REVISE – The balcony scene

Read the paraphrased text and complete the conditional sentences with the correct verb.

1 If you ________ your name, swear you love me.
2 You are still you, even if you ________ a Montague.
3 A rose would smell just as sweet if we ________  it something else.
4 Romeo would still be perfect if he ________ called Romeo.

Match the conditions Juliet poses to the correct conditional.
1 If you don't deny your name, swear you love me. ________
2 You are still you, even if you are not a Montague. ________
3 A rose would smell just as sweet if we called it something else. ________
4 Romeo would still be perfect if he weren't called Romeo. ________

Choose the correct alternative to paraphrase T16 from your textbook.

JULIET Oh, Romeo, Romeo! ________ are you Romeo? Deny your family and ________ your name. Or, if you will not, just ________ you love me, and I will stop being a Capulet.
ROMEO [Aside] Should I listen more, or should I ________ now?
JULIET It is only your name that is my enemy. You are ________ you, even if you are not a Montague. Oh, be someone else! What is in a name? It is not a physical part of you. What is in a name? A rose would smell ________ if we called it something else. So, Romeo would still be perfect if he ________ called Romeo. Romeo, give up your name, and in exchange, take ________.
ROMEO I accept your offer. Call me ________, and I will be reborn. From now on, I will not be Romeo.
JULIET Who are you, hiding in the night, ________ my private thoughts?
ROMEO I do not ________ how to tell you who I am. I ________ my name since it makes me your enemy. If I had written it down, I would tear it up.

Match the sentence halves which express Juliet's thoughts. Write the correct letters (A-F) in the gaps.

1 Juliet uses the example of the sweet smelling rose ________
2 She suggests that Romeo would retain his perfection ________
3 Driven by her passion, she believes that love ________
4 She suggests that if Romeo were to renounce his family name or change it ________
5 In place of Romeo's name ________
6 She implies that beyond their names, as beyond the name of the rose, ________

A Juliet offers her 'self'.
B to make the audience understand that language is arbitrary.
C they could be together without the constraints of their family rivalry.
D even if he were not a Montague.
E the lovers could exist as unnamed selves.
F can transcend social identities.

Choose the correct alternative to complete the text. Then look at the prompts in brackets and write some extra reflections in your exercise book. You can use the final text as revision material for your test.

In this scene of Romeo and Juliet, Juliet contemplates the idea of love ________ social identities. (Refer to the comparison to the rose to clarify this idea.) She suggests that if Romeo ________ his family name, or if she did it, they could be together. (Quote the lines in which she offers to deny her name and those in which she asks Romeo to do so.) This is ________ request on her part as names, especially in Elizabethan times, were ________ family and social status. (Refer to the Elizabethan context and the importance of family, property and inheritance.) Names are ________ one's identity, and to give up one's name is to deny a fundamental part of oneself. In conclusion, the scene explores the ________ between individual desires and societal expectations. While the lovers wish for a world ________ names and labels, the play ultimately reveals the limitations of such a dream.