verona

 

Welcome to the confession corner.

I'm not a huge fan of Romeo and Juliet. I'll sob as hard in the end as the next hopeless sook, but then I still cry in The Lion King, and occasionally when I hear about shootings on the radio. And if I think about it later I'll feel a bit gipped. I'll feel a bit ripped off, because if I really look at it, I don't buy the love. It's too fast and too heavy. I ranted about this long and bitterly after our day in Verona. Ella deserves recognition for her valiant attempts to defend the poor kid against my nastiness. To no avail.

Sorry Romeo, I don't buy you. 

Not like I buy Hamlet, you know. Now there's a soul in turmoil. In fact, I think my disdain for the star-crossed lovers stems mostly from an incredulity that this is the most popular of Shakespeare's works. Don't let me make this some kind of one-sided literary debate (hold me back by the ruffled collar).

Anyway, I may not be a true believer, but I couldn't go to Italy without visiting Verona and getting all sappy on Juliet's balcony and liking it. I posed for photos and all that because no matter how sceptical and disdainful I try to be, flippin' heck wouldn't it be just so swell if some handsome idiot was all 'I can't go on without you? I'm only woman. 

And here is some of the most concentrated and heartfelt and famous graffiti in the world. Over and over, aching hearts have penned their forevers on these walls. They’ve scratched them into the forevers of others, and others have re-etched so that the paint at eyelevel is covered. I walk through the tunnel and wonder about the pinings on these walls and the strength of the gruesome love that the graffitiers covet. Seems a strange thing to aspire to, but that might just be me.

The crowds at Juliet's house are those press-and-struggle crowds only trying to reach photographable matter. The golden statue of Juliet stands in front of a wall papered with notes and chewing gum, her left breast shining with the polish of millions of hands. She seems indifferent, I'll be honest, and I'm not convinced this compulsive groping is actually going to do much for the luck of the unlucky masses.

Stepping inside the house and the museum is a cool respite. It seems most people want their photos and their wall-scrawl and that'll do. That's perfectly fine with me because it leaves the big house with an echoing feeling that I like. This place is such a strange thing. I keep catching myself thinking oh, there's Juliet's crumbling plaster, cool, then remembering that she's completely fictional and feeling like a dick. The story becomes something more like legend here. Legend feels more real, something regular that happened and then was twisted by time into a kind of incredible but true history. And here's something totally made-up that managed to do the same thing.

You know, that's pretty impressive. I respect that. I might not be convinced by poor Romeo, but I respect the kind of love story that's so passionate we can't help but want it to be true.