The+Art+of+Wooing

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="O, Wilt thou leave me so unsatisfied?": The Art of Wooing in "Romeo and Juliet"= The following is excerpted from the [|website] of an 8th grade teacher. Click [|here] for the complete website content.

Each year when I start my "[|Romeo and Juliet]" unit with my 8th graders, I prepare myself for the shock and disbelief my students exhibit when they discover "[|Romeo and Juliet]" are teenagers.

"She's thirteen! That's wrong!" exclaims one incredulous boy.

"How could she get married when she's thirteen? That's unbelievable," replies a girl as she twirls her belly button ring.

"Well, I guess it's hard to believe that anyone who is thirteen could fall in love..." I say. And sure enough, each year, there are a few students who challenge me on this.

"That's not true. I've been in love," a heartsick girl says.

This begins a month-long discussion on whether young teenagers can know what love means and whether the love they feel is real, or just a form of lust. There are always a variety of interpretations of the relationship between [|Romeo and Juliet], and within my own classes I enjoy watching the dynamics between the girls and boys as they try to figure out what is real and what is fantasy. It's an exciting moment when they connect their own new experiences with relationships to the play and start to question their own decisions and motivations.

I find that my students have trouble believing that so long ago, in [|Elizabethan England], kids experienced the same feelings of frustration and elation with love that they do today.

"That was soooo long ago" they exclaim.

I start off with today's world - I ask them how people fall in love, what does love mean, and how can you tell the difference between love and lust? We discuss ways people express love to each other and how we woo each other. Then I ask them to brainstorm ways that Elizabethan people might have wooed each other.

"How should I know?" one kid always asks.

Which leads me perfectly into introducing "The Mysteries of Love and Eloquence; or the Arts of Wooing and Complementing." This is a book that suggested ways for young Elizabethans to woo each other. Published in [|London] in 1658, this text offers some fascinating Elizabethan pick-up lines.