Comparison and contrast techniques in academic analysis

Romeo and Juliet and English Patient

Shakespeare's romantic tragedy Romeo and Juliet provides an archetypical structure for the development of similar tales. One example of a story built on themes evocative of Shakespeare's play is Michael Ondaatje's 1992 novel The English Patient. Although the plot and characters differ considerably as do the time periods in which the stories are set, Romeo and Juliet and The English Patient share themes, imagery, and motifs in common. Both stories take place amidst violence and war; both are also set in Italy. Both focus on tales of passionate, forbidden, and unrequited that is love made all the more powerful against the violent backdrop. War is integral to the plot and character development in both stories: war creates the symbolic and actual tension between the various pairs of lovers in the two tales. War is what brings the lovers and friends together and what tears them apart. War also offers rich, death-laden imagery that serves as both setting and as foreshadowing. Because war necessarily entails death, the readers of both Romeo and Juliet and of The English Patient are aware that none of the affairs will have a happy ending. The relationships between Romeo and Juliet, Almasy and Katherine, and Kip and Hana develop due to the circumstances and politics of war, the violence of which underscores the tumultuous and tragic nature of their respective romances.

Both Romeo and Juliet and The English Patient open with suggestions and imagery of war. For example, the opening scene of Romeo and Juliet includes a battle between servants of the Capulet and Montague families, while the opening chapter of The English Patient includes allusions and direct references to World War II. Thus Shakespeare and Ondaatje imply that war is integral to the plots of both stories. Imagery of war pervades both Romeo and Juliet and The English Patient. In the play, the family feuding culminates in hand-to-hand combat, especially in Act II, scene 1 in which Tybalt kills Mercutio and Romeo kills Tybalt. In Ondaatje's novel, warlike imagery is more modern and impersonal, such as bombs, mines, and military aircraft. Thus the main difference between the implications of war in Romeo and Juliet and The English Patient is that in the former, the feuding is personal, whereas in latter it is impersonal. Moreover, disregarding the flashbacks, war in The English Patient has ended whereas in Romeo and Juliet the feuding is ongoing and only ceases at the end of the play after the deaths of the two title characters. In spite of these differences in imagery, war significantly impacts the development and nature of the characters in both stories. War is in fact necessary for the development of the relationships between Romeo and Juliet, Almasy and Katherine, and Kip and Hana.

One of the reasons why war is necessary for the development of romance in the two tales is that it necessitates the infiltration of enemy forces and thus creates the allure and fascination of forbidden love. Official or sanctioned love holds no interest for any of the main characters: Rosaline does not return Romeo's affections, nor does Juliet return Paris's. Similarly, Katherine in The English Patient steps out on her husband in favor of the mysterious Almasy. Thus war creates the tension that sparks forbidden love; both war and love involve intense emotions and physical passions. Romeo falls in love with an enemy of his family; Katherine falls in love with not only another man but an enemy of the state; Kip falls in love with a woman who represents Western culture. War creates a state of opposites: in war the object is to annihilate the Other, while with love the object is to embrace and consume the Other. Juliet is Romeo's Other and vice versa; Almasy is Katherine's Other and vice versa; Hana is Kip's Other and vice versa. Without the sensation of difference and the mystique of the Other, romantic passion would not flourish; nor would war.

War also necessitates the infiltration of the enemy, creating dynamic plot developments that lead to death and the demise of the main characters in both stories. When Romeo entered the Capulet ball he crossed into enemy lines. His presence in the Capulet house infuriated Tybalt, who later challenges him to a duel, kills Romeo's kinsman, and hopes to kill Romeo himself. The feuding family drives the plot forward and leads directly to the tragic ending that characterizes Shakespeare's play. Similarly, the English Patient, like Romeo, infiltrates enemy territory as he serves as a German spy during the war. His discovery by British intelligence forces has a similar effect as that of Romeo's discovery by Tybalt: Almasy's actions indirectly cause the death of Katherine, just as Romeo and Juliet's actions indirectly cause each others' deaths. Furthermore, the situation also leads to the exile, banishment, and identity crisis of both Romeo and the English Patient. After killing Tybalt, Romeo is forced to flee Verona under edict of the prince. Likewise, Almasy is ostracized, forced to flee Cairo. Romeo must consider leaving behind his family name in order to be with his lover Juliet; Almasy must likewise conceal his identity in light of the circumstances of the war.

War also leads to conflicted loyalties in both Romeo and Juliet and The English Patient. After Romeo kills Tybalt, Juliet feels torn between her kin and her lover in Act III, scene 2, between "My dear-lov'd cousin, and my dearer lord?" (line 68). A similar conflict of loyalties occurs in the English patient regarding Kip's feelings for Hana. Kip eventually chooses to leave not because he fell out of love but because his ties to national identity trumped his feelings. Although the dropping of the atomic bomb had nothing to do with Italy or especially Hana, Kip viewed the act as symbolic of continued Western oppression of Eastern, nor non-white cultures. Because Hana represented Western, white culture and identity, Kip was forced to confront and assert his deeper loyalties to his native land. Kip's reaction and his decision to leave the villa for India is therefore the opposite of Juliet's reaction: Juliet decides that Romeo is indeed "dearer" than her "dear-lov'd cousin," and is in fact willing to leave behind her family and her personal identity in favor of a new life with Romeo. Kip, on the other hand, could not surrender such an essential part of his identity. In both cases, war instigates the essential conflict of loyalties.