the way in which Shakespeares sonnets and p
a silent addressee or love object but another speaking subject, see Da
Performance in Shakespeare's Sonnets and Plays (Cambridge: Cambri
41 See Stanley Cavell, The Avoidance of Love: A Reading oř Ri
Knowledge in Seven Plays of Shakespeare (Cambridge: Cambridge

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DEFYING THE STARS 21

one might not pose* How easily even t

lends itself to interrogation! "O Romeo
(L 33)* Once Romeo sees that recognizin
speech," the problem of his own freedo
compels Romeo to answer Juliet; in fact,
silent, bearing witness to her free speech
response is obliged or prohibited, Rome
his own: "Shall I hear more, or shall I spe
Yet this moves a bit too fast* Although
tioning and thinking aloud, she has not y
She is not yet free for another, with anot
to his presence, he must reveal himself t
His challenge is to allow Juliet to appea
himself necessary for Juliets freedom*

О be some other name*

-2*2*42

There are many ways to appear necessary for another's self-realization* M

evidently, one can appear capable of furnishing the occasion or conditions
another to act on his own* Let us suppose that these conditions range fro
parents loving attention facilitating a child's developing autonomy to the ins
tutional forms of recognition that can bestow liberties upon a human bei
In such cases, ones actions are "necessary conditions" for another's freedom b
being, in principle, performable by anyone endowed with a certain stan
within the family, state, or civil society* Because only a "member in good stan
ing" - someone possessed of the appropriate rank, title, or position - can exte
the form of recognition necessary for another's relative freedom, such acts
not mutually free* The effectiveness of the actions of the "member in good sta
ing" is dependent on her membership, not on whom she recognizes*
Membership in a collective necessarily precludes acts of free mutual s
recognition, inasmuch as it remains a function of hierarchy* This is why Ro
and Juliet's recognition of one another is not dependent upon any hierarchic
membership in a broader form of social life* This, and not the need to estab
that "who" Romeo is can be separated from "what" he is called, is why the lo
wish to doff their families' titles: "Deny thy father and refuse thy name* / O
thou wilt not, be but sworn my love /And I'll no longer be a Capulet" (2*2*34
36)* By distinguishing Romeo from "Romeo" - "So Romeo would, were he
Romeo call'd, / Retain that dear perfection which he owes / Without that tit
(11* 45-47) - Juliet is not establishing the obvious fact that Romeo's phy

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22 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

singularity is not a name» That "a rose by any other wor

is hardly a questionable conclusion* Instead, when Juliet
name that is my enemy: / Thou art thyself, though not
she asserts the extent to which they can recognize one an
other membership or belonging:

Juliet Romeo, doff thy name,

And for thy name, which is no part of thee
Take all myself
romeo I take thee at thy word
Call me but love, and Г 11 be new baptisd:
Henceforth I never will be Romeo»
(1147-51)

All that is required is that "that dear perfection which he owes / Without that
title" adhere not in any "recognition" bestowed by the house of Montague, but in
his active self-individuation*

Thou art thyself, though not a Montague*

What's Montague? It is nor hand nor foot
Nor arm nor face nor any other part
Belonging to a man* О be some other name*
(11* 39-42)

It is this nascent "own-ness" that Romeo enacts when he responds, unseen in the
darkness*

By a name
I know not how to tell thee who I am:
My name, dear saint, is hateful to myself
Because it is an enemy to thee*
Had I it written, I would tear the word*
(11* 53-57)

It can be disconcerting to hear "By a name / I know not how to tell who I am"
spoken in the dark by an unseen intruder* Juliet is given the chance to recognize
not Romeos name (nor any other objective indicator, like his face) but his active
(spoken) self-individuation:

Juliet My ears have yet not drunk a hundred words

Of thy tongues uttering, yet I know the sound*
Art thou not Romeo, and a Montague?
romeo Neither, fair maid, if either thee dislike*
(11* 58-61)

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DEFYING THE STARS 23

In this mutual self-recognition, they are

diately free "with one another"
Of course, if there is truly no mediation
them ("Stony limits cannot hold love ou
nothing substantial, no "third party" bi
am afeard, / Being in night, all this is b
substantial" (1L 139-41)*
The lovers next impulse is to grasp s
vows:"0 gentle Romeo, / If thou dost lov
By grasping at such straws, it becomes a
the oath:

romeo Lady, by yonder blessed moon

Juliet О swear not by the moon, th'i
romeo What shall I swear by?
Juliet Do not swear at all*
Or if thou wilt, swear by thy gracious self,
Which is the god of my idolatry,
And I'll believe thee*
romeo If my hearts dear love -
Juliet Well, do not swear* Although I joy in thee,
I have no joy of this contract tonight*
(11* 107, 109, 112-17)

If contracts bring no joy, then the sought "satisfaction" must lie in the free act
of mutual self-recognition, whereby one claims one's own freedom through
another's* This is Shakespeare's answer to the question "what satisfaction canst
thou have tonight?"

romeo Th exchange of thy love's faithful vow for mine*

Juliet I gave thee mine before thou didst request it,
And yet * * * * I would it were to give again
And yet I wish but for the thing I have*
My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep: the more I give to thee
The more I have, for both are infinite*
(11* 127-29, 132-35)

The young Hegel referred to these lines as the paradigmatic expression of

mutual self-recognition and earthly happiness, and it is difficult to disagree*42
That the lovers freely and mutually recognize one another in such short order

42 G* W. E Hegel, "Love," in Early Theological Writings, trans* T* M* Knox (Philadelphia: U of

Pennsylvania P, 1971), 307*

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24 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

accounts for the exhilarating rush of the scene: the urge

one s own life to be "infinite" through another, not as pr
as a worldly realization of freedom through another* To
world, this moment has seemed a quintessential depiction
profession of human happiness*
So, what goes wrong? Why does Shakespeare know
here?

XI

Parting is such sweet sorrow*

-2*2*184

Shakespeare seems to have been tempted to end the scene at this momen
hence, the next lines: "I hear some noise within* Dear love, adieu" (2*2*136)* B
ending the scene here would mean showing the lovers to be subject to worldly
demands and intrusions* Shakespeare knows, I think, that such intrusions
not determine Romeo and Juliets fate as lovers - they are at most sources
frustrating interruptions - and so he does not let us off the hook so easily* "St
but a little," Juliet tells Romeo,"I will come again' (2*2*138)*
So Romeo stays* And stays*
No external demand really compels them to part this night* The only reaso
that Juliet can find to send Romeo away is so that he can arrange a time a
place for them to marry* This raises the question: why do they marry at all? T
Friar sees in the marriage an opportunity to turn the households rancor to lov
for her part, the Nurse sees nothing more than the chance to make some extr
money (2*4*146-49)* As I see it, Romeo and Juliet do not marry to legitim
their sexual relations or to appease their families, as if they were worried abo
what God or the Nurse might think of the rope ladder dangling from Juliet s
bedchamber* They seem content to celebrate the marriage in the privacy of t
confessional, eschewing public acknowledgment* Elsewhere, at any rate, Shake
speare depicts marriages that not only flout social expectation ( Othello ) b
fulfill no social function (As You Like It )* Romeo and Juliet marry to undersco
that their mutual self-recognition means taking matters into their own hands
further expression of their own self-determination:

[B]ut come what sorrow can,

It cannot countervail the exchange of joy
That one short minute gives me in her sight*
Do thou but close our hands with holy words,
Then love -devouring death do what he dare;
It is enough I may but call her mine*
(2*6*3-8)

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DEFYING THE STARS 25

The tragic turn in the drama is not t

enmity, civic laws, betrothals, biological n
intrinsic to the lovers ability to defy ex
that it passes almost imperceptibly; Be
the lovers, they have no obligation to pa
rate - even if just to sleep - this "parting"
newfound freedom» Meticulously, the co
as a reflection on this self-defeating turn
familiar to all lovers» Because no externa
to say "good night" - "Three words, de
thousand times good night" (2»2»142, 154
You have to be on your way - says Juliet
for us to marry »
And so Romeo departs, only to hear him
О for a falconers voice / To lure this tas
why does Juliet lure him back? Merely t
Nurse to him»

romeo By the hour of nine»

Juliet I will not fail » » » »
[Awkward pause.]
I have forgot why I did call thee back»
romeo Let me stand here till thou remember it»
Juliet I shall forget, to have thee still stand there,
Remembering how I love thy company»
And I'll still stay to have thee still forget»
(11» 168-74, emphasis added)

We know how these conversations go» They mark the rhythm of an exchange
that has discovered the vertiginous substance of its own freedom» You say good
night; no, you say good night » » » » You hang up; no, you, hang up» » » »
Is this the upshot of mutual self-recognition? Is this what the happiness of
freedom looks like? "Good night, good night» Parting is such sweet sorrow /
That I shall say good night till it be morrow" (11» 184-85)» If we are honest with
ourselves, is not what every lover wants at such moments, really, to hang up the
phone? To say, sweetly and sincerely but finally, "good night»p" Would not the
finality of the good night or adieu be the truest actualization of this newfound
freedom? This, I think, is what we hear when the drowsy Juliet tries to put a stop
to things, murmuring:

Juliet 'Tis almost morning, I would have thee gone,

And yet no farther than a wantons bird, » » »

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26 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
So loving-jealous of his liberty*
romeo I wish I were thy bird»
Juliet Sweet, so [yawns Juliet] would L
(11 176-77, 181-82)

But because separation is the operation of the lovers' very freedom, an

sion hinders peaceful sleep/ yet I should kill thee with much cherishing

XII

These violent delights have violent ends

And in their triumph die, like fire and powder,
Which as they kiss consume*
-2.6.9-11

"O sweet Juliet" cries Romeo, before taking up his sword against Ty
beauty hath made me effeminate softend valours steel" / And in
(3.1.115-17). Romeos love of Juliet is not disavowed by his murde
any more than it is replaced by his love of Mercurio. Neither lov
What Romeo learns, rather, is that to be a lover - of Mercutio
requires him to stake his life, even when there is no prize to be gaine
the quarrel is manifestly pointless and decides nothing. Self-realizati
staking ones life through another; because Tybalt seeks not an am
"quarrel" with Romeo, Romeo cannot stake his life without taking u
When Mercutio complains about Romeo s "vile submission," he is not
ing about the humiliation of conceding to a Capulet; he is suggest
refuse to take up the sword in the face of a challenge is to efface one
Romeos initial reluctance to do so - namely, that he empties himself
as a self- determining individual, a self-evacuation through which Ty
passes unobstructed - is what brings about Mercurios death. To a
the duel is "worth fighting" for some other reason or other (fam
friendship, or honor) is to ask the wrong question. As both Hegel
speare recognized, that dueling need have no further ethical justifica
and so forth) accounts for its significance in the struggle for self-r
the face of this, Romeo must accept Tybalts challenge if he is to reaff
existence: "Either thou, or I, or both" (3.1.131).
At the same time, by slaying Tybalt, Romeo ends up accomplis
what the city itself would have undertaken: "His fault concludes but
law should end / The life of Tybalt" (3.1.187-88) Seen by others to
the law, not his life, into his own hands, Romeo loses his standing as
without losing his life. "The law that death . . . turns threatened it to
Romeos life is spared, and his only mortal foe vanquished: "Tybal

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DEFYING THE STARS 27

thee, / But thou slew'st Tybalt* There

initial reaction - "ТЪеге is no world w
death, misterm'd" (1L 20-21) - looks, as
overwrought* There is every reason to th
patience "till we can find a time / To blaz
/ Beg pardon of the Prince and call thee
fort * * * reviv'd by this" sensible persp
chamber to reassure her* Life has brought
No more leaping over stony walls* Romeo
night in Juliets chamber*
Shakespeare shows the lovers aloft at Ju
is no resigned, tearful acceptance of the n
trary, the lovers begin with a bald-faced
supposedly face* "Wilt thou be gone?" be
known; but let us listen again, this time f
necessity of parting but also of natures c
reality's necessities tout court The lovers
themselves the power to outstrip reality

It is not yet near day*

It was the nightingale and not the lark
That pierc'd the fearful hollow of thin
Believe me, love, it was the nightingale

"Therefore," continues Juliet defiantly/stay

None of this should astonish us* We
and the passage of time by pushing the s
pushing it twice* Or by making love in th
Or by "calling in sick*" To be free and sel
of making day night, or night day* This i
of their worldly position* Rather, the lov
these limitations are not fully "limiting"
obstacles do not disappear, then they do n
Stay yet : thou need'st not to be gone *
The starkest "reality" with which they m
or the earths rotation* The more profoun
they make them out to be - that Romeo n
that no external power separates them ab
"follow" Romeo "throughout the world," a
slipping off to Mantua with him here (2*2

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28 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

see in the very next scene - to accept the Friar's "remedy"

she wakes from the drug, Romeo shall "bear' her "henc
Although she is later willing to accept an escape to Mantu
Paris, she does not rush to flee at this moment, when sh
escape "disguis'd" (3*3*167) alongside Romeo without th
Shakespeare knew perfectly well how to stage an escape f
the Friar suggests as much*
At this point, then, Romeo abandons his "realism" ("I m
or stay and die" [3*5*11]), takes Juliets wager, and raises t

Let me be taen, let me be put to death,

I am content, so thou wilt have it so*
I'll say yon grey is not the mornings eye,
'Tis but the pale reflex of Cynthia s brow*
Nor that is not the lark whose notes do beat
The vaulty heaven so high above our heads*
I have more care to stay than will to go*
Come death, and welcome* Juliet wills it so*
(11* 17-24)

A pause ensues* Romeo and Juliet have agreed to take the

hands, irrespective of the world's power over them* In th
ficult to do* All that is required is all that is ever required
lives; that they not flinch in the face of death* As we kn
never recoil in the face of death* She will soon take up
measures will come*
It is not the fear of death that will separate them .
"O tell me not of fear" (4*1*121)*
Romeo's next words - not death - are what truly terrify
my love - Romeo says - day and night are what we make
I need not leave. You need not remain. We can stay togeth
"How is't my soul? Let's talk* It is not day" (3*5*25)*
"Let's talk*" With these words, it becomes clear that wh
the very freedom that has afforded them such exhilaratio
see Romeo himself* No night to hide her blush; no father
doff; no more walls to climb; no more excuses*
But how is this to be faced? If nothing external divides t
arateness - if it is to be a source of freedom and happines
accomplished and not passively suffered* Juliet does not
Romeo herself* "It is [day], it is* Hie hence, begone, away
loving-jealous of his liberty," through whose song extern
ished, now sings of freedom's internal discord*

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DEFYING THE STARS 29

It is the lark that sings so out of tune,

Straining harsh discords and unpleasin
Some say the lark makes sweet division
This doth not so, for she divideth us ♦ .
О now be gone.
(11 27-30, 35)

XIII

If thou dar st, I'll give thee remedy.

- 4.1.76

By banishing Romeo, Juliet claims something of her freedom. This is n

to say that it was easy or pleasurable. After watching Romeo descend from h
window following just "one kiss," she says,"Methinks I see thee, now thou art
low / As one dead in the bottom of a tomb. / Either my eyesight fails, or th
lookst pale" (3.5.55-57). Romeo replies/ trust me, love, in my eye so do yo
Dry sorrow drinks our blood" (11. 58-59).
While for many readers, this foreshadows the plays final scene, I take
moment to be far more prosaic. The lovers are, in effect, breaking up. The re
tionship is not over, but the lovers are coming to grips with their freedom wi
one another as their capacity for active separation, with the fact that claimin
this separateness, even in its sorrowful effects, is the essential happiness of th
individual lives. Neither wants the other to truly die; Juliet is not saying tha
she wants "to see Romeo dead in the bottom of a tomb."43 Romeos "real" deat
would indeed be incompatible with the happiness of her newfound freed
Rather, she expresses something of the inverse; because Romeo did not h
to die to accomplish their separation - as in the traditional marriage vow,"unt
death do us part" - they can claim the separation, this little death, as their ow
doing. They have not really lost blood; they have made themselves pale "and a
these woes shall serve / For sweet discourses in our times to come" (11. 52-53)
For the first and last time Juliet faces a sunrise, a future, that appears to h
open and undecided. Perhaps they "shall . . . meet again" (1. 51). She is anything
suicidal at this moment. She radiates the happiness of self-realization. She faces
morning sun with aplomb. "Be fickle, Fortune . . . But send him back" (11. 62, 64). 44

43 Juliet hardly lingers over the sight when she gets the chance to see Romeo dead. Perh
an analyst could tell Julia Kristeva why she wants to claim "that Juliet's jouissance is often st
through the . . . desire ... of Romeo's death." See Tales of Love, trans. Leon S. Roudiez (N
York: Columbia UP, 1987), 221.
To the objection that Juliet sends Romeo away out of fear of the social powers inimical
his safety, note that Juliet's words come before the Nurse's early warning - "The day is brok

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30 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

Her self-determination is immediately put to the test b

mother cannot wait until after breakfast to share: Juliet
Thursday* Having only moments ago tasted freedom with
back into the bonds of the ancient family* This , we migh
her to suicide* And it is true that she would rather die t
will negate her family's demand at any cost: "Shall I be m
morning? / No! No! This shall forbid it* Lie thou there*
(4*3*22-23, sd)*
However, it is not exactly right to conclude only tha
herself to avoid marrying Paris* Because this alternative
to Paris - would merely decide the fate of her individ
acknowledged and valued by her family, this choice appea
unsatisfying* Either way, she would belong to the Capule
In seeking a "remedy," what Juliet wants is a third option
this marriage or suicide*
Because the Nurse offers no remedy, Juliet turns to the
dom thou canst give no help, / Do thou but call my resol
this knife I'll help it presently" (4*1*52-54)* Juliet wants t
her family other than by dying* She wishes to separate he
ily's claim upon her life* This is why she does not kill her
hearing her father's firm instruction* Instead, she threa
on the Friar should he fail to help her negate her family's
these circumstances would seal her place in the ancient fa
because, if the Friar failed to provide a remedy, then - an
wild desperation - suicide would be a sad necessity, an
absolute loss of freedom* She stakes her life for freedom
direct, necessary conflict with her family*
In light of this, we can demystify the Friar's medici
that is at least as old as Xenophon's popular Ephesian Tale
notorious source of perplexity*

[If] Thou hast the strength of will to slay thyself,

Then it is likely thou wilt undertake
A thing like death to chide away this shame,
That copst with death himself to scape from it*
(11* 72-75)

wary, look about" (3.5.40). Concern for one another's safety did not
ing the night together or from getting married» In short, if concern f
paramount, there would be no drama.
Such abject "belonging is illustrated when Juliet encounters Pari
Paris sees her tear-streaked face and declares, "Thy face is mine, and th

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DEFYING THE STARS 3 1

The Friars plan does not require Juliet to o

exploits the fulfillment of the family's hig
Juliet a life beyond her value to them* The
to separate her life and eventual (real) deat
her life its final value, not by denying the fam
but by letting the family accomplish precis
reconciling her to the Family, letting her
been* As he knows, Juliet's freedom canno
Family; if her freedom is merely liberation
in necessary opposition, she can never claim
plan allows those who love Juliet to be abl
mal activity appropriate to it: the funerary
in her very being, and assigns to her body
she does belong to them as this valued bod
she is to claim her life* She must "die" to t
But because this death will be counterfeit
family's most sacred act of love into a cer
not by openly opposing the family's love b
been accomplished, to be a hollow formalit
ruse exposes the gap between their blind
freedom) and their perception of her indivi
to seem to her family precisely as she h
beauty, "as good as dead" - the strategy
family's inability to distinguish between t
Moreover, by surviving her own burial, J
the meaning of her actions, for her and u
quences for the community into which she
her freedom through some action of hers
recognizable fidelity to social norms (marr
world's laws (suicide)* On the contrary, by
ily vault in order to extricate herself from
between fidelity and betrayal, duty and tra
However, the Friar is no magician* Julie
freedom beyond the macabre business of s
already well aware* "Give me, give me!" she
What is required is not simply contact w
that these corpses were once her family, he

46 The Friar in fact instructs Juliet to agree to the

/ To marry Paris" (4.1. 89-90).

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32 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
How if, when I am laid in the tomb,
I wake before the time that Romeo
Come to redeem me? Theres a fearful point!
♦ . ♦ a vault, an ancient receptacle
Where for this many hundred years the bones
Of all my buried ancestors are pack'd,
Where bloody Tybalt yet green in earth
Lies festering in his shroud,
(4330-32, 39-43)

This awareness carries with it another, darker reality* By

her family's care for her dead body - by turning familial
of her, into a charade - she will not be able to see her dea
anything other than mere corpses, shapes of natural degr
will have emptied the family's funeral of its meaning, she
in the bodies of the dead anything worthy of valuation, of
dead will have lost their dignity for her, and will seem no
remains* Therefore, the cost of her freedom is high inde
outlive the claims of her living family members on her lif
community of the living and the dead that binds her to o
dismal scene I needs must act alone' (1* 19)* Henceforth, s
the dead but plunder their corpses for a means of self-de
shall I not * * *

* * * madly play with my forefathers joints,

And pluck the mangled Tybalt from his shroud,
And, in this rage, with some great kinsman's bone
As with a club dash out my desperate brains? * * *
Romeo, Romeo, Romeo, here's drink! I drink to thee!
(11* 49,51-54, 58)

What makes Juliet s stratagem all the more shocking is

own affective investment in its outcome, our own disinves
the community* Let Verona in Adige in melt! A plague on b
lovers claim their lives as their own!

Just as she had feared, Juliet awakens in the tomb, am

covered with a dead man*"Thy husband in thy bosom the
"A greater power than we can contradict / Hath thwa
explains the Friar (11* 153-54)* Nevertheless, Juliet's aims
contradicted* Yes, Romeo is dead, but Juliet's freedom ha
entirely, as she demonstrates when she dismisses the Friar
for I will not away" (1* 160)* In Romeo's death, she sees t

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DEFYING THE STARS 33

actions*47 He was not slain by Paris, nor w

the unstoppable course of nature* He had b
recognizes that he has staked his own life i
his final and defining deed: "What's here? A
/ Poison, I see, hath been his timeless en
mourn his death* Eschewing what she el
(3*2*120), she refuses to see Romeos deat
Instead, she seeks through Romeo precise
freedom to claim her separation from him
left no friendly drop / To help me after?"
His lips are still warm* "Haply some poiso
His body is not bloodied and appears unblem
yet find a beautiful death in a long, slow kis
(1* 166)* The freedom of this happy end
worlds stirring, which compels a quicker
("O happy dagger" [1* 167])* We wish for h
surely dying*

XIV

Death, lie thou there, by a dead man interr'd*

-5*3*87

Neither Romeo nor Juliet acknowledges the other s death by caring for the
other s dead body* Without denying deaths finality, they avoid grief and mourn
ing* Instead, each responds immediately by consciously, even joyfully and hap-
pily, committing suicide* "How oft when men are at the point of death / Have
they been merry!" (5*3*88-89)* How is this to be explained?
By responding to the course of nature in a nonnatural (let us say "human")
fashion, funerary rites enact the minimum conditions for a human community
Beginning with the ancient family or tribe, the community is organized by the
nonnatural practices (like naming or burial) through which it accounts for the
natural facts (like births and deaths) that are its unavoidable conditions* Suc
practices must be "ritualized" and performed by successive generations* Only

47 It is not clear how Romeo interprets the cause of Juliet s death, I assume that he does no
hear Paris s remark at the tomb, which attributes Juliets death to "grief" for Tybalt (5.3.50)*
Given his own search for poison, it is tempting to conclude that Romeo understands her death
to have been a suicide by ingestion. Perhaps he understands the motive for Juliets suicide to hav
been her betrothal to Paris, which he mentions under his breath as he enters the vault: "What
said my man, when my betossed soul / Did not attend him, as we rode? I think / He told m
Paris should have married Juliet." (11. 76-78).

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34 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

in the performance of such duties do individual family m

another» Human customs are revisable* But revisions in o
only through the repetition or transmission that gives the
To belong to a human community is to be bound to c
haps the most irrevocable of which are funerary rites, si
practices by which to affirm the belonging of a dead ind
erational life of the community, there can be no inherita
versely, without an inheritable community - that is, with
by which that community is instituted and maintained -
be possible; again, by "human life" we can mean only live
such by a community, through its ritual practices*
To be mourned is perhaps the fullest, most abiding form
tion* An individual attains her full humanity, her full bel
community only by having her dead body mourned and c
munity*48 By the same token, to be left unburied, unmou
by the community, abandoned absolutely* This means tha
death, the "given" mortality of individual lives, is an exte
which there can be no human belonging* For there to be
community, our final separation from each another must
we suffer, or acknowledge as such - it cannot appear as th
own doing*
In his reflections on these matters, Hegel adds several striking qualifications*
Hegel describes death as a natural course wherein an individuals life, with all
of its unpredictable twists and turns, finally "concentrates * * * into a single com-
pleted shape" and falls into the "calm of simple universality," the repose of death*
Death appears as a process whereby the particular "individual" is folded into the
"universality" of natural processes (worms, decay, and so on)*
Whence, a profound worry: because "Nature" has no "movement of con-
sciousness," the natural processes that absorb the individual appear to reduce
conscious life to a moment of biological necessity - say, to the feeding of
microbes* As Hegel points out, such a reduction is utterly intolerable to con-
scious beings, because it entails admitting either that "Nature herself" under-
takes the conscious action of destroying the individual, or that there are no
conscious actions*49 Obviously, to admit either of these conclusions is to utterly
erode any claim for freedom and self-realization* As Hegel puts it, "the move-
ment of consciousness" must assert itself by "interrupting the work of Nature

48 For an elaboration of this thought, in relation to contemporary contexts, see two recent
books by Judith Butler, Precarious Life (New York: Verso, 2004), and Frames of War (New York:
Verso, 2009),
49 Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, 270, paragraph 452,

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DEFYING THE STARS 35

and rescuing the [dead individual] from d

itself the act of destruction/' We stave o
individual (by embalming or special ga
destruction for ourselves (by burial or cre
But - and here is the point to be underl
be interrupted and taken over by the deed
it is the task of the family - not of free
the dead. An individual can act on behalf
the ritual without the justification pro
As Hegel explains, the reason for this is t
sheer fact of individuals mortality* In th
the living and the dead, nothing can prev
to belong wholly and finally to nature* If
do so through the ritual actions that con
community*
With all of this in mind, we can come
and Juliet did not perform any funerary
time bring more fully into view a strugg
seem not to have acknowledged* Because
herself from her family by means of th
any community* Romeo still "belongs"
him after his death* But he could not car
that she has already been buried in the C
"died" to the community to which the
declarations that his "banishment" is "dea
they could respond to the others death
higher than their own* Neither performs
At the same time, their inability to "in
ing on "the act of destruction" does not m
reduced to the mere course of biological n
as simply abandoned to the relentless w
Romeo and Juliet manage, through the
avoid: "Well, Juliet I will lie with thee ton
Each succeeds in seeing in the other s d
of death - rigor mortis or the foul stenc
and vitality of which each has intimate a
nature and human society are flouted* R
the kiss; his body's integrity is undimini

50 Romeo apparently makes good on his prom

(53.83) but only after slaying him. He buries Par

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36 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
О my love, my wife,
Death that has suck'd the honey of thy breath
Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty.
Thou art not conquer'd, Beauty's ensign yet
Is crimson in thy lips and in thy cheeks,
And Deaths pale flag is not advanced there*
(53.91-96)

Romeo and Juliet are not the passive beneficiaries of good

audience knows, this moment is the result of the lovers
ful ingestion of unnatural substances, the unwavering re
commits suicide in the others embrace* The lovers assert their freedom and
"the movement of consciousness" through deeds that can have no communal
justification, no social explanation* No community could justify or explain their
actions * In their suicides, the lovers show the community's most sacred duties to
be mere empty formalities* They shine a harsh light on the frigid ceremony of
the family tomb, and stain "The stony entrance of this sepulchre" with "blood"
(11* 141, 140)*
And yet we communally venerate the lovers actions - in our drama, in our
poetry, in desire for the myth* In part, this is because we mistakenly offer this
veneration as a memorialization of the lovers belonging to a "different" com-
munity, to one another, a single pair* Like the families, we allow them to remain
interred together, sharing a funerary moment, entwined forever in a tale of woe:
"Romeo and Juliet" But in venerating their struggle as a kind of Liebestod , we
mistake these individuals for a single pair* That is, we treat the "pair" as would
treat any individual member of our community* The two suicides are treated
as if they were one death, for the care of which Capulet and Montague will be
reconciled as brothers*

By treating them as one, we forget that they were not a united "pair" but two
separate individuals* We mistake their separate suicides for a single death and
confuse the active individuation of the lovers with the eternal being of a single
pair*51 To see this mistake is to confront the fact that there is no ritual practice
by which the community can respond to the free, separate actions of individuals*
The community, as we have seen, asserts its "movement of consciousness" only in
response to natural facts, not conscious deeds*52

51 Note that the families and civic authorities speak only of the young lovers' deaths, not their
suicides. As Lady Capulet says/'O me! This sight of death is as a bell / That warns my old age
to a sepulchre" (53.205-6).
52 Hegel makes this point when he notes that the family's duty emerges in response not to
a deed but to a state of "pure being , death', '"a. state which has been reached immediately, in the
course of Nature, not the result of an action consciously done" See Phenomenology of Spirit, 270,
paragraph 452,

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DEFYING THE STARS 37

How, then, might we be more faithful

lovers? How might we reenact the lov
significance/or usi Romeo and Juliet, we
death* Rather, they refuse to regard m
an external power, as the fact that we
dramas perspective, each outlives the ot
one another dead* Thus, the objective re
community is founded loses its objective
human separateness - the cold, grim pow
by the subjective aims of the lovers*

Shall I believe
That unsubstantial Death is amorous
And that the lean abhorred monster k
Thee here in dark to be his paramour?
For fear of that I still will stay with t
And never from this palace of dim ni
Depart again*
(11* 102-8)

Even in dying, their final deeds, they d

viduation* Death - the last God, the n
usurped by the purposeful actions of lov
as their own*

Eyes, look your last*

Arms, take your last embrace! And lip
The doors of breath, seal with a right
A dateless bargain to engrossing Death
(11* 112-15)

For Romeo and Juliet, falling in love has brought the realization that they are
neither bound to, nor separated from, one another by any "third" power -
nature, mortality, family enmity, or civic norms* While these external powers
did individuate them for others - as family members or citizens or individual
bodily creatures - these powers are not, they come to realize, the substance of
their love* They experience freedom and self-realization as lovers, not only by
negating these powers - to the point of taking their lives - but in the acts of
mutual self-recognition that this negation makes possible* These acts, including
their suicides, constitute their love affair, the dawning realization that nothing,

53 Jacques Derridas essay on Romeo and Juliet makes the same observation without, however,
developing it. See 'Aphorism, Countertime" in Philosophers on Shakespeare (n. 21 above), 174-75*

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38 SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY

not even mortality, separates or individuates us absolut

actively claim our separateness if our life is to be our own
Rather than the sad story of two individuals whose des
both formed and thwarted by "A greater power than we
we see the tragic story of two individuals who enact their
their own freedom, the only way that they can - throug
the act of dying*

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