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Romeo and Juliet Act 3 Scene 1?

In Romeo and Juliet Act 1 Scene 3, what does the following quote mean?

  • “Did you fall on your face? / You’ll fall backwards when you know more, / won’t you, Juliet.” It's not that I'm trying to cheat on my homework, but I'm clueless and I don't know who to ask. Please help me.

  • Answer:

    Nobody except Mary Read knows what they're talking about...Folks, if you don't REALLY know, don't answer--it's called Yahoo Answers, not Yahoo Guess... If you want to understand a Shakespeare quote, don't take it out of context!!! (And don't use a bad rendering into contemporary English, as you have.) Read the Nurse's ENTIRE speech, and it should be fairly clear. YES: the Nurse is quoting her husband, talking to Juliet when she was a very tiny little girl, and fell on her face. Nurse's husband picked her up and made a dirty joke: you're falling on your face now, but when you are OLDER--OF AGE--you'll fall backwards. The implication, to have sex. And then, just to make sure everybody's got the joke, the Nurse repeats it again at the end of her monologue. So why repeat an old joke about Juliet growing up to "fall backwards"? Because her mother has just summoned her to tell her that it's time for her to get married. And the old dirty joke is about to come true. ADDENDUM: And Melasonde provides ANOTHER wrong answer...At this point in the play, Juliet hasn't even MET Romeo yet... If. You. Don't. Really. Know. Don't. Answer. It just confuses people...!

musical9... at Yahoo! Answers Visit the source

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Other answers

Life is about trial and error. You gain more insight and experience. For each step forward, you'll take two steps back.

Audrey

it means when you have more knowledge you'll have more to fall back on instead of falling on ur face (or sticking your foot in ur mouth <more comonly known>)

nchs_baby

The quote means that you amy have failed this time. But in due time you will be able to pick yourself up and learn from your mistakes as time go one.

FlawlessKarat

It's the Nurse quoting her husband, and the falling backwards he's referring to is falling on her back for the act of sexual intercourse.

Mary Read

The Nurse is addressing that Juliet looks flustered and is being careless, not only about her movement but her choices in life. By saying she would fall back is addressing that if Juliet were smarter she would fall back in order to save her face from harm. It also means that she should make the right decision about her life (to be with Paris or Romeo) in order to "save face" with her family.

melasonde

My husband—God rest his soul, he was a happy man—picked up the child. “Oh,” he said, “Did you fall on your face? You'll fall backward when you grow smarter. (Means she will ie on her back to have sex when she is older) Won't you, Jule.” And I swear, the poor pretty thing stopped crying and said, “Yes.” Oh, to watch a joke come true! I bet if I live a thousand years, I'll never forget it. “Won't you, Jule,” he said. And the pretty fool stopped crying and said, “Yes.”

kiki

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