Dear Juliet: Wherefore all the hoopla in Verona?

To visit or not to visit? That question tormented me before and after arriving in Verona. Juliet’s House is an admitted tourist trap, but curiosity led me to investigate wherefore the crowds jostle to take photos of a fake balcony and rub a bronze breast.

Before we set out for Verona – the northern Italian city forever entwined with William Shakespeare’s tragic Romeo and Juliet – I researched the immensely popular tourist sights: the Casa di Giulietta, Romeo’s House, and Juliet’s Tomb. I resolved to:

• Walk by Romeo’s house, which is all you can do anyhow since it’s a private home not open to the public.
• Visit Juliet’s tomb, since the entrance fee is combined with the Museum of Frescoes; somehow that legitimized visiting anything related to the fictional heroine.
• Not pay money to visit inside Juliet’s House, which requires booking ahead online for a timed entry. I wavered about stepping inside the (free) courtyard where swooning young women drag their men to fondle bronze Juliet’s right breast for luck and photograph the alleged balcony.

Then, I watched the 2010 movie “Letters to Juliet” by which I learned about the real-life team of volunteers who answer the thousands of handwritten letters people mail to Juliet every year asking for love advice. Really? People write to a fictional character? I was curious enough to register online to be Juliet’s Secretary for two hours one day. Bill rolled his eyes.

“It’s just for research,” I explained. As a retired journalist, I felt compelled to do due research before trashing anything stupid…

Then off we flew to Italy.

Fake, fictional, fabricated

Renovations in the 1930s added a balcony to Juliet’s House. Romeo’s House is closed to the public.

The Juliet craze is ripe for inspiring cynicism.

1. She’s fictional, people! How can you write letters to someone who didn’t exist, never mind expect an answer?
2. Shakespeare’s play did not mention a balcony. I verified that by re-reading the play before our travels. When Romeo steals into the Capulet garden at night, hoping to catch a glimpse of his (new) true love, Juliet appears at a window, not a balcony, to utter the famous “O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?” line.
3. In the 1930s, the city government bought the medieval Dal Capello home and Antonio Avena, Director of Civic Museums, had it restored to be Juliet’s House, adding the balcony to attract tourists.
4. Even the bronze Juliet statue in the courtyard is a replica. The original is inside Juliet’s House.
5. It’s not clear that Romeo’s House was owned by the real-life Montecchi family, the model Shakespeare used for the Montagues.

I remember loving Romeo and Juliet back in Grade 9 English class. Like many young teens, I fell in love with the fantasy of true love, the hope, the expectation that everything will work out, never mind that their love story had a tragic ending.

Now, as an adult with adult children, the practical side of me exclaimed: Juliet was 13! Way too young to get married a day after meeting each other. They were in lust, not love. And that Romeo – what did he know? He attended the Capulet party to see his “true love” Rosaline and immediately switched allegiance to Juliet. Even Friar Lawrence chided him for changing loves so quickly: “Is Rosaline, that thou didst love so dear, So soon forsaken? Young men’s love then lies Not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes.” Or other body parts.   

We were staying in Verona for two weeks to house-sit and pet-sit a lovely black-and-white cat named Midori. When I told Midori’s mom I’d signed up to be Juliet’s Secretary, she rolled her eyes and hit her forehead with her hand.

“You know, the balcony is an old sarcophagus,” she said. An old stone tomb. One more reason for skepticism.  

The next day, when she took us on a quick tour to familiarize us with Verona’s old town, we walked by Romeo’s alleged house, but she didn’t take us anywhere near Via Cappello where the crowds congregate outside Juliet’s House. I took that as a sign that locals are mystified by the touristic nonsense.

Shakespeare’s source

Images of Shakespeare appear in various spots around Verona.

Even Shakespeare wasn’t entirely original with his Romeo and Juliet story. Indeed, Dante Alighieri (exiled to Verona from Florence) was the first to write about the feuding houses of Montecchi and Cappelletti in 13^th-century Verona, according to the Club di Giulietta website.

Later, in the early 1500s, two Italian novelists used the same plot, one of which was translated into French, and then written into a poem that was considered Shakespeare’s main source when he wrote R&J in 1596.

For a witty take on Shakespeare’s writing of R&J, watch this clip from the BBC comedy series “Upstart Crow” when the Bard asks his 13-year-old daughter Susanna to test-drive Juliet’s lines.

(I didn’t see any mention of Shakespeare’s play “The Two Gentlemen of Verona” and when I started to read it, I understood why. Although the two gentlemen are from Verona, most of the action takes place in Milan and a forest near Mantua.)

Juliet’s Tomb

Juliet’s Tomb made me clutch my heart at the tragic romance of it all.

Still, if you’re going to fall victim to romance, Verona is your place. Charming, cobbled higgledy-piggledy narrow lanes suddenly open into courtyards, with bright geraniums dripping from window boxes. Jasmine, with its heady scent, climbs the arched porticoes. Faded frescoes shelter under roof overhangs. Bells ring out from ornate towers as they’ve done for centuries. Wrought-iron balconies overlook marble-paved sidewalks that lead through enormous doors in Roman walls. 

I vacillated. Juliet has clearly become a symbol of love in a world that’s being torn apart, where cynicism and ugliness seem to take precedence. Wouldn’t it be good to err on the side of love, even if it’s schmaltzy and touristy and fake? 

A small wedding party surrounded us as we entered the green oasis of Juliet’s Tomb and the Museum of Frescoes, on the grounds of an old Franciscan convent. What a strange place to have a wedding ceremony. Romeo and Juliet died! It was a tragedy, not a happily-ever-after ending!

R&J tourism is not new. Long before Juliet’s House was conjured as a tourism site, famous writers visited her alleged tomb, including Charles Dickens in 1846 and Lord Byron in 1816, who chipped off pieces of the tomb and wrote: “I have brought away a few pieces of the granite, to give to my daughter and my nieces.”  

The bride and groom went off to say their vows while we descended stone steps and entered the cool, dank suitably romantic crypt. I must admit, a little frisson of excitement coursed through me when I spotted Juliet’s red marble sarcophagus. Even though I knew the bathtub-like coffin complete with stone pillow couldn’t possibly have held a fictional character, there’s something about the stories and the romantic settings that’s enchanting. Why is that? I mean… wherefore is that? Cognitive dissonance?

Only afterwards did I learn that Juliet’s tomb was used as a watering trough in the 1500s and wasn’t placed into the crypt until 1938.

Juliet’s Courtyard

The arched tunnel walls, filled with love graffiti, lead into the courtyard where people rub Juliet’s right breast for luck in love.

Early one morning, we walked along Via Cappello, past the shops selling heart-shaped padlocks and R&J fridge magnets, and a place that would machine-embroider, on the spot, your and your Romeo’s names on all manner of fabric items.

Next to the embroidery shop, I twisted Bill’s arm into stepping into the courtyard of Juliet’s House, since there was no lineup. From the street, we entered an arched tunnel, with walls lined in love graffiti. We emerged into a lovely honey-stoned courtyard. Ivy spilled over the walls. The keystone above the entry archway had a carved marble stone cap, symbol of the hat-making Dal Cappello family (aka Capuleti) who lived there long ago.

Already, the diehard fans had gathered to take turns posing with bronze Juliet. Romeo photographers waited patiently below the balcony for their Juliets to appear so they could immortalize her in pixels.

In the past, people stuck love notes to the courtyard walls with chewing gum, but that bad habit seems to have been curbed. Now, people lock heart-shaped padlocks to objects all over town, including a utility pipe we saw hanging from a bridge over the Adige River that winds it way around Verona.

We stood, gazing in wonder. Bill was appalled. I was more… intrigued.

Juliet’s Secretary

The Club di Giulietta archives on the shelves hold letters going back to 1991.

Butterflies churned in my stomach as I walked to the Club di Giulietta office to become Juliet’s Secretary  and answer letters for her. How could I respond to someone who believed she was writing to a real Juliet? What if I gave bad advice? I should have been practising writing about love in flowery, romantic language.

Giovanna greeted us – six young women plus me and another older woman. We sat around a wooden table that held boxes of letters in different languages, plus pens, letter opener, letterhead and envelopes. Behind us were row upon row of shelves holding file boxes of letters going back to 1991.

“We welcome people who want to keep the tradition alive,” she said.

Gardener Ettore Solimani was Juliet’s first secretary back in the 1930s: people left letters on Juliet’s supposed grave (near today’s tomb) and he began answering them. “So he started the tradition.”

Fast forward to 1972, when Giovanna’s father, Giulio Tamassia, and other artists and scholars created the Club di Giulietta as a nonprofit cultural organization to continue answering the deluge of letters. Giovanna now manages the club with help from a small group of Verona volunteers plus people like me, who want the experience of being Juliet’s Secretary. (I considered the 25-Euro fee to be a donation to the club.)   

Juliet receives about 8,000 handwritten letters and emails a year, Giovanna said. Some letters arrive by mail while others are deposited in the red Juliet mailboxes at her house and tomb. As the club website says, “Perhaps we contact a real person by phone or email, while we prefer paper and pen to reach a mythical character.”

Letters arrive from teenagers, young adults, older adults, mostly women but 10 to 20 percent men, some same-sex relationships. Some include thanks for answering letters, but most share their love stories, some with quite complicated situations.    “Start reading and see if you want to answer,” she said. “It’s like replying to a friend…. Be brave, passionate and wise, like Juliet.”

I answered four letters on each of the two days I was Juliet’s Secretary.

We began opening letters and reading. One by one we picked up our pens and started writing answers on the special stationery. The eight of us wrote in English, German, Danish and Portuguese (Brazilian).

Replying turned out to be easier than I’d anticipated. The writers were mostly young (in their teens and early 20s), looking for love, and expressed their fears of being alone, of choosing the wrong person, especially after a disappointment such as a failed long-distance relationship. Since the writers were mostly younger than my own adult children, I simply pretended to write to my kids. I assured them they had not run out of time to find love and that love can blossom in many different ways, often starting as a friendship. I compared chasing after love to chasing a butterfly – you rarely catch it. But while you’re enjoying the beauty of sitting in a garden, one just may alight on your hand.

My letters went to Malta, Kazakhstan, and the U.S.A. (California and Montana). I found it strangely satisfying work.

I stayed behind to chat with Giovanna, who described the letter archives as “a treasure of stories. The mailbox is always full.”

She’s read heartfelt letters from homosexual men who are afraid they won’t be accepted or find love. From older women who want to find love again after divorce or widowhood. And from people who have friends, a good social life, a good career and are happy but, they haven’t found true love so feel their lives aren’t complete.

“Just to write a letter can be therapeutic,” she said. “Love may hurt but reading all these letters you find it’s the most important thing in life. It gives you strength.”

She believes people are conditioned to seek love. “Maybe humans are made to be in couples.”

Two days later, I returned and answered more letters, from three Americans and one New Zealander living in Canada. Two young men had volunteered to answer letters too.

I unfolded the pages in one letter and out fluttered a 5-Euro note, included as “a gesture of thanks for all of the letters you answer.”

Academic studies

University of Rome student Fiore is examining the expectations of letter writers.

At the club on my second day, I met Fiore, a University of Rome student doing her thesis on the Juliet letters. We went for coffee afterwards so I could ask about her findings.

“I played Juliet in a play – that’s why I chose this topic,” Fiore explained. Although she’s majoring in art history, her thesis falls under cultural anthropology. She’s still developing her thesis statement, but it will involve the expectations of the letter writers.

“Juliet is a symbol of love and that’s what people want, a love that’s so powerful and passionate that nothing can stop it,” she said. “They ask her to protect their love as if she’s a saint.”

Fiore has read dozens of letters, including one from a boy who apologized for touching Juliet’s breast and, yes, from some people who ask if Juliet is real or not!

“They want to talk and unload their feelings with no judgement.”

Not all letters are about romantic love though. Two sisters, a mother and grandmother who had watched the “Letters to Juliet” movie together wrote that their Romeo was their family love. “Your Romeo can be your dog, your daughters, sister, grandfather,” said Fiore.

Indeed, I had read a letter from a young Nepalese woman living in the U.S.A. who wanted advice about how to help her family emigrate to be with her. I had no idea what to say so I couldn’t reply.

“Times change but the topic is always the same,” said Fiore. “At the end of the story, it’s love, whether family or romantic.”

Juliet’s House

I backtracked on my pledge! I succumbed to Juliet fever, visited her house, and stood on the alleged balcony.

I wavered, but ultimately, I relented. Romance and curiosity won. Bill shook his head and flatly refused to go, so I booked one ticket to Juliet’s House.

When I arrived, the line to get into the courtyard stretched through the long archway and far down the street. I showed the security guard my 2 p.m. timed-entry ticket and she let me go right in. The courtyard was jam-packed – not like the other time we’d visited. Bill would have hated the crowd. I showed my ticket again to enter Juliet’s House.

The five levels with creaky wood floors have been restored to look like a typical Veronese nobleman’s home from the 14^th century and it’s beautiful. Adornments include fragments of frescoes, paintings inspired by R&J, and the original bronze Juliet sculpture. A top room included 14^th-century pottery, on loan from a museum, that Juliet’s family would have used, and framed collages of historic R&J post cards. The big wooden bed and costumes from the Franco Zeffirelli movie took pride of place in two rooms.

“Do some people believe Juliet is real?” I asked a security guard. She said yes – mostly children but sadly some adults as well.

I stood in line in the balcony room, waiting my turn with mostly younger women, although I noted an older couple behind me, and a father with two young sons. The line moved slowly but people were patient, perhaps knowing they could then take their time to get the perfect balcony shot. I must admit, I got excited as my turn approached.

The woman behind me said she’d take my photo and she certainly she knew how to wield a camera. I stepped onto the balcony and she took half a dozen good shots quickly. I felt a bit silly but you know what? I was happy I’d done it! Turning my back to the camera, I looked down into the courtyard throng. Nope. My sensible, crowd-fearing Romeo was not there.  

Wherefore all the hoopla?

Even Juliet is incredulous at the hoopla her story has inspired.

Does Juliet exist? Of course not. She’s a fictional character, but her love story is based on the historic reality of medieval feuds and killings.

And today’s reality is that her spirit lives on. Visiting Juliet’s House and especially being Juliet’s Secretary convinced me of that. Hundreds of thousands of people believe she exists as a symbol of love and are willing to inscribe that faith with pen on paper to write to her.

In the end, I think I’d rather side with the power of love over cynicism and hate. As I replied on behalf of Juliet: “You’ll know deep down in your soul when you’ve found someone you want to spend the rest of your life with, someone you just can’t imagine life without, someone who is your rock and anchor, yet frees you to fly and be your best self. Hold out for that kind of love.”

I may have been writing about Bill… I did not, however, buy a potholder with “Kathryn and Bill” embroidered on it.

My sensible, crowd-fearing Romeo has been with me for 40 years.

We visited Verona in May-June, 2024. Find out where we are right now by visiting our ‘Where’s Kathryn?’ page.