ABSTRACT
When Juliet, talking with Romeo on her balcony, dramatically shifts from the formal you to the informal thou, she affirms the love Romeo has overheard her express when she thought she was alone. Such a poignant pronoun shift occurs in Racine's Phèdre too, but Shakespeareans may be surprised to learn that Sir Philip Sidney got there first. Juliet's declaration of love echoes a speech made by Philoclea, another very young woman in love, in Sidney's Arcadia (1593). In this chapter, I will examine Juliet's language then Romeo's among the verbal motifs Shakespeare borrowed from Sidney's brilliant but today too often neglected Arcadia.
