A Conversation with Romeo

Welcome back. But first, If you’re joining us now for the first time, here is what you must know.

Verona is split by a feud between two houses: Montague and Capulet. Romeo Montague meets Juliet Capulet at a feast, and they fall in love with reckless sincerity. They marry in secret—hoping, perhaps, that love might stitch together what hatred tore.

However the city runs on pride and sudden violence. A street fight ends in death. Romeo kills Tybalt and is banished. Juliet faces a forced marriage. A message fails to arrive. The tragedy does what tragedy does.

Today, we step away from the crowd and speak to one young man at the center.

Romeo.

George
Romeo, you are often described as impulsive. Romantic. Dramatic.
Let me ask a sharper question:

When people call you “rash,” what do they fail to see?

ROMEO:
They fail to see… I was trying to be good.
Not perfect. Not wise. But good.

Transcript

Welcome to celebrate creativity - this is conversations with George and this specific episode is an interview with Romeo - an episode called jumping off the page.

For your information, I am the host voice and the guest voice is Romeo. Like mini of Shakespeare's characters, Romeo is so lifelike he almost jumps off the page

I currently am speaking right now to Romeo of the play Romeo and Juliet. Can you tell us when it all began? And I think you know what I mean.

If you ask me when it began, I’ll tell you: at the party.
If you ask me when it ended, I’ll tell you: before it ended—before I understood anything at all.

WILL (gentle):
Then let us understand it now. Not to change the ending—
but to hear the human heart inside the machine.

George
Welcome back. But first, If you’re joining us now for the first time, here is what you must know.

Verona is split by a feud between two houses: Montague and Capulet. Romeo Montague meets Juliet Capulet at a feast, and they fall in love with reckless sincerity. They marry in secret—hoping, perhaps, that love might stitch together what hatred tore.

However the city runs on pride and sudden violence. A street fight ends in death. Romeo kills Tybalt and is banished. Juliet faces a forced marriage. A message fails to arrive. The tragedy does what tragedy does.

Today, we step away from the crowd and speak to one young man at the center.

Romeo.

George
Romeo, you are often described as impulsive. Romantic. Dramatic.
Let me ask a sharper question:

When people call you “rash,” what do they fail to see?

ROMEO:
They fail to see… I was trying to be good.
Not perfect. Not wise. But good.

George
All right. Then let us walk through your goodness—moment by moment—
and see where it helped, and where it harmed.

At the beginning, you are consumed by Rosaline—who does not love you back.
Were you in love with her… or in love with the idea of love?

ROMEO (a little embarrassed):
Both.
And if that sounds foolish, remember: I was young, and poetry was a kind of mirror.
I stared into it until I mistook my own longing for a person.

George
So you were rehearsing sorrow.

ROMEO:
Yes.
And the rehearsing felt like meaning.

George
People mock you for this.

ROMEO:
They should. A little.
But mockery never cured a heart. It only teaches a heart to hide.

George
Tell me this: did you want to be cured?
ROMEO:
I wanted to be seen.
And I thought sadness made me visible.

George
If you were alive now, some would say: “You were addicted to intensity.”

ROMEO (defensive, then honest):
Intensity was the only language I trusted.
Quiet happiness felt like it could be taken away.
So I chose the emotion that hurt—because pain at least proved I was alive.

Moment one — The party: “love at first sight” or “recognition”?

George
Then you go to a Capulet feast. You see Juliet.
The story turns like a hinge.
She is a copWhat exactly happened inside you?

ROMEO:
It was like stepping into a room and realizing you’ve been breathing the wrong air your whole life.

George
So it wasn’t merely desire.

ROMEO:
No.
Desire grabs. This… named me.
I didn’t feel bigger. I felt—accurate.

George
And yet you knew the danger.

ROMEO:
The danger arrived a heartbeat late.
First came wonder.
Then came the knowledge: “She is a Capulet.”
And by then, it was too late to become cautious.

George
At the party, you speak to her in language shaped like prayer.

ROMEO (soft):
Because it felt like entering a sanctuary.
And also because I wanted her to believe I was worthy of the moment.

George
So you performed.

ROMEO:
We both did.
But it wasn’t false.
It was… the best selves we could reach.

George
Many listeners will ask: “How can love be real if it is swift?”

ROMEO:
Because reality is not measured by time.
It’s measured by what you are willing to lose.

George
You return beneath her window.
You hear her speak the truth of names.
And you choose—immediately—commitment.

Why?

ROMEO:
Because the world was loud with hatred.
And she was… a single clear note.
I didn’t want to be the kind of man who hears something pure and walks away to be sensible.

George
That sounds noble.

ROMEO (grim):
Noble can still be reckless.

George
When you swore yourself to her, did you believe love could end the feud?

ROMEO:
I believed love could create a private country inside a public war.

George
And did you believe you could keep that country secret?

ROMEO:
Yes.
That is the laughable part.

George
Say it plainly: why did secrecy seem wise?

ROMEO:
Because adults had made hatred respectable.
So we borrowed their respectability—quiet plans, closed doors, cautious messengers—
and we thought we were being grown.

George
Now we come to that hot afternoon.
Tybalt confronts you. You refuse to fight. Mercutio fights instead.
Mercutio falls. You kill Tybalt.

You have been judged for this moment more than any other.
Tell me: in that minute, who were you trying to be?

ROMEO:
I was trying to be two men at once.

George
Explain.

ROMEO:
I was a husband—newly made, newly responsible.
And I was also a young man in a city where reputation is armor.
When Tybalt provoked me, I wanted peace.
But peace looked like weakness.
And weakness in Verona invites the knife.

George
So you refused, and you thought you were being honorable.

ROMEO:
I thought I was being merciful.

George
And Mercutio read it differently.

ROMEO:
He read it as abandonment.
And Mercutio—God love him—would rather die than be bored.
He treated danger like sport… until it became real.

George
When he was wounded—what did you feel?

ROMEO (voice breaks, then steadies):
That the world had tricked us.
That all our cleverness—our jokes, our swagger—was paper against fire.

George
Then you killed Tybalt.

ROMEO:
Yes.
And it wasn’t justice.
It was grief with a sword.

George
Do you regret it?

ROMEO:
Every breath.
And—if I’m honest—there’s worse:
I regret that for a second, it felt right.
Not morally right.
Emotionally right.

George
In other words: the feud trained you.

ROMEO:
Yes.
It trained my hands faster than it trained my mind.

George
If you could speak to young men listening—what would you warn them?

ROMEO:
That pride is a hunger you can never feed.
And if you try, you will eat everyone you love.

George
After Tybalt’s death, the Prince banishes you.
Some would say: you got mercy.

ROMEO:
Mercy can be torture if it removes your reason for living.

George
You think of exile as death.

ROMEO:
Because Juliet was not an ornament in my life.
She was the life.

George
You spend the night with her, and then you must flee.
When dawn arrives, what is your memory of that morning?

ROMEO:
The sound of birds that didn’t care.
The way the world continued as if nothing had happened.
And the cruelty of sunlight—showing everything clearly when clarity was useless.

George
What did you fear most as you left?

ROMEO:
Not that I would die.
That I would live—
and become a story she told herself to survive.

George
Now the most brutal irony: you are undone by information.
A letter does not reach you.
Instead you receive news that Juliet is dead.

What happens in your mind when you hear it?

ROMEO:
The future vanished.
Not slowly—instantly.
Like a candle pinched out.

George
You return to Verona with poison.

ROMEO:
Yes.


George
Some listeners will call that selfish.

ROMEO:
Let them.
They are not wrong to accuse me.
But they should accuse the whole city, too.
Because I did what Verona teaches: when pain comes, answer it with finality.

George
Did you ever doubt the report?

ROMEO:
No.
Because despair is impatient.
It says: “Don’t investigate—act.”

George
If you had waited one hour…

ROMEO:
Don’t.
Don’t open that door in my mind.
It is full of ghosts that never stop speaking.

George
And yet—in the tomb—you speak of love even as you die.

ROMEO:
Because love was the only thing I did that felt like truth.
Everything else was noise.

George
Listeners, you see what this play does.
It doesn’t ask you merely to mourn two young lovers.
It asks you to watch a culture manufacture tragedy—then blame the victims for reacting like products of that culture.
Romeo is not an angel.
He is not a monster.
He is a boy shaped by a city’s habits—
and then briefly reshaped by love—
and then crushed between the two.

If you want a single sentence to carry forward, it is this:
Love made Romeo brave.
The feud made Romeo dangerous.
And time gave him no room to become wise.

George
Scholar’s Corner—where we take one modern claim and test it against lived experience.

Here’s the claim:
“Romeo is just impulsive. The real problem is his personality.”

Romeo—your reply?

ROMEO:
My personality was the match.
The feud was the room full of smoke.

George
Exactly.
A match alone does little on stone.
But in a dry house? In a windy house?
Then everyone stares at the match and pretends the house was not built of tinder.

George
A quick note for those who love performances:
watch how actors handle Romeo’s shift after Mercutio’s fall.
Before, he’s lyrical—sometimes almost playful.
After, he’s smaller, tighter, haunted.
If a production doesn’t change Romeo’s physical energy there, it misses the hinge.

George
Next time, we speak with Juliet.

And I will ask her what I asked Romeo:
“When did the story become unstoppable?”

But I will also ask something Romeo could not answer:

“When the world demanded you be obedient—how did you become brave instead?”

Until then—be gentle with young hearts.
They are powerful engines in fragile bodies.

Fare you well.

Sources Include:  the complete works of William Shakespeare, Asimov’s Guide to Shakespeare: A Guide to Understanding and Enjoying the Works of Shakespeare by Isaac Asimov, Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human by Harold Bloom, Shakesfear and How to Cure It, an unpublished manuscript by Ralph Cohen, and ChatGPT four.


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