Bad Advice In Shakespeare's Romeo And Juliet

William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet is a play that contains universal themes. During the play Friar Lawrence says to Romeo before the wedding that “this alliance may so happy prove/To turn your households’ rancour to pure love” (II.iii.91-92), which is a piece of bad advice that led to a disaster for a different character in the play. Something like this also happened in Laura Langston’s The Art Of Getting Stared At. Bad advice of one individual created a monumental disaster for another. Sloane starts losing her hair and gets diagnosed with alopecia areata, she then struggles with keeping her disease a secret and begins focusing on her appearance. Sloane takes her stepmother's advice and decides to get a wig that is attached to a ball cap. During Sloanes laughter flash mob shoot for the video, the wig falls off.

Sloane starts losing her hair and gets diagnosed with alopecia areata. “A pile of hair came out when I showered.” (Langston49), Sloane got frantic and nervous when she noticed an abnormal amount of her hair falling out. She checked to make sure that she did not have any bald spots, however she did in fact find three. She went to a specialist and

some doctors and was told that she has the disease alopecia areata “I believe you have alopecia areata.” (Langston79). “Losing my hair sucks.” (Langston89) Sloane gets sad and upset, and doubts her disease, but starts figuring out ways to hide her hair loss.

Sloane struggles with keeping her disease a secret and begins focusing on her appearance.

“Damn I can’t take my hat off.” (Langston79). Sloane finds things to cover up her head and gets worried people will judge her if they found out, so she decides to keep her disease a secret. Sloanes stepmother, Kim, takes her to a wig fitting to find Sloane some more natural looking choices to hide her hair loss “I am surrounded by hair and mirrors.” (Langston233). Sloane begins losing her facial hair starting with her eyebrows and decides to draw them on with makeup, and eventually gets them tattooed on “Makeup saves lives too.” (Langston278). Sloane was brought up to not care about appearance and to focus on intelligence. She is now changing these priorities so she doesn't get judged and stereotyped as a

“freak”.

Sloane takes Kim’s advice to get a wig that is attached to a ball cap. During Sloanes only shot for her laughter flash mob shoot for her college entry video, the wig falls off. “A denim ball cap. A cap with dark hair attached.” (Langston235) Sloane gets her new wig and gets excited to wear it on-camera during the flash mob. When the flash mob finally rolls around everything is falling perfectly into place until somebody pulls Sloane’s hat off “Behind me, someone pulls the hat from my head.” (Langston295). Sloane is embarrassed and ashamed as well as flushed with an instant redness because of the humiliation she feels when she realizes everyone has stopped laughing and is now staring at her astonished “Eyes staring. Mouths gaping. Laughter dies.” (Langston296). Sloane decides that she does not want anything to do with this video anymore and slightly blames Kim for making and taking her to the wig appointment in the first place.

During this novel Sloane faces many challenges, from getting diagnosed with alopecia areata, to learning how to focus on her appearance. She gets help from her stepmother to become confident in the way she looks, however one certain offer that Kim gave Sloane about trying out some wigs went horribly wrong and made Sloane too traumatized to even leave her house for weeks. Certain pieces of advice from somebody can really affect somebody else. Whether for good or for bad, it is always good to be prepared and aware for there is always an outcome.