On a recent visit to my old high school, I took a look at my old textbook. It is the one I so fondly remember reading Romeo and Juliet from. This is the textbook currently used in the Unit 5 high schools here in Bloomington-Normal. It is the Adventures in Reading textbook published by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc.
When I first read Romeo and Juliet, all those years ago, I thought I was reading the "real" version. Nowhere did it say that this was an abridged version of the classic, and little did I question what was written in my textbook. I look upon it now, and realize exactly how bowdlerized it is. Then I realize how much of it they spoon-fed me and how I believed it all. The textbook from which the ninth graders of this town read has many bowdlerized passages.
To begin with, all of the same passages in Act I that Janet Zweig displays as being left out of the Understanding Literature textbook, were also left out of the Adventures in Reading textbook, plus some. As one expects, most of the conversation between Sampson and Gregory in the beginning of the play was omitted. Talk of pushing women to the wall, taking their maidenheads with their pretty pieces of flesh and so forth were all taken out, probably because Mr. Bowdler found them to be too vulgar for audiences. However, I did find that the lines "Draw thy tool" and "My naked weapon is out" were still in the play. I questioned one of the Normal Community High School English teachers about it, and she said that those lines do generate some giggles. So why did Mr. Bowdler decide that it was okay to leave those sexual innuendoes in the play? Maybe he decided that he was desecrating the play enough . . . or maybe he just missed them. I think that Bowdler’s choice of eliminating these passages was a poor one. These lines help develop these characters. They show Shakespeare’s extreme ease at making two minimal individuals in the play come to life and have their own personalities and characteristics. Sampson and Gregory catch our attention with their bold and perhaps vulgar talk, but they do what they were meant to do. . . grab our attention.
Later in Act I, scene III, the nurse, Lady Capulet, and Juliet discuss the daughter’s growing up and maturing. One of the first few lines that the textbook leaves out of this scene is the nurse’s line "God forbid." This is one of the easier lines to explain why Mr. Bowdler chooses to extract it from the play. Obviously any lines mentioning God in them might offend someone, somewhere, at sometime. Granted, the nurse nearly takes the Lord’s name in vain, but that is what makes the nurse seem all the more real. Later, the textbook deletes the part of the nurse discussing the conversation between Juliet and her husband when Juliet was but a child. The conversation dealt with the nurse’s husband telling Juliet that when she is older she will be falling "backward when thou hast more wit." This is clearly saying that when Juliet is older, she will learn to fall back to the man and submit herself to him. All of this is relevant to the furthering of the nurse’s character. We get to see the crassness and abrasive personality that makes her seem real to us. When Mr. Bowdler takes out this bit of dialogue, he eliminates the distinguishing characteristics of the nurse and the differences between her (of the lower class) and Lady Capulet and Juliet of the upper class.
Throughout the play, there are many passages excised. Many quality passages that only enhance the play, not degrade it. I have noticed, that most of the passages cut are from the beginning of the play. This is the most critical part of the play. It gives the basic setup of the story and the general background and insight into the characters. Mr. Bowdler cuts out any references to sex, or anything that might use the word "prick" or such, even if it has a completely different meaning. He also cuts out any references to God and anything that may be degrading towards women or saying that they are inferior. Unfortunately, Mr. Bowdler does not seem to recognized, as the rest of us do, that this is what things were like when Shakespeare wrote the play. By censoring us, he is trying to portray a book, a history, as it was not.
Bowdlerization is a form of censorship. Mr. Bowdler found parts of Romeo and Juliet to be unsuitable; therefore, he omitted them, thinking them not to be of importance. Many people do this nowadays for ‘the betterment of our society.’ It soon becomes that "the views of such individuals are not just expressed as their own, and then forgotten. These individuals put pressure either upon public officials to take action against what they feel is objectionable, or they make efforts themselves to intimidate the sellers" (Hoyt 104). Censorship usually starts because one person finds something offensive in some part of a novel. This becomes a conflict for the person, sometimes a conflict of the most intense nature because it deals with and/or questions their beliefs. One soon realizes that "[t]his conflict is a war of words, but one that has the potential for reordering how expression is created and disseminated." (Harer 5). It becomes a matter of being "politically correct," which in the end, becomes more of a nuisance than a blessing.
How much of a nuisance has this become in Romeo and Juliet? I believe that by bowdlerizing the play, we have eliminated some of the more wonderful examples of enhancing a character. Taking out the passages makes the characters more flat and less lifelike. Their real attributes and qualities disappear and leave only a shell of what Shakespeare intended for them to be. We have our freshman in high school read this play. For many of them, this is the first literary exposure they have had to Shakespeare. Unfortunately, they will not get to experience all of Shakespeare to its greatest degree. People wonder if this bowdlerization affects the quality of Shakespeare’s work and if we do not get the same out of Romeo and Juliet as we would with the unabridged version.
I think that by bowdlerizing this play, we greatly reduce the enjoyment that one receives out of reading such a classic. However, I do believe that what Mr. Bowdler has omitted does not really change the play itself. The meaning is still included; it is just that the characters lose some of their depth. Romeo and Juliet is still the classic Shakespearean tragic love story, regardless of whether or not it is the subject of bowdlerization. Summary Comments
Works Cited
"Romeo and Juliet." Adventures in Reading. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc., Chicago; 1985.
Harer, John and Steven Harris. Censorship of Expression In the 1980’s. Greenwood Press, Connecticut; 1994. Hoyt, Edwin and Olga. Censorship in America. Seabury Press, New York; 1970.
Mowat, Barbara and Paul Werstine, ed. William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Washington Square Press Pocket Books, New York; 1992.