Romeo & Juliet - Act 1 Prologue
The prologue establishes the Capulet/Montague feud as ‘ancient’, and emphasizes the feud as defining much of the action. The tragedy is already given a positive spin, in that it will end the strife.
CHORUS
Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life;
Whose misadventured piteous overthrows
Doth with their death bury their parents' strife.
The fearful passage of their death-marked love,
And the continuance of their parents' rage –
Which, but their children's end, nought could remove –
Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage;
The which if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.