Romeo and Juliet

“New love can look for all the world like mental illness, a blend of mania, dementia, and obsession that cut people off from friends and family and prompts out of character behavior.” The opening line of “Watching New Love as it Sears the Brain”, much like the opening lines of “Romeo and Juliet”, tell the reader what is happening before it really happens. The article talks about how people that have just fallen in love can appear crazy to the rest of the world, even though they might feel even more sane than ever before. Romeo and Juliet have this same experience. Characters like the Friar worry about Romeo and Juliet because they are smart and sensible and know Romeo and Juliet are rushing into a big mistake. In “Romeo and Juliet” Shakespeare's characters portray very similar characteristics of the people talked about in the New York Times article “Watching New Love as it Sears the Brain”.

The first characteristic displayed was when you are dumped or rejected it can actually heighten romantic love. The first time this was really displayed in “Romeo and Juliet” is when Romeo is in Love with Rosaline and can not get his mind off of her. As “Watching New Love as it Sears the Brain” explains “being dumped actually does heighten romantic love”. This has three effects on the plot of Romeo and Juliet. The First is that it causes Romeo to be sad and even more in love with Rosaline. The second is that because of Rosaline Romeo and Juliet meet. If Benvolio had not convinced Romeo to crash the Capulet’s party with him Romeo would have never met Juliet. The third is that even though his Romanticism was heightened because of Rosaline, it does not matter, as soon as Romeo and Juliet meet Romeo is instantly in love with her thus starting their spiralling relationship that of course ends up in death.

The second characteristic displayed is the irrational decision making. After the Capulet dance is over, Romeo goes to Juliet’s bedroom just to watch her. He hears her calling out his name and so he steps forward and essentially says “here I am”. This starts a chain of irrational, ridiculous events that could only possibly be caused by love. But blaming their failures purely on Romeo would not be fair at all. We as readers of both the article and the play can now give Romeo the benefit of being rejected and falling head over heals for Juliet because of it. However Juliet has no excuse for falling in love so fast and acting like such a fool. She was not rejected recently, or in love, no, she is just an idiot thirteen year old girl that does not understand her emotions. She practically begs for this to happen as she stands out on her balcony calling out Romeo’s name. Any sane person could have guessed that Romeo would be there watching her since he is such a creep. But of course neither of them are really sane at this point because they are in the “throes of new love” as the article says, which causes them to not think straight or be sensible.

The last of the three main characteristics that Romeo and Juliet show that can be found in “Watching New Love as it Sears the Brain” Is that the “drive for romantic love can be stronger than the will to live.” This one gets shown in “Romeo and Juliet” in a big way. Of course they have to kill themselves, what else would be such a perfect ending to such a tragic love story. Romeo comes to Verona only to find out his worst fears were a reality, Juliet is dead. So what does he do? The only sane thing to do. He of course kills himself because he can not live without the love of his life. But wait it gets worse. As all the readers of “Romeo and Juliet” know, Juliet was not really dead, she just took a sleeping potion so that she could be with her Romeo, but clearly he had not gotten the message. As she awakes she finds only the most tragic thing possible. Romeo is dead on the floor next to her. So again the only sane thing she could do would be to kill herself, because she could not go on without the love of her life either. Clearly this proves that Shakespeare was way ahead of his time because he covered the three most important points of this article and it was made about 411 years after he wrote Romeo and Juliet.

The Characteristics portrayed by Romeo and Juliet in the timeless classic about their three days of knowing each other, prove that not only was Shakespeare ahead of his time but, he also really nailed it when it came to how new love affects the way your brain works. The author of “Watching New Love as it Sears the Brain”, Benedict Carey, really explains to his readers how research can really prove everything that Shakespeare thought. Being dumped can heighten romantic love, new love will always cause irrational decision making, and of course that the love for someone in your life can be stronger than the will to live. In conclusion “Romeo and Juliet” is a tale of ridiculous love that covers all of the same bases that “Watching New Love as it Sears the Brain does”