Romeo and Juliet
Attitude analysis
Journalistic writing
Objectives: Here is what you will be able to do by writing this paper:
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Craft a news story lead (introductory paragraph)
Structure a paper in journalistic writing style and recognize how this
style is similar to and differs from typical essay writing.
Similarities: both types of writing address literary elements we have studied all
semester: characters, conflict, setting.
 Quotes in a journalism story equate to evidence from text in a literary analysis.
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Integrate primary sources into your paper (your survey results and
excerpts from Romeo and Juliet).
Utilize the objective (third person) writing voice you have used in
your literary analysis.
Learn how to separate essential information from non-essential, and
how to prioritize it in your writing.
Journalistic writing
A long-standing model in journalistic writing is
called the inverted pyramid.
 Draw one of these on your sheet.
 This model is a prioritizing device. It dictates
that the most crucial information comes early in
the story (or at the top of the pyramid).
 In a straight news story, this most often means
the most important information is in the first
paragraph.
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Journalistic writing
The most important information contains
the important “news elements”: basically,
the who, what, where, when, why, and
how.
 However, that can be a lot to include in
one paragraph, especially because
journalistic writing requires short, quickhitting paragraphs, often made up of only
one or two sentences.
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Journalistic writing
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So your first step is to meet this objective: determining
which of the 5 W’s and H is most important.
Generally, this is the who, when, and what.
The “when” is referred to as “timeliness”: it is what
makes information “news.”
So “when” could refer to the most recent development in
an ongoing incident.
“Who” would only be the most important element if it
involved a well-known person that most of the readers
would have heard of.
Journalistic writing
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For example, if a story involved the arrest of Justin Bieber, he
would be newsworthy enough to name in the lead paragraph.
“Teen heartthrob Justin Bieber was arrested Thursday on
shoplifting charges after 48 bottles of hair gel spilled out of
his backpack at a local hair salon.”
If the same alleged arrest was made involving one of your
peers, you would not name the person in the first paragraph.
“A local high school student was arrested Thursday on
shoplifting charges after 48 bottles of hair gel spilled out of
his backpack at a local hair salon.”
You would then name that person in the second paragraph.
Journalistic writing
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Now, as you move down the pyramid, you want to
integrate the other components in descending order of
importance. These include:
The rest of the 5 W’s and H.
Quotes from your sources, properly attributed. This
means that – just as we did in the literary analysis
papers – that you name the key people in the story by
first and last name the first time you refer to them
(“Justin Bieber”). After that, you simply use the last
name (“Bieber”).
Journalistic writing
OTHER CONSIDERATIONS:
 Remember that you are a reporter: that means you simply report the news,
rather than add your opinion or commentary to it. Keep your view out of
the story and utilize third person writing voice.
 You want to remain objective, so avoid subjective or judgmental words.
 For example, you would not say that “Bieber looked guilty as he
addressed the media following his arrest.” That implies that you have
decided his guilt. Instead, simply state that “Bieber addressed the
media following his arrest.”
 Avoid verbs like “admitted” (which implies guilt), unless the source says
that directly: “I admit that I use hair gel, but…” Instead, simply use
“said.”
 “Bieber said he has used hair gel in the past.”
 In this assignment, use past-tense verbs: Justin Bieber was arrested…
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Romeo and Juliet: Survey analysis
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OK, so now we apply our new-found journalism
principles to our final paper: a survey analysis.
The most critical news element will be the “what” – your
survey results.
The first step in this analysis is to review your survey
results to determine what is potentially the most
interesting or important information. This could be a
response that generated near-unanimous agreement or
disagreement, or one that illustrated a wide debate.
Review your survey summaries.
Romeo and Juliet
To get the paper started, choose one
response to focus on: here, let’s choose
the “love at first sight” question.
Let’s say your results showed that most
respondents disagreed with the notion of
love at first sight.
Romeo and Juliet
That one result will get the paper going
(you will discuss two or three other results
later in the paper).
Now, we need to craft an introduction or
opening. Let’s look at three types of leads:
summary, descriptive, and anecdotal.
Romeo and Juliet
A “summary” opening gets right to the heart of
the story, right away, with the most interesting
or important information. This is what we did
with “Hazard.”
Example:
Love at first sight is not only impossible but
also highly undesirable, especially for teenagers,
according to a survey exploring a key theme of
William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
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A descriptive opening re-creates a scene
and may build to a punch line:
Example:
Boy meets girl. Boy falls in love with
girl. Boy marries girl – all within the space
of a few hours.
Romeo and Juliet
The anecdotal opening includes a little story (a “vignette”) to help
illustrate the bigger topic.
Example:
When Lauren Smith was five years old, she pledged to never
love a boy more than the blonde-haired, blue-eyed prince who sat
next to her in kindergarten.
“I thought he was so choice,” said Smith, now a freshman at
City High School. “I knew the minute I saw him that he would be
mine. Oh yes, he would be mine.”
Ten years later, Smith has jettisoned both her “prince,” whom
she actually dismissed a week after she met him, and the belief that
love at first sight is possible.
Romeo and Juliet
Now the key is to build on whatever
opening you choose by providing more
information about your opening and your
findings (the survey).
Let’s re-visit the summary opening:
Romeo and Juliet
Love at first sight is not only impossible but highly undesirable,
especially for teenagers, according to a survey exploring a key
theme of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
Ninety percent of those surveyed indicated that love at first
sight just doesn’t happen, especially not between two young
teenagers who surely don’t even know what love is.
The survey was administered to a range of age groups made
up of both genders, and included questions about love, romance,
and marriage. The contemporary responses were then compared to
the prevailing attitudes of the key characters in Shakespeare’s tale
of the two young, “star-crossed” lovers.
Romeo and Juliet
Let’s do the same thing with the descriptive
introduction:
Boy meets girl. Boy falls in love with girl. Boy
marries girl – all within the space of a few hours.
What seemed perfectly normal for Romeo
and Juliet, the star-crossed protagonists of
William Shakespeare’s tragedy of the same
name, would be seen as highly improbable, if
not utterly weird, today, according to the results
of a recent survey on love, romance, and
marriage.
Romeo and Juliet
Now let’s try with the anecdotal opening:
When Lauren Smith was five years old, she pledged
to never love a boy more than the blonde-haired, blueeyed prince who sat next to her in kindergarten.
“I thought he was so choice,” said Smith, now a
freshman at City High School. “I knew the minute I saw
him that he would be mine. Oh yes, he would be mine.”
Ten years later, Smith has jettisoned both her
“prince,” whom she actually dumped a week after she
met him, and the belief that love at first sight is possible.
Romeo and Juliet
“He was the classic case of ‘nice house –
nobody home,’” Smith said. “I learned that ‘love
at first sight’ is a fool’s paradise.”
Smith’s dismissal of the notion of love at first
sight is mirrored in a recent survey on love,
romance, and marriage, administered to a range
of age groups of both genders as part of a study
of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
An overwhelming majority of respondents
indicated love at first sight is impossible,
especially between two young teenagers who
surely don’t even know what love is.
Romeo and Juliet
A key thing to remember: No matter what
type of opening you choose, don’t wait too
long to establish that your paper is about
the survey. Again, this is your “controlling
purpose” – or the thesis – that tells the
reader what the paper is going to discuss
or reveal. Don’t make the reader wait too
long to find out.
Romeo and Juliet
Now that we’ve established the “controlling purpose” of
our paper – the survey results – we can start filling it in
with more information. Let’s return to the last points of
our most recent example:
Smith’s dismissal of the notion of love at first sight is mirrored
in a recent survey on love, romance, and marriage, administered to
a range of age groups of both genders as part of a study of William
Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
An overwhelming majority of respondents indicated love at first
sight is impossible, especially between two young teenagers who
surely don’t even know what love is.
Romeo and Juliet
Now we can add more information, including a second result from
the survey and a comparison to the play itself:
Ninety percent of respondents also indicated you can be too
young to fall in love.
That response represents a 180-degree difference from those
expressed in fair Verona more than 500 years ago in the world of
Romeo and Juliet. Juliet’s mother, Lady Capulet, doesn’t even flinch
at the idea of her 13-year-old daughter getting married. In fact, she
encourages it, as noted in this passage from the play:
“Younger than you, here in Verona, ladies of esteem, are made
already mothers,” Lady Capulet tells Juliet (1.3.75-78).
Romeo and Juliet
Now, we can add another survey result and a
comment from one of your respondents.
Most contemporary teenagers surveyed said,
“No way.”
“I think that’s disgusting, and I don’t agree
with it,” said Katie Johnston, a CHS junior. “And
it’s disturbing – so disturbing that (any girl) who
is thinking about getting married at 13 should go
see a counselor.”
Romeo and Juliet
Now, we can add another comment from
the survey, this time from another age
group.
Johnston’s mother, Anne Johnston,
echoed those sentiments.
“Back in old times it was a common
thing,” she said. “Nowadays, I think it’s
ludicrous. I think even age 18 is too
young.”
Romeo and Juliet
You can even add a dissenting opinion from your results:
The lone respondent in favor of love and marriage at
such an early age, 14-year-old Gabi Jones, indicated that
she would have no problem with marrying 25-year-old
actor Zac Efron, who coincidentally bears a striking
resemblance to actor Leonard Whiting, who portrays
Romeo in the 1968 film version of the play.
“I’d prefer Johnny Depp,” said Jones. “But you have
to draw the age line somewhere. It’s just so hard to
choose. They’re both so dreamy.”