Harina and I worked on this together, so we both have the same translation. We figured out what it meant together, and made sure we both were involved fully with the translation.
Two households, both alike in dignity,
Two families both with the same honour, respect and wealth,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
In the city Verona,
they live their lives; everything takes place here,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
A fight that has been going on for a long time, and is still
happening in the present,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
Where their fight
has made them lose respect, because people look up to them, and they do not get
along.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
Two families, who are enemies, have children who unluckily
become lovers
A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;
Two people, who are
deeply in love, take their life for each other;
Whose misadventured piteous overthrows
The deaths of their children end their rivalry that existed for
many years
Do with their death bury their parents' strife.
Because of the
children’s death, the parents started to get along.
The fearful passage of their death-mark'd love,
The tragic unlucky love story of these two children,
And the continuance of their parents' rage,
And the parent’s
constant rivalry,
Which, but their children's end, nought could remove,
That killed their children
Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage;
Is now the
theme/subject of our play
The which if you with patient ears attend,
If you listen to the play carefully;
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.
You will understand what truly happened.
