William Shakespeare:
The next borrower of the now famous tale became the most well-known version in todays literature, Shakespeare’s play, Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare was able to dramatize Brooke’s poem into an emotional play; making a swift, explosive drama that immortalized the lovers' desire. When Shakespeare began to create his play, there were three main changes he made to Brooke’s basic plot line: he compressed the action from several months to a few days, he developed Mercutio from a mere courtier into a much more complex character and he brought Paris back into the story at the end, to die by the hand of Romeo at Juliet’s tomb. Shakespeare’s play also included several drastic transformations amongst the characters compared to other versions. For example, Shakespeare made Juliet fourteen years old, four years younger than the Juliet in Bandello’s version and two years younger than Juliet in Brooke’s poem. Shakespeare also completely rewrote and restructured the beginning of Brooke’s version in order to foreground the conflict between the two households and reveal the social spectrum of Verona. Unlike "Romeus and Juliet," the play opens with a brawl. By the end of the first act, the audience has met almost all the major players and Shakespeare has introduced all the future lines of conflict in the play.