Romeo and Juliet
By William Shakespeare
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Table of Contents
1.
Introduction
2.
Author Biography
3.
Reading Shakespeare
4.
Historical Background
5.
List of Characters
6.
One−Page Summary
7.
Summary and Analysis
8.
Critical Commentary
9.
Quizzes
10.
Character Analysis
11.
Themes
Table of Contents
1
12.
Principal Topics
13.
Essays
14.
Criticism
15.
Selected Quotes
16.
Suggested Essay Topics
17.
Sample Essay Outlines
18.
Modern Connections
19.
FAQs
20.
Bibliography and Further Reading
Introduction
A perennial staple of high school English classes, Romeo and Juliet was written by Shakespeare at a relatively
early juncture in his literary career, most probably in 1594 or 1595. During much of the twentieth century,
critics tended to disparage this play in comparison to the four great tragedies that Shakespeare wrote in the
first decade of the seventeenth century (Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth, and Othello). Appraised next to the
Bard's mature works, Romeo and Juliet appears to lack the psychological depth and the structural complexity
of Shakespeare's later tragedies. But over the past three decades or so, many scholars have altered this
assessment, effectively upgrading its status within Shakespeare's canon. They have done this by discarding
comparative evaluation and judging Romeo and Juliet as a work of art in its own right.
Viewed from this fresh perspective, Shakespeare's tragic drama of the "star−crossed" young lovers is seen to
be an extraordinary work. Indeed, Romeo and Juliet was an experimental stage piece at the time of its
composition, featuring several radical departures from long−standing conventions. These innovative aspects
of the play, moreover, reinforce and embellish its principal themes. The latter include the antithesis between
love and hate, the correlative use of a light/dark polarity, the handling of time (as both theme and as structural
element), and the prominent status accorded to Fortune and its expression in the dreams, omens and
forebodings that presage its tragic conclusion.
Author Biography
The Life and Work of William Shakespeare
Details about William Shakespeare’s life are sketchy, mostly mere surmise based upon court or other clerical
records. His parents, John and Mary (Arden), were married about 1557; she was of the landed gentry, and he a
yeoman—a glover and commodities merchant. By 1568, John had risen through the ranks of town
government and held the position of high bailiff, similar to mayor. William, the eldest son and the third of
eight children, was born in 1564, probably on April 23, several days before his baptism on April 26 in
Stratford−upon−Avon. Shakespeare is also believed to have died on the same date—April 23—in 1616.
It is believed William attended the local grammar school in Stratford where his parents lived, and studied
Author Biography
2
primarily Latin rhetoric, logic, and literature. At age 18 (1582), William married Anne Hathaway, a local
farmer’s daughter who was eight years his senior. Their first daughter (Susanna) was born six months later
(1583), and twins Judith and Hamnet were born in 1585.
Shakespeare’s life can be divided into three periods: the first 20 years in Stratford, which include his
schooling, early marriage, and fatherhood; the next 25 years as an actor and playwright in London; and the
last five in retirement back in Stratford where he enjoyed moderate wealth gained from his theatrical
successes. The years linking the first two periods are marked by a lack of information about Shakespeare, and
are often referred to as the “dark years.”
Shakespeare probably left school at age 15, which was the norm, to take a job, especially since this was the
period of his father’s financial difficulty. Numerous references in his plays suggest that William may have in
fact worked for his father, in addition to a myriad of other jobs, thereby gaining specialized knowledge.
At some point during the “dark years,” Shakespeare began his career with a London theatrical company,
perhaps in 1589, for he was already an actor and playwright of some note by 1592.
Shakespeare apparently wrote and acted for numerous theatrical companies, including Pembroke’s Men, and
Strange’s Men, which later became the Chamberlain’s Men, with whom he remained for the rest of his career.
In 1592, the Plague closed the theaters for about two years, and Shakespeare turned to writing book length
narrative poetry. Most notable were “Venus and Adonis” and “The Rape of Lucrece,” both of which were
dedicated to the Earl of Southampton, whom scholars accept as Shakespeare’s friend and benefactor despite a
lack of documentation. During this same period, Shakespeare was writing his sonnets, which are more likely
signs of the time’s fashion rather than actual love poems detailing any particular relationship. He returned to
playwriting when theaters reopened in 1594, and did not continue to write poetry. His sonnets were published
without his consent in 1609, shortly before his retirement.
Amid all of his success, Shakespeare suffered the loss of his only son, Hamnet, who died in 1596 at the age of
11.
But Shakespeare’s career continued unabated; and in London in 1599, he became one of the partners in the
new Globe Theater, which was built by the Chamberlain’s Men.
When Queen Elizabeth died in 1603 and was succeeded by her cousin King James of Scotland, the
Chamberlain’s Men was renamed the King’s Men. Shakespeare’s productivity and popularity continued
uninterrupted. He invested in London real estate and, one year away from retirement, purchased a second
theater, the Blackfriars Gatehouse, in partnership with his fellow actors.
Shakespeare wrote very little after 1612, which was the year he completed Henry VIII. It was during a
performance of this play in 1613 that the Globe caught fire and burned to the ground. Sometime between 1610
and 1613, Shakespeare returned to Stratford, where he owned a large house and property, to spend his
remaining years with his family.
William Shakespeare died on April 23, 1616, and was buried two days later in the chancel of Holy Trinity
Church where he had been baptized exactly 52 years earlier. His literary legacy included 37 plays, 154
sonnets and five major poems.
Incredibly, most of Shakespeare’s plays had never been published in anything except pamphlet form, and
were simply extant as acting scripts stored at the Globe. Theater scripts were not regarded as literary works of
art, but only the basis for the performance. Plays were simply a popular form of entertainment for all layers of
Author Biography
3
society in Shakespeare’s time. Only the efforts of two of Shakespeare’s company, John Heminges and Henry
Condell, preserved his 36 plays (minus Pericles, the thirty−seventh).
Reading Shakespeare
In this section:
• Shakespeare’s Language
• Shakespeare’s Sentences
• Shakespeare’s Words
• Shakespeare’s Wordplay
• Shakespeare’s Dramatic Verse
• Implied Stage Action
Shakespeare’s Language
Shakespeare’s language can create a strong pang of intimidation, even fear, in a large number of
modern−day readers. Fortunately, however, this need not be the case. All that is needed to master the art of
reading Shakespeare is to practice the techniques of unraveling uncommonly−structured sentences and to
become familiar with the poetic use of uncommon words. We must realize that during the 400−year span
between Shakespeare’s time and our own, both the way we live and speak has changed. Although most of
his vocabulary is in use today, some of it is obsolete, and what may be most confusing is that some of his
words are used today, but with slightly different or totally different meanings. On the stage, actors readily
dissolve these language stumbling blocks. They study Shakespeare’s dialogue and express it dramatically in
word and in action so that its meaning is graphically enacted. If the reader studies Shakespeare’s lines as an
actor does, looking up and reflecting upon the meaning of unfamiliar words until real voice is discovered,
he or she will suddenly experience the excitement, the depth and the sheer poetry of what these characters
say.
Shakespeare’s Sentences
In English, or any other language, the meaning of a sentence greatly depends upon where each word is
placed in that sentence. “The child hurt the mother” and “The mother hurt the child” have opposite
meanings, even though the words are the same, simply because the words are arranged differently. Because
word position is so integral to English, the reader will find unfamiliar word arrangements confusing, even
difficult to understand. Since Shakespeare’s plays are poetic dramas, he often shifts from average word
arrangements to the strikingly unusual so that the line will conform to the desired poetic rhythm. Often, too,
Shakespeare employs unusual word order to afford a character his own specific style of speaking.
Today, English sentence structure follows a sequence of subject first, verb second, and an optional object
third. Shakespeare, however, often places the verb before the subject, which reads, “Speaks he” rather than
“He speaks.” Solanio speaks with this inverted structure in The Merchant of Venice stating, “I should be
still/Plucking the grass to know where sits the wind” (Bevington edition, I, i, ll.17−19), while today’s
standard English word order would have the clause at the end of this line read, “where the wind sits.”
“Wind” is the subject of this clause, and “sits” is the verb. Bassanio’s words in Act Two also exemplify this
inversion: “And in such eyes as ours appear not faults” (II, ii, l. 184). In our normal word order, we would
say, “Faults do not appear in eyes such as ours,” with “faults” as the subject in both Shakespeare’s word
order and ours.
Inversions like these are not troublesome, but when Shakes–peare positions the predicate adjective or the
object before the subject and verb, we are sometimes surprised. For example, rather than “I saw him,”
Shakespeare may use a structure such as “Him I saw.” Similarly, “Cold the morning is” would be used for
Reading Shakespeare
4
our “The morning is cold.” Lady Macbeth demonstrates this inversion as she speaks of her husband:
“Glamis thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be/What thou art promised” (Macbeth, I, v, ll. 14−15). In current
English word order, this quote would begin, “Thou art Glamis, and Cawdor.”
In addition to inversions, Shakespeare purposefully keeps words apart that we generally keep together. To
illustrate, consider Bassanio’s humble admission in The Merchant of Venice: “I owe you much, and, like a
wilful youth,/That which I owe is lost” (I, i, ll. 146−147). The phrase, “like a wilful youth,” separates the
regular sequence of “I owe you much” and “That which I owe is lost.” To understand more clearly this type
of passage, the reader could rearrange these word groups into our conventional order: I owe you much and I
wasted what you gave me because I was young and impulsive. While these rearranged clauses will sound
like normal English, and will be simpler to understand, they will no longer have the desired poetic rhythm,
and the emphasis will now be on the wrong words.
As we read Shakespeare, we will find words that are separated by long, interruptive statements. Often
subjects are separated from verbs, and verbs are separated from objects. These long interruptions can be
used to give a character dimension or to add an element of suspense. For example, in Romeo and Juliet
Benvolio describes both Romeo’s moodiness and his own sensitive and thoughtful nature:
I, measuring his affections by my own,
Which then most sought, where most might not be found,
Being one too many by my weary self,
Pursu’d my humour, not pursuing his,
And gladly shunn’d who gladly fled from me. (I, i, ll. 126−130)
In this passage, the subject “I” is distanced from its verb “Pursu’d.” The long interruption serves to provide
information which is integral to the plot. Another example, taken from Hamlet, is the ghost, Hamlet’s
father, who describes Hamlet’s uncle, Claudius, as
…that incestuous, that adulterate beast,
With witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts—
O wicked wit and gifts, that have the power
So to seduce—won to his shameful lust
The will of my most seeming virtuous queen. (I, v, ll. 43−47)
From this we learn that Prince Hamlet’s mother is the victim of an evil seduction and deception. The delay
between the subject, “beast,” and the verb, “won,” creates a moment of tension filled with the image of a
cunning predator waiting for the right moment to spring into attack. This interruptive passage allows the
play to unfold crucial information and thus to build the tension necessary to produce a riveting drama.
While at times these long delays are merely for decorative purposes, they are often used to narrate a
particular situation or to enhance character development. As Antony and Cleopatra opens, an interruptive
passage occurs in the first few lines. Although the delay is not lengthy, Philo’s words vividly portray
Antony’s military prowess while they also reveal the immediate concern of the drama. Antony is distracted
from his career, and is now focused on Cleopatra:
…those goodly eyes,
That o’er the files and musters of the war
Have glow’d like plated Mars, now bend, now turn
The office and devotion of their view
Upon a tawny front…. (I, i, ll. 2−6)
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Whereas Shakespeare sometimes heaps detail upon detail, his sentences are often elliptical, that is, they
omit words we expect in written English sentences. In fact, we often do this in our spoken conversations.
For instance, we say, “You see that?” when we really mean, “Did you see that?” Reading poetry or
listening to lyrics in music conditions us to supply the omitted words and it makes us more comfortable
reading this type of dialogue. Consider one passage in The Merchant of Venice where Antonio’s friends ask
him why he seems so sad and Solanio tells Antonio, “Why, then you are in love” (I, i, l. 46). When Antonio
denies this, Solanio responds, “Not in love neither?” (I, i, l. 47). The word “you” is omitted but understood
despite the confusing double negative.
In addition to leaving out words, Shakespeare often uses intentionally vague language, a strategy which
taxes the reader’s attentiveness. In Antony and Cleopatra, Cleopatra, upset that Antony is leaving for Rome
after learning that his wife died in battle, convinces him to stay in Egypt:
Sir, you and I must part, but that’s not it:
Sir you and I have lov’d, but there’s not it;
That you know well, something it is I would—
O, my oblivion is a very Antony,
And I am all forgotten. (I, iii, ll. 87−91)
In line 89, “…something it is I would” suggests that there is something that she would want to say, do, or
have done. The intentional vagueness leaves us, and certainly Antony, to wonder. Though this sort of
writing may appear lackadaisical for all that it leaves out, here the vagueness functions to portray Cleopatra
as rhetorically sophisticated. Similarly, when asked what thing a crocodile is (meaning Antony himself who
is being compared to a crocodile), Antony slyly evades the question by giving a vague reply:
It is shap’d, sir, like itself, and it is as broad as it hath breadth.
It is just so high as it is, and moves with it own organs.
It lives by that which nourisheth it, and, the elements once out of it, it transmigrates. (II,
vii, ll. 43−46)
This kind of evasiveness, or doubletalk, occurs often in Shakespeare’s writing and requires extra patience
on the part of the reader.
Shakespeare’s Words
As we read Shakespeare’s plays, we will encounter uncommon words. Many of these words are not in use
today. As Romeo and Juliet opens, we notice words like “shrift” (confession) and “holidame” (a holy relic).
Words like these should be explained in notes to the text. Shakespeare also employs words which we still
use, though with different meaning. For example, in The Merchant of Venice “caskets” refer to small,
decorative chests for holding jewels. However, modern readers may think of a large cask instead of the
smaller, diminutive casket.
Another trouble modern readers will have with Shakespeare’s English is with words that are still in use
today, but which mean something different in Elizabethan use. In The Merchant of Venice, Shakespeare
uses the word “straight” (as in “straight away”) where we would say “immediately.” Here, the modern
reader is unlikely to carry away the wrong message, however, since the modern meaning will simply make
no sense. In this case, textual notes will clarify a phrase’s meaning. To cite another example, in Romeo and
Juliet, after Mercutio dies, Romeo states that the “black fate on moe days doth depend” (emphasis added).
In this case, “depend” really means “impend.”
Shakespeare’s Wordplay
All of Shakespeare’s works exhibit his mastery of playing with language and with such variety that many
Reading Shakespeare
6
people have authored entire books on this subject alone. Shakespeare’s most frequently used types of
wordplay are common: metaphors, similes, synecdoche and metonymy, personification, allusion, and puns.
It is when Shakespeare violates the normal use of these devices, or rhetorical figures, that the language
becomes confusing.
A metaphor is a comparison in which an object or idea is replaced by another object or idea with common
attributes. For example, in Macbeth a murderer tells Macbeth that Banquo has been murdered, as directed,
but that his son, Fleance, escaped, having witnessed his father’s murder. Fleance, now a threat to Macbeth,
is described as a serpent:
There the grown serpent lies, the worm that’s fled
Hath nature that in time will venom breed,
No teeth for the present. (III, iv, ll. 29−31)
Similes, on the other hand, compare objects or ideas while using the words “like” or “as.” In Romeo and
Juliet, Romeo tells Juliet that “Love goes toward love as schoolboys from their books” (II, ii, l. 156). Such
similes often give way to more involved comparisons, “extended similes.” For example, Juliet tells Romeo:
‘Tis almost morning,
I would have thee gone,
And yet no farther than a wonton’s bird,
That lets it hop a little from his hand
Like a poor prisoner in his twisted gyves,
And with silken thread plucks it back again,
So loving−jealous of his liberty. (II, ii, ll. 176−181)
An epic simile, a device borrowed from heroic poetry, is an extended simile that builds into an even more
elaborate comparison. In Macbeth, Macbeth describes King Duncan’s virtues with an angelic, celestial
simile and then drives immediately into another simile that redirects us into a vision of warfare and
destruction:
…Besides this Duncan
Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been
So clear in his great office, that his virtues
Will plead like angels, trumpet−tongued, against
The deep damnation of his taking−off;
And pity, like a naked new−born babe,
Striding the blast, or heaven’s cherubim, horsed
Upon the sightless couriers of the air,
Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye,
That tears shall drown the wind…. (I, vii, ll. 16−25)
Shakespeare employs other devices, like synecdoche and metonymy, to achieve “verbal economy,” or using
one or two words to express more than one thought. Synecdoche is a figure of speech using a part for the
whole. An example of synecdoche is using the word boards to imply a stage. Boards are only a small part of
the materials that make up a stage, however, the term boards has become a colloquial synonym for stage.
Metonymy is a figure of speech using the name of one thing for that of another which it is associated. An
example of metonymy is using crown to mean the king (as used in the sentence “These lands belong to the
crown”). Since a crown is associated with or an attribute of the king, the word crown has become a
metonymy for the king. It is important to understand that every metonymy is a synecdoche, but not every
synecdoche is a metonymy. This is rule is true because a metonymy must not only be a part of the root
Reading Shakespeare
7
word, making a synecdoche, but also be a unique attribute of or associated with the root word.
Synecdoche and metonymy in Shakespeare’s works is often very confusing to a new student because he
creates uses for words that they usually do not perform. This technique is often complicated and yet very
subtle, which makes it difficult of a new student to dissect and understand. An example of these devices in
one of Shakespeare’s plays can be found in The Merchant of Venice . In warning his daughter, Jessica, to
ignore the Christian revelries in the streets below, Shylock says:
Lock up my doors; and when you hear the drum
And the vile squealing of the wry−necked fife,
Clamber not you up to the casements then… (I, v, ll. 30−32)
The phrase of importance in this quote is “the wry−necked fife.” When a reader examines this phrase it
does not seem to make sense; a fife is a cylinder−shaped instrument, there is no part of it that can be called
a neck. The phrase then must be taken to refer to the fife−player, who has to twist his or her neck to play
the fife. Fife, therefore, is a synecdoche for fife−player, much as boards is for stage. The trouble with
understanding this phrase is that “vile squealing” logically refers to the sound of the fife, not the
fife−player, and the reader might be led to take fife as the instrument because of the parallel reference to
“drum” in the previous line. The best solution to this quandary is that Shakespeare uses the word fife to
refer to both the instrument and the player. Both the player and the instrument are needed to complete the
wordplay in this phrase, which, though difficult to understand to new readers, cannot be seen as a flaw
since Shakespeare manages to convey two meanings with one word. This remarkable example of
synecdoche illuminates Shakespeare’s mastery of “verbal economy.”
Shakespeare also uses vivid and imagistic wordplay through personification, in which human capacities and
behaviors are attributed to inanimate objects. Bassanio, in The Merchant of Venice, almost speechless when
Portia promises to marry him and share all her worldly wealth, states “my blood speaks to you in my
veins…” (III, ii, l. 176). How deeply he must feel since even his blood can speak. Similarly, Portia, learning
of the penalty that Antonio must pay for defaulting on his debt, tells Salerio, “There are some shrewd
contents in yond same paper/That steals the color from Bassanio’s cheek” (III, ii, ll. 243−244).
Another important facet of Shakespeare’s rhetorical repertoire is his use of allusion. An allusion is a
reference to another author or to an historical figure or event. Very often Shakespeare alludes to the heroes
and heroines of Ovid’s Metamorphoses. For example, in Cymbeline an entire room is decorated with
images illustrating the stories from this classical work, and the heroine, Imogen, has been reading from this
text. Similarly, in Titus Andronicus characters not only read directly from the Metamorphoses, but a subplot
re−enacts one of the Metamorphoses’s most famous stories, the rape and mutilation of Philomel. Another
way Shakespeare uses allusion is to drop names of mythological, historical and literary figures. In The
Taming of the Shrew, for instance, Petruchio compares Katharina, the woman whom he is courting, to
Diana (II, i, l. 55), the virgin goddess, in order to suggest that Katharina is a man−hater. At times,
Shakespeare will allude to well−known figures without so much as mentioning their names. In Twelfth
Night, for example, though the Duke and Valentine are ostensibly interested in Olivia, a rich countess,
Shakespeare asks his audience to compare the Duke’s emotional turmoil to the plight of Acteon, whom the
goddess Diana transforms into a deer to be hunted and killed by Acteon’s own dogs:
Duke:
That instant was I turn’d into a hart,
And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds,
E’er since pursue me. […]
Valentine:
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But like a cloistress she will veiled walk,
And water once a day her chamber round…. (I, i, l. 20 ff.)
Shakespeare’s use of puns spotlights his exceptional wit. His comedies in particular are loaded with puns,
usually of a sexual nature. Puns work through the ambiguity that results when multiple senses of a word are
evoked; homophones often cause this sort of ambiguity. In Antony and Cleopatra, Enobarbus believes
“there is mettle in death” (I, ii, l. 146), meaning that there is “courage” in death; at the same time, mettle
suggests the homophone metal, referring to swords made of metal causing death. In early editions of
Shakespeare’s work there was no distinction made between the two words. Antony puns on the word
“earing,” (I, ii, ll. 112−114) meaning both plowing (as in rooting out weeds) and hearing: he angrily sends
away a messenger, not wishing to hear the message from his wife, Fulvia: “…O then we bring forth
weeds,/when our quick minds lie still, and our ills told us/Is as our earing.” If ill−natured news is planted in
one’s “hearing,” it will render an “earing” (harvest) of ill−natured thoughts. A particularly clever pun, also
in Antony and Cleopatra, stands out after Antony’s troops have fought Octavius’s men in Egypt: “We have
beat him to his camp. Run one before,/And let the queen know of our gests” (IV, viii, ll. 1−2). Here “gests”
means deeds (in this case, deeds of battle); it is also a pun on “guests,” as though Octavius’ slain soldiers
were to be guests when buried in Egypt.
One should note that Elizabethan pronunciation was in several cases different from our own. Thus, modern
readers, especially Americans, will miss out on the many puns based on homophones. The textual notes
will point up many of these “lost” puns, however.
Shakespeare’s sexual innuendoes can be either clever or tedious depending upon the speaker and situation.
The modern reader should recall that sexuality in Shakespeare’s time was far more complex than in ours
and that characters may refer to such things as masturbation and homosexual activity. Textual notes in
some editions will point out these puns but rarely explain them. An example of a sexual pun or innuendo
can be found in The Merchant of Venice when Portia and Nerissa are discussing Portia’s past suitors using
innuendo to tell of their sexual prowess:
Portia:
I pray thee, overname them, and as thou namest them, I will describe them, and according
to my description level at my affection.
Nerrisa:
First, there is the Neapolitan prince.
Portia:
Ay, that’s a colt indeed, for he doth nothing but talk of his horse, and he makes it a great
appropriation to his own good parts that he can shoe him himself. I am much afeard my
lady his mother played false with the smith. (I, ii, ll. 35−45)
The “Neapolitan prince” is given a grade of an inexperienced youth when Portia describes him as a “colt.”
The prince is thought to be inexperienced because he did nothing but “talk of his horse” (a pun for his
penis) and his other great attributes. Portia goes on to say that the prince boasted that he could “shoe him
[his horse] himself,” a possible pun meaning that the prince was very proud that he could masturbate.
Finally, Portia makes an attack upon the prince’s mother, saying that “my lady his mother played false with
the smith,” a pun to say his mother must have committed adultery with a blacksmith to give birth to such a
vulgar man having an obsession with “shoeing his horse.”
It is worth mentioning that Shakespeare gives the reader hints when his characters might be using puns and
innuendoes. In The Merchant of Venice, Portia’s lines are given in prose when she is joking, or engaged in
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bawdy conversations. Later on the reader will notice that Portia’s lines are rhymed in poetry, such as when
she is talking in court or to Bassanio. This is Shakespeare’s way of letting the reader know when Portia is
jesting and when she is serious.
Shakespeare’s Dramatic Verse
Finally, the reader will notice that some lines are actually rhymed verse while others are in verse without
rhyme; and much of Shakespeare’s drama is in prose. Shakespeare usually has his lovers speak in the
language of love poetry which uses rhymed couplets. The archetypal example of this comes, of course,
from Romeo and Juliet:
The grey−ey’d morn smiles on the frowning night,
Check’ring the eastern clouds with streaks of light,
And fleckled darkness like a drunkard reels
From forth day’s path and Titan’s fiery wheels.
(II, iii, ll. 1−4)
Here it is ironic that Friar Lawrence should speak these lines since he is not the one in love. He, therefore,
appears buffoonish and out of touch with reality. Shakespeare often has his characters speak in rhymed
verse to let the reader know that the character is acting in jest, and vice−versa.
Perhaps the majority of Shakespeare’s lines are in blank verse, a form of poetry which does not use rhyme
(hence the name blank) but still employs a rhythm native to the English language, iambic pentameter,
where every second syllable in a line of ten syllables receives stress. Consider the following verses from
Hamlet, and note the accents and the lack of end−rhyme:
The síngle ánd pecúliar lífe is bóund
With áll the stréngth and ármor óf the mínd (III, iii, ll. 12−13)
The final syllable of these verses receives stress and is said to have a hard, or “strong,” ending. A soft
ending, also said to be “weak,” receives no stress. In The Tempest, Shakespeare uses a soft ending to shape
a verse that demonstrates through both sound (meter) and sense the capacity of the feminine to propagate:
and thén I lóv’d thee
And shów’d thee áll the quálitíes o’ th’ ísle,
The frésh spríngs, bríne−pits, bárren pláce and fértile. (I, ii, ll. 338−40)
The first and third of these lines here have soft endings.
In general, Shakespeare saves blank verse for his characters of noble birth. Therefore, it is significant when
his lofty characters speak in prose. Prose holds a special place in Shakespeare’s dialogues; he uses it to
represent the speech habits of the common people. Not only do lowly servants and common citizens speak
in prose, but important, lower class figures also use this fun, at times ribald variety of speech. Though
Shakespeare crafts some very ornate lines in verse, his prose can be equally daunting, for some of his
characters may speechify and break into doubletalk in their attempts to show sophistication. A clever
instance of this comes when the Third Citizen in Coriolanus refers to the people’s paradoxical lack of
power when they must elect Coriolanus as their new leader once Coriolanus has orated how he has
courageously fought for them in battle:
We have power in ourselves to do it, but it is a power that we have no power to do; for if he
show us his wounds and tell us his deeds, we are to put our tongues into those wounds and
speak for them; so, if he tell us his noble deeds, we must also tell him our noble acceptance
Reading Shakespeare
10
of them. Ingratitude is monstrous, and for the multitude to be ingrateful were to make a
monster of the multitude, of the which we, being members, should bring ourselves to be
monstrous members. (II, ii, ll. 3−13)
Notice that this passage contains as many metaphors, hideous though they be, as any other passage in
Shakespeare’s dramatic verse.
When reading Shakespeare, paying attention to characters who suddenly break into rhymed verse, or who
slip into prose after speaking in blank verse, will heighten your awareness of a character’s mood and
personal development. For instance, in Antony and Cleopatra, the famous military leader Marcus Antony
usually speaks in blank verse, but also speaks in fits of prose (II, iii, ll. 43−46) once his masculinity and
authority have been questioned. Similarly, in Timon of Athens, after the wealthy lord Timon abandons the
city of Athens to live in a cave, he harangues anyone whom he encounters in prose (IV, iii, l. 331 ff.). In
contrast, the reader should wonder why the bestial Caliban in The Tempest speaks in blank verse rather than
in prose.
Implied Stage Action
When we read a Shakespearean play, we are reading a performance text. Actors interact through dialogue,
but at the same time these actors cry, gesticulate, throw tantrums, pick up daggers, and compulsively wash
murderous “blood” from their hands. Some of the action that takes place on stage is explicitly stated in
stage directions. However, some of the stage activity is couched within the dialogue itself. Attentiveness to
these cues is important as one conceives how to visualize the action. When Iago in Othello feigns concern
for Cassio whom he himself has stabbed, he calls to the surrounding men, “Come, come:/Lend me a light”
(V, i, ll. 86−87). It is almost sure that one of the actors involved will bring him a torch or lantern. In the
same play, Emilia, Desdemona’s maidservant, asks if she should fetch her lady’s nightgown and
Desdemona replies, “No, unpin me here” (IV, iii, l. 37). In Macbeth, after killing Duncan, Macbeth brings
the murder weapon back with him. When he tells his wife that he cannot return to the scene and place the
daggers to suggest that the king’s guards murdered Duncan, she castigates him: “Infirm of purpose/Give me
the daggers. The sleeping and the dead are but as pictures” (II, ii, ll. 50−52). As she exits, it is easy to
visualize Lady Macbeth grabbing the daggers from her husband.
For 400 years, readers have found it greatly satisfying to work with all aspects of Shakespeare’s
language—the implied stage action, word choice, sentence structure, and wordplay—until all aspects come
to life. Just as seeing a fine performance of a Shakespearean play is exciting, staging the play in one’s own
mind’s eye, and revisiting lines to enrich the sense of the action, will enhance one’s appreciation of
Shakespeare’s extraordinary literary and dramatic achievements.
Historical Background
Historical Background
The first permanent professional theater in England was built around 1576 and was called the Theater. Other
theaters soon opened, including two called the Curtain and the Rose. Not only was Shakespeare working as a
playwright and an actor for the Theater, he was also a stock holder.
Another theater soon opened and became one of the most famous of the London public playhouses. It was
completed around 1599 and was called the Globe. It was perhaps the largest theater in England and derived its
name “from the sign painted above its door, a picture of Atlas holding the world on his shoulders” (Kittredge).
Shakespeare also owned stock in the Globe and performed as an actor in many of his own plays. The Globe
was an enclosed theater without a roof. The spectators who stood or sat on the ground around the acting area
were called “groundlings.” The wealthier playgoers sat in galleries surrounding the stage area. There was no
Historical Background
11
curtain, and sunlight provided the lighting for the performances; therefore, the performances were held during
the day. Because there were no sets or scene changes, Shakespeare’s characters wore extravagant costumes to
provide the beauty and pageantry that was expected on the stage. Plays were usually fast−paced and colorful
productions. The actors, as a rule, played more than one part in a play, and all of the women’s parts were
portrayed by young boys.
Shakespeare began writing comedies from about 1594 to 1603. During this period he produced such works as
The Taming of the Shrew, Two Gentlemen of Verona, A Midsummer−Night’s Dream, The Merchant of Venice,
Much Ado About Nothing, and Twelfth Night. Two of Shakespeare’s tragedies were also written during this
time period. One was Julius Caesar and the other was Romeo and Juliet.
The play version of Romeo and Juliet was probably written early in his career around 1595 to 1596. The play
is considered to be a tragedy and portrays the interplay of human character and motive. Much of Romeo and
Juliet is written in blank verse, which is unrhymed iambic pentameter. Iambic simply means a metrical foot
made up of an unstressed and stressed syllable, and pentameter means that each line has five metrical feet.
While most of Romeo and Juliet is written in iambic pentameter, the characters of lower social position speak
in prose.
The play is rich in rhyming words, word plays, and puns. Most of Shakespeare’s plays begin with a great deal
of action designed to capture the attention of the groundlings immediately. Therefore, Romeo and Juliet
begins with a street fight between the servants of the Capulets and the Montagues, the warring families in the
play.
The plot of Romeo and Juliet was taken from an earlier version of the story. The theme appeared in the fourth
century in a Greek tale and later in the sixteenth century as Luigi da Porto’s Hystoria di due nobili Amanti. In
the later version, the city is Verona, and da Porto was the first to call the hero and heroine Romeo and
Giulietta. Probably Shakespeare’s most direct source was a long English narrative poem written in 1562 by
Arthur Brooke, called The Tragicall Historye of Romeus and Juliet. Shakespeare used the characters in
Brooke’s poem but developed them in much greater depth and detail, thus transforming the story of
star−crossed lovers into the most famous love story ever known.
List of Characters
Friends and Relatives of the Montague Family:
Romeo—Son of Montague who falls in love with Juliet
Montague—Head of the family who is at war with the Capulets and father to Romeo
Lady Montague—Wife to Lord Montague and mother to Romeo
Mercutio—A kinsman to the prince and a friend to Romeo
Benvolio—A gentle and peace−loving young man who is nephew to Montague and a friend to Romeo
Balthasar—A loyal friend and servant to Romeo
Abram—A servant of the Montague family
Friends and Relatives of the Capulet Family:
Juliet—Daughter of Capulet who falls in love with Romeo
List of Characters
12
Tybalt—A fiery tempered young man who is the nephew of Lady Capulet and cousin to Juliet
Capulet—Head of the family who is at war with the Montagues and father to Juliet
Lady Capulet—Wife to Lord Capulet and mother to Juliet
Nurse—A witty nurse and friend to Juliet
Sampson—A servant of the Capulet family
Gregory—A servant of the Capulet family
Peter—A servant to Juliet’s nurse
Other Characters:
Chorus—Introduces the play, and sets scene in Acts I and II
Paris—Kinsman to the prince and a young nobleman who asks for Juliet’s hand in marriage
Escalus—The prince of Verona
Friar Laurence—A Franciscan friar who marries the lovers in hopes of making peace with the two warring
families
Friar John—A Franciscan friar who was entrusted with an important letter to Romeo
Apothecary—A poor druggist in Mantua who sells poison to Romeo
Page—A servant to Paris
One−Page Summary
The play opens with the servants of the Montague and Capulet families quarreling and fighting in the streets
of Verona, Italy. The two families have been enemies for as long as anyone can remember. Romeo, son of
Lord Montague, accidentally finds out about a ball given by Lord Capulet and plans to attend uninvited.
Romeo and his friends Mercutio and Benvolio put on masks and attend the ball, where Romeo meets the
beautiful Juliet and falls instantly in love. Later that night Romeo goes to Juliet’s balcony, and they exchange
vows of love. Romeo enlists the help of Friar Laurence, who agrees to marry the young lovers in hopes of
ending the long−standing feud between the two families.
Romeo returns from his wedding and finds that his friend Mercutio is engaged in combat with Tybalt, a
member of the Capulet family. Tybalt kills Mercutio. Romeo, enraged over his friend’s death, then slays
Tybalt. Romeo immediately realizes that he has murdered his wife’s cousin and flees to Friar Laurence for
help. He also learns that the Prince has banned him from the city under penalty of death if he is found within
its borders. Friar Laurence arranges for Romeo to spend one last night with Juliet before he flees to Mantua.
In the meantime, Lord Capulet, unaware that Juliet is married to Romeo, has promised her hand in marriage to
Paris. When Juliet is told of the arranged marriage, she is desperate and seeks the help of Friar Laurence, who
gives her a vial of sleeping potion. The potion will have a death−like but temporary effect. The plan is for
One−Page Summary
13
Juliet to take the potion, appear to be dead, and be laid out in the family vault. Romeo will come to the vault
the next night and be there waiting when she awakens. The couple will then flee to Mantua to live. Friar
Laurence sends the important message to Romeo telling him of his plan to help Juliet, but the message never
reaches Romeo. Juliet, assured by Friar Laurence that Romeo will be waiting for her when she awakens in the
tomb, goes home and drinks the potion.
Hearing that Juliet is dead, Romeo purchases poison from a poor apothecary and rushes to her tomb. Upon his
arrival, he finds Paris, also in mourning. Thinking that Romeo has come to rob the tomb, Paris fights with
Romeo. Romeo kills Paris, enters into the tomb, and buries Paris there. He then bids farewell to Juliet and
takes the poison. Awakening from her death−like sleep, Juliet discovers her dead lover and kills herself with
Romeo’s dagger. Friar Laurence arrives too late to save the lovers and tells the Prince the entire story. The
Montagues and Capulets promise to end their hostilities, which have caused the deaths of their only children.
Estimated Reading Time
Because of the play form and the language of Shakespeare, an average student should spend about an hour per
act in individual reading. Each act may be broken down into two or three scenes at a time to ensure
understanding. The language might be difficult at first and will require careful examination of footnotes or
help located in the text. After reading each scene, you should answer all study questions in relation to that
scene to ensure understanding and comprehension. The essay questions may be used if needed. Since there are
five acts in Romeo and Juliet, you should expect to spend approximately five hours divided in segments of
eight to ten sessions.
Summary and Analysis
Act I, Scenes 1 and 2: Summary and Analysis
New Characters:
Chorus
Sampson: a servant in the Capulet household
Gregory: a servant in the Capulet household
Benvolio: a peace−loving friend to Romeo and the Montague family
Tybalt: a fiery−tempered member of the Capulet family
Lord Capulet: the head of the Capulet household
Lady Capulet: the wife of Lord Capulet and mother of Juliet
Lord Montague: the head of the Montague household
Lady Montague: the wife of Lord Montague and the mother of Romeo
Prince Escalus: the Prince of Verona whose job is to keep the peace
Romeo: the tragic hero of the play who falls in love with the enemy’s daughter, Juliet
Paris: the young nobleman who is asking Lord Capulet for Juliet’s hand in marriage
Summary and Analysis
14
Servant: a servant to the Capulet family who has been asked to deliver invitations to the ball
Abram: servant to Montague
Summary
Before the action of Act I begins, the Chorus sets the stage with the Prologue, which summarizes the basic
plot of the play. It states that two families in Verona have been bitter enemies for centuries. The fighting has
broken out again between the families. A child from each of the warring families meet and fall in love, and it
is the death of the children that finally ends the feud between the parents.
Scene 1 opens in Verona, Italy, with two Capulet servants walking down the street hoping to meet and start a
fight with servants from the Montague family. Sampson decides to start the fight by biting his thumb at the
Montague servants. This is an insulting gesture and sure to help start a quarrel. Gregory tells Sampson that he
will back him up. They meet the Montague servants and a fight ensues. As the fighting progresses, even the
townspeople take sides and become involved, resulting in a street brawl.
Benvolio enters and attempts to break up the fighting, but Tybalt also comes on the scene and challenges him
to a duel. Just as Lord Capulet and Lord Montague call for their swords in order to enter into the fight, the
Prince and his attendants arrive and break up the quarrel. The Prince threatens to execute anyone who breaks
the peace with another brawl in Verona. He requests that Lord Capulet meet him privately and tells Lord
Montague that he will talk with him that afternoon.
Benvolio relates the circumstances of the fight to Lord Montague. Lady Montague asks where Romeo is, and
Benvolio tells her that he saw him out walking at dawn. Lord Montague is worried about Romeo and states
that something is bothering him; however, no one can find out what it is. It seems that he has been seen
walking in the night and at dawn with tears in his eyes; but, when the sun comes up, he retreats into his room
and pulls the curtains against all light. Romeo approaches, and Benvolio promises to find out what is
bothering him.
Benvolio meets Romeo and asks him what “sadness lengthens his (Romeo’s) hours.” Romeo replies that not
having the love that he wants has made him unhappy. It seems that the woman he loves (Rosaline) has sworn
not to fall in love. Benvolio encourages Romeo to forget her by comparing her beauty with that of other girls
in Verona. Romeo replies that a comparison with other girls would only make her appear even more beautiful.
Benvolio states that he will get him to forget her or die trying.
Scene 2 also takes place on a street in Verona. Lord Capulet is discussing the recent brawl with Paris, a young
nobleman. Capulet states that as old as he and Lord Montague are, it will not be too difficult to keep the
peace.
Paris has asked for Juliet’s hand in marriage and is asking for a reply from Lord Capulet. Lord Capulet tells
Paris that he feels that thirteen is too young, but allows Paris to try to sway her into accepting his offer. If
Juliet consents, Lord Capulet will also.
Lord Capulet tells Paris that he is giving an “old accustomed feast” this night and invites him to attend. Lord
Capulet then hands an invitation list to a servant to deliver throughout the city, not realizing that the servant
cannot read.
The servant is disgruntled because he cannot read the list and states that people should stick with what they
know best. At that moment, Romeo and Benvolio enter, and the servant asks Romeo if he can read the list to
him. Romeo reads the invitation list, and the servant invites him to attend the feast if he is not from the house
Summary and Analysis
15
of Montague. Romeo asks where the feast is to be held, and the servant replies that it is to be held at his
master’s house, the house of the “great rich Capulet.”
Benvolio hears the name of Rosaline (the woman with whom Romeo thinks he is in love) on the list and
persuades Romeo to attend the feast in order to compare the beauty of Rosaline with all the other beauties in
Verona. Romeo agrees to go, but only to stand and stare at Rosaline.
Analysis
Before the action in Act I begins, Shakespeare uses a chorus to sum up or preview the plot of the play for the
audience. The Chorus presents the Prologue of the play as a sonnet, and it serves three distinct purposes. First,
it serves to introduce an atmosphere of conflict between two families which paradoxically yokes together the
themes of love and violence. Second, it directs the reader’s attention to the important part fate plays in the
lives of the lovers. Third, it points out that the fate of the lovers is not within their control. The paradoxical
theme of love and death, as announced in the Prologue, indicates the fate of the lovers with such words as
“star−crossed,” “fatal loins,” and “death−marked love.” The Prologue also establishes that the lovers are
victims of both their parents’ hate and an aggressive, violent society that regenerates itself with the breeding
of more hate. The Prologue sums up the setting, the plot, the play’s ending, the role of fate in the play’s
development, and the length of time the play will take on the Elizabethan stage.
The plot of Romeo and Juliet only encompasses five days in the lives of the characters, and it is important to
follow closely the day on which each event occurs. Scenes 1 and 2 take place on the first day, and it is a
Sunday at nine in the morning.
In Scene 1, the action of the play begins on the streets of Ve− rona with the servants of the feuding families
instigating a fight. The feud between the families is an ancient, bitter hatred that has affected the entire city
and become a public issue. Even the townspeople of Verona have become involved in the fight. Shakespeare
intended to begin his play with a street fight in order to appeal to the common people and immediately gain
the attention of the groundlings who might become restless quickly.
The quarrel between the servants is an opportunity for Shakespeare to introduce the feud humorously. The
Capulet servants banter as they swagger down Verona’s streets. The play on words (choler−collar) delighted
the Elizabethan audience. Shakespeare relieves the tension brought about by the fiery−tempered Tybalt
through his use of humor. When Lord Capulet requests his long sword, his wife retorts, “A crutch, a crutch!
Why call you for a sword?” She insinuates that because of his age, a crutch might be more appropriate.
Foreshadowing should be noted in the Prince’s speech to the warring families. He states that brawling has
broken out three times. Each fight has disturbed the “quiet of our streets” and caused the citizens of Verona to
begin fighting again. The Prince’s warning words are, “If ever you disturb our streets again, your lives shall
pay the forfeit of the peace.” He decrees that the punishment for future fighting will be death. The Prince is
the voice of authority in Verona. His rule is absolute, and the consequences of his warning will surface in
future scenes as the plot progresses.
The theme of love coexisting with hate or death is echoed in Shakespeare’s word play and is vividly seen in
the form of oxymorons in the following passage: “O brawling love! O loving hate!...O heavy lightness!
serious vanity! / Mis−shapen chaos of well−seeming forms! / Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick
health! / Still−waking sleep....” The concepts of love and death or hate do not naturally go together, but
represent opposites. Romeo uses these images to describe love. His selection of words also echo the strife of
civil violence.
Since tragedy emphasizes character over fate, the characters become responsible for their own destruction.
However, it is fate that manipulates the characters’ decisions and development. Fate leads them into the
Summary and Analysis
16
circumstances that will ultimately help destroy them. Therefore, fate plays a tremendous part in the plot of
Romeo and Juliet. Chance, coincidence, circumstance, and change are all dramatic means by which fate is
given its influence in the play. The connection of character with the deed and the catastrophe sets the course
of the tragedy, and its outcome is inevitable. The role of chance should be noted in such events as Lord
Capulet giving the invitation list to a servant who cannot read, the servant asking Romeo to read the list of
names and then inviting him to the feast, and Rosaline’s appears on the invitation list. Benvolio then
convinces Romeo to attend the ball in order to compare her beauty with the other girls who will be attending.
Romeo’s character develops as he moves from a shallow infatuation for Rosaline to a mature romantic love
for Juliet later in the play. In Act I, Romeo is portrayed as moody and melancholy. His “love” for Rosaline is
not returned by her, and it has become a tormenting sickness to him. Benvolio asks, “What sadness lengthens
Romeo’s hours?” Romeo responds by saying, “Not having that which having makes them short.” His
unhappiness illustrates the emptiness of his love. Romeo, in Scene 2, is suffering and listless in his love for
Rosaline. Benvolio makes a universal observation when he states, “Alas that love, so gentle in his view,
should be so tyrannous and rough in proof.” Benvolio points out that love is gentle in appearance but mean
and rough in reality.
Love is illustrated in two different ways during the play. Not only is there a comparison of youthful, shallow
love to the more mature love shared by Romeo and Juliet, but there is the love that is so overpowering that it
seems to transcend all bounds of convention and reason. This type of love, experienced by Romeo and Juliet,
is the opposite of the restricted, courtly love that is prevalent in fourteenth century Verona. Courtly love was
governed by the customs and traditions of the time. According to custom, the young man must ask the father
for the hand of his daughter in marriage. There was no such thing as a “love” marriage because the marriages
were arranged by the fathers. Girls were betrothed to whomever their fathers chose, usually in alliances for
family betterment. Many times the girl was extremely young. Juliet was not quite fourteen, and her mother
says that she herself married at that age. The arranged marriage was based on family status and kinship. By
asking Lord Capulet for Juliet’s hand in marriage, Paris abides by all the rules of etiquette and is in harmony
with social expectations. On the other hand, Romeo will break all the conventional rules with his
impulsiveness and his own values not subject to time or custom.
Act I, Scenes 3−5: Summary and Analysis
New Characters:
Nurse: Juliet’s nurse who has taken care of her since her infancy
Susan: the Nurse’s daughter who was born on the same day as Juliet but died. She is not in the scene but is
alluded to by the Nurse
Mercutio: a friend to Romeo who loves words
Summary
In Scene 3 Lady Capulet informs Juliet that it is time for her to think of marriage. At first Lady Capulet sends
the Nurse away, but then calls her back, remembering that she knows all their secrets anyway. The Nurse and
Lady Capulet discuss Juliet’s age; and the Nurse recalls exactly the hour of Juliet’s birth because she was born
on Lammas Eve, the same day as Susan, her daughter who died.
Lady Capulet asks Juliet if she is ready to marry. Juliet replies that she has not even thought of marriage. Lady
Capulet tells her about Paris and compares him to a book that only needs a cover (a wife). Lady Capulet
stresses his physical attractiveness and his wealth, which enforce the belief that love dwells in the eye rather
Act I, Scenes 3−5: Summary and Analysis
17
than in the heart. Juliet, always obedient to her parents, agrees to look at him at the feast that night and to
consider his suit.
Scene 4 portrays Romeo and his friends on their way to the ball. The young men are carrying or wearing
masks. Benvolio suggests that they enter quietly, dance, and then leave. Mercutio is a glib speaker and loves
to hear himself talk. He is light−hearted and ridicules Romeo’s love−sickness. He (Mercutio) delivers a
speech about Queen Mab, the queen of fairyland, and what she is able to do to dreamers. Romeo has a
premonition that something is about to happen that will shorten his life, but decides that he must go forward
regardless.
The setting in Scene 5 is within the Capulet house. The servants are busy preparing for the ball. Lord Capulet,
jolly and remembering his youth, welcomes everyone and intimidates the young women into dancing with
him by saying that “Ladies that have their toes unplagued with corns will walk about (dance) with you.” If any
young lady refuses to dance with him, he swears to tell everyone that she has corns on her feet.
Romeo sees Juliet for the first time and falls instantly in love. His tortured love for Rosaline has been replaced
with a blissful love for Juliet. He compares her beauty to the brightness of torches, a rich jewel in an Ethiop’s
ear, and a snowy dove. As he speaks of her beauty, Tybalt recognizes his voice and knows that he is a
Montague. Tybalt sends for his sword only to be stopped by Lord Capulet, who warns him not to disrupt his
ball with a fight. Lord Capulet allows Romeo to remain at the feast because he is behaving like a gentleman,
Verona speaks well of him, and he does not want the joy of his ball disrupted. Tybalt is furious that Romeo is
allowed to stay and storms out. Romeo and Juliet speak to one another using words such as “pilgrim,” “saint,”
“palmers,” “devotions,” and “shrines”—all holy terms. Juliet is called away to her mother, and Romeo asks
the Nurse who she is. He is told that she is a Capulet, and he realizes that his “life is my foe’s debt.” As
Romeo and his friends leave the feast, Juliet asks the Nurse who he is. The Nurse tells her that “His name is
Romeo, and a Montague, / The only son of your great enemy.” It is this knowledge that makes Juliet say, “My
only love sprung from my only hate! / Too early seen unknown, and known too late!”
Analysis
When Juliet’s mother comes to discuss marriage with her and sends the Nurse away, the nurse feels
disappointment and hurt. The Nurse has been more of a mother to Juliet than Lady Capulet. The Nurse and
Lady Capulet are opposites in nature. The nurse exhibits complete ease with Juliet. She is earthy, a little
bawdy, and very frank with her opinions, advice, and feelings. On the other hand, Lady Capulet is stiff and
reserved with her daughter. Juliet responds to the Nurse with gaiety and fondness, while her relationship with
her mother is reserved, respectful, and timid. Juliet is the child the Nurse took in when her own baby died;
thus, a very close relationship has developed between the two. The ties between Juliet and the nurse go far
beyond master and servant. Never discouraged by the Capulet family, the Nurse has taken on the role of
companion, confidant, friend, mother, and co−conspirator.
It should be noted that Juliet is polite and obedient to her parents. Chastity, silence, and obedience were three
virtues expected of both daughters and wives in the Elizabethan period. Juliet’s defiance later in the play
becomes a sign of the unconventionality of her love and its transforming powers. In Act I, Juliet respects the
wishes of her parents and strives to please them, even if it means marrying someone they have chosen for her.
When her mother discusses marriage with her, she is respectful, obedient, but indifferent. Her attitude will
change as the play progresses and she becomes more of a woman.
Elizabethan spectators enjoyed humor, and Shakespeare does not disappoint them. Humor relieves tension
built by intense moments in the script, and it also provides entertainment for the audience, especially the
groundlings who might become restless if the action did not move rapidly. Shakespeare employs humor when
old Lord Capulet, who is reliving his youth, threatens to tell everyone that any young lady who refuses to
dance with him has corns on her feet. It is also used when Benvolio teases Romeo about his love−sickness.
Act I, Scenes 3−5: Summary and Analysis
18
The Nurse’s constant chatter when Lady Capulet tries to talk to Juliet about marriage, a serious subject, also
provides additional humor in these scenes.
While humor and lightheartedness are important, images are equally important in building the total impression
of the play, and these should be noted in the first act. As Lady Capulet appeals to Juliet to consider marriage
to Paris, she uses the comparison of Paris to a fine book. Lady Capulet says, “Read o’er the volume of young
Paris’ face, and find delight writ there with beauty’s pen.... And what obscur’d in this fair volume lies/ Find
written in the margin of his eyes./ This precious book of love, this unbound lover,/ To beautify him only lacks
a cover.” The comparison is very formal and conventional.
The love that Romeo and Juliet share is sprinkled with religious imagery as well as light imagery. The words
that Romeo and Juliet speak to one another upon first meeting are filled with religious meanings and
undertones. The first 14 lines of their conversation is a sonnet consisting of references to worship. Juliet is the
saint, and Romeo is the pilgrim. The imagery is illustrated with the following discussion between Romeo and
Juliet. Romeo says, “If I profane with my unworthiest hand/ This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this:/My lips,
two blushing pilgrims, ready stand/ To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.” Juliet replies, “Good
pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,/ Which mannerly devotion shows in this;/ For saints have hands
that pilgrims’ hands do touch,/ And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss.” The devotion that Romeo and Juliet
show for one another is pure and holy, unlike the infatuation that he had felt so recently for Rosaline.
Throughout the play there is a contrast between light and dark images. Rosaline becomes associated with
darkness and Juliet with lightness. The imagery of light is illustrated by such comparisons as Juliet’s beauty to
the brightness of torches, jewels, and a “snowy dove trooping with crows.”
Mercutio is a key character in the play. He believes in taking action and in being realistic. He entertains his
friends with his nimble wit and use of puns, figurative language, and word play. Mercutio’s speech is both
imaginative and filled with imagery as he describes the work of Queen Mab on sleeping people. He becomes
carried away with his witty fantasy on dreams and has to be stopped by Romeo. Mercutio is used as a foil or
contrast to Romeo. This contrast makes the particular qualities of each character stand out vividly. At this
point in the play, Romeo is focused on his inner life and his emotions, while Mercutio is focused on
entertaining others with his wit. Romeo is melancholy and fatalistic while Mercutio is cheerful and confident.
Through instances of chance, coincidence, circumstance, and change, the theme of fate in the lives of Romeo
and Juliet is continued in Scenes 3, 4, and 5. Romeo was persuaded by Benvolio to attend the ball. He
consents to go only to watch Rosaline, not knowing that he will meet his only true love—Juliet. Juliet, on the
other hand, is present at the ball supposedly observing Paris, a prospective husband. Both Romeo and Juliet
fall instantly in love with one another. It is also fate that Lord Capulet refuses to allow Tybalt to vent his
anger against Romeo, and even allows Romeo to remain at the ball.
Foreshadowing anticipates what will come to pass, and thus reinforces the sense of fate at work in the play.
There are three examples of foreshadowing in this act. The Prince’s speech in Scene 1 warns that death will be
the penalty if the city’s peace is again disturbed by the feuding families. In Scene 4, Romeo has a premonition
of something evil happening, “some consequence, yet hanging in the stars,” but he feels that he can do
nothing to prevent it from occurring. He believes that fate has complete control of his destiny and this
premonition echoes the “star−crossed lovers” mentioned in the Prologue. The third example of foreshadowing
is in Scene 5 when Tybalt delivers his warning as he leaves his uncle’s feast. He states, “I will withdraw; but
this intrusion shall,/ No seeming sweet, convert to bitt’rest gall.” Tybalt vows to seek revenge upon Romeo
for daring to attend the Capulet ball.
As a whole, Act I provides the reader with the introduction or exposition. It creates the tone of the play which
allows the audience to know the dangers associated with a romance between a Capulet and a Montague. It
Act I, Scenes 3−5: Summary and Analysis
19
presents the co−existing concepts of love and hate that are present not only within these two warring families,
but in society at the time. Act I also defines the setting and introduces most of the characters.
Act II, Scenes 1 and 2: Summary and Analysis
Summary
Act II begins with another Prologue in the form of a sonnet which provides the audience with a preview of
what is to come. It states that the shallow love that Romeo had for Rosaline has been replaced with love for
Juliet. “Alike bewitched by the charm of looks” expresses that both Romeo and Juliet are mutually attracted to
one another. His feelings are returned and “passion lends them power.”
Scene 1 takes place outside the walls of Lord Capulet’s house. Romeo feels that he can not leave because his
heart remains where Juliet lives, and he climbs over the wall into the orchard. Romeo’s friends, who do not
know of Romeo’s new love, call for him and try to entreat him to come out of hiding by calling out Rosaline’s
name. Mercutio teases Romeo about Rosaline, not realizing that her name now means nothing to him.
Romeo’s friends give up looking for him and return to their homes.
Scene 2 takes place within the walls of Lord Capulet’s orchard. Romeo watches as Juliet appears at her
window and compares her to light, the East, the sun, and the stars in heaven. As she leans her cheek upon her
hand, he wishes that he could be a glove on the hand that touches her cheek. He listens as she calls out his
name, and he hears her proclaim that it is only his name that is her enemy. Romeo jumps from the bushes and
declares that he will change his name if that is keeping her from loving him. Juliet is startled and surprised
that he has heard her secret thoughts. She asks how he was able to get over the high orchard walls and find
her. To this, Romeo answers that love helped him accomplish both. Juliet is concerned that she has been too
forward with him. She promises that she will be more true than any girl who acts shy and distant. Romeo tries
to swear on the moon that he loves her; however, Juliet begs him not to swear on something that changes so
frequently. The two lovers exchange vows of love, and Juliet asks if his intentions are honorable. If they are,
when should she send someone to get the information concerning the time and place for their wedding.
Romeo tells her to send someone at nine o’clock in the morning for the details. The Nurse calls to Juliet,
interrupting their balcony love scene. As Romeo prepares to leave, Juliet says her famous lines, “Good night,
good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow /That I shall say good night till it be morrow.”
Analysis
These two scenes, which show that Benvolio and Mercutio believe Romeo is still playing a love game, and
which isolate the lovers from family and friends, are probably the most well known scenes in the play. Some
of the most poetic language is found here in the form of images, figures of speech, and the music of the lines.
Romeo’s soliloquy, a dramatic monologue spoken aloud to reveal a the character’s thoughts, is found in the
first part of Scene 2. The monologue conveys an idealized quality of their love and clearly describes his new
feeling for Juliet in terms of brightness. He even states that the brightness of her eyes, if up in heaven, would
light up the skies and make the birds think it was day. He again uses imagery of light and dark when he first
sees Juliet on the balcony and states, “What light through yonder window breaks?/ It is the East, and Juliet is
the sun!/Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,/ Who is already sick and pale with grief.” As Rosaline was
compared to moon and night, Juliet is compared to sun, brightness, warmth, and light.
The famous lines, “O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo?” do not mean she is looking for him, but
that she is asking why he is called Romeo and a Montague. She continues her speech declaring that if he
cannot give up his name, she will give up her Capulet name. She then goes on to state that it is only his name
that is her enemy, but not the person. She compares their love to lightning that ceases almost as soon as it is
Act II, Scenes 1 and 2: Summary and Analysis
20
seen and to a bud that would bloom in time. This contrasting comparison illustrates the new meanings of love
in each of their lives. Romeo is willing to face death in exchange for Juliet’s love. The two lovers will
repeatedly demonstrate that they prefer death to separation. Their entire relationship has been formed quickly.
They have declared their love, exchanged vows, and plan to be married, all in a matter of hours. Possibly
because both lovers realize the dangers of their love, they act quickly and impulsively.
Impulsive behavior is considered to be Romeo’s tragic flaw (a weakness in a character that will cause his
destruction). This flaw is first seen when Romeo quickly forgets Rosaline and turns his attentions to Juliet. He
not only falls deeply in love with Juliet, but plans marriage, all within a matter of hours. While a certain
amount of impetuosity is natural in the young, extremes can prove destructive for the characters.
Act II, Scenes 3 and 4: Summary and Analysis
New Characters:
Friar Laurence: a Franciscan friar who is a priest and a specialist in herbs and medicines. He hopes that the
marriage will end the feud between the two families.
Peter: the Nurse’s servant
Summary
As Scene 3 begins, the reader finds Friar Laurence carrying a wicker basket and selecting herbs, flowers, and
plants to use in making medicine. It is daybreak on Monday, the second day in the lives of the lovers. Friar
Laurence tells how plants contain both poisonous and healing powers. If a plant’s use is abused, the result is
harmful. “Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied, / And vice sometime by action dignified.” He applies this
same lesson to man, who possesses both good and evil within him. If man allows the evil to become
predominant in his life, it will destroy him.
Romeo approaches, and Friar Laurence asks if he is ill or if he has been up all night. Romeo answers that he
has been up all night. To this, the Friar assumes that he has been with Rosaline and committed sin. Romeo
assures him that this is not so and states that he has forgotten Rosaline. He reveals to the Friar that he has been
with the daughter of Lord Capulet, and they have fallen in love and wish to be married today. The Friar scolds
him for professing to love one woman one day and another on the next day. He states, “Young men’s love
then lies /Not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes.” Romeo assures him that they both love one another. The
Friar, hoping to end the feud by marrying the two lovers, agrees to marry them. As Romeo prepares to leave,
the Friar worries about the haste of the marriage and says, “Wisely and slow. They stumble that run fast.”
Scene 4 reveals Mercutio and Benvolio in the streets of Verona. They are discussing their love−sick friend
who did not even go home last night after the ball. Benvolio says that Tybalt has sent a challenge to Romeo
for a duel. Both friends wonder if Romeo will be able to handle a duel because he has been acting so strangely
concerning Rosaline. His love−sickness has made him “already dead: stabbed with a white wench’s black eye;
run through the ear with a love song.”
They are discussing Tybalt’s expert fencing capabilities when Romeo appears. They tease Romeo about
giving them the slip after the ball and about his love for Rosaline. As they banter words back and forth, the
Nurse and her servant come on stage.
Mercutio makes fun of the Nurse with insulting words and she becomes angry. She asks for Romeo, and he
identifies himself to her. She says that Juliet has sent her for the marriage information. Romeo tells the Nurse
that Juliet is to devise a reason to go to chapel that evening, and Friar Laurence will marry them. Romeo then
Act II, Scenes 3 and 4: Summary and Analysis
21
tells her that his servant will give her a rope ladder to take back with her. Romeo will use the ladder to climb
into Juliet’s window later that night.
Analysis
Shakespeare’s introduction of Friar Laurence gathering herbs is especially important to the plot of the play.
Elizabethans were fascinated with potions and poisons, and the Friar’s philosophical discourse on the power
of medicinal plants and the similarities between plants and men enthralled them. The speech at the beginning
of Scene 3 is a soliloquy stressing the dichotomy of nature and man and could be viewed as foreshadowing.
Man, like many plants, does possess the capability of evil as well as good. Even the goodness in Romeo
cannot overshadow his feelings of revenge later in the play. The Friar himself attempts to accomplish good by
agreeing to unite the lovers in marriage, hoping that the alliance will end the feud between the families. Yet,
the Friar acts rashly or impulsively when he agrees to the marriage. His intentions are good and honorable;
however, he acts without considering the possible consequences of a secret marriage between members of
feuding families. He cautions Romeo by saying that “Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast.” Then, he
violates his own admonition by hastily agreeing to the marriage. Friar Laurence’s hastiness is also a flaw
within him that will aid in the destruction of the lovers.
Romeo’s tragic flaw, impulsiveness, is recognized by the Friar who cautions him about acting too hastily. He
reminds Romeo of his infatuation with Rosaline, which is so quickly forgotten. The Friar is an understanding
and broadminded man who only tries to help by agreeing to the marriage.
Mercutio is again illustrated as a man of many words as he teases Romeo about Rosaline and love. As
Mercutio and Benvolio discuss Romeo and the challenge sent by Tybalt, Mercutio is concerned about
Romeo’s ability to fight. “Alas, poor Romeo, he is already dead! / Stabb’d with a white wench’s black eye;
shot through / The ear with a love song; the very pin of his heart / Cleft with the blind bow−boy’s butt−shaft;
and is he / A man to encounter Tybalt?” Mercutio has no idea that Romeo is no longer bothered with his
former infatuation with Rosaline or that he has moved on to a new and deeper relationship with Juliet.
When the Nurse and Peter arrive upon the streets of Verona, Mercutio enjoys ridiculing her as well. She, in
turn, reveals coarseness or vulgarity by saying, “I’ll take him down,/ And ‘a were lustier than he is, and
twenty / Such Jacks; and if I cannot, I’ll find those that shall./ Scurvy knave!” When she talks to Romeo, she
tries to appear more ladylike by saying “I desire some confidence with you.” She should have said,
“conference.” The use of a word that sounds like the one intended but is ridiculously wrong is called a
malapropism and is used by Shakespeare in many of the Nurse’s speeches.
The Nurse’s love for Juliet prompts her to warn Romeo against hurting her. The Nurse plays an important part
in advancing the plot of the play. She is closest to Juliet and enjoys being a part of the romantic plans of
marriage. She is the important messenger of the details of the union, of when and where it will take place.
By the second day, the lovers have met, fallen in love, and plan to marry. The lovers are able to accomplish
this with the help of the Nurse and the Friar, who have become accomplices.
Act II, Scenes 5 and 6: Summary and Analysis
Summary
Scene 5 takes place within the Capulet orchard where Juliet is anxiously waiting for the Nurse to return with
news from Romeo. The Nurse left at nine o’clock and it is now twelve. Juliet wishes that the Nurse were as in
love as she is so that she would be faster in her return, for the waiting is torture for Juliet. The Nurse finally
arrives, and Juliet says, “O Lord, why lookest thou sad? / Though news be sad, yet tell them merrily; / If good,
Act II, Scenes 5 and 6: Summary and Analysis
22
thou shamest the music of sweet news / By playing it to me with so sour a face.” The Nurse replies that her
bones ache and asks that Juliet leave her alone for awhile. Juliet says, “I would thou hadst my bones, and I thy
news.” The Nurse banters with Juliet, claiming to be hot and too tired to talk. Then she tells Juliet that she has
made a good choice. The Nurse finally asks Juliet if she is able to go to shrift today. If so, Romeo is waiting
there to make her his wife.
Scene 6 takes place in Friar Laurence’s cell where both he and Romeo are waiting for the arrival of Juliet. The
Friar hopes that the future will not punish them with sorrow, and Romeo replies that sorrow cannot equal the
joy that one minute in the sight of Juliet gives him. The Friar again cautions Romeo with the words, “Love
moderately; long love doth so; Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow.”
Juliet arrives and they both proclaim their immense love for one another. Juliet says, “But my true love is
grown to such excess / I cannot sum up sum of half my wealth.” At this point, the Friar performs the wedding
ceremony.
Analysis
The love scenes are brought to a resolution as the friar marries the two lovers at the end of Scene 6. The
relationship is further strengthened between Juliet and the Nurse as the nurse teases her about the wedding
plans sent by Romeo. The Nurse is more the mother than Juliet’s real mother—Lady Capulet. The nurse is
immersed in Juliet’s affairs and strives to help her with her plans. She approves of Romeo—his good looks
and his polite mannerisms.
It is almost humorous the way Shakespeare allows the Nurse to torment Juliet with her important news. “Now,
good sweet nurse—O Lord, why look’st thou sad?/ Though news be sad, yet tell them merrily;/ If good, thou
shamest the music of sweet news/ By playing it to me with so sour a face.” The nurse replies, “I am aweary,
give me leave awhile./ Fie, how my bones ache! What a jounce have I had!” Juliet says, “ I would thou hadst
my bones, and I thy news.” As she complains about her weary bones, her tiredness, and her headache, Juliet is
impatient to learn if and when she will be a bride.
The actual marriage ceremony is not included in the text. The beauty of the moment is presented as Romeo
and Juliet exchange their love for one another, and the Friar states, “You shall not stay alone/ Till Holy
Church incorporate two in one.”
There was no such thing as a “love” marriage in the Elizabethan social culture. The marriages were arranged
by the father, and the daughter was expected to be obedient to her parents in their requests. It should be noted
that Paris was courting by the accepted rules of the day. He talked with the father first and asked for Juliet’s
hand in marriage. Paris is patient and waits for an answer from Lord Capulet. Romeo, on the other hand, does
not court by the accepted rules. He has gone behind the father’s back, talked directly with the daughter, and
asks her to marry him. Not only has he not courted by the rules, the lovers are married secretly without the
knowledge or consent of the parents.
It should also be noted that Juliet, like Romeo, is impatient and hasty in her decisions. She has abandoned all
sense of reason and propriety and is ruled entirely by her impulses. She has fallen in love within the space of
only a few hours and plans to marry within one day of meeting Romeo. Her impatience is also shown as she
waits for the Nurse to return from seeing Romeo and again as she inquires about the meeting between the two.
Time, newly calculated or experienced in love’s world is referred to in Juliet’s soliloquy as she waits for the
Nurse to return with the wedding news. Love has made time of great importance. Juliet’s impatience and
hastiness is illustrated as she waits for the Nurse to return from meeting with Romeo. She states, “Therefore
do nimble−pinio’d doves draw Love,/ And therefore hath the wind−swift Cupid wings./ Now is the sun upon
the highmost hill/ Of this day’s journey, and from nine till twelve/ Is three long hours; yet she is not come.”
Act II, Scenes 5 and 6: Summary and Analysis
23
Time has new meaning for Juliet. The love that she feels is unconventional and not a part of the regimented
society of Verona.
Romeo has plunged into his new love impulsively. His passions completely absorb him and he has no
thoughts of the consequences of his love for Juliet. His actions are not guided by reason, but by feelings alone.
His willingness to face death is again acknowledged when Romeo states, “Then love−devouring death do
what he dare—/ It is enough I may but call her mine.” He does not realize that his lines touch upon the theme
of love co−existing with death, or that they foreshadow the future for him and his new love.
Act II is where the complication or rising action takes place. Tension is created because of the conflict created
when the children of two opposing families meet and fall in love. Additional conflicts are presented in the
form of Tybalt challenging Romeo to a duel, and the actual marriage of Romeo and Juliet performed by Friar
Laurence. This marriage intensifies the conflict, which in turn adds to the complication of Act II.
Act III, Scenes 1 and 2: Summary and Analysis
Summary
Scene 1 takes place on the streets of Verona. It is Monday afternoon on day two, about an hour after the
wedding between Romeo and Juliet. Benvolio and Mercutio are walking down one of the streets when
Benvolio suggests that they retire. The day is extremely hot, and if they meet with the Capulets, tempers will
flare and there is bound to be a fight. Mercutio is ready for a fight and hopes to have one. The Capulets enter
led by Tybalt, who inquires about Romeo. Tybalt had challenged Romeo to a duel to get revenge for his
uninvited appearance at the Capulet ball. At this time, Romeo, who is returning from Friar Laurence’s chapel,
approaches the group of men.
Tybalt insults Romeo by calling him a villain, but Romeo responds by saying that Tybalt does not know him.
To this, Tybalt challenges him to draw his sword, but Romeo replies, “I do protest I never injured thee, But
love thee better than thou canst devise.” Mercutio steps in to defend Romeo’s honor and returns Tybalt’s
insult by calling him “Good King of Cats.” Mercutio draws and he and Tybalt begin to fight. Romeo calls for
Benvolio to help him stop the fight. Romeo reaches to push Mercutio away, thereby blocking Mercutio’s
view. Tybalt takes the opportunity to reach under Romeo’s arm and fatally stabs Mercutio. When Romeo is
told that Mercutio is dead, he realizes that his love for Juliet has made him act “effeminately.” When Mercutio
is killed, Romeo’s sense of honor and loyalty leave him no choice but to avenge his friend’s death. He calls to
Tybalt who returns and they fight. Romeo kills Tybalt and immediately realizes that he has murdered his new
bride’s cousin. Benvolio pleads with him to run and hide before he is found. The Prince comes to the public
square and asks Benvolio the cause of the deaths. Benvolio relates the story, and the Prince exiles Romeo
under penalty of death.
Scene 2 takes place late Monday afternoon. Juliet is anxiously waiting for night to come and with it, Romeo.
The Nurse enters carrying the rope ladder and crying, “He’s dead, he’s dead, he’s dead...O Romeo, Romeo! /
Who ever would have thought it? Romeo!” Juliet mistakenly thinks that Romeo is dead. Then the Nurse
begins calling out Tybalt’s name and Juliet believes that both Romeo and Tybalt are dead. The Nurse finally
tells her that Romeo killed Tybalt and has been banished by the Prince. Juliet, at first, feels betrayed by
Romeo. Then her love for Romeo takes away the blame she felt against him. Juliet tells the Nurse that she will
be weeping long after others have stopped weeping for Tybalt. She orders the Nurse to take a ring to Romeo
as a token and to bid him come to her that night for a last farewell.
Analysis
Act I of the play is considered the introduction with Act II being the complication or rising action. Act III of
Act III, Scenes 1 and 2: Summary and Analysis
24
the play is the climax or turning point. The turning point of a play takes place when something happens that
turns the action of the play either toward a happy ending or toward a tragic ending. Romeo’s killing of Tybalt
is the turning point. Because of this act, Romeo will be banished, and there is no chance that he and Juliet will
be able to reveal their marriage to their feuding parents. After the murders take place, the fate of the lovers is
really out of their hands. Circumstances just carry the lovers into destruction and hopelessness.
Many of the characters have unknowingly aided in the rapidly approaching destruction of the lovers. Friar
Laurence has contributed by hastily consenting to marry them without thinking about the consequences. The
Nurse, through love for Juliet and her enjoyment of the “love game,” has also contributed to the tragedy.
Tybalt, because of his temper and unwillingness to have Romeo remain at the Capulet ball, issued a challenge,
which led to the inevitability of a duel. Even Romeo’s preoccupation with Juliet and his love contribute to
reaching the climax of the play. These characters are all involved in the downfall of the lovers. However, none
of them do so diliberately. Their basic character traits cause them to act and react in the manner that they do.
While fate still has some role in these events, it is important to acknowledge that action proceeds inevitably
from the nature of the characters and the conditions surrounding them.
Shakespeare has created three distinct personalities in the characters of Tybalt, Benvolio, and Mercutio. All
the young men involved in the quarrel have contrasting temperaments. Tybalt is arrogant, proud,
bad−tempered, and is called “Good King of Cats.” Benvolio, on the other hand, is reasonable, offers good will
to all, and is peace loving. It is interesting to note that he is the one who always tries to make peace, break up
fights, and console his friends. It is Benvolio who relates to Lord Montague the details of the initial fight in
the beginning of the play, and it is Benvolio who is asked by the Prince to relate the details of this deadly fight
in Act III, Scene 1. Mercutio is portrayed as clever; smart; and a lover of words, puns, and figures of speech.
He is able to joke even about death. When Mercutio is asked about his wound, he replies with a pun, a
humorous use of a word to suggest two or more meanings, by stating, “No, ’tis not so deep as a well, nor so
wide / as a church door; but ’tis enough, ‘twill serve. Ask / for me tomorrow, and you shall find me a grave
man.” He is, in fact, so witty that no one takes him seriously when he is no longer joking.
Fate or chance again comes into play when the Prince gives Romeo his sentence. The law of Verona declares
that if someone sheds blood, then his blood must be shed also. Because Tybalt killed Mercutio, he himself
must be killed, and Romeo accomplished just that. However, Romeo has then shed blood. The Prince could
have Romeo put to death, but he only banishes him.
The Nurse, in Scene 2, again misleads Juliet by not immediately telling her the news of Tybalt and Romeo.
She weeps and cries out names and keeps Juliet guessing what has actually happened. The Nurse does not
intentionally attempt to keep the news from Juliet, but she is overcome with grief. Her nature prevents her
from telling Juliet the news in a calm and straightforward manner. When Juliet first hears that Romeo is
responsible for Tybalt’s death, she feels deceived by his love. She answers the Nurse using oxymorons, “O
serpent heart, hid with a flow’ring face!/ Did ever dragon keep so fair a cave?/ Beautiful tyrant! fiend
angelical!/ Dove−feather’d raven! wolvish−ravening lamb!/ Despised substance of divinest show!/ Just
opposite to what thou justly seem’st—/ A damned saint, an honourable villain!”
Juliet has divided emotions between her cousin and her husband, but when the nurse wishes grief, woes, and
sorrows upon Romeo, Juliet rallies to Romeo’s defense with the words, “Blister’d be thy tongue/ For such a
wish! He was not born to shame. / Upon his brow shame is asham’d to sit;/ For ’tis a throne where honour
may be crown’d/ Sole monarch of the universal earth.” Juliet immediately realizes that her allegiance is with
her husband. Even though she feels betrayed by him, she loves him deeply. Her love for him transcends even
the grief of her cousin’s death.
There is an ironic juxtaposition of love and death in these scenes. The values of love are represented by their
marriage. This new love has caused Romeo to behave differently in the face of Tybalt’s challenge and insults.
Act III, Scenes 1 and 2: Summary and Analysis
25
And, set against this emotional love and well−being is the atmosphere of hate and revenge. After the death of
Mercutio, Romeo realizes that his love has replaced his masculine characteristics. This leaves him feeling that
he betrayed Mercutio by allowing him to fight what should have been his own fight. He states, “O sweet
Juliet,/ Thy beauty hath made me effeminate/ And in my temper soft’ned valour’s steel!” After the death of
his friend, Romeo replaces his effeminate values of love with the masculine values of honor and revenge.
Shakespeare uses a number of allusions in this play, many of which are found in Scene 2 as Juliet waits for
Romeo to come to her by night. Allusion is a reference to something in another work of literature, mythology,
or history, and it is illustrated in the references to Phoebus Apollo, the Greek and Roman god of light.
Many examples of the theme of light and dark recur in these scenes. As Juliet is anxiously waiting for Romeo
to come to her in scene 2, she gives a poetic praise of night when she states, “Come, night; come, Romeo;
come, thou day in night;/ For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night/ Whiter than new snow upon a raven’s
back./ Come, gentle night; come, loving, black−brow’d night;/ Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die,/
Take him and cut him out in little stars,/ And he will make the face of heaven so fine/ That all the world will
be in love with night/ And pay no worship to the garish sun.” The romantic night will give her her love who is
illustrated as the brightness in the realm of blackness. Along with the images of dark and light is the reference
to love and death co−existing side by side. Even in death, Juliet knows that he will continue to light the
heavens in the form of stars.
Act III, Scenes 3 and 4: Summary and Analysis
Summary
Scene 3 takes place on Monday night inside Friar Laurence’s cell. When Romeo fled the streets of Verona
after the killings, he went there to hide. As the Friar approaches, the distraught Romeo asks what the Prince
has decreed as his punishment.
The Friar says, “Not body’s death, but body’s banishment.” To this, Romeo cries that banishment is worse
than death because “There is no world without Verona walls.” Friar Laurence attempts to make Romeo realize
that he could have been sentenced to death, that the decree of banishment means that at least he will live.
Romeo claims that not being able to see and touch Juliet is the same punishment as death. Romeo will not be
consoled and throws himself on the floor in an extravagant display of grief.
The Nurse enters and is stern with Romeo. She says, “Stand up, stand up! Stand, and you be a man. / For
Juliet’s sake, for her sake, rise and stand! / Why should you fall into so deep an O?” At the sound of Juliet’s
name, Romeo inquires about her and asks if she hates him for killing her cousin. The nurse says that she is
weeping and calling out both their names. Romeo grabs a knife, asks where in his anatomy does the name
Montague lodge, and attempts to kill himself by cutting out that part.
The Nurse takes the dagger from Romeo,and the Friar accuses him of being womanish. The Friar gives
Romeo three reasons why he should be glad that he is alive. One, Juliet is alive. Two, Tybalt could have killed
him instead of the other way around. He should be happy that he (Romeo) is alive. Three, the Prince exiled
Romeo instead of ordering his death. Friar Laurence then suggests a plan. Romeo is to visit Juliet that night as
planned earlier. Then, he is to leave the city before daylight and travel to Mantua where he will stay until it is
safe to return to Verona. The Friar will attempt to reconcile the feuding families, reveal the secret marriage,
and obtain the Prince’s pardon for Romeo which will allow him to return to Verona. The Nurse and Romeo
are pleased with the plan. She gives Romeo Juliet’s ring. The Friar warns Romeo once again that he must be
out of the city before the break of day. Friar Laurence will keep in touch with Romeo through his servant and
let him know how things are progressing in Verona.
Act III, Scenes 3 and 4: Summary and Analysis
26
Scene 4 takes place within the Capulet house where the reader finds Paris evidently asking for an answer to
his suit of marriage to Juliet. Lord and Lady Capulet are present, and it is very late on Monday night. Lord
Capulet tells Paris that under the circumstances of the day (the recent killings) they have not had the
opportunity to discuss marriage with Juliet. Lord Capulet, thinking that Juliet will be obedient in his wishes,
decides to go ahead and tell Paris that he will give his consent for them to marry on Thursday of that week.
Lord Capulet asks Lady Capulet to tell Juliet the good news before she retires for bed.
Analysis
Both Romeo and Juliet view his banishment as the worse kind of punishment. When Friar Laurence tells him
the Prince’s decree, Romeo states, “There is no world without Verona walls,/ But purgatory, torture, hell
itself./ Hence−banished is banish’d from the world,/ And world’s exile is death: then banished,/ Is death
mis−term’d; calling death banishment.” Romeo realizes that his name has caused most of the complications in
his life. Had his name not been Montague, he and Juliet could possibly have married with the blessings of
both sets of parents. His anguish over killing Juliet’s cousin causes him to become irrational. He draws his
sword and states, “In what vile part of this anatomy/ Doth my name lodge? tell me that I may sack / The
hateful mansion.”
The Friar keeps Romeo from killing himself, but Romeo’s attempted suicide is another example of his
impulsiveness. He is very emotional and very rash in everything he does. His love with Juliet has been intense
and fast and now appears to be destroyed. The love that he and Juliet share seems to be all consuming for both
of them. It is not a courtly love and is not even considered a part of this world. Their love is so overwhelming
that neither can imagine existing without the other. Death becomes the solution if they cannot be together.
The Nurse and Friar Laurence accept the news of death and banishment differently. True to her character, the
Nurse is incoherent as she relates the news of Tybalt to Juliet; however, the Friar remains calm and
philosophical concerning Romeo. These two characters begin to take on an even greater role in the lives of the
lovers as they attempt to help and comfort them. It is the Friar who comes up with a plan to reunite the lovers
for one last time. Friar Laurence only wants to help the lovers and ultimately end the feuding between the
families. The Friar also realizes that he plays an important part in the consequences of the hastily arranged
marriage performed by him. He must feel responsible for what has ultimately happened. His chances of
reuniting the warring families looks rather bleak at this time.
The plot becomes intricate and complicated when Lord Capulet agrees to the marriage suit of Paris. He tells
Paris, “I will make a desperate tender/ Of my child’s love; I think she will be ruled/ In all respects by me; nay,
more, I doubt it not.” This announcement is not only significant for plot, but is an expression of patriarchal
values, which are set against the freedom of love. Just as Romeo becomes a victim of societal values based on
revenge and honor, so Juliet must submit to patriarchal authority in which women are always in subjection to
their husbands or fathers. He has no idea that Juliet is already married, but assumes that she will be obedient
to him and his requests. The customs of the day required her complete obedience. By arranging the marriage
for Thursday, he unknowingly will force Juliet into more hasty actions. The plans of her father add new
complications to Juliet’s already troubled life.
Dramatic irony occurs when the audience knows that Juliet and Romeo are already married, and the characters
on stage have no idea. Even as Lord Capulet gives his consent to Paris, they do not know that Romeo is with
Juliet in her chamber.
Act III, Scenes 3 and 4: Summary and Analysis
27
Act III, Scene 5: Summary and Analysis
Summary
Scene 5 takes place very early Tuesday morning on day three. Romeo and Juliet have been together for the
night and are discussing whether they hear the nightingale or the lark. The nightingale sings at night, and the
lark sings in early morning. The child in Juliet insists that it is the nightingale, while Romeo insists that it is
the lark, and he must hurry from the city. Juliet persuades him that it is the nightingale, and Romeo decides
that he will stay longer, risking capture and even death. At this point, the more mature and fearful Juliet says
that it is indeed the lark, and he must flee. They bid farewell, and Juliet has a vision that the next time that
they see one another, he will be dead in a tomb.
Romeo leaves and Lady Capulet enters. Juliet is surprised by her mother’s early visit and allows her mother to
believe that her red eyes and wan appearance are the result of her weeping for Tybalt. Lady Capulet tells Juliet
that she is going to send someone to Mantua to give Romeo poison. Then she tells her that she has good news
for her. Her father has agreed to have her marry County Paris at Saint Peter’s Church next Thursday.
Juliet says, “He shall not make me there a joyful bride!” Lord Capulet enters and notices the tears and asks if
Lady Capulet has given her the news. Lady Capulet assures him that she told Juliet the news, and she (Juliet)
wants nothing to do with Paris or the marriage.
Lord Capulet threatens Juliet and tells her that she will marry him or she can beg on the streets for all he cares,
but she will inherit nothing from him. Juliet begs him for a delay, but he is angry and strong willed with her.
He tells her that she will be at the church on Thursday even if he has to drag her there on a hurdle.
Juliet turns to her mother for help, and Lady Capulet says, “Do as thou wilt, for I have done with thee.” When
Lord and Lady Capulet leave, she turns to the nurse for help. The advice of the Nurse is to forget Romeo
because he is banished. She recommends that Juliet marry Paris, who is “a lovely gentleman.” To this advice,
Juliet tells the Nurse that she is going to Friar Laurence’s cell to make confession and be forgiven for her sins.
Juliet is really going to seek his advice. If the Friar can not help her out of this situation, she has the power to
kill herself rather than marry Paris.
Analysis
Within a matter of two days, Juliet has grown from an obedient child into a willful young woman. As morning
comes after their wedding night together Juliet at first refuses to believe that it is the lark singing, because she
cannot bear to have Romeo leave her. Knowing that the lark sings at daybreak, and the nightingale sings at
night, she wants to forestall daybreak when she knows that Romeo must leave. When Romeo says, “Let me be
taken, let me be put to death,” she becomes practical and aware of the danger. She then considers his safety
before her desires and knows that it is time for him to leave. As Romeo leaves and she is looking down at him
in the dawn of light, she says, “O God, I have an ill−divining soul!/ Methinks I see thee, now thou art below,/
As one dead in the bottom of a tomb;/ Either my eyesight fails, or thou look’st pale.” Her premonition is a
foreshadowing of the events to come.
The discussion between Lord and Lady Capulet and Juliet is extremely revealing. It allows the reader to see
the coldness that exists between Juliet and her mother. There seems to be no closeness whatsoever. When
Lady Capulet tells Juliet’s father that she wants nothing to do with the marriage to Paris, Lord Capulet
becomes angry. Juliet’s mother tells him that “I would the fool were married to her grave!” Little did she
know that she was foreshadowing the future for her daughter. Juliet pleads with her mother to help her delay
the marriage, and her mother turns from her. Juliet attempts to persuade Lord Capulet to delay the marriage
which causes him to become almost violent with her. He says, “Hang thee, young baggage! Disobedient
wretch! / I tell thee what—get thee to church a Thursday / Or never after look me in the face. / Speak not,
Act III, Scene 5: Summary and Analysis
28
reply not, do not answer me! / My fingers itch.” He goes on to rant and rave that she can beg, starve or die in
the streets because he wants nothing to do with her if she does not consent to the marriage to Paris. He uses
such insulting names as “greensickness,” “carrion,” “baggage,” and “tallow−face” to describe his daughter.
These are hardly words of endearment coming from her father. He cannot comprehend her disobeying him
and is outraged at her sudden defiance.
Juliet delivers a brief soliloquy at the end of Act III as she expresses anger with the Nurse and announces that
she will go consult with the Friar. Up until this point, the Nurse has been Juliet’s confidant, counselor, and
conspirator in her plans; however, her advice to marry Paris and forget Romeo has caused Juliet to seek help
from someone else. By advising Juliet to forget Romeo and marry Paris, the Nurse totally loses Juliet’s
confidence. Juliet will no longer confide in the Nurse or trust her. She has also enabled Juliet to become more
independent and self−reliant.
By the end of Act III, both Romeo and Juliet have changed a great deal. Both lovers realize that the love that
they have for one another is beyond this world of customs and parental involvement. Their love goes even
beyond death, and they never waver in their fidelity. Rashness is still considered Romeo’s tragic flaw. It is not
his desire for revenge but the rashness of the revenge that was his undoing. Juliet’s changes are demonstrated
in her new determination and strength of character as she goes alone to Friar Laurence to seek advice.
Act IV, Scenes 1−3: Summary and Analysis
Summary
As scene 1 opens, Paris is found at Friar Laurence’s cell consulting with him about his wedding plans. The
friar, who knows why this marriage can never take place, says that it is rushing to have the marriage on
Thursday. Paris tells Friar Laurence that they have decided to go ahead and marry because Juliet has been
weeping uncontrollably, and her father is worried about her. Lord Capulet, not knowing that she weeps for
Romeo, believes that the marriage will help her get over Tybalt’s death more quickly. Juliet arrives and Paris
greets her as his wife. She responds coolly but cordially. After Paris tells her that he will come for her early
Thursday morning, he departs. Juliet entreats the Friar to “come weep with me—past hope, past care, past
help!”
The Friar tells her that he already knows the circumstances. Juliet explains that she would do anything to get
out of the marriage to Paris and pleads for the friar to help her. She also tells him that if he cannot help, she
will kill herself rather than marry Paris.
The Friar, realizing that she is serious about her feelings, tells her that he has a plan. She must go home,
consent to marry Paris, and then she is to sleep alone on that Wednesday night before the wedding is to take
place. When she is in bed, she is to drink a potion that he has made to induce sleep. The sleep will be so deep
that no pulse can be found, and her body will be cold to the touch. The color will leave her face and she will
appear as dead. She will stay in this condition 42 hours and then will awaken as from a pleasant sleep. When
her family finds her early Thursday morning, they will take her to the family tomb where she will rest with
Tybalt and those ancestors who have died. He, the Friar, will send letters to Romeo telling him of the plan,
and he will be in the tomb waiting for her to awaken. Then, the two of them will go to Mantua.
Scene 2 finds Lord Capulet, the Nurse, and servants preparing for the wedding. Juliet returns from Friar
Laurence’s cell and goes directly to her father where she begs for his forgiveness. She says, “I beseech you!
Henceforward I am ever ruled by you.” Lord Capulet is so happy that she has returned to her original obedient
nature that he sends for Paris to tell him that they can marry Wednesday instead of waiting for Thursday. Lord
Capulet tells Lady Capulet to help Juliet, and he plans to stay up all night directing the servants in making
Act IV, Scenes 1−3: Summary and Analysis
29
preparations for the wedding that will take place in the morning, a day earlier than originally planned.
Scene 3 takes place within Juliet’s chamber. She tells her mother that she needs no further help and that she
needs to be left alone. As Juliet prepares to drink the potion, she becomes frightened and worries that if the
potion does not work, she will have to marry Paris in the morning. To insure that this does not happen, she
places her dagger beside her. A second worry is that possibly the potion is really poison, because the Friar
might be afraid for his life since he was the one who married her to Romeo. A third worry is that she might
awaken before Romeo gets there and because there is no air to breathe, she will suffocate. Her fourth worry is
that she will awaken in the tomb, but the terror of the vault will be too much for her and she will lose her mind
and kill herself.
Then she thinks she sees Tybalt’s ghost coming for Romeo. It is this sight that enables her to summon up the
courage to drink the potion.
Analysis
Act IV is considered the falling action of the play. The action moves swiftly and logically toward the tragedy
that occurs at the end of the play. The consequences or forces that oppose the protagonists bring the ultimate
end closer. The recent events have propelled the characters in one direction and the results are almost
inevitable at this point. The tempo of the action increases from this act until the end of the play.
Juliet is experiencing internal conflict throughout this act and especially in Scenes 1, 2, and 3. She has
developed from a child into a woman who has fallen in love and married. She must act without Romeo and
without the assistance of the nurse. She has disobeyed her parents by refusing to marry Paris, and lied about
her reason for going to Friar Laurence’s cell. She knows that she can not legally or morally marry Paris. Yet,
she cannot tell her father about her marriage to Romeo. She also knows that by giving the impression of
conformity and submitting to the wishes of her father, she can avoid any more confrontations and carry out
the plan devised by the Friar. Her sense of betrayal by the nurse’s advice to marry Paris has caused Juliet to
feel that she has lost her closest friend and confidant. Juliet realizes that she must rely upon her own decisions
and intuitions from now on. When she returns from Friar Laurence’s cell and prepares to drink the potion, she
is again struck with internal conflict. Her desperation is demonstrated by the fact that she places a dagger
beside her in case the potion does not work. Rather than marry Paris, she will choose death.
Friar Laurence has become a pivotal character in the plot of the play. Some of his actions have been hasty and
without proper reasoning. However, the Friar only wants good to come of his decisions. The reader was
prepared for the use of the Friar’s knowledge of herbs and plants from Act II, Scene 3. This knowledge will be
used in the potion Juliet is to drink. He has become a confidant to not only Romeo, but also Juliet. He is
patient with the lovers as they threaten suicide in place of being apart. He has kept them from suicide and
helped to find a solution to the dilemma that surrounds them. He is a neutral character who tries to end the
violence in his society; however, his plans will cause the deaths of a number of characters.
Scene 2 contrasts drastically with the preceding one which was centered upon desperation, talk of death,
conflict, and trouble. In this scene, there are happy preparations for a celebration of marriage. It is a domestic
scene full of excitement and promises of new beginnings. It is dramatic irony that the audience or reader
knows that because of the sleeping potion Juliet will not be a part of the joy, preparations, or celebration.
Juliet’s final speech before she drinks the potion is a good example of the Shakespearean soliloquy. She
deliberates its pros and cons before drinking the liquid. She is afraid that the potion will not work. She fears
that Friar Laurence has given her poison to cover his part in the secret marriage to Romeo. She is afraid of
awakening in the burial vault before Romeo arrives and not being able to breathe, and finally, she is afraid of
going mad amid the horrors of the skeletons and smells that will surround her.
Act IV, Scenes 1−3: Summary and Analysis
30
Act IV, Scenes 4 and 5: Summary and Analysis
Summary
Scene 4 takes place in a hall of the Capulet’s house. Lord and Lady Capulet, the Nurse, and numerous
servants are busily preparing for the wedding. The Capulets and their servants are making jokes, not realizing
that Juliet is in a deathlike trance in her room. She has risked her life in order to avoid what her family is
celebrating. The curfew bell has just chimed three o’clock on Wednesday morning. Lord Capulet hears the
music made by Paris and his company as they come for Juliet, and sends the Nurse to awaken and prepare her
for the wedding.
Scene 5 is within Juliet’s chamber. The Nurse comes into her room calling for her to get up because Paris is
arriving. She calls her a “slugabed,” a sleepy head, and draws back the curtains surrounding her bed. She
believes that Juliet is dead and begins screaming. Lord and Lady Capulet rush into the room. Lord Capulet
looks at her and exclaims, “She’s cold, / Her blood is settled, and her joints are stiff; / Life and these lips have
long been separated. / Death lies on her like an untimely frost.” The Friar, Paris, and his musicians enter, and
Lord Capulet tells them that Juliet is dead, and “Death is my son−in−law, Death is my heir; / My daughter he
hath wedded.” The love that the Capulets have for their daughter is indicated in the following lines:
“Accursed, unhappy, wretched, hateful day!/ Most miserable hour that e’er time saw/ In lasting labour of his
pilgrimage!/ But one, poor one, one poor and loving child,/ But one thing to rejoice and solace in,/ And cruel
death hath catch’d it from my sight!” The anguish seems to be genuine even though earlier in the play Juliet’s
parents had wished that she “were married to her grave.” The lines that Lord and Lady Capulet say are
repetitive and exaggerated. Their grief does not raise sympathy in the audience or reader because of the
knowledge that Juliet is not really dead.
The Friar, knowing that she is not really dead, attempts to comfort them by saying that they have done their
part. Now, she belongs solely to Heaven. He consoles them and tells them to dry their eyes for she is better off
in heaven. Lord Capulet decrees that everything that was to celebrate a wedding is to be changed befitting a
funeral. The happiness of the wedding music will be changed to “melancholy bells.” The hymns will change
to dirges, and the bridal flowers will now become funeral flowers.
The scene ends with a comic discussion between the musicians and Peter.
Analysis
Compared to the volatile scene when Juliet refuses to marry Paris, Lord and Lady Capulet behave quite
differently when they believe that she is dead. Lady Capulet’s last words in Act III were “I would the fool
were married to her grave!” Little did she realize that she was foreshadowing the future for her daughter. Lord
Capulet, also, changed during the course of the play. In Act I, Lord Capulet tells Paris that “She is the hopeful
lady of my earth.” All his other children are dead and his life revolves around her; yet, he refuses to consider
her feelings. Act III illustrates the anger and vengeance he threatens to take out on her if she does not marry
Paris, and then, in Act IV, he swings full circle back to the doting and loving father. The Capulets’ flaws
center on their egos. They become too assured that they alone know what is best for their daughter. They do
not have a close relationship with her and communicate poorly. In spite of these character flaws, they do love
their only remaining child, and want what they believe to be the best for her.
It is interesting to watch the Friar lovingly and patiently console the parents because he knows all the
circumstances. Some critics have wondered if the friar might be afraid of admitting his part in the uniting of
the lovers because of the feud between the families.
There are many instances of dramatic irony in this act. Dramatic irony is a contrast between the audience’s
understanding of words and actions and the character’s understanding. Juliet’s meeting with Paris in Friar
Act IV, Scenes 4 and 5: Summary and Analysis
31
Laurence’s cell is one example. Juliet is there to seek help in avoiding the very marriage that Paris is there
trying to arrange. Another example are the wedding preparations by Lord Capulet. The Capulets and their
servants are making jokes and busily preparing for the wedding, and the bride lies in her room in a deathlike
trance. He is preparing for gaiety and happiness, and Juliet has taken a deathlike sleeping potion. The wedding
arrangements will change into funeral arrangements. The ironic imagery of Juliet as the bride of death is
illustrated in the lines, “The night before thy wedding−day/ Hath Death lain with thy wife. There she lies,/
Flower as she was, deflowered by him./ Death is my son−in−law, Death is my heir;/ My daughter he hath
wedded.” The emphasis on this tragic reversal anticipates the ending and is an example of tragedy as a
reversal of expectations.
The final scene with Peter and the musicians provides the audience with comic relief. These men are not
involved in Juliet’s death and illustrate the fact that ordinary life goes on in spite of tragedy. Peter, who is
himself a servant, enjoys making the musicians subservient to him.
Act V, Scenes 1 and 2: Summary and Analysis
New Characters:
Balthasar: a servant to Romeo
Apothecary: a druggist in Mantua who is extremely poor
Friar John: a Franciscan friar who is a friend to Friar Laurence
Summary
Romeo is waiting for Balthasar to arrive with news from Verona. He is in Mantua and it is Thursday. He has
had a dream that Juliet finds him dead, and she brings him back to life as an emperor with her kisses.
Balthasar arrives telling Romeo that he saw Juliet buried in the Capulet tomb. Romeo says, “Then I defy you,
stars!” and makes a hasty plan. He orders Balthasar to hire some fast horses and bring him ink and paper.
Romeo inquires if there is a letter from the friar, and when the servant answers negatively, Romeo orders him
to get what he demanded.
Romeo remembers an Apothecary in Mantua who appears to be extremely poor. Romeo decides to go to him
and try to buy poison. It is against the law to sell poison in Mantua, but Romeo thinks he can sway the
Apothecary to sell it to him because of his (the Apothecary’s) extreme poverty.
Romeo offers the apothecary 40 ducats or gold pieces for the poison. At first, the man refuses to sell him the
liquid, but reconsiders after Romeo reminds him of his extreme poverty. The Apothecary tells Romeo how to
administer the poison, and Romeo replies, “There is thy gold—worse poison to men’s souls. / Doing more
murder in this loathsome world, / Than these poor compounds that thou mayst not sell. / I sell thee poison;
thou hast sold me none.” After buying the poison, Romeo plans to go to Juliet’s grave and die with her.
Scene 2 takes place in Friar Laurence’s cell where he is welcoming Friar John from Mantua. Friar Laurence
asks if there is a letter from Romeo, and Friar John tells him that he was not able to go to Mantua after all.
While he was visiting the sick, the city authorities were afraid that the sickness might be the plague and
quarantined the house. He was not allowed to leave the house or give the letter to a messenger to return to the
Friar. Friar Laurence realizes that Romeo knows nothing of the plan to meet Juliet in the tomb and fears the
worst. He asks Friar John to bring him a crow bar quickly, and he prepares to leave for the Capulet tomb
where Juliet will be waking up within the next three hours.
Analysis
Act V, Scenes 1 and 2: Summary and Analysis
32
Events involving chance, circumstance, and coincidence in tragedy reinforce the notion of fate, and are
considered beyond human control and contrary to men’s best intentions. It is a coincidence that there happens
to be a poor Apothecary who consents to sell Romeo the poison even if it is against the law. It is a matter of
chance that the important letter relating the plans for Romeo and Juliet was not delivered by Friar John. The
need for the delivery is coincident with the delay caused by the quarantine. Coincidence is also involved when
Balthasar reports Juliet’s death to Romeo before a true report is received from the friar. Romeo has no way of
knowing that she is not dead. From this false knowledge, Romeo, being impetuous, acts too hastily and rushes
to the Apothecary to purchase poison in order that he might die with Juliet. Through fate or the use of chance,
circumstance, or coincidence, the resolution or conclusion of Act V is now inevitable.
Dreams and premonitions in the play, like foreshadowing, intensify the work of fate. Romeo has a dream of
death in which he says,”My dreams presage some joyful news at hand;/ My bosom’s lord sits lightly in his
throne;/ And all this day an unaccustom’d spirit/ Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts./ I dreamt
my lady came and found me dead/ Strange dream, that gives a dead man leave to think/ And breathed such
life with kisses in my lips,/ That I revived, and was an emperor.” His dream of death is soon to be fulfilled and
Juliet will kiss him on the lips. She will not awaken him, but she will join him in death.
The sickness that was so feared by the authorities that it caused them to quarantine Friar John was the bubonic
plague. This plague killed millions of people in Europe, and its causes were not understood by the people. It is
ironic that the authorities, through a fear of death by the plague, kept Friar John from delivering the letter,
because the undelivered letter caused many deaths not related to the plague.
Romeo always considered suicide the final solution if he cannot live with Juliet. Thus, it is no surprise that,
upon learning of Juliet’s “death,” he immediately goes to purchase poison. After Romeo buys the poison he
says, “Come, cordial and not poison, go with me/ To Juliet’s grave; for there must I use thee.” Romeo’s verbal
irony is that the poison, because it will reunite him with Juliet, is really a restorative medicine. It was believed
that a “cordial” was a kind of medicine that restored the heartbeat.
Act V, Scene 3: Summary and Analysis
New Characters:
Page: a servant to Paris
Summary
Scene 3 takes place in the churchyard where the Capulet monument is located. Paris and the Page are outside
the tomb of Juliet. Paris instructs the page to put out the torch and stand guard while he enters the tomb. The
Page is to whistle if anyone approaches. As Paris begins to enter the tomb the Page whistles, indicating that
someone is near. Paris watches as Romeo and Balthasar approach. Romeo instructs Balthasar to give a letter
to his father the next morning and not to intervene with his purpose. Romeo tells Balthasar that the reason he
is at the tomb is to look upon Juliet’s face and to remove a ring from her finger. Balthasar is then instructed to
leave the churchyard under the penalty of death by Romeo if he fails to obey him.
Balthasar does not believe Romeo’s reasons for being at the tomb and fears for his master. Because of his
concern for Romeo, Balthasar hides nearby rather than leave the churchyard.
As Romeo enters the tomb, Paris recognizes him as Romeo, the one who killed Tybalt and caused Juliet so
much grief. Paris believes that he has come to the tomb to do some “vile outrage” to the bodies of Tybalt and
Juliet. He steps forward and tries to prevent Romeo from entering the tomb. Because Paris has no torch,
Romeo does not recognize him. They fight, and Paris is killed. As they fight, the Page runs for help. After
Paris falls fatally wounded, Romeo looks upon his face and realizes that it is Paris. He remembers Balthasar
Act V, Scene 3: Summary and Analysis
33
telling him something about Juliet being promised to marry Paris, so he decides to bury him also in the tomb
with Juliet. Romeo drags Paris’ body into the Capulet tomb and goes to Juliet’s side.
As he embraces Juliet, Romeo talks about her beauty even in death. Her lips and cheeks are crimson, and he
notices that even Death cannot take away her beauty. He embraces her, kisses her one last time, and joins her
in death by drinking the poison.
At this point, Friar Laurence enters the churchyard and stumbles upon Balthasar who is hiding. Balthasar tells
the friar that Romeo has been in the tomb about half an hour and he is afraid. The Friar is afraid that
something has happened and rushes into the tomb. He finds the bodies of Paris and Romeo. Juliet is just
beginning to stir, and upon recognizing the friar, she asks about Romeo. The Friar hears the night guard
coming and knowing that he could be implicated in the murder, becomes frightened and begs Juliet to
accompany him outside. He tells her that their plans have gone awry and Paris, as well as Romeo, are dead.
He promises to take her to a place where nuns live. Juliet refuses to leave and the friar, rather than be
discovered, does not even stay to help Juliet, but flees.
Juliet notices the cup in Romeo’s hand and knows that it is poison that has ended her lover’s life. She tries to
drink just one drop to kill herself, but she finds nothing left in the cup. She kisses him and realizes that his lips
are still warm. Upon hearing the watchmen approaching, she takes Romeo’s dagger and kills herself.
The watchmen enter the tomb and find the bodies of Paris, Romeo, and Juliet, who supposedly died two days
ago. Yet, her body is warm and newly dead. The Capulets and the Montagues are sent for as the watchmen
begin to bring in suspects. One watchman brings Balthasar into the tomb, and another watchman finds Friar
Laurence. The Prince arrives and inquires about the deaths. When the Capulets arrive, Lord Capulet notices
that Romeo’s dagger is the one that was used to kill his daughter and assumes that Romeo is responsible for
her death. Lord Montague enters and tells the Prince that grief over Romeo’s exile has also caused Lady
Montague’s death.
The Prince demands that the cries of vengeance be stopped until the truth can be discovered. He orders that
the “parties of suspicion” be brought forward. The Friar admits to being the most suspected because he was
caught leaving the churchyard carrying instruments to break into a tomb. Finally the Friar is forced to relate
the entire story concerning Romeo and Juliet. He tells how they were married and her father demanded that
she marry Paris. He tells of the plan for Juliet to drink the sleeping potion, be reunited with Romeo after 42
hours, and the accidental quarantine that prevented his letter from reaching Romeo. The Friar accepts the
responsibility for what has happened and says, “Let my old life be sacrificed some hour before his time / Unto
the rigor of severest law.” The Prince says that Friar Laurence is a holy man and turns to question Balthasar.
Balthasar tells the Prince how he brought news of Juliet’s death to Romeo in Mantua. He relates how they
arrived at the tomb and Romeo gave him the letter that was to have gone to Lord Montague the next morning.
The Page is then instructed to tell his side of the story. He relates how his master came to Juliet’s grave to
bring flowers and weep. Paris was startled when Romeo approached the tomb, and fearing that Romeo wanted
to do some damage to the bodies, tried to arrest him. Paris and Romeo fought and Paris was killed.
After reading the letter, the Prince declares that all the Friar had said was true. Because of the hatred between
the Capulets and Montagues, both sides have lost many loved ones. The Capulets and Montagues shake hands
and decide to build gold statues in honor of their children. Their children were “poor sacrifices of our enmity.”
The play ends with the Prince saying that there was never a story sadder than the one of Romeo and Juliet.
Analysis
The conclusion or catastrophe takes place in Scene 3 of the play. The conclusion quickly draws to a close as
Act V, Scene 3: Summary and Analysis
34
almost all the characters are on stage for various reasons. This last scene reveals one death not witnessed and
three that are performed on stage. The predictions issued at the beginning of the play by the Chorus have all
been fulfilled. Each scene contributes to the plot and focuses on the lovers’ plight. This scene contains more
examples of fate or coincidence and how it controlled the lives of the lovers.
Some illustrations of the workings of fate through chance or coincidence are Romeo’s suicide just before
Juliet awakens, Friar Laurence arriving just a little too late to save him, and even Juliet’s death. If Romeo had
not been so hasty, he would have realized that Juliet was not dead. Just a small hesitation on his part would
have allowed her to awaken. Again, Romeo and Juliet’s hastiness play a part in their destruction. The deaths
are not only a testimony to the force of fate working through chance, coincidence, change or reversal,
circumstance, and personal flaws, but to the power of their love.
Again, light transforms the darkness when he first sees Juliet in the tomb and says, “For here lies Juliet, and
her beauty makes/ This vault a feasting presence full of light.” The love that they saw in one another’s
presence was a source of warmth and light. The theme of light and dark is present even in the last scene of the
play.
Irony also plays a part as the families honor the lovers in death although they would have refused to recognize
their love while they were alive. Romeo and Juliet lived in a culture that was unsympathetic toward love and
idealism. The violence and hatred present in their society naturally bred tragedy.
Romeo’s speech as he opens the Capulet tomb contains many examples of metaphorical language. He says,
“Thou detestable maw, thou womb of death, / Gorged with the dearest morsel of the earth, / Thus I enforce
thy rotten jaws to open, / And in despite I’ll cram thee with more food.” Romeo is comparing the tomb to a
detestable maw, and a womb of death. The dearest morsel of the earth is referring to Juliet and the jaws refer
to the mouth of the tomb itself. His death fulfills the reference of cramming the tomb with more food. Death is
personified as her love—an image foreshadowed earlier.
In the final scene, the Prince says, “See what a scourge is laid upon your hate, / That heaven finds means to
kill your joys with love.” It is ironic that love could kill joy, but the love shared by Romeo and Juliet
ultimately ended their lives. Romeo and Juliet were the “joys” of the Montague and Capulet families. It was
because of the hate between the families that the children were afraid to make their love known.
One of the causes of this tragedy is that the flaw of impulsiveness is shared by many of the characters. Friar
Laurence, Tybalt, Lord Capulet, Romeo, Mercutio, Juliet, and even the Nurse all contribute to the tragedy
through impulsiveness, which is the real villain in the play. Shakespeare illustrated the rashness in the old and
young alike in a universal way. Chance or fate plays a role in this tragedy, but the importance of character and
the actions stemming from it are equally important. The connection of character with his deed and then to the
tragedy sets the course for the catastrophe, and its outcome is inevitable.
The universality of Shakespeare’s plays make the reader or audience realize that time does not alter human
nature, and Romeo and Juliet have become symbols of youthful romance. Hate breeds violence and death, and
love can transcend all earthly rules and boundaries.
Critical Commentary
Critical Commentary
35
Act I Commentary
Opening Prologue: The first act prologue not only reveals what will happen during the course of the play, but
also some of the major dichotomies. The opening line shows us that the Capulet and Montague houses are,
although at odds, equal in their aristocratic status. It was considered "fashionable" in the Renaissance for
aristocratic families to have feuds, but they were not to engage in public fighting, a taboo which is broken by
the Capulets and the Montagues. However, line 4 indicates that these equal families are in an ungoverned
situation where no rules will be obeyed, which is why they are able to fight. The Chorus reveals one of the
most important themes of the play in line 5−8, which is that Romeo and Juliet are destined not only to love
each other, but to die, which will end the feud. The fact that Shakespeare tells us the end of the play before it
even begins is intentional—this creates a tension between what we as the audience know must happen, and
what could have happened if the characters had acted differently. Thus the theme of fate versus free will
emerges: do Romeo and Juliet die because it was their destiny, or do they die because of their actions and the
actions of those around them? The third major point that surfaces in the opening prologue is one of extremes.
There is extreme hatred between the Capulet and Montague families. The only solution to this situation is,
according to line 11, the "end" of Romeo and Juliet. Thus we see a situation in which one extreme, hatred, is
ended by its opposite: love.
Scene i: This scene is really a compilation of three mini−scenes. The first mini−scene begins with the fighting
between the servants, after some brief comic relief through the jokes of Sampson and Gregory. The fact that
the servants from each household are fighting further demonstrates that this feud has gone too far—so far, in
fact, that Benvolio, who is a Montague, is prevented from breaking up the servants' fight by Tybalt, who,
although Lady Capulet's nephew, is not really a Capulet. Even the Prince has very little control of the
situation, which is evident in line 81 when fighting continues despite the fact that he has ordered them to stop.
Escalus' weakness as ruler is revealed in his speech, where he notes that this is the third time that public
fighting has erupted between the two families. His threat to execute any member of either family in lines
94−95 is fairly meaningless because he has done little to prevent their previous outbreaks, and Escalus does
indeed fail to make good on his threat in Act III, scene 1. This lack of order in Verona contributes to the
violence that occurs.
In the next section of the scene, we see Montague, Lady Montague, and Benvolio discussing Romeo, whose
depression has attracted their attention. The Montagues have asked Romeo why he is so sad, but have gotten
no response. This is typical for the Renaissance—as aristocrats, the Montagues are not really expected to have
much to do with his upbringing, and therefore do not understand him much. However, the fact that Romeo
keeps so much from his parents will lead to his death because he is not accustomed to confiding in the
Montagues. Romeo does, however, confide in Benvolio in the third section of the scene. Romeo has been
pining away for Rosaline, whose desire to lead a chaste life leads him to associate her with the moon goddess
Diana in line 207. This association is important, as he will call Juliet the sun in Act II, scene 2. This
comparison illustrates the dichotomy of light and dark that will run throughout the play. We also see one of
Romeo's major character traits in this scene through his depression. Romeo is the embodiment of the
Renaissance ideal of courtly love—he is fully consumed by love, and is devastated by Rosaline's rejection of
it. This leads him to keep to the shadows and avoid the sun (note the light/dark theme at work). Romeo's
plethora of oxymorons ("brawling love," "loving hate," "heavy lightness," etc.) are a reflection of his mastery
of this concept. Despite this, however, Benvolio (who is no courtly lover) promises to snap Romeo out of his
depression, which Benvolio will accomplish by showing Romeo other women. Benvolio's statement at the end
of the scene, "I'll pay that doctrine, or else die in debt," is prophetic—Benvolio will indeed show Romeo a girl
who will make him forget all about Rosaline (l. 236).
Scene ii: In the beginning of the scene, Capulet is still consumed with thoughts of Montague, but decides that,
being as old as they are, avoiding confrontation should not be difficult. As long as things stay equal (because
Act I Commentary
36
both Montague and Capulet are equally bound to fulfill the order of the Prince), Capulet is willing to accept
the command. Paris, a kinsman of the Prince, then reminds Capulet of his desire to marry Juliet. Through
Capulet's speech, we learn that, like the Montagues, Capulet really does care about his daughter's well being.
Although the marriage would no doubt benefit him, Capulet is more concerned with Juliet's age (lines 10 and
11), her health (line 13), and her happiness (line 17), than he is about the possible profits to be made by an
alliance with the royal family. The consideration and attachment of both sets of parents is notable in a time
when children were often used as a commodity to advance the interests of the family in general. This part of
the scene also introduces us to Paris, who will function as a foil character to Romeo. Like Romeo, Paris is a
handsome, well−spoken aristocrat who is interested in a wife. Ironically, Capulet gives Paris the same advice
Benvolio gives Romeo by suggesting that Paris may see some women at the forthcoming party that may
interest him more than the current object of his affections. However, unlike Romeo, Paris' affections for his
first choice remain firm throughout the play.
Scene iii: In this scene, we are finally introduced to Juliet, who is in her home helping to prepare for the party
later that night. Through the Nurse's reminiscences about Juliet, we learn that despite having fallen and
bumping her head as a toddler, Juliet was smart enough to acknowledge the Nurse's husband's suggestion that
she should fall backward instead of forward in order to avoid doing the same thing again. Her ability to
overcome her feelings will aid her later in the play. Once the Nurse's jokes are over, Lady Capulet tells Juliet
"the good news"—that Paris wants to marry her. Juliet quickly replies that she has never thought about
marriage, despite the fact that many girls younger than she already have children (Lady Capulet herself had
already borne Juliet at Juliet's age). Lady Capulet tries to talk Juliet into wanting Paris, but Juliet, being
intelligent despite her lack of experience, replies in line 97 that she will try to like him, but there are no
guarantees (people cannot control what appeals to them, of course). Ironically, it is this inability to control
love that causes the downfall of Romeo and Juliet.
Scene iv: Although the main action of this scene involves Romeo, Benvolio, and Mercutio (another of the
Prince's kinsmen) heading to the Capulet party, the major importance of the scene lies in the characters'
discussions of love and dreams. Romeo, as a courtly lover, is "weighed down" by his unrequited love and
wants to carry the torch (both literally and figuratively). This leads to Mercutio's jokes about love, which he
equates only with sexual desire. Unsuccessful in deterring Mercutio, Romeo then tries to talk his friends out
of making him go to the masque because he had a bad dream. This introduces an important aspect of
Romeo—he professes a great belief in dreams and in fate throughout the play. Romeo's dream tells him that
attending the party will lead to his untimely death in lines 106−112, but, despite this, he chooses to attend the
party. This is typical for Romeo, who constantly refers to fate as the controlling force in his life, but
constantly acts against what he believes to be destined, which ultimately results in his death. Mercutio
attempts to assuage Romeo's fears by talking about Queen Mab, the fairy who is responsible for dreams.
When Mercutio gets caught up in his description of Queen Mab, he reminds Romeo that dreams are nothing.
This discussion of the importance of dreams stems from the fate/free will theme—if there is fate, then dreams
might matter, but if we have free will, then dreams are indeed nothing.
Scene v: After another spot of comic relief in the form of the servants (a technique Shakespeare utilizes in
many of his plays to alleviate the tension after a serious scene), the party commences. Benvolio's prophecy
does indeed come true—Romeo is distracted from his "love" for Rosaline upon seeing Juliet for the first time.
He begins to speak in extremes once again, obsessed by Juliet's beauty. The idea of questioning love at first
sight never occurs to Romeo, who is too in love with being in love to think about it. He is so in love, in fact,
that he does not even notice Tybalt, who is preparing for a fight once he recognizes Romeo's voice. Once
again we see the juxtaposition of extremes—Romeo's extreme love for Juliet and Tybalt's extreme hatred for
the Montagues. Fortunately for the unaware Romeo, Capulet appears and calms his nephew down because it is
rude to attack someone in your own house, no matter who they are. This concept of hospitality is shared by
many cultures.
Act I Commentary
37
When Romeo and Juliet begin to speak to one another, it is poetry in both a literal and figurative sense. The
language utilized is romantic and full of imagery. When their speech is combined, it forms an English sonnet,
a 14−line love poem with alternating rhyme patterns and iambic pentameter that will eventually come to be
called a Shakespearean sonnet. The talk of shrines and pilgrims is religious in nature, which is typical for the
ideal of courtly love, in which the love for a woman should be so pure as to be religious in nature. Once they
become aware of each other's identities, there are more prophetic statements—Romeo owes his foe, and Juliet
says that "if he be married,/My grave is like to be my wedding bed" (ll. 134−135).
Act II Commentary
Prologue: This prologue lists the consequences of the newfound passion of Romeo and Juliet. In the first four
lines, the Chorus reminds us that although Romeo was once completely enamored of Rosaline, his
once−invulnerable attraction has been vanquished by his love for Juliet, which is much more "fair." The
prologue goes on to state that there is immense danger in this relationship, even going so far as to compare
Juliet to a fish attracted to the bait of a fishing hook. Although Romeo and Juliet cannot conduct their
relationship in the typical Renaissance England manner (as Paris attempts to do by approaching Capulet
instead of Juliet), the combination of the strength of their love and "good" timing allows them the ability to
develop their romance. As we were told in the Act I prologue, the love of Romeo and Juliet will
counterbalance the hate of the feud, which is encapsulated in the last line of this prologue.
Scene i: Scene 1 begins where Act 1 leaves off—with the guests leaving the party. Romeo, being the devoted
lover that he is, cannot leave Juliet, and climbs the wall to the Capulet orchard. However, he is still close
enough to hear his friends calling for him. Mercutio, in one of his many displays of wit, decides to cast a spell
and "conjure" Romeo by reciting all of what he thinks to be important to Romeo—love and Rosaline. While
commenting that this sort of speech will anger Romeo, Benvolio tells Mercutio that "Blind is his love and best
befits the dark" (l. 32). With this statement, the light/dark theme resurfaces. This will become critical in the
next scene.
Scene ii: Once his friends leave, Romeo turns his attention to Juliet, who has just come out to the balcony for
one of the most famous scenes in all of literature, despite its relatively minor status to the play itself. Upon
seeing Juliet, Romeo compares her to the sun. This brings the light/dark dichotomy to the foreground. Juliet is
associated with the sun, which overpowers the moon (Rosaline) through her light. However, it is the darkness
of the night that allows Juliet to symbolize the sun, which she cannot do during the day because the real sun
dominates the sky. Because of this, and because Romeo and Juliet cannot be together in the daytime for fear
of their parents' rage, night is their time. Day, which is usually associated with good, turns to evil because of
the destruction of the feud and the separation of Romeo and Juliet. This reversal of the significance of day and
night is continued throughout the play.
When Juliet speaks, she reveals a great deal about her character. Although she is in love with Romeo, her first
reflection is on the problems their love provokes. She asks why (wherefore) Romeo has to be a Montague, and
reflects upon the irrelevance of names, which should not matter when people are in love. When Romeo
interrupts her thoughts, Juliet's reaction is logical rather than emotional; instead of rejoicing in her lover's
presence immediately, she questions him about who he is, how he got to the orchard, and reminds him that he
will be killed if her family discovers him. Even when Romeo is swearing his love, Juliet reminds him of the
fickleness of love and the difficulties of their situation. Even though Juliet is a sheltered young girl, she
realizes that there is more to a successful relationship than just initial attraction. Juliet's ability to think while
she is in love with Romeo will almost salvages their marriage later on.
Scene iii: This scene begins with Friar Laurence, Romeo's mentor and friend, picking herbs. While this seems
Act II Commentary
38
irrelevant, Friar Laurence's speech about the nature of the plants he picks reveals several key facts of the play.
First of all, Friar Laurence's knowledge of plant lore will be useful to Juliet when he gives her the potion in
Act IV. He refers to the sun as "Titan's fiery wheels," inferring the destruction of day, and that, although good
and bad are polar opposites, each balances each other, as do the other dichotomies of the play. The last flower
picked has special significance because its poison, once smelled, "slays all senses with the heart." The flower
symbolizes both the love of Romeo and Juliet, which slays their senses, and, contrarily, the hatred of the
Capulets and the Montagues. The end of the friar's speech reminds us what will happen at the end of this play
because rude will, or hatred, will be the "canker death" that eats up the love of Romeo and Juliet.
Another significance of this scene is its prophetic nature. While pointing out the near−lunacy of Romeo's
falling in love with Juliet so soon after his pining for Rosaline, Friar Laurence recites several well−meaning
mantras which, had everyone in the play followed them, would have prevented the disaster to come. Friar
Laurence first reminds Romeo that weak men bring down women, which Romeo will prove in Act III, scene 1
by killing Tybalt. The friar also compares Romeo's love to a grave in lines 83−84, which foreshadows the
death to come. Despite these protests, the friar agrees to marry Romeo and Juliet because he hopes to end the
feud. When Romeo rushes out to give the news to the Nurse, Friar Laurence warns him that people who hurry
stumble. This, of course, foreshadows the stumbling that the friar himself will be doing in Act V, when he
fails to follow his own advice.
Scene iv: This scene gives insight to the personalities of Romeo, Mercutio, and the Nurse, Angelica. Mercutio
and Benvolio open the scene by analyzing Romeo's ability to successfully answer Tybalt's challenge.
Mercutio predicts that Romeo will lose because his "feminine" love weakens him and makes him not enough
of a man to handle the situation. This is the first mention of the masculine/feminine theme of the play, and
Mercutio's notions of masculinity will lead him to provoke the fatal fight in Act III. When Romeo arrives,
Mercutio is distracted by the wittiness of Romeo's responses to his jokes, and even gives up when Romeo is
too clever for him. This demonstrates than Romeo can be clever when he is in the mood. Mercutio, having lost
to Romeo, chooses a new target—the Nurse. While Romeo is trying to give the Nurse the message he intends
for Juliet, Mercutio jokes about the Nurse being a bawd and even sings a song to emphasize the point. While
the Nurse feigns offense, she also makes crude jokes herself throughout the play. Thus the scene shows
Romeo's talent for wit, and recalls the baseness of the Nurse and Mercutio.
Scene v: Although Juliet can think during the most romantic scene in the play, that does not mean she is
always logical. In this scene, an impatient Juliet hounds the Nurse for information about Romeo. The Nurse,
of course, complicates the matter by teasing Juliet and refusing to immediately tell her what she wants to
know. Juliet complains that old people are too slow (which foreshadows Friar Laurence in Act V), and
complains again when the Nurse teases her. Eventually the joke wears thin, and the Nurse tells her to go to
Friar Laurence's cell to be married.
Scene vi: Marriage is usually the final scene in stories, but because of the Capulet−Montague feud, it is
merely a minor scene in the play. Whereas Romeo makes the mistake of thinking that marrying Juliet should
be sufficient grounds for happiness ("It is enough I may but call her mine"), Friar Laurence reminds him that
this marriage is not going to be the end of the problem. Because of the intensity of the love of Romeo and
Juliet, which the friar describes as violent, he reminds Romeo to moderate his love so that it can last, because
violent emotions cause people to do violent things. When Juliet arrives, Romeo is full of lover's conceits,
whereas Juliet can only tell him that she loves him so much that she cannot describe it. Friar Laurence,
knowing and witnessing the strong attraction between the two, marries them immediately.
Act II Commentary
39
Act III Commentary
Scene i: Like the first scene of Act I, this scene has three major parts. The first part begins with Benvolio and
Mercutio discussing the heat, which stirs the "mad blood." Benvolio, who tries once again to avert a fight,
suggests that they go inside, but Mercutio claims that Benvolio is more likely to cause trouble than he is. This
is mere projection—Mercutio is obviously talking about himself when he refers to Benvolio's quick temper.
Mercutio is so accurate in these opening lines of the scene that he even predicts his own death when he
declares that if there were two of the people he is describing, "we should have/none shortly, for one would kill
the other." We do indeed have two hot−headed individuals in this play—Mercutio and Tybalt, and we will
shortly have none because Tybalt enters the scene looking for Romeo in order to pursue his challenge.
The second part of this scene concerns the duels. Romeo, having just come from his own wedding, tries to
avoid fighting Tybalt out of his love for his wife and concern for her family, despite Tybalt's attempts to
enrage him through insults. Romeo is doing exactly what he is supposed to do here—he is not supposed to
fight in public because of the Prince's decree, and he should not try to kill his wife's cousin. While Romeo is
trying to be logical and pacifying, Mercutio allows his temper to get the better of him. He believes that Romeo
is acting like a girl in refusing to fight. Mercutio, who was trying to start a fight with Tybalt, decides to
engage him at this point. When Romeo attempts to break up the fight, Tybalt stabs Mercutio under Romeo's
arm and kills him. However, Mercutio does not see his own fault in this—he blames Romeo, the Montagues,
and the Capulets instead. Romeo, believing that his love for Juliet makes him "effeminate," stops thinking all
together and kills Tybalt. He does not stop to consider that Mercutio started the fight for no logical reason
against the orders of the Prince, his kinsman. Because Romeo's masculinity has been called into question, he
commits the "manly" act of vengeance in order to make up for his former "femininity." Also, Romeo knows
that pursuing Tybalt will have consequences (which he relates in lines 117−118), but when he finally kills
Tybalt, he blames fate for it. Romeo's statement that he is "fortune's fool" reminds us of the fate/free will
theme—is Romeo destined for bad things, or does he choose his actions himself?
The last part of the scene shows the mindset of the "adults" in the play. Upon seeing the bloody body of
Tybalt, Lady Capulet immediately demands the death of Romeo, despite the fact that she tried to stop the fight
in Act I, scene 1. Grief over her nephew has turned Lady Capulet into a willing participant in the feud.
Montague, wishing to protect his son, reminds the Prince that Romeo was Mercutio's friend, and therefore
properly avenged his death. The Prince, in another attempt to gain order, orders Romeo banished from Verona
on pain of death. However, as we have seen before in this play, the Prince's orders only have a limited effect,
and his decree will not stop further bloodshed and grief. The Prince's last line in the scene underscores
this—in having mercy by banishing Romeo instead of having him executed, the Prince has merely invited
more murder to occur.
Scene ii: Juliet begins this scene with an image−filled soliloquy about night. Because nighttime belongs to
Romeo and Juliet, Juliet associates it with love and civility. Like Romeo, she compares the object of her love
to light by calling him "day in night," which furthers the light/dark theme. This reverie is quickly ended,
however, when the Nurse comes with news of Tybalt's death. Juliet's reaction to this news is natural. She first
thinks that the Nurse is referring to Romeo, since she was already thinking of him, but begins to curse Romeo
when she learns that he killed Tybalt. Anger and resentment are very typical in this situation, but Juliet
overcomes them to remember that Tybalt would have killed Romeo if he could have, and then forces herself
to attempt to calm down. Her eyes betray her, however, and she continues to cry for Tybalt, as well as
Romeo's banishment. Even though Juliet is trying to come to terms with these events, she is only human, and
needs her husband to comfort her.
Scene iii: The theme of masculinity and femininity continues in this scene. Romeo, who is hiding in Friar
Laurence's quarters until nightfall, bemoans his bad luck in being banished from Verona, despite knowing that
Act III Commentary
40
there would be consequences from the pursuit of Tybalt. For Romeo, banishment is death because it takes him
away from Juliet, who is his life. Although Friar Laurence tries to console him, Romeo is consumed with his
grief until both Friar Laurence and the Nurse remind him that he is acting like a woman (i.e., being
overemotional). Friar Laurence addresses this directly by asking him if he is a man and by calling his tears
"womanish." After the attacks on Romeo's masculinity and Friar Laurence's reminders to count his numerous
blessings, Romeo calms down, listens to the friar's plan, and leaves to see Juliet. The irony here is that Juliet,
who by gender should be the feminine one in the relationship, takes on "masculine" qualities during the play,
especially in her ability to calm her emotions in a tense situation long enough to solve the problem. Romeo,
although a man, is overly emotional, a trait that results in the death of Tybalt. However, notions of gender are
quite complex here−−masculinity is also associated with violence when Romeo decides that avenging
Mercutio's death is the "manly" thing to do, when the "feminine" act of peace would have allowed him to stay
with Juliet. Despite the appeals to Romeo's manly side in this scene, masculinity is not necessarily superior to
femininity in the play.
Scene iv: This very short scene between Capulet and Paris serves as a counterpoint to Act I, scene 2. Capulet,
who previously declared that Juliet is too young to be married and that he would never force her into
marriage, changes his mind and decides to rush the marriage between Paris and Juliet. During the time of the
Renaissance as well as today, a wedding three days after the funeral of a loved one is questionable, but
Capulet insists that it will be acceptable, although even Paris recognizes that this may not be a good time for
it. There is some question here as to Capulet's purposes in hurrying the ceremony. Although Capulet claims to
have loved Tybalt dearly and to know his daughter's mind, Capulet may be attempting to forge an alliance
with the royal house as a result of the day's events in order to gain advantage in the feud. He may also be
trying to cheer up his family after their tragic loss. Whatever the case, Capulet's deal with Paris forces Juliet to
take drastic measures in order to save her marriage.
Scene v: The first half of this scene recalls the light/dark theme once again. While Juliet insists that it is still
night (which means that Romeo can stay), Romeo reminds her that day has come, and the bird singing outside
is the lark. However, Juliet's insistence wears down Romeo, who will gladly stay and die rather than be
separated from his wife. After saying this, Juliet realizes her selfishness, and complains about the discordant
lark that symbolizes the day that steals her life, Romeo, away. Juliet then brings back the topic of destiny by
appealing to fortune and having a vision of Romeo dead (which will come true at the end of Act V). Although
Romeo's escape seems to indicate that they may be successful in eventually reuniting, the mention of fate
reminds us that they are destined to die.
The second half of the scene shows the interaction between the Capulets as parents and their daughter. Lady
Capulet brings Juliet two different pieces of bad news: Lady Capulet is going to arrange for Romeo's death,
and Lord Capulet has arranged for Juliet's marriage to Paris. Juliet, of course, sees both pieces of information
as deadly to herself. She tries to use clever and polite words to talk her way out of the situation, much the way
Romeo tries to calm Tybalt in scene 1, but her parents, like Tybalt, are only further incensed. This is not
surprising, considering the Capulets and the Montagues cannot be reasoned with in regard to the feud. In the
heated exchange between them, both parents make statements that foreshadow their daughter's death, leaving
Juliet to cry to the Nurse for comfort. The Nurse, however, only considers the material, and advises Juliet to
marry Paris, despite the fact that Juliet has sworn an oath to God. Juliet, seeing the Nurse as one who has little
regard for the soul or other ideals, separates herself emotionally from her caretaker forever, and runs to the
only spiritual counselor she has left—Friar Laurence.
Act IV Commentary
Scene i: Friar Laurence and Juliet both display their wit and their emotions in this subtext−filled scene. While
Act IV Commentary
41
Paris arranges for the marriage and Friar Laurence tries to keep what he knows quiet, Juliet comes to the cell
hoping to elicit the friar's wisdom. While Paris attempts to get some sign of affection from Juliet, Juliet
manages to dodge his questions with quick retorts and avoidance. When Paris leaves, Juliet cries to the friar
for help, and threatens to stab herself to death if he does not come up with a solution for her problem.
Although her grief is a strong as Romeo's was in Act III, the difference here is that Juliet is willing to allow
the friar to share his wisdom with her. Romeo did not listen to the friar at all until his manhood was called into
question. Friar Laurence, seeing Juliet's desperation, hands her a potion that will kill her, albeit temporarily, if
she is not prevented by "womanish fear." Juliet, who in this example of gender typing is more masculine than
Romeo because she can overcome her emotions, accepts the potion and agrees to the friar's plan.
Scene ii: This scene is another example of the use of comic relief after a tense situation. The Capulet
household is in preparation for the wedding. In a reversal of gender roles, Capulet does the majority of the
wedding preparation, from arranging for the cook in the beginning of the scene to playing the housewife while
letting his wife help Juliet. Juliet is forgiven for her act of rebelliousness, but all is not quite forgotten. Capulet
decides to have the wedding a day early (although he thought Wednesday too soon in Act III, scene 4), and he
sends both the Nurse and Lady Capulet to Juliet in order to keep an eye on her.
Scene iii: This scene explores the nature of fear and the power of love to overcome it. Once Juliet "rids"
herself of her mother and the Nurse, her soliloquy focuses on the task at hand—the drinking of the potion. The
coldness of the fear Juliet feels almost prevents her from taking the potion. In another image−filled speech,
Juliet contemplates the potion's effects. She is at first terrified to be alone, but in a metadramatic comment
remarks that she must complete her "scene" on her own. She then wonders if the potion will work at all, which
will leave her stuck with the same situation in the morning, but then solves that problem by pulling out a
dagger with which to commit suicide. The next problem is whether the potion is a poison with which Friar
Laurence will dispatch her to avoid the shame he would incur by admitting that he married her to Romeo.
Juliet reasons herself out of this fear by noting that the friar is a holy man. Then she contemplates the idea of
waking up before Romeo arrives at the tomb. Juliet believes that she would either suffocate from lack of air or
go insane from seeing the corpses of her relatives, especially that of Tybalt. Juliet becomes engulfed in this
fear and thinks she sees Tybalt's ghost, an indication of the depth of her terror. However, this fear reminds her
of the reason that she is going through all of this turmoil—to be with Romeo. The strength of her love and
desire for Romeo prompts Juliet to take the potion, which would have led her to her goal, had not
circumstances (or fortune) intervened.
Scene iv: Shakespeare once again provides comedy to relieve the tension of Juliet's traumatic "suicide." The
Capulets, still preparing for the wedding, are joking with each other, and the Nurse even goes so far as to joke
with Capulet. The rush of the preparation and Capulet's order to make haste reminds us of Friar Laurence's
admonitions about hurry, which can lead to disaster. Indeed, the haste of the wedding has led to disaster, as
the Nurse will discover in the next scene.
Scene v: The Nurse, joking of Juliet's impending wedding night, enters Juliet's room in order to awaken her
for the ceremony. The way in which she attempts to awaken Juliet is reminiscent of Act I, scene 3, when the
Nurse called Juliet to her mother. It takes the Nurse a while before she realizes that Juliet is not being lazy
because of her enjoyment of her own wit. Once she does, however, the Capulets rush to the bedside. Capulet,
refusing to believe the Nurse, insists on checking her body himself. Once he accepts her death, Capulet refers
to Death as Juliet's husband and his son−in−law, which is ironic considering the events to come. While the
Capulets and Paris lament the loss of Juliet, the friar reminds them that Juliet is better off—and she is, for the
moment, because she has avoided the wedding. The friar also reminds them that they should rejoice for their
daughter's happiness, an admonition that could have prevented this situation had they followed it sooner.
More comic relief then follows from the musicians, who were originally hired for the wedding, but must now
play for the funeral.
Act IV Commentary
42
Act V Commentary
Scene i: Romeo, who has fled to Mantua, opens this scene talking of the wonderful dream he has just
experienced. Romeo, who professes a great belief in dreams and fate throughout the play, dreams that Juliet
came to him and woke him up from death. Ironically, this is the reverse of what Friar Laurence and Juliet
planned, as Romeo is supposed to take Juliet, who is "dead," and lead her from the tomb to their new life
together. If Romeo truly believes that dreams can predict the future, then he should follow his first inclination
to believe that all will be well. However, Romeo's faith in dreams and fortune is shallow, and he will only
believe what his emotions tell him to. When Balthasar brings news of Juliet's funeral, which he witnessed,
Romeo immediately blames fate: "Is it e'en so? Then I defy you, stars!/Thou knowest my lodging" (ll. 23−24).
Although he initially believes his dream that he and Juliet will succeed in their quest to be together,
Balthasar's news makes him think that his fate is to live out his life without Juliet. Although Romeo does ask
Balthasar for any letters from the friar (which would have prevented the events to come, had there been any),
Romeo never really stops to question the oddity of the situation. In sudden "haste," Romeo rushes off to find
an apothecary, from whom he procures a poison which will kill him without any pain. To commit suicide in
such a manner would have been considered "feminine" and weak during the Renaissance, when a "manly"
suicide would have been to fall on his sword. Romeo displays his quick thinking again when he talks the
apothecary into giving him the poison, an act that brings the death penalty by Mantua law. If Romeo had
thought more about Juliet's death instead of how to talk the apothecary into selling him the poison, he might
have realized that perhaps Juliet was not dead after all.
Scene ii: This brief scene reveals a major aspect of Elizabethan life and an important plot point. Friar John,
who was supposed to have delivered a letter to Romeo telling him of the new plan, arrives at Friar Laurence's
cell after temporary imprisonment. Friar John and a fellow priest had been visiting the sick when the local
health inspectors suspected that they had visited a house where someone had the bubonic plague (also known
as the Black Plague). The plague killed thousands of people throughout all of Europe during the medieval
period and the Renaissance. The only way to prevent the spread of the plague was through quarantine, a
practice that even affected Shakespeare's company when plague outbreaks forced the closing of the London
theatres. Friar John, who could have prevented Romeo's return to Verona by giving him the letter from Friar
Laurence, was quarantined and unable to deliver the letter. Friar Laurence, in a panic, asks for a crow bar to
open the Capulet tomb with, and rushes out to get Juliet, who will awaken in three hours.
Scene iii: The final scene of the play begins not with Romeo or Juliet, but with Paris. Paris' devotion to Juliet
by his vow to come every night and lay flowers at her tomb reminds us that he is not that different from
Romeo. Unfortunately, this similarity will not prevent Paris' downfall. Unlike his kinsman Mercutio, who
fought instead of trying to follow the Prince's edict, Paris attempts to arrest Romeo when he arrives rather than
engage him in battle. This is Paris' duty, and he tries to perform it because he follows the Prince's orders.
However, Romeo, who calls Paris a "youth" although they are the same age because Romeo feels old, kills
Paris first and asks questions later. Romeo remembers that Paris loved Juliet also just a bit too late because he
once again refuses to stop and think about a situation before acting. However, Romeo will do Paris the "favor"
of laying him with Juliet.
Romeo then proceeds into the tomb and looks at Juliet, who looks very much alive. Throughout his death
speech, Romeo almost guesses what is occurring. He remarks that Juliet looks much too alive for someone
who has been dead for almost two days. She is still beautiful, her face still has color, and she has not begun to
decompose. However, unlike Juliet, who conquered her fear, Romeo lets his fear that fate wants to keep him
separated from his wife lead him to take the potion. As soon as Romeo drinks the poison, Friar Laurence
arrives on the scene. He would have been there sooner, but he was running so fast that he tripped over several
gravestones on the way, violating his warning to Romeo that people who run fast stumble. If Friar Laurence
had followed his own advice, he would have arrived early enough to prevent Romeo's suicide. Upon learning
Act V Commentary
43
from Balthasar that Romeo is in the tomb, he rushes in to find a dead Romeo and an awakening Juliet. When
Juliet asks for her husband, Friar Laurence tells her that "a greater power than we can contradict/Hath
thwarted our intents" (ll. 153−154), which calls to mind the fate/free will theme of the play—is the power fate
or bad choices? The friar, who has warned against allowing emotion too much sway with actions, panics and
runs away, leaving Juliet with her husband's corpse. Juliet decides to join her husband, but there is not enough
poison for her to share in his death, so she uses a dagger to commit suicide, which is the "manly" way to die.
When the citizens of Verona arrive at the tomb, they see the three corpses, and question the friar as to how
this occurred. The Prince chastises both Montague, who wife has just died from grief, and Capulet, telling
them that this event is the product of their hate. Escalus also notes that some of the fault is his own for failing
to prevent the situation, and that all are equally punished. Each of the families have lost two members. The
Capulets lose Juliet and Tybalt, the Montagues have lost Romeo and Lady Montague, and the Prince has lost
Paris and Mercutio, because they are all to blame for the feud. These losses, as promised, bring the end of the
feud—Capulet and Montague swear to raise monuments to the other's child, now cured by the love of Juliet
and her Romeo.
Quizzes
Act IV, Scenes 4 and 5: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. Scene 4 takes place at what time in the morning?
2. Scene 4 takes place on what day?
3. How do the Capulets know that Paris is approaching?
4. Who is sent to wake up Juliet?
5. What does the Nurse find?
6. Who tries to console the Capulets by saying that Juliet is better off in heaven?
7. How do the wedding preparations change after they find Juliet?
8. How does the County Paris react to the death of Juliet?
9. How does Lord Capulet know that she is dead?
10. How does the act end?
Answers
1. Scene 4 takes place at three in the morning.
2. Scene 4 takes place early on Wednesday morning.
3. The Capulets know that Paris is coming because they can hear the music of his musicians.
4. The Nurse is sent to wake up Juliet.
Quizzes
44
5. The Nurse finds Juliet “dead” in her bed chamber.
6. The Friar tries to console the Capulets by assuring them that Juliet is in heaven.
7. The wedding preparations change dramatically. The wedding music becomes funeral dirges. The wedding
flowers become funeral flowers, and the happiness associated with a wedding becomes sadness.
8. Paris is devastated by the news that Juliet is dead. He says, “Beguiled, divorced, wronged, spited, slain! /
Most detestable Death, by thee beguiled, / By cruel, cruel thee quite overthrown. / O love! O life! not life, but
love in death!”
9. Lord Capulet believes that Juliet is dead because he feels that her body is cold to the touch and her joints
are stiff.
10. Act IV ends with a comic discussion between the musicians and Peter.
Act V, Scenes 1 and 2: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. Where does Scene 1 take place?
2. What was Romeo’s dream?
3. Who brings Romeo the news that Juliet is dead?
4. Why does Romeo go to the Apothecary?
5. How much does Romeo pay for the poison?
6. Why does the Apothecary hesitate in selling Romeo the poison?
7. What persuades the Apothecary to go ahead and sell Romeo the poison?
8. Who does Friar Laurence entrust with the important letter to Romeo?
9. Why is the letter not delivered to Romeo?
10. How long will it be before Juliet wakes up?
Answers
1. Scene 1 takes place in Mantua where Romeo has been banished.
2. Romeo dreams that Juliet finds him dead and brings him back to life as an emperor with her kisses.
3. Balthasar, Romeo’s servant, brings him the news that Juliet is dead and was buried in the Capulet tomb.
4. Romeo goes to the Apothecary to buy poison.
Act V, Scenes 1 and 2: Questions and Answers
45
5. Romeo pays 40 ducats for the poison.
6. The Apothecary hesitates in selling Romeo the poison because it is against the law in Mantua to sell the
substance.
7. Because of his extreme poverty, the Apothecary consents to sell Romeo the poison.
8. Friar Laurence entrusts the important letter to Friar John to deliver to Romeo. This letter explains to Romeo
about Juliet’s pretended death and tells him to be at the tomb when she wakes up.
9. Friar John is not able to deliver the letter because he is quarantined while visiting the sick.
10. Juliet is due to wake up in about three hours.
Act V, Scene 3: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. Why is Paris at Juliet’s tomb?
2. What is Paris’ last request?
3. Why does Paris think Romeo has come to the Capulet tomb?
4. Who kills Paris?
5. If Romeo had not been so hasty in drinking the poison, what would he have noticed about Juliet?
6. Name the people who have died in this scene.
7. Where does Friar Laurence want to take Juliet?
8. How does Juliet kill herself?
9. Who is suspected the most as a murderer and why?
10. What four accounts does the Prince hear?
Answers
1. Paris has come to Juliet’s tomb to bring flowers and weep.
2. As he dies, Paris’ last request is to lie beside Juliet.
3.Paris believes that Romeo has come to the tomb to do damage to the bodies of Tybalt and Juliet.
4. Romeo kills Paris.
5. If Romeo had not been so hasty in drinking the poison, he would have understood why Juliet’s lips and
cheeks were crimson. She was beginning to wake up from the potion.
Act V, Scene 3: Questions and Answers
46
6. Paris, Lady Montague, Romeo, and Juliet have all died in this scene.
7. When Juliet wakes up, Friar Laurence is there and wants to take her to a “sisterhood of holy nuns.”
8. Juliet kills herself with Romeo’s dagger.
9. Friar Laurence is suspected the most because he is carrying tools for digging and opening tombs.
10. When the Prince wants to know what has happened, Friar Laurence, Balthasar, the Page, and the contents
of the letter in Balthasar’s possession all give the same account of the events.
Act I, Scenes 3−5: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. What is the setting for the play?
2. What scene of conflict opens the action of the play?
3. Which character tries to stop the fighting among the servants?
4. Which character is aggressive and eager to fight?
5. What warning does the Prince give to anyone who breaks the peace again?
6. Who has asked for Juliet’s hand in marriage?
7. How old is Juliet?
8. In what state of mind is Romeo when we first see him in the play?
9. Explain how Romeo finds out about the Capulet ball.
10. How does Benvolio try to remedy Romeo’s love sickness?
Answers
1. The setting is a street scene in Verona, Italy.
2. The play opens with a conflict between the Capulet and Montague servants. Eventually, even the
townspeople become involved.
3. Benvolio tries to stop the fighting among the servants.
4. Tybalt is aggressive and eager to fight. He challenges Benvolio to draw his sword.
5. The Prince decrees that if anyone breaks the peace again, he shall pay with his life.
6. Paris has asked for Juliet’s hand in marriage.
7. Juliet is thirteen years old.
Act I, Scenes 3−5: Questions and Answers
47
8. As the play opens, Romeo’s state of mind can best be described as love−sick, in love with love, moody, and
melancholy.
9. Romeo finds out about the Capulet ball when an illiterate Capulet servant asks him to read the invitation list
to him.
10. Benvolio tries to remedy Romeo’s love−sickness by getting him to consent to go to the Capulet ball and
examine other beauties.
Act I, Scenes 3−5: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. Who is Susan?
2. When is Juliet’s birthday?
3. Why does Lady Capulet visit with Juliet? What questions does she ask her?
4. How do the Nurse and Lady Capulet feel about Paris?
5. Which character loves to talk?
6. Who is Queen Mab?
7. What premonition does Romeo have?
8. How did Lord Capulet force the young ladies to dance with him?
9. Who recognizes Romeo’s voice at the feast and becomes furious because he is allowed to stay?
10. Who first tells Romeo and Juliet who the other is?
Answers
1. Susan is the Nurse’s daughter who was born on the same day as Juliet; however, she died.
2. Juliet’s birthday is on Lammas Eve.
3. Lady Capulet visits with Juliet to ask her if she is ready for marriage. She asks Juliet to look at Paris at the
feast that night.
4. The Nurse and Lady Capulet feel that Paris is a perfect match for Juliet and are in favor of the marriage.
5. Mercutio loves to talk and uses figurative language and many plays on words.
6. Queen Mab is the Queen of Fairies. She is responsible for what men dream.
7. Romeo has a premonition that something is about to happen that will shorten his life.
Act I, Scenes 3−5: Questions and Answers
48
8. Lord Capulet threatens to tell everyone that any young lady who does not dance with him has corns on her
feet.
9. Tybalt recognizes Romeo’s voice and becomes furious when Lord Capulet allows him to remain at the ball.
10. The Nurse is the one who identifies each of the lovers.
Act II, Scenes 1 and 2: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. Instead of returning home, where does Romeo go after the ball?
2. What is a soliloquy and how is it used in Scene 2?
3. By whose name does Mercutio call for Romeo?
4. How does Romeo learn of Juliet’s love for him?
5. What does Romeo say helped him climb over the high walls of the Capulet orchard and find Juliet’s
window?
6. What do Romeo and Juliet exchange?
7. What do Romeo and Juliet plan to do the next day?
8. To what does Romeo compare Juliet’s beauty?
9. Who keeps interrupting the balcony scene?
10. Why does Juliet ask Romeo not to swear by the moon?
Answers
1. After the ball, Romeo goes over the wall and into the Capulet orchard.
2. A soliloquy is a dramatic monologue spoken aloud by a character to reveal his thoughts to the audience.
Romeo uses a soliloquy to describe Juliet’s beauty as she stands on her balcony.
3. Mercutio keeps calling for Romeo in Rosaline’s name.
4. He overhears Juliet speaking of her love for him when she thinks she is alone.
5. Love, which gave him wings, helped him over the wall and made it possible for him to find her balcony.
6. Romeo and Juliet exchange vows of love.
7. Romeo and Juliet plan to be married the next day.
8. Romeo compares Juliet’s beauty to brightness, warmth, and light.
Act II, Scenes 1 and 2: Questions and Answers
49
9. The Nurse keeps interrupting the balcony scene.
10. Juliet asks Romeo not to swear his love on the moon because the moon appears to change in size as it
orbits the earth, suggesting that it is fickle.
Act II, Scenes 3 and 4: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. What is Friar Laurence’s special skill or area of knowledge?
2. With what does Friar Laurence compare the beneficial and poisonous parts of the plant?
3. About what does the Friar caution Romeo?
4. Why does the Friar agree to marry Romeo and Juliet?
5. Who has sent Romeo a challenge for a duel?
6. What excuse is Juliet to give for going to Friar Laurence’s cell?
7. Where are Romeo and Juliet to be married?
8. Who teases Romeo about Rosaline and his love−sickness?
9. Who teases the Nurse and causes her to become crass?
10. How does Romeo plan to get into Juliet’s window?
Answers
1. Friar Laurence’s special skill is in making medicines and potions from herbs.
2. Friar Laurence compares the beneficial and poisonous parts of a plant to the good and evil within a man.
3. Friar Laurence cautions Romeo about being too hasty.
4. The Friar believes that by marrying the two lovers, he will end the feud between the Capulets and the
Montagues.
5. Tybalt has sent Romeo a challenge for a duel. He is angry that Romeo came to the ball uninvited and was
allowed to remain.
6. Juliet is going to get permission to go to Friar Laurence’s cell by saying that she needs to go to shrift, or
confession.
7. Romeo and Juliet are to be married in Friar Laurence’s cell.
8. Mercutio, Romeo’s friend, teases him about Rosaline and his love−sickness.
9. Mercutio teases the Nurse and causes her to become angry.
Act II, Scenes 3 and 4: Questions and Answers
50
10. Romeo has given the Nurse a rope ladder in order that he might climb into Juliet’s window later that night.
Act II, Scenes 5 and 6: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. At what time did Juliet send the Nurse to see Romeo and find out the wedding plans?
2. How long has Juliet been waiting for the Nurse to return with the news from Romeo?
3. How does the Nurse react when she finally returns?
4. How does the Nurse feel about the marriage?
5. What is the Friar afraid of?
6. The friar warns Romeo again about something. What is it?
7. How much do the lovers say their love has grown?
8. How many people know of the marriage?
9. Where does the marriage take place?
10. What is another name for the Friar?
Answers
1. Juliet sent the Nurse at nine o’clock in the morning to find out the wedding news from Romeo.
2. Juliet has been waiting three hours for the Nurse to return with the news.
3. The Nurse teases Juliet by claiming to be tired from her journey and prolongs telling her the news.
4. The Nurse is in favor of the marriage and feels that Romeo is handsome as well as polite.
5. The Friar is afraid that both lovers are acting too hastily.
6. The Friar warns Romeo again about acting too hastily.
7. The lovers say that their love has grown to such an extent that it cannot be counted.
8. Four main characters know of the marriage. Romeo and Juliet, of course, are aware; but also the Nurse and
Friar Laurence have become accomplices in the affair.
9. The marriage takes place in Friar Laurence’s cell or chapel.
10. Friar Laurence is also referred to as the ghostly confessor.
Act II, Scenes 5 and 6: Questions and Answers
51
Act III, Scenes 1 and 2: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. Who begs Mercutio to leave the streets of Verona because the Capulets might also be out on this extremely
hot day?
2. Who comes to the public square looking for a fight with Romeo?
3. What does Mercutio call Tybalt?
4. How does Tybalt insult Romeo and try to get him to fight him?
5. Why won’t Romeo fight Tybalt?
6. Why does Mercutio fight Tybalt?
7. How is Mercutio killed?
8. Why does Romeo kill Tybalt?
9. Who tells the Prince about the murders?
10. What is Romeo’s punishment?
Answers
1. Benvolio tries to get Mercutio to leave the streets of Verona because he is trying to prevent another fight.
2. Tybalt comes to the public square hoping to incite a fight with Romeo.
3. Mercutio calls Tybalt “Good King of Cats.”
4. Tybalt insults Romeo by calling him a villain, hoping that this will cause him to fight.
5. Romeo will not fight Tybalt because now they are related by marriage. Tybalt is Juliet’s cousin.
6. Mercutio fights Tybalt because he is angry that Tybalt is insulting Romeo, his friend.
7. Mercutio is killed when Romeo comes between them and blocks his view of Tybalt. Tybalt reaches under
Romeo’s arm and stabs Mercutio.
8. Romeo kills Tybalt because he feels that he must revenge his friend’s death. After all, it was Romeo’s fight
and not Mercutio’s.
9. Benvolio is the one who tells the Prince about the murders and relates exactly what happened.
10. Romeo’s punishment is to be banished from Verona. If he is caught in the city of Verona, he will be put to
death.
Act III, Scenes 1 and 2: Questions and Answers
52
Act III, Scenes 3 and 4: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. What day is it in Scene 3?
2. Where did Romeo run to hide after the murder of Tybalt?
3. How does he react to the news that he is banished from Verona?
4. Who tells him that the Prince has banished him?
5. What upsets Romeo the most about being banished?
6. The Friar gives three reasons that Romeo should be happy. What were they?
7. What does the Nurse give to Romeo?
8. Where is Romeo to go before daybreak?
9. On what day does Lord Capulet plan for Juliet to be married to Paris?
10. Who is to tell Juliet the “good news” concerning her future marriage to Paris?
Answers
1. It is very late on Monday night in Scene 3.
2. After the murders, Romeo ran to hide in Friar Laurence’s cell.
3. Romeo would rather die than be banished from Verona.
4. The Friar tells him the news that he will not be killed but only banished.
5. The thought of not seeing or touching Juliet ever again bothers Romeo the most.
6. The Friar gives Romeo three reasons for being happy: Juliet is alive; he is alive, and he is only banished not
killed.
7. The Nurse gives Juliet’s ring to Romeo.
8. Romeo must leave Juliet’s bed chamber before daybreak and go to Mantua.
9. Lord Capulet has arranged for Juliet to marry Paris on Thursday.
10. Lady Capulet is to tell Juliet the “good news” before she retires to bed.
Act III, Scene 5: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. On what day does Scene 5 take place?
Act III, Scenes 3 and 4: Questions and Answers
53
2. What is significant about the lark and the nightingale?
3. What vision does Juliet have as Romeo is leaving?
4. Who comes to visit with Juliet early that morning?
5. What news does Lady Capulet give to Juliet?
6. What is Juliet’s reaction to the news that Lady Capulet gives her?
7. Who does Juliet turn to for help when her parents leave?
8. What advice does the Nurse give Juliet?
9. Why does Juliet tell the Nurse that she is going to see Friar Laurence?
10. If the Friar cannot furnish a solution for Juliet, what does she have the power to do?
Answers
1. Scene 5 takes place on day three, a Tuesday morning.
2. The lovers are trying to determine the time of night or early morning. Romeo must be out of the city before
daylight. The nightingale sings at night, while the lark sings in the early part of the morning.
3. Juliet has a vision that she sees Romeo as one dead in the bottom of a tomb.
4. Juliet’s mother, Lady Capulet, comes to visit with her early that morning.
5. Lady Capulet brings Juliet the news that her father has consented for her to marry Paris on Thursday.
6. Juliet is upset and willfully says that she will not marry Paris. This is the first time she has been disobedient
to her
parents.
7. After her parents leave, Juliet turns to the Nurse for a solution to her dilemma.
8. The Nurse advises Juliet to forget Romeo, since he is banished, and marry Paris.
9. Juliet tells the Nurse that she is going to see Friar Laurence to confess her sins and get forgiveness. She is
really going there to seek the Friar’s help.
10. If Friar Laurence cannot help her, she has the power to commit suicide rather than marry Paris.
Act IV, Scenes 1−3: Questions and Answers
Study Questions
1. Why is Paris at Friar Laurence’s cell?
Act IV, Scenes 1−3: Questions and Answers
54
2. What reason does Paris give the Friar for the hasty marriage?
3. How long will the sleeping potion take effect?
4. Where will Juliet be put after her family believes that she is dead?
5. Who will be waiting in the tomb when Juliet awakens from the sleeping potion?
6. Who is supervising the preparations for the wedding?
7. What change does Lord Capulet make in the wedding plans?
8. If the potion does not work, what does Juliet plan to do?
9. What vision makes her have the strength to go ahead and drink the potion?
10. How will Romeo know about the plans?
Answers
1. Paris is arranging his wedding with Friar Laurence.
2. The marriage is hasty in order to stop Juliet’s tears over Tybalt’s death.
3. The sleeping potion will last for 42 hours.
4. After her parents think she is dead, Juliet will be placed in the Capulet vault with her deceased ancestors.
5. When Juliet awakens from the sleeping potion, Romeo will be waiting for her in the tomb.
6. Lord Capulet is supervising the wedding preparations.
7. Lord Capulet moves the wedding from Thursday to Wednesday.
8. If the potion does not work, she plans to kill herself with the dagger that she lays beside her.
9. The vision of Tybalt coming after Romeo gives her the strength to go ahead and drink the potion.
10. Romeo will know of the plan because Friar Laurence is planning to send him a letter.
Character Analysis
Mercutio (Character Analysis)
Mercutio is a kinsman to the prince and friend to Romeo. Mercutio is often interpreted as a comic foil to
Romeo. (A foil is a character who by strong contract underscores or enhances the distinctive qualities of
another character.) Mercutio's bawdy discussions of sex, for example, and his witty and light−hearted use of
language contrast sharply with Romeo's romantic view of love and his gloomy lovesickness. It will be helpful
in understanding Mercutio to look at some words related to his name: mercurial, an adjective meaning
changeable; Mercury, the Roman messenger god and of eloquence; and mercury, the poisonous element.
Character Analysis
55
Mercutio's eloquence is displayed throughout the play. In scenes in which he appears and speaks, he tends to
become the center of attention. He dominates his companions with his teasing and quick wit. When Romeo
and his group of friends are walking to the Capulet party, Romeo is moping about Rosaline. The witty
Mercutio tries to get Romeo's mind on something else. He also describes imagination in a powerful,
memorable way in his "Queen Mab" speech (I.iii.52−94). The speech, a dramatic demonstration of Mercutio's
eloquence, describes dreams as coming from a fairy creature. When Mercutio's cleverness threatens to run
away with him, Romeo asks him to be quiet. When Mercutio and Benvolio look for Romeo after the Capulet
party, Mercutio makes various obscene jokes at Romeo's expense, but Romeo will not reveal his hiding place.
His wit and his bawdy humor are also displayed in his conversation with the nurse who arrives looking for
Romeo.
Mercutio's changeable nature shows in the fatal marketplace scene. At one moment he is joking with Benvolio
about quarreling, and the next moment he is quarreling in deadly earnest himself. He had hoped to see Romeo
answer Tybalt's challenge to a duel and is disappointed by what he sees as Romeo's cowardice or submission.
He suddenly jumps in and accepts Tybalt's challenge himself. He fights well but is fatally injured when Tybalt
takes unfair advantage of Romeo's well−meant interference.
Mercutio's bitterness—or poisonous attitude—is shown in his wishing a plague on both the Montagues and
the Capulets. Despite his usually easy−going manner, when confronted by a member of the Capulet
household, Mercutio is eager to fight. He becomes angered by Tybalt's taunts and Romeo's refusal to fight.
When he is mortally wounded, he curses the houses of Montague and Capulet. The extent of his feelings is
revealed by the fact that this acrimonious denouncement is repeated three times by Mercutio: in III.i.91,
99−100, and 106.
Lawrence (Character Analysis)
Also: Friar Lawrence and in some editions, Laurence
Friar Lawrence is a Franciscan monk. He lives in modest quarters suitable to someone who is a follower of St.
Francis. He is a priest who is able to conduct religious ceremonies such as marriage and burial. He is also able
to hear confessions and forgive sins. He serves as an adviser to Romeo and later to Juliet, and he develops
several plans for the young lovers to follow. Also, he comments on the action at key points. Many of his
speeches have a philosophical content to them.
When the friar first appears on stage (II.iii), he is gathering weeds and flowers in the early morning while the
dew is still fresh and before the day gets hot. He makes medicines and various preparations from the plants he
gathers in his willow basket. He comments that there is something powerful and potentially good in each
thing on the earth but that everything must be used in a good way to preserve its good qualities.
Friar Lawrence, a friend to Romeo, knows about Romeo's infatuation with Rosaline. When Romeo comes to
him early in the morning, he jokes that maybe Romeo has been out with Rosaline and did not get home to rest.
He thinks that Romeo's shift in affection from Rosaline to Juliet is sudden and hasty, but he agrees to marry
them because he thinks that it may help to end the hatred between the feuding households. Just before the
marriage, Friar Lawrence counsels the lovers on the benefits of moderation. He will not allow them to stay
alone together until they are married.
To the young lovers in the play, Friar Lawrence seems trustworthy and wise, when many other adults in
Verona seem to be full of rejection, ridicule, bad advice, and bad example. Romeo trusts Friar Lawrence so
Lawrence (Character Analysis)
56
much that he goes to the priest's residence to hide before leaving town. Romeo is frustrated and upset and
even threatens to stab himself. Friar Lawrence counsels Romeo against this course of action. He suggests that
Romeo should develop a philosophic outlook, an idea heartily rejected by Romeo. When nothing else will
work, the friar not only points out to Romeo all the worst things which could have happened but did not, but
instructs Romeo to visit Juliet and then to leave town until everything can be worked out with the families and
the prince.
Juliet trusts the friar when she has given up on the nurse. She goes to see the friar when her parents are
insisting on her marriage to Paris. When Friar Lawrence sees how desperate and frantic Juliet is, he suggests
the potion to her. This represents a change of plan from the one discussed with Romeo. This new plan does
not make any reference to gaining the approval of the families, yet it attempts to preserve the happiness of the
lovers.
The friar's plan fails, mostly due to accidents of mistiming. Romeo receives word of Juliet's "death" through
his servant. The friar's news that Juliet is not actually dead has been prevented from getting through to
Romeo. Lord Capulet changes the date of the wedding. Romeo arrives just before Juliet wakes up, and then
kills himself. Still, Juliet could have been saved. The friar does get to the tomb in time to save her. When she
wakes up, he tries to persuade her to leave. Yet, when he hears a noise, he runs out, afraid of discovery.
After the bodies of Romeo and Juliet are discovered, the friar offers the prince a summary of what has
happened. Having confirmed the story with Romeo's letter to his father (delivered by Balthasar) the prince
absolves the friar of wrongdoing, calling him a "holy man" (V.iii.270), and blames the feuding families for the
deaths of Romeo and Juliet.
Benvolio (Character Analysis)
He is a nephew to Montague and a cousin and friend to Romeo. His name means well−wisher, which reflects
to some degree Benvolio's role in the play as a loyal friend and a peace−maker. Benvolio attempts to stop the
fight between the servants at the beginning of the play. Early in the play, Benvolio wishes to help Romeo's
parents by learning from Romeo why he has been acting so strangely and trying to avoid everyone. When he
questions Romeo gently and learns that his problem is lovesickness, he counsels Romeo to look at other
beauties and forget about anyone who is not interested in him. Benvolio suggests that Romeo go to the
Capulet party and see other pretty young women.
Throughout the play, Benvolio demonstrates his common sense and his loyalty to his friends. Benvolio tries to
serve as a restraining influence on Mercutio, who seems to constantly be talking himself into trouble. Also,
when Benvolio and Mercutio discuss the challenge from Tybalt to Romeo, he shows confidence in Romeo by
stating that Romeo will answer the challenge.
In the marketplace scene in which the stabbings of Mercutio and Tybalt occur, Benvolio senses that tempers
are flaring and that the hot weather will lead to trouble. When Tybalt enters and he and Mercutio exchange
words, Benvolio advises that they should go somewhere private, or talk calmly in the marketplace, or just
leave. This advice, of course, has no effect.
After the fight, Benvolio emphatically urges Romeo to run away before he is caught and put to death. Then,
when the prince arrives, Benvolio attempts to provide a fair account of what has happened, maintaining that
Romeo behaved properly but that both Tybalt and Mercutio were hot−tempered and looking for a quarrel. He
also points out how everything happened so quickly that he could not draw his sword in time to stop Tybalt
and Romeo from fighting.
Benvolio (Character Analysis)
57
Lord Capulet (Character Analysis)
A leading citizen of Verona and head of one of the two feuding families. His attitudes seem to display a
mixture of qualities rather than conveying a sense of consistency of action. When the audience first sees him,
he is calling for a sword to join in the fighting of the servants and young men in the opposing households. He
acts this way even though he is an older man and a more dignified behavior would most likely be more
appropriate for his age. However, he is concerned with maintaining order in his own house, especially after
the prince's promise to execute any disturbers of the peace. Thus, he takes pains to prevent Tybalt from
starting a brawl in his house at the party. Capulet is also motivated by his desire to appear as a good host. He
jokes with the guests, compliments the dancers, orders the servants to regulate the heat in the room better by
subduing the fire, and takes a peaceful attitude towards Romeo's uninvited presence at the feast.
His attitude towards Juliet shows this mixture of traits also. When Paris asks for her hand in marriage, he says
that she is too young and that Paris should let two more years pass. He also seems to say that his agreement is
only a part of such an arrangement and that Juliet must agree, also. Yet as negotiations with Paris continue in
Act III, Capulet assumes that Juliet will do exactly as he wishes. In his conversation with Paris, he also shows
more concern about his image than about his daughter's feelings. He thinks she is extremely grieved by
Tybalt's death, not at all suspecting the real cause of her grief, Romeo's banishment. He appears to be more
concerned about how the scheduling of the marriage will affect townspeople's attitudes towards the
seriousness or casualness of his grieving for Tybalt. As Juliet and her parents discuss the arranged marriage to
Paris and Juliet's unwillingness to participate in the wedding is revealed, Capulet threatens to throw Juliet out
and let her die in the streets. Even after this confrontation with Juliet, Capulet continues with wedding
preparations, indicating his complete disregard for Juliet's hopes for her future. When Juliet pretends that she
has just returned from confession to Friar Lawrence and is sorry for her stubbornness, Capulet is so pleased he
changes the wedding date, demonstrating again how out of touch he is with his daughter's true feelings.
After Juliet's death, sorrow is Capulet's dominant response. Yet his sadness appears to be tinged with the
knowledge that he will die without heirs and that the wedding feast is spoiled. Only when he sees Juliet in the
tomb bleeding and dead does his sorrow over her loss and over his role in the feud seem complete. Finally,
Capulet extends his hand in forgiveness and reconciliation to Montague.
Prince Escalus (Character Analysis)
The ruler of Verona. Fourteenth−century Italy consisted of kingdoms, papal states, and local lordships.
Verona under Prince Escalus was in the third category. The prince is physically present in three scenes (I.i,
III.i, and V.iii), yet his presence is felt throughout the play for he makes the laws and the decisions in Verona.
In his first appearance, Escalus speaks very sternly about the fighting between the servants and the young men
in the opposing households. He directs the fighting parties to throw their weapons to the ground, stating that
they have started civil wars three times just by words alone. He threatens any disturber of the peace with
death. This speech is effective in stopping the current fighting, and the prince effectively separates the angry
Capulets and Montagues. Yet, the prince's approach does not put a permanent stop to the fighting, as the
marketplace incident later shows.
In his second appearance, the prince must investigate the cause of the deaths of Mercutio and Tybalt. He
shows lenience rather than exacting the letter of the law he pronounced earlier, making his rule seem
inconsistent at best: he banishes Romeo rather than executing him, although he warns that Romeo's return
Lord Capulet (Character Analysis)
58
would incur the death penalty. Furthermore, he appears to have based this decision on his personal interests,
stating that the Capulet/Montague feud has caused the death of his kinsman, Mercutio.
Both Juliet and Romeo, as well as Friar Lawrence, seem to respect the prince's banishment of Romeo as a firm
and definite ruling. Friar Lawrence devises two plans to comply with it but hopes that the prince can be
persuaded to relent.
In his final appearance, the prince is forced to investigate more deaths: those of Romeo and Juliet. He collects
eye−witness testimony and corroboration of this evidence. In his grief, his words are brief to Capulet and
Montague. From the point of view of the whole community, the prince pronounces insightful commentary of
the actions which have occurred, commenting that through the feud "all are punish'd" (V.iii.295). In other
words, all have suffered and lost. Prince Escalus's words accurately describe the tone at the end of the play: "a
glooming peace this morning with it brings" (V.iii.304−5). Peace has finally been achieved, but at a cost.
Juliet (Character Analysis)
Juliet is the daughter of Lord and Lady Capulet and one of the two title characters. When the play begins, we
learn from the nurse's remarks that Juliet is about two weeks shy of her fourteenth birthday. In Juliet's first
meeting with her mother and the nurse, Juliet shows herself to be a docile, dutiful child. She comes when she
is called, responding respectfully to her mother: "Madam, I am here, / What is your will?" (I.iii.5−6). When
her mother discusses the topic of Paris's interest in her, Juliet consents to go to the party and meet Paris. She
adds that she will only allow her looks to go as far as her mother gives her permission. Juliet's youthfulness is
echoed in comments by her father, who has hesitated over Paris's interest in marrying her.
The first meeting between Romeo and Juliet is a defining moment in Juliet's life. Romeo describes her as
lovely and rich in beauty. Juliet speaks this way to him as well. Their words to each other complete a sonnet
in which Juliet, a heretofore inexperienced child, suddenly speaks with great naturalness, insight, and
understanding about love. Equally suddenly, Juliet becomes resourceful and not yet ready to share with the
nurse her newfound discovery. Instead of asking the nurse Romeo's name directly, she asks the nurse about
the identities of various young men leaving the party, Romeo among them. She realizes in a moment of
illumination that she is in love with an enemy to her family.
When Juliet speaks to the night of her love for Romeo, she speaks of his true perfection of self. Unlike the
older generation in the play, she is able to look beyond names and feuds. She utters one of the most quoted
lines in all of Shakespeare's works, when she says "That which we call a rose / by any other word would smell
as sweet" (II.ii.43−4). She admits her complete love for Romeo, and it is at this moment that he reveals
himself to her, standing on the ground beneath her balcony. Although Juliet speaks of the "maiden blush"
(II.ii.86) on her face and wonders if she has said too much, she bluntly asks Romeo "Dost thou love me?"
(II.ii.80).
In addition to Juliet's ability to honestly expresses herself, some commentators have noted that she is quite
practical, in contrast to Romeo. She is concerned about Romeo's safety, warning him about her kinsmen and
wondering how he was able to get over the high orchard walls. Additionally, it is Juliet, not Romeo, who sets
into motion the practical details of the wedding, instructing Romeo to send her word about where and when
the event will take place (II.ii.144−46).
From this point on, Juliet shows herself to be focused on her husband and her love for him and willing to do
whatever it takes for the two of them to be together. Her passion shows in her impatience for her wedding
night. She can hardly wait and compares her feelings to those of a child with a new outfit to wear but having
Juliet (Character Analysis)
59
to wait overnight until the special holiday to do so. When the nurse brings a confused account of the death of
Tybalt, making it sound as if Romeo has died, Juliet is devastated. Even when the account is made plain,
Juliet threatens to take her life if she and Romeo cannot be together.
Juliet is willing to take risks and look for opportunities to allow herself and Romeo to be together. When
Romeo and Juliet have one night of love together, it is in Juliet's own room. Juliet lets him go, reluctantly.
When Juliet's parents come in to talk to her about Paris, she refuses to accept their proposal. The nurse advises
her to accept, resulting in Juliet's decision not to confide in the nurse any longer. Juliet mentions her threat of
suicide to Friar Lawrence and states her willingness to do whatever he advises. Before Juliet takes the friar's
potion, she thinks of everything that could go wrong with it. She considers the possibility that Friar Lawrence
may have given her real poison to protect himself from discovery. She also considers the possibility of poor
timing, which would mean that she would wake up in the tomb alone. However, all of these possible
mischances are set aside for the chance for her and Romeo to be together. At the end of the play, she has the
choice of leaving the tomb with the friar or staying with Romeo and joining him in death. She chooses death
rather than living in a world without Romeo.
Nurse (Character Analysis)
The nurse is a servant in the Capulet household. The nurse is often interpreted as a comic foil to Juliet. (A foil
is a character who through strong contrast underscores or enhances the distinctive qualities of another
character.) She seems to be in higher standing than the other servants since she is a companion to Juliet, is
present in private family conversations, and has her own servant, Peter. In Renaissance England, unmarried,
widowed, or poor women might work for relatives in positions like the one in which the nurse finds herself.
At any rate, she is trusted by the Capulets and informed about their intimate affairs.
The nurse's main role in the play is as a companion and advisor to Juliet. She feels affection for Juliet, whom
she has cared for since Juliet was an infant. It is revealed that the nurse lost her own child, Susan, and perhaps
she views Juliet as a daughter. The nurse's affection for Juliet remains constant throughout the play, even if
her advice is of questionable value. Juliet trusts the nurse enough to send her to Romeo the morning after the
balcony scene to learn what Romeo's intentions are. On this errand, the nurse takes it upon herself to make
sure that Romeo's intentions are honorable, since Juliet is young and inexperienced. When Juliet learns of
what has happened in the marketplace, the nurse tries to comfort her and decides to bring Romeo to Juliet. On
the morning after the lovers' one night of married happiness together, the nurse warns them that Romeo needs
to leave Juliet's bedroom because Lady Capulet is coming. When Lord Capulet scolds Juliet harshly, the nurse
tells him he is wrong to do so. She does not back down, so that he even yells at her. When Juliet and the nurse
are left alone after the angry scene with Juliet's parents, the nurse tries to comfort and console Juliet.
The nurse, with her bumbling mannerisms and her bawdy language, is often thought to be one of
Shakespeare's great comic characters. She is a talkative woman and tends to repeat herself and to
free−associate in her conversations. When she and Lady Capulet and Juliet are about to discuss Paris's offer
for the first time, she repeats a story about Juliet as a toddler several times. Lady Capulet has to ask her to
stop. When she brings the message back to Juliet from Romeo, Juliet has to ask her to get to the point faster.
Under pressure, she also talks in a confusing style that misleads her listener. When she tries to tell Juliet about
what has happened in the Verona marketplace, Juliet at first thinks that Romeo is dead because of the way the
nurse is garbling the details.
Another aspect of the nurse's conversation is that she does not mind making vulgar jokes. She even does so
with Juliet, since the jokes pertain to Juliet's wedding night and the possibility of pregnancy. The nurse also
converses in this vulgar manner with Mercutio.
Nurse (Character Analysis)
60
The nurse is depicted as a practical, down−to−earth character. She advises Juliet to marry Paris. Even though
she knows Juliet is married to Romeo, she considers that Romeo's banishment makes him useless to Juliet.
She sees no obstacle to a second marriage in Juliet's secret wedding vows pronounced to Romeo. She even
helps in the kitchen the night before the planned wedding between Juliet and Paris. In this scene, she jokes
with Lord Capulet and he calls her by her name, Angelica.
Romeo (Character Analysis)
Romeo is the son to Lord and Lady Montague and one of the two title characters. Romeo's first love interest is
not Juliet but a young woman named Rosaline, who, like Juliet, happens to be a Capulet. When characters first
refer to Romeo, he is described as acting in a peculiar way. His friend and cousin, Benvolio, discovers why:
the cause is hopeless, incurable lovesickness. Rosaline has vowed to live unwed and without a lover.
(Rosaline, incidentally, never appears in the play.) Romeo's infatuation with Rosaline and her resoluteness to
remain celibate inspire Romeo's behavior. He goes out walking near the woods before dawn. If anyone sees
him, he runs away into the woods to avoid having company. When the sun comes up, he returns home,
retreats into his bedroom, and won't come out. Benvolio advises Romeo that his feelings are infatuation, based
on a lack of experience with women. After being encouraged to do so by Benvolio and Mercutio, Romeo
attends the Capulet party and sees Juliet. When they meet, they fall in love immediately.
Romeo is surrounded by a group of young male friends. Like his friends, Romeo enjoys joking. However,
Romeo's jokes, unlike Mercutio's in particular, usually do not have a sexual double meaning. He also tends to
be more serious than his friends. In speaking about going to the Capulet party, Romeo says that he plans to
stand at the side of the dance floor and watch the other dancers. He even wonders whether they should be
going at all and worries about the effect of these actions on the rest of his life.
Many observers debate Romeo's development in the play. Some argue that he is overly emotional, hasty and
immature and that he remains that way throughout the play. While some readers view Romeo as immature for
falling out of love with Rosaline and in love with Juliet so quickly, others maintain that Romeo's infatuation
with Rosaline early in the play in a sense prepares him to experience real love. Even though Romeo's speeches
about love early in the play are wordy and somewhat awkward, they show that he has a sense of beauty and is
trying hard to express what it is like to be in love. When he first sees Juliet, he shows that he is able to
appreciate true beauty and express it in a powerful way. His speeches become more eloquent.
Romeo is also criticized by some for his apparent lack of moderation. While he demonstrates self−control in
his rejection of Tybalt's challenge to a fight, after Mercutio steps in and is killed, Romeo abandons his
self−restraint and fights and kills Tybalt. In his earnestness to avenge Mercutio, he fails to consider the
consequences his actions will have on his relationship with Juliet. His words "O, I am fortune's fool"
(III.i.136), some would argue, suggest that he does consider the consequences of his emotional actions, but
only after it is to late. Many others would argue that Romeo's words demonstrate his attempting to evade
responsibility for his actions completely by blaming what has happened on fate.
After he learns he is to be banished for killing Tybalt, Romeo throws himself to the ground and weeps. Friar
Lawrence tells him that banishment is better than death, but Romeo responds that being without Juliet is
torture. Romeo's desperate weeping is alternately viewed as unmasculine and unproductive or as
demonstrative of the passionate depth of his commitment to Juliet. He says he can't accept Friar Lawrence's
calm, philosophical advice because Friar Lawrence, as a man who is celibate, is not in a position to
understand Romeo's feelings: Juliet is his heaven, and hell is being in exile without her. Romeo only accepts
Friar Lawrence's counsel when it includes a visit to Juliet.
Romeo (Character Analysis)
61
Some readers believe that Romeo achieves greater maturity toward the plays end. When Romeo's servant
brings word of Juliet's funeral, Romeo decides immediately what he will do and takes action, rather than
weeping as he did when he was banished. He thinks quickly of the poison he knows he can buy in Mantua.
When he rushes back to Verona, he does not take time to see who Paris is before killing him and joining
Juliet, but he does grant Paris's wish to be placed in the tomb near Juliet.
Tybalt (Character Analysis)
He is a nephew to Lord Capulet and a cousin to Juliet. He does not speak many lines, but he influences the
entire course of the play to a degree that exceeds his seemingly minor role in it. Throughout the play, he
demonstrates his angry, resentful, and stubborn nature. When Tybalt first appears, Benvolio is attempting to
stop the servants of the Capulet and Montague households from fighting. By contrast, Tybalt urges on the
fight and succeeds in drawing Benvolio in to fighting with him. At the Capulet party, Tybalt recognizes
Romeo's voice and within ten words is calling for his sword. He also refers to Romeo as a "slave" (I.v.55).
Tybalt says he does not consider it a sin to strike Romeo dead.
Tybalt shows his stubbornness at the Capulet party. Lord Capulet urges Tybalt to control himself, telling him
that he is acting like a boy trying to be a man. Although Tybalt has to give in to his uncle, he vows to get
revenge on Romeo for coming to the Capulet party uninvited. The next day, Tybalt sends a letter to Romeo's
house challenging him to a duel.
Tybalt's actions in Act III influence the remaining events of the play. He quarrels with Mercutio and
challenges Romeo to a sword fight. Tybalt insults Romeo, and he insists that Romeo draw his sword and fight
with him. Romeo refuses to fight, and Mercutio instead takes up the challenge. Tybalt is a skilled fighter,
according to Mercutio, who comments that Tybalt has studied dueling. Thus, when Mercutio taunts him and
calls for a fencing move, Tybalt is able to display it. In addition to his being belligerent and stubborn, Tybalt
also has no qualms about fighting unfairly. When Romeo steps between the fighters, Tybalt stabs Mercutio
under Romeo's arm. After Mercutio is killed, Tybalt declares that Romeo will accompany Mercutio in death.
Instead, Tybalt is slain.
Other Characters (Descriptions)
Abram
He is a servant of the Montagues. Abram appears in the first scene of the play and quarrels with the Capulet
servants, Sampson and Gregory.
Anthony
In some editions of the play, Anthony and Potpan are named as servants of the Capulet household.
Apothecary
The apothecary is a druggist in Mantua. He only speaks a few lines, but Romeo offers an insightful
description of his poor shop and of his appearance. The apothecary is thin and wears ragged clothes. His shop
has a few strange things spread throughout, perhaps to make it look like more than it is: a tortoise, a stuffed
alligator, skins of strange fish, green pots, seeds, rose petals pressed into cakes for perfume. He is so poor that
he sells Romeo a deadly, fast−acting poison even though it is against the law in Mantua to do so.
Attendants
Tybalt (Character Analysis)
62
As the ruler of Verona, Escalus is accompanied by attendants. The attendants are described as the prince's
Train in I.i and simply as attendants in the final scene of the play.
Balthasar
He is a servant to Romeo. Balthasar appears with Abram in the first scene of Act I, but does not participate in
the quarrel with the Capulet servants. He is loyal to Romeo and tries to help him. After Juliet's funeral, he
rushes to Mantua to bring the news of Juliet's "death" to Romeo. He shows his concern for Romeo and asks
him to remain patient, to not act hastily. Balthasar returns with Romeo to Verona and accompanies him to the
tomb, although Romeo tells him not to interfere. At the end of the play, Balthasar provides Prince Escalus
with the letter which Romeo has written to his father. The letter supports Friar Lawrence's account of what has
happened.
Capulet (Lady Capulet)
Lady Capulet is Lord Capulet's wife and Juliet's mother. Juliet's mother has two important conversations with
her daughter during the play. The first one occurs in Act I. In it, Lady Capulet directs Juliet to think about
marriage. She informs Juliet that Paris is interested in marrying her and reminds Juliet that she herself became
a mother when she was about Juliet's age. The second conversation takes place in III.v, just after Romeo's
departure for Mantua. Lady Capulet informs Juliet that the marriage between her and Paris will take place and
that preparations have begun. She at first misunderstands Juliet's sorrow as stemming from mourning for
Tybalt. She becomes angry that Juliet refuses to marry Paris. She refers to Juliet as a fool and says she wishes
Juliet were dead. Though she tries somewhat to check her husband's similarly angry words, after a long
decisive speech from him to Juliet, Lady Capulet refuses to speak to her daughter. Though Juliet's mother
shows some tenderness and concern for her in Act IV prior to the wedding morning, her larger, practical
concern appears to be the wedding preparations, not Juliet's feelings. She seems genuinely sorrowful at the
discovery of Juliet's body on the wedding morning and once again at the Capulet monument. She even
suggests it may cause her to die.
Catling (Simon Catling)
See Musicians
Chorus
The Chorus speaks twice in the play, before the beginning of Act I and before Act I. The Chorus functions as
a commentator on the action and basic meaning of the play. It sets the scene in Verona, a city in northern
Italy, and, in a sonnet, summarizes the action. The play will be about two feuding households of equal rank, a
pair of lovers from these houses whose misadventures lead them to take their lives, and whose parents thereby
finally end their ancient grudges. At the beginning of Act II, the Chorus speaks about young love, "the charm
of looks," and the power passion gives to people to overcome obstacles.
Citizens of Verona
The citizens are unnamed townspeople who appear in public street scenes. Early in the play, they attempt to
stop the fighting between the two feuding households. They appear in Act I inquiring about Mercutio's
murderer, and they detain Benvolio so that the prince may question him. The citizens are described as running
through the streets toward the Capulet monument in the final scene of the play.
Clown
The clown is a servant to Capulet. The clown is given the responsibility of delivering Capulet's party
invitation to certain people in Verona, but he cannot read. After running into Romeo on the street, he asks
Romeo to help him read the list of names. The clown invites Romeo to attend the party. In some editions of
the play, this role is identified as "servant" rather than "clown."
Friar John
Tybalt (Character Analysis)
63
See John
Friar Lawrence
See Lawrence
Gentlemen of both houses
These gentlemen appear in public scenes involving the feuding households. Men from both houses are present
in the marketplace scene. They assemble when the prince pronounces the sentence of banishment on Romeo
and go to the Capulet monument at the end of the play.
Gentlewomen of both houses
Gentlewomen from the Capulet household appear at Lord Capulet's party. Gentlewomen from both houses
assemble when the prince pronounces the sentence of banishment on Romeo and go to the Capulet monument
at the end of the play.
Gregory
As another servant of the Capulets, he accompanies Sampson and jokes and puns with his friend. Gregory
tries to avoid being led into a fight with the Montague servants by Sampson.
Guards
They have no speaking part and are not listed separately in stage directions. Some editions of the play refer to
the watch as the guards.
John (Friar John)
Friar John is a Franciscan friar who has been asked by Friar Lawrence to carry an important letter to Romeo in
Mantua. Before he can deliver the letter, he is quarantined in Verona because of the plague. As soon as he is
able, he gives word to Friar Lawrence.
Lady Capulet
See Capulet
Lady Montague
See Montague
Maskers
Five or six people wearing masks accompany Romeo and his friends to the Capulet party. Maskers going to a
party at one time would have introduced themselves by a speech. Romeo wrote a speech, as a courteous
interloper, but is told by Benvolio that such speeches are out of style now. Perhaps symbolically the maskers
could be seen as representing love in hiding or a forbidden love. As a dramatic issue, the masks are necessary
to get Romeo and his friends into a party to which they have not been invited.
Montague (Lady Montague)
Lady Montague is Lord Montague's wife and Romeo's mother. She has very few lines in the play. She seems
to be a person of reason and restraint, physically holding her husband back from fighting, and tells him not to
"stir one foot to seek a foe" (I.i.80). In the final scene of the play, the audience hears from Lord Montague that
his wife has died of grief over Romeo's banishment.
Montague (Lord Montague)
Head of the Montague household and Romeo's father. He appears very little in the play, yet he seems to be
closer to Romeo than Juliet's parents are to her. For example, he describes Romeo's mysterious behavior to his
nephew, Benvolio. He indicates that both he and his friends have tried to learn from Romeo the cause of his
Tybalt (Character Analysis)
64
behavior. He is pleased at Benvolio's offer to talk to Romeo. During the prince's investigation of the
marketplace brawl which left Mercutio and Tybalt dead, Montague defends his son to the prince, saying that
Romeo simply acted as the law itself would have in taking Tybalt's life. In the final scene of the play, he
appears to be genuinely grieved at his son's untimely death. Recognizing finally that the feud must be laid
aside, Montague takes Capulet's hand extended in a gesture of peace. Moreover, he offers to make a memorial
statue of Juliet in gold.
Musicians
Three musicians are present at the Capulet house to play for the marriage between Juliet and Paris. They do
not play after Juliet's body is discovered. Peter cannot resist trying to boss them and pun with them. Peter
addresses them as Simon Catling, Hugh Rebeck, and James Soundpost. These names are taken from musical
instruments.
Old Man
This older relative of the Capulet family attends the Capulet party. Lord Capulet talks to him briefly at the
party. He functions dramatically to show Lord Capulet's age. Both he and Capulet are older men, past
dancing. They like to reminisce about the passage of time.
Page to Paris
Paris's page accompanies him to Juliet's tomb. He is instructed to stay alone in the churchyard and whistle a
warning to Paris if anyone approaches. Even though he is afraid, he does as he is told. When he realizes that
Paris and another man (Romeo) are fighting, he runs to get the watch. He testifies to the prince at the end of
the play about his knowledge of the occurrences within the tomb.
Pages
Pages are young male servants to people of higher social standing. They run errands, carry messages, and
accompany their masters. Mercutio has a page with him in the marketplace; after being stabbed by Tybalt,
Mercutio sends his page for a surgeon. Paris also has a page.
Paris
Paris is a young nobleman and kinsman to Prince Escalus. He is a conventional young lover who seeks Juliet's
hand in marriage. He is said by Juliet's mother to be handsome in appearance, and the nurse describes Romeo
as a dishcloth compared to Paris. Observing the standards of the time, he first approaches Juliet's father about
the possibility of his marrying Juliet. In fact, he has more conversations with Lord Capulet than with Juliet
throughout the whole course of the play. When Capulet seems to express reservations about a marriage
between his child and Paris based on Juliet's youth, Paris tries to be persuasive. He takes Capulet's advice in
going to the party to try to win Juliet's hand there. He does not appear to be aware of Juliet's feelings at all,
because he goes to see Friar Lawrence to arrange the wedding without even recognizing that Juliet has no
romantic feelings for him and is, in fact, already married. However, he seems to be a genuine and forthright
person. He is sorrowful at Juliet's funeral, and in the last act he brings flowers to her grave. This suggests that
he has true feelings for Juliet as it is a private action, not a public one performed for the benefit of an audience
such as her family. Additionally, he refers to Juliet as his love. Even at this point, however, he does not seem
to really understand Juliet; he thinks she died from grief over Tybalt.
Peter
Peter is the nurse's servant. He carries the nurse's fan for her on her errand to Romeo from Juliet. He talks in
the sexual double meanings popular among the Capulet servants. At the nurse's orders, he stands at the gate
when they return to Juliet with Romeo's message. After Juliet's funeral, he asks the musicians to play music to
comfort him. When they won't, he refuses to pay them. He appears to enjoy the opportunity to boss the
musicians, probably since he himself is usually ordered about.
Tybalt (Character Analysis)
65
Petruchio
Petruchio is described as a mute follower of Tybalt. He is with Tybalt in the marketplace brawl.
Potpan
In some editions of the play, Potpan and Anthony are named as servants of the Capulet household.
Rebeck (Hugh Rebeck)
See Musicians
Sampson
He is a servant of the Capulets. Sampson quarrels with Montague servants and bites his thumb at Montague
servants as a gesture of defiance in order to provoke a fight. Additionally, he represents some fairly typical
Renaissance attitudes towards women. He uses a biblical phrase about women being the "weaker vessels"
(I.i.16), and his comments about women indicate that he thinks of them as sexual objects.
Servants
The servants in the play are employed by the Capulet and Montague households. Servants announce the
arrival of guests, set out napkins, silverware, and trenchers of food, and serve meals. They also are directed to
clear furniture from the hall floor for dancing, tend to the fire and carry logs, and invite guests to various
functions.
Soundpost (James Soundpost)
See Musicians
Torch−Bearers
Torch−bearers carry light to the Capulet party in I.iv. Romeo expresses his wish to carry a torch so as to avoid
dancing.
Watchmen
Three watchmen patrol at night to protect the town and to make sure that the prince's rulings are carried out.
For example, Friar Lawrence warns Romeo that he must leave Juliet before the watch is set. Paris's page calls
the watch when he realizes his master is in a fight at the Capulet tomb. The watchmen catch Balthasar and the
Friar, gather preliminary evidence on what has happened, and report on their findings to the prince.
Themes
It is often said that Shakespeare never blotted a line, but it is also true that he borrowed a few. As in most of
his plays, the Bard drew upon existing literary sources in composing Romeo and Juliet. Thus, for example,
Mercutio's "Queen Mab" speech (I.iv.53−95) bears a close resemblance to a verse passage from Geoffrey
Chaucer's Parliament of Fowles written two centuries before Shakespeare's age. As for the central story of
Romeo and Juliet, the direct source of Shakespeare's plot was a 3,000 line verse drama written by the English
poet Arthur Brooke in 1562 and republished in 1587 as The Tragically Historye of Romeus and Juliet.
Brooke, in his turn, drew upon a French version by Pierre Boaistua. It is, however, an Italian poet, Luigi Da
Porto, who first set the story of the doomed lovers in Verona and gave them the names Romeo and Guiletta in
1530. Beyond this, the story of a family feud serving as an obstacle to true love dates back to ancient Roman
comedies and their Greek antecedents.
The extensive literary lineage of the Romeo and Juliet story may appear to be incongruent with recent
approaches to Shakespeare's play that focus on its experimental nature. It is, however, in the radical departures
Themes
66
from existing forms that Shakespeare displays his creative brilliance in Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare was
the first to dramatize the "tragicall historye" of the Veronese lovers. This, in itself, required consummate skill
to reduce a story that unfolds over months or years to less than a week's duration and to boil the presentation
down into "two hours traffic of our stage" (First Prologue, 12). But far more important than this alteration,
Shakespeare had the creative audacity to present the story of Romeo and Juliet as a tragedy in the same class
as the tragedies of Ancient Greece. For openers, while Romeo and Juliet are scions of noble families, they are
not royals. Given the age−long limitation of tragedy to the affairs of kings and queens, the notion that two
upper−middle class youths could serve as the protagonist of a tragedy was outlandish to Elizabethan
audiences. As the Prince says in the plays concluding couplet: "For never was a story of more woe / Than this
of Juliet and her Romeo" (V.iii.309−310). The story is, in fact, sad; but in this, it manifests two further
innovations. First, when Elizabethan audiences saw two young lovers on stage in opposition to resistant
parents (usually fathers), they customarily assumed that love would triumph in a happy ending. In a sense,
love does triumph, and there is a restoration of civil harmony in the play's final scene; but Romeo and Juliet,
despite the youth of its title characters, ends badly. At the same time, while both characters have adolescent
shortcomings, neither (nor both) of them have a classical tragic flaw. Their demise is the outcome of
circumstance and Fortune.
By way of addition, Romeo and Juliet is an experimental play in that it embodies forms and techniques that
had not been used by playwrights in the past. The inclusion of two choral sonnets before Act I and Act II and,
even more stunningly, of Romeo and Juliet's jointly composed sonnet in Act I, scene v (92−105) is a technical
innovation with a supreme purpose. It sets Romeo and Juliet apart from a generally prosaic world, for the
language that they exchange between each other possesses a lyrical quality that is noticeable (and
deliberately) of a higher order than the rest of the play's text. As will be discussed further under the heading of
Time, not only did Shakespeare telescope and compress events, Romeo and Juliet is self−consciously
designed with a pace of events that takes on momentum as the lives of the lovers careen toward catastrophe.
In the first two quatrains of the play's opening sonnet, the chorus spells out the story line and establishes its
central theme as the antithesis between love and hate.
Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the loins of these two foes
A pair of star−cross'd lovers take their life;
Whose misadventur'd piteous overthrows,
Doth with their death bury their parents' strife.
(Opening Prologue, 1−8)
There are, to be sure, variants upon the love/hate polarity in terms of youth versus age and, less importantly,
good versus evil; but it is the conflict between the love of Romeo and Juliet, on the one hand, and the hate that
divides their respective families, on the other, that predominates. Thus, in the play's opening scene, after
witnessing the evidence of the first fray between his kinsman and the Capulets, Romeo observes, "Here's
much to do with hate, but more with love" (I.i.175); while after learning Romeo's last name, Juliet similarly
remarks, "My only love sprung from my only hate!" (I. v.138). At the play's midpoint, Juliet is told that
Romeo has killed her cousin, Tybalt; and love and hate (temporarily) assume the qualities of good and evil as
she first refers to Romeo as a "dove−feathered raven! wolvish ravening lamb!" and then concludes the diatribe
with
A (damned) saint, an honorable villain!
O nature, what hadst thou to do in hell
Themes
67
When thou didst bower the spirit of a fiend
In mortal paradise of such sweet flesh?
(III.ii.79−82).
But Juliet then rebukes herself for chiding Romeo in such moralistic terms: this is not a play about good and
evil (as Shakespeare's great tragedies all are) but about love versus hate.
In the last scene of Act III, Romeo says to Juliet "More light and light, more dark and dark our woes"
(III.v.36). Light and dark figure prominently in the play as both a symbolic cluster and as an element of its
stagecraft. It is in Romeo's eyes that the light of Juliet's beauty shines most lyrically. True, part of his
description of Rosaline in Act I, scene ii runs, "The all seeing sun / Ne'er saw her match since first the world
begun" (92−93). But it is only when he sees Juliet that Romeo's verbal expression of light transcends the
hackneyed.
O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear;
Beauty too rich for use, for earth to dear!
(I.v.44−47).
In the balcony scene (Act II, scene ii), Romeo outdoes even this elegance in the famous speech:
But soft, what light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief,
That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.
(II.ii.2−6).
Both Juliet and Romeo's love for her are brilliant, incandescent. But this illumination is overcome by the
shades of death, and Shakespeare reinforces the thematic with the visual by setting the final scene of his play
at night in a sealed tomb illuminated only by torches that fall by the wayside.
Time is of urgent concern in Romeo and Juliet. Doting upon Rosaline, the "sad hours seem long" (I.i.162) to
Romeo when we first meet him. Before Romeo and Mercutio reach the banquet scene that concludes the
opening act, Mercutio complains about wasted time. But the most prominent example of Time in both the text
and the actual pace of Romeo and Juliet appears in Act III, scene ii, as Juliet (innocent of Romeo's crime)
urges the Sun to move more rapidly across the sky so that night falls and her lover arrives.
Gallop apace, you fiery−footed steeds,
Toward Phoebus' lodging; such a waggoner
As Phaeton would whip you to the west,
And bring in cloudy night immediately.
(III.ii.1−4).
Now Romeo's "three−hours wife" (III.ii.99) tries to speed time along just as she and Romeo tried to slow it
down at the end of the balcony scene (Act II, scene ii). It is, in the end, haste that triumphs. Following the duel
scene that opens Act III, events move with greater and greater momentum, and we gain the decided sense that
the lives of the lovers are running headlong and out of control. This is especially true of the play's anchoring
character, the wise Friar Laurence. Friar Laurence repeatedly speaks of moving slowly; and since the effects
of the potion are limited to forty−two hours, the plan that he concocts with Juliet depends upon timing. But
Themes
68
Friar Laurence himself acts in haste under the pressure of circumstance. He agrees to marry the lovers on the
quickly−formed hunch that this will put generations of feuding to an end; the sleeping potion scheme occurs
to Friar Laurence as a brilliant flash suggested by Juliet's statement that she will kill herself; he then trips in
haste on gravestones trying to get the message to Romeo after the mission of his intended messenger, Friar
John, is inadvertently delayed.
One facet of Brooke's Historie that Shakespeare amplified was his source's emphasis upon the Elizabethan
concept of Fortune or Fate. Upon learning of Mercutio's death, Romeo exclaims, "This day's black fate on
more days doth depend, / This but begins the woe others must end" (III.i.119−120). In Act III, scene v, Juliet
addresses Fortune and implores Its aid.
O Fortune, Fortune, all men call thee fickle;
If thou art fickle, what dost thou with him
That is renown'd for faith? Be fickle, Fortune:
For then I hope thou wilt not keep him long,
But send him back.
(ll.60−64).
Fortune is fickle: it is improbable that so perfectly matched a couple should be barred by a senseless family
conflict (the cause of which is never mentioned and cannot be recalled); it is only through mischance that
Romeo takes his own life in the mistaken belief that his love is dead, causing her to follow suit.
Accompanying Fortune in Romeo and Juliet are dreams and forebodings. There is, to begin, Romeo's
off−hand reference to having dreamed and Mercutio's rejoiner that his dream was that dreamers lie. This is
followed by one of the most renowned set piece of the play, Mercutio's "Queen Mab" speech about the flights
of fancy that take place in dreams under the aegis of Queen Mab and her entourage. Then, in the first lines of
Act V, Romeo speaks of dreams that "presage some joyful news at hand." Ironically, such news (Friar
Laurence's letter about the death potion ruse) is on the way, but it fails to reach Romeo in Time.
In Act II, scene vi, Friar Laurence says to the lovers that "These violent delights have violent ends / And in
their triumph die" (9−10). This seeming homily is prescient: the play ends violently; the love of Romeo and
Juliet triumphs only after they are dead. From the start of their romance, the lovers intuitively sense that their
doom is ordained along with their passion. In the scene before he first meets Juliet, Romeo says to his friends:
I fear, too early, for my mind misgives
Some consequence yet hanging in the stars
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night's revels, and expire the term
Of a despised life clos'd in my breast
By some vile forfeit of untimely death.
(I.iv.106−111).
An affected youth given to dramatic posing, the speech is consistent with the pre−Juliet Romeo in its
self−absorption; whatever its well−spring, it is uncannily accurate. Juliet takes this premonition a step further
toward the conclusion of the balcony scene.
Although I joy in thee,
I have no joy of this contract tonight,
It is too rash, too unadvis'd, too sudden,
Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be
Ere one can say it lightens
Themes
69
(II.ii.116−120).
Romeo's vague premonition in the play's first act is particularized by Juliet in the second act, for she projects
that haste will be a determinative factor in the outcome of her romance with Romeo and that their lives will be
utterly extinguished after shining brightly like a bolt of lightening. In Act III, Juliet's powers of divination
grow even stronger as she sees Romeo "As one dead in the bottom of a tomb" (III.v.56). This, of course, is
precisely accurate: Romeo will, in fact, die in the Capulet mausoleum, and Juliet will, in fact, see him there.
Principal Topics
Critics and readers have proposed three main ways to interpret Shakespeare's arrangement of the events and
circumstances in Romeo and Juliet. (The deliberate construction of the play so that its action seems to lead
inevitably to the "catastrophe" of the young lovers' deaths, is known as Shakespeare's "tragic design.") One
method is to regard Romeo and Juliet as helpless victims of the arbitrary operation of fate. Numerous tricks of
chance in the play support this theory; for example, Romeo's failed attempt to stop the fight between Mercutio
and Tybalt and Friar John's inability to leave Verona due to the plague. References to "fortune" and the "stars"
throughout the play, particularly the description of Romeo and Juliet in the Prologue to Act I as "star−crossed
lovers," also uphold this argument. This emphasis on fortune as a guiding force that determines one's destiny
was probably not lost on Elizabethan audiences, who would have been familiar with and likely endorsed this
conviction. A second perspective is that Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy of Providence or divine will.
Proponents of this interpretation maintain that the seemingly coincidental or accidental events in the play are
in fact initiated by God to punish, and ultimately reconcile, the feuding families. God finally achieves this
reconciliation by using the deaths of the lovers as a moral example for the others. A third reading of
Shakespeare's tragic design holds that the lovers' own reckless passjon leads to their double suicide.
Supporters of this viewpoint sometimes regard Friar Lawrence as a spokesman for Shakespeare himself, for
the monk does not completely endorse Romeo and Juliet's impetuous behavior but rather cautions them to
"love moderately." These three perspectives of Shakespeare's tragic design are perhaps the most commonly
discussed issues in Romeo and Juliet. At various times throughout the centuries since the tragedy was written,
critics have genera.lly emphasized one or another of these interpretations. Recently, however, commentators
have argued that Shakespeare actually presents a balance of all three concepts in the play.
Closely related to the problem of Shakespeare's tragic design is the question of the play's effectiveness as an
"authentic" tragedy. In drama, atragedy traditionally recounts the significant events or actions in a
protagonist's life which, taken together, bring about the catastrophe. The ambiguity surrounding the cause of
the lovers' deaths has led some critics to regard the play as an apprentice tragedy, one in which Shakespeare
had not yet developed his skills as a tragic dramatist. In fact, Romeo and Juliet is often considered an
experiment in tragedy, in which the playwright attempts to break free of traditional patterns by omitting the
necessary cause−and−effect relationship between the lovers' characters and their catastrophe.
Another prominent aspect of Romeo and Juliet is Shakespeare's handling of the passage of time to underscore
the lovers' hasty action, perhaps most evident in the characters' headlong rush to fulfill their love for each
other. Shakespeare most notably emphasizes this haste by compressing the several months' action of Brooke's
Tragical Historye of Romeus and Juliet to only five days. Further, Shakespeare's masterful use of language as
well as his various references to the explicit progression of time combine to establish an atmosphere of hasty
action. This technique is evident in Juliet's speech in Act III, scene ii, "Gallop apace, you firey−footed steeds,
/ Towards Phoebus' lodging; such a waggoner / As Phaeton would whip you to the west, / And bring in cloudy
night immediately. / Spread thy close curtain, love−performing night, / That runaway's eyes may wink, and
Romeo / Leap to these arms untalk'd of and unseen!" Subtle patterns of swift imagery and lively dialogue, as
well as the Chorus's commentary, create an undercurrent of tension and impulsiveness that is discernible
throughout the play. On several occasions, Shakespeare ironically contrasts the notion of time and haste with a
Principal Topics
70
particular character's dialogue. One example of this technique is the contradiction between the play's hurried
pace and Friar Lawrence's warning to Romeo: "Wisely and slow, they stumble that run fast" (II. iii. 94). The
priest later fails to heed his own advice, however, when, in Act V he is startled and hastens from the tomb,
leaving Juliet to her fate. Shakespeare employs all of these devices to create a frantic atmosphere in which the
characters behave recklessly.
Examining the nature of Romeo and Juliet's love is also important to achieve an understanding of the play as a
whole. In some ways, the lovers' passion reflects the practice of "courtly love." Courtly love is a tradition that
defines what love is and establishes a code of behavior for lovers. It flourished in the Middle Ages and had a
significant influence on Renaissance literature. In essence, under this system love is illicit and sensual and is
accompanied by great emotional suffering. The lover (in literature, usually a knight) falls in love at first sight
and agonizes over his situation until his affection is returned. Once he achieves this goal, he is inspired to
perform great deeds. Further, the lovers pledge their fidelity to one another and vow to keep their union secret.
Romeo and Juliet's affair closely follows this pattern: they fall in love at first sight; their love is strengthened
rather than weakened by the feud; they meet at night and vow to conceal their union; and each promptly
resolves to commit suicide upon learning of the other's death. Another important feature of Romeo and Juliet's
love is its spiritual quality. The couple treats love with great reverence, and it is their faithfulness to it in the
face of violence, hatred, and even death which ultimately restores peace and order to Verona.
Many of the central issues in Romeo and Juliet are reinforced by Shakespeare's use of opposites and
contradictory images, perhaps most notably the contrast between light and darkness. In most cases, the
emphasis on light—starlight, moonlight, sunlight, and lightning—expresses Romeo and Juliet's love for one
another. Darkness, however, in the form of clouds, rain, and nightfall, reflects the evil of the feud. In addition,
star imagery enhances the theme of fate in the play, serving not only as a metaphor for feminine beauty and
the lovers' passion, but also for destiny. Another concept fundamental to understanding Romeo and Juliet is
the struggle between the opposing forces of love and death. Shakespeare developed this theme by constructing
images that personify death as Juliet's lover. This overall impression is achieved through the repeated use of
oxymora (the pairing of contradictory terms), such as "death−mark'd love," and more subtle word oppositions,
like "womb" and "tomb."
Essays
The Capulet − Montague Feud
In the Prologue to Romeo and Juliet, the Chorus tells us of an "ancient grudge" between two households of
equal dignity that has broken out into a "new mutiny" that will cause blood to flow in the streets of Verona
and will ultimately result in the deaths of the "star−cross'd lovers." The Chorus points to the heads of these
two families as the source of the strife at hand, the rage of their parents causing the deaths of their children.
We soon learn the surnames of the warring clans, Capulet and Montague, and both patriarchs (as well as their
respective ladies) appear in the flesh in the play's first scene. Although Tybalt of the Capulets is the most
aggressive character on the stage, Mercutio's twice−spoken curse, "a plague a' both houses!" (III, i. ll.91, 106),
makes it plain that the sides are equally to blame for his death, and by extension, for the tragedy that befalls
the lovers. Beyond this, however, we are never told what the original cause of the war between the Capulets
and Montagues was. The inference here is that the conflict is an archaic rivalry based upon the very equality
of the families' social standing that has been driven forward by a long skein of injuries and slights. Not only
has the issue at odds been lost to time and the overlay of fresh events, there is no effective mechanism to
resolve it at hand. While the parental figures of the play, most notably Old Capulet, act as tyrants, civil
authority is wanting in Verona. That being so, the cause of the ongoing mutiny that is played out before us
does not stem solely from strong parental domination but also from the weak authority of the state as
embodied in Prince Escalus.
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71
The play moves directly from the Prologue to a lower case example of the mutiny as a confrontation unfolds
between servants of the Capulet and Montague households. As Sampson and Gregory square off against
Abram and Balthasar, the vulgar obscenities and gestures which they exchange undercut any sense of real
danger. The interplay among these underlings is stylized and restrained; before any threshold is crossed,
Samson checks with Gregory about whether the law is on their side if they assent to an implied challenge. The
foot soldiers in the war between the families are far less serious than the Prologue forebodes. The comic
aspect of the feud is reinforced when Old Capulet arrives in person in his gown, calls to his wife for a "long
sword" and is punctured roundly when she tells him that a crutch is all that he can handle at his advanced age.
Montague arrives, mimics the mindless behavior of the servants and is duly restrained by his wife. This is not
the stuff of menace or of chivalry, and the humor woven into this first display of mutiny in Verona mutes any
sense of immediate threat.
There is, however, the showdown between Benvolio and Tybalt that erupts after the servants have had their
say, and in the character of Tybalt we do see a deadly menace. When the level−headed Benvolio seeks to
avoid a fight by engaging his adversary as a partner in peace, Tybalt issues the challenge: "What, drawn and
talk of peace? I hate the word / As I hate hell, all Montagues, and thee / Have at thee coward" (I, i. ll.69−71).
What matters here is not that Benvolio (or the Montagues) are less at fault than Tybalt (or the Capulets) but
that there are differences of degree in the animosity levels of individuals within each camp. In Act II, scene iv,
after Benvolio apprises Mercutio that Tybalt has challenged Romeo to a duel, we learn from Mercutio that,
Tybalt, the "Prince of Cats," is a "duellist" and "a gentleman of the first house." Tybalt's membership in the
Capulet family confers a certain status upon him, but his lethal intentions and the skill to act upon them put
him at a particularly high "rank" within his clan and, in the eyes of those on his level, notably Mercutio
himself. The bloodshed that occurs in the duel scene (Act I, scene iii) is not simply an inevitable outcome of
two families at war, but of a social structure or sub−culture that has evolved over generations through which
Tybalt is matched with Mercutio.
Returning to the play's opening scene, following a crowd of citizens shouting, "Down with the Capulets.
Down with the Montagues," Prince Escalus enters and angrily complains to the heads of the warring factions
that three times "civil brawls" have arisen from an "airy word" between Old Capulet and Montague. The
Prince is not entirely accurate in his charge; the elderly men have had no hand in provoking the fracas.
Escalus then lays down the law, saying to both of the patriarchs, "If ever you disturb our streets again / Your
lives shall pay the forfeit of the peace" (I, i. ll.96−97). The Prince's order seems harsh and extreme in its
finality, but it raises the question of what the Prince did after the first two outbreaks. The chinks in the
Prince's authority widen after the deaths of Mercutio and Tybalt at the outset of Act III. Romeo is not
sentenced to death for his crime, but merely exiled, and as for Old Montague and Old Capulet they are
punished with fines for their responsibility in an incident much more serious than the hurly−burly of the first
scene. Escalus only partially acknowledges his weakness as an enabling force in the conflicts that (seem to)
end with the deaths of Romeo and Juliet when he casts his judgment:
Where be these enemies? Capulet! Montague!See what a scourge is laid upon your hate, That
finds means to kill your joys with love.And for winking at your discords tooHave lost a brace
of kinsmen. All are punished (V, iii. ll.291−295).
While pronouncing all guilty, Escalus does not indicate what the punishment is to be, and in the last line
before the play's concluding couplet, the Prince wavers still further, asserting for the future that "some shall be
pardon'd, and some punished" (l.308). Worse, although the standard interpretation of their joint pledge to erect
statutes to the memory of the ancient lovers takes this to be a sign of reconciliation, rivalry persist between
Old Capulet and Old Montague, the latter claiming to have the capacity to give more than his counterpart
demands of him. In the end, the deaths of Romeo and Juliet are ordained by the war between their houses, but
that conflict is also the result of actions by individual characters, like Tybalt and Mercutio, and inaction by a
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72
weak and wavering sovereign.
Fate and Free Will in Romeo and Juliet
One of the most important issues in the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet is that of choice. Do the characters have
the ability to choose what they want to do, or are they simply destined to participate in death and destruction?
There is ample evidence of both fate and free will in the play, and the presence of both greatly affects the
interpretation of the plot and the characters.
Fate as a dominating force is evident from the very beginning of the play. The Chorus introduces the power of
fortune in the opening prologue when we are told that Romeo and Juliet are “star−crossed” (destined for bad
luck) and “death−marked,” and that their death will end their parents’ feud. Fate and fortune are closely
related in the play, as they both concern events that are out of human control. By telling us that Romeo and
Juliet are destined to die because of their bad luck, Shakespeare gives us the climax of the play before it even
begins. This strategy, which seems odd considering the end has been spoiled for the audience, serves two
purposes: it allows the introduction of the power of fate and fortune over people’s lives by declaring the fate
of Romeo and Juliet at the very beginning, and it also creates tension throughout the play because they very
nearly succeed despite this terrible declaration. Thus the opening prologue sets up the fate/free will problem.
The characters themselves all believe that their lives are controlled by destiny and luck, and Romeo is a prime
example of this. When Romeo and his friends journey to the Capulet’s ball in Act I, scene iv, Romeo hesitates
to go because he has had a bad dream:
...[M]y mind misgivesSome consequence, yet hanging in the stars,Shall bitterly begin his
fearful dateWith this night’s revels and expire the termOf a despised life, closed in my
breast,By some vile forfeit of untimely death (I, iv. 106−111).
Romeo not only acknowledges the power of the stars, which tell what fate has in store through astrology, but
he also believes that his destiny is to die. Romeo’s belief in fate also affects his interpretation of events. When
Romeo kills Tybalt in Act III, scene i, he claims that he is “fortune’s fool” by having contributed to his own
downfall. In Act V, scene i, Romeo demonstrates his belief in the power of dreams to foretell the future once
again when he believes that he will be reunited with Juliet on the basis of another dream. However, when
Balthasar informs him that Juliet is dead, Romeo once again rails against the power of fate: “Is it e’en so?
Then I defy you, stars! / Thou knowest my lodging” (V, i. 24). Romeo finally tries to escape from his destiny
at the end of the play by committing suicide to “shake the yoke of inauspicious stars,” ironically fulfilling the
destiny declared by the Chorus in the opening prologue.
Other characters in the play believe in the power of fate as well. Juliet appeals to fortune when Romeo escapes
to Mantua in Act III, scene v:
“O Fortune, Fortune! All men call thee fickle. If thou art fickle, what dost thou with himThat
is renowned for faith? Be fickle, Fortune,For then I hope thou wilt not keep him longBut send
him back” (III, v. 60−64).
Juliet demonstrates here that she not only believes in the power of luck and fate over her own situation, but
that Romeo himself has faith in those concepts. Friar Laurence also shows his belief in the power of destiny
over people. When Romeo runs to his cell after killing Tybalt, Friar Laurence acknowledges that Romeo does
indeed have bad luck: “Affliction is enamored of thy parts, / And thou art wedded to calamity” (III, iii.
ll.2−3). As a priest, Friar Laurence naturally believes that destiny exists, as God has planned out all events.
However, the friar will also become a victim of fate by the end of the play. His letter to Romeo, which details
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Friar Laurence’s plan for Romeo to pick up Juliet at the Capulet tomb after she has awakened from the effects
of the potion, could not be delivered because of the “unfortunate” quarantine of Friar John. Friar Laurence
then has the misfortune of accidentally tripping over gravestones while running to meet Juliet, which delays
his arrival until after Romeo has committed suicide. Friar Laurence recognizes the power of fate to overrule
his good intentions when Juliet awakens: “A greater power than we can contradict / Hath thwarted our
intents” (V, iii. ll.153−154). The fact that Friar Laurence, Juliet, Romeo, and the other characters in the play
believe so strongly in fate and fortune is not surprising, given the time period. Faith in destiny and luck was
typical in the Renaissance, and Shakespearean audiences would not have questioned the dominance of these
concepts in the lives of the characters. Indeed, it would have seemed odd if the characters did not believe in
the power of fate or in the ability of the stars to dictate lives.
Not only does Shakespeare make the case for the power of fate in terms of the characters’ beliefs in the play,
but he also strengthens it by including a multitude of ironic statements that predict events in the play. Romeo
and Mercutio both predict their own deaths through their statements in Act I, scene iv, and Act III, scene i,
respectively, and Juliet foresees Romeo’s death in Act III, scene v. Friar Laurence makes several prophetic
statements throughout the play, including the infamous “Wisely and slow. They stumble that run fast,” from
the end of Act II, scene iii, which predicts the mistake that he himself will make at the play’s climax. Even
Lady Capulet, in her anger over her daughter’s defiance, wishes that Juliet “were married to her grave,” in Act
III, scene v, which will indeed become the case. Through these statements and the opinions of the characters
themselves, Shakespeare would seem to indicate that the power of fate over humanity is unbreakable, and
even the power of love cannot overcome it.
The power of fate to control our lives seems insurmountable in light of what the characters say in Romeo and
Juliet, but when we consider what they actually do, the issue becomes much more problematic. Although
Romeo professes a great belief in the power of the stars over his life, he constantly acts against what he
believes his destiny to be. When he has the dream that he will die if he goes to the Capulet ball, he still goes,
even though Mercutio’s “Queen Mab” speech has not impressed him. Romeo knows that he should not
engage Tybalt in Act III, scene i, and even notes that the consequences of fighting Tybalt will be dire: “This
day’s black fate on moe days doth depend; / This but begins the woe others must end” (ll.117−118). Romeo
realizes that his actions and those of Mercutio and Tybalt will have repercussions, but he ignores them in
order to exact his revenge for his friend’s death. This makes his complaint about being “fortune’s fool”
questionable, as he had already perceived the consequences of his actions. Romeo refuses to follow his fate in
Act V, when, despite having a dream that predicted happiness with Juliet, he immediately attempts to procure
poison in order to commit suicide without even questioning how Juliet dies or asking Friar Laurence for
details. He also kills himself in order to escape fate, which cannot be possible if fate exists. If Romeo’s belief
in destiny is as strong as he claims, he should not attempt to contradict it so often.
This tendency to profess a belief in fate but act according to one’s own wishes is typical of more characters in
this play than just Romeo. The Capulets and the Montagues, who complain about their bad luck when their
children commit suicide at the end of the play, are willing participants in the feud that causes the situation in
the first place. Tybalt and Mercutio, who are technically not of either house and should not be involved in the
feud, willingly fight each other because of their bad tempers. Friar Laurence, who states that Romeo has bad
luck, tries to counteract it by helping Romeo escape to Mantua and by devising the plan to get Juliet there.
Friar Laurence also acts against his own advice when he runs, panicking, to Juliet’s tomb, only to stumble and
delay his arrival. If he had followed his own advice, he would have arrived before Romeo commits suicide,
and even possibly before Romeo kills Paris. Note that all of these characters choose their actions in these
situations—no one has made the Capulets, the Montagues, Tybalt, or Mercutio participate in the feud, and
Friar Laurence does exactly what he tells Romeo not to do by hurrying. The choices the characters make
eventually result in the deaths of Romeo and Juliet.
Juliet also acts according to her own mind, despite her belief in fate. Despite her love for Romeo, Juliet knows
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that a relationship with him is not the wisest choice:
Although I joy in thee,I have no joy of this contract to−night.It is too rash, too unadvised, too
sudden;Too like the lightning, which doth cease to beEre one can say ‘It lightens’ (II, ii. ll.
116−120).
Not only is a relationship with Romeo a bad idea because they have just met, but it is complicated even more
by the feud. Juliet chooses to pursue this relationship despite these problems, knowing that it may result in
both of their deaths. When the Capulets demand that Juliet marry Paris so quickly after Tybalt’s death (which
under normal circumstances would not have been done), Juliet chooses to allow Friar Laurence to concoct a
plan to save her, which involves taking the potion. No one makes Juliet take the potion; she does so of her
own free will. She also chooses to kill herself rather than confront her parents once Romeo has committed
suicide. All of the characters in the play have options, and it is their actions, which contradict their belief in
fate, that lead to the deaths that occur.
The problem of fate and free will in Romeo and Juliet is a difficult one indeed. There are obvious examples of
“accidents” in the play: the servant who encounters Romeo and Benvolio and invites them to the Capulet
party, the meeting of Romeo and Juliet, the quarantine of Friar John, and the presence of Paris at the tomb
when Romeo arrives. These accidents and the beliefs of the characters in the power of fate and fortune suggest
that Romeo and Juliet are indeed death marked. There are, however, obvious circumstances where the
characters choose their actions of their own free will: the feud itself, the decision of Romeo and Juliet to
marry each other, the fight in Act III, scene i, and the suicides of Romeo and Juliet. The characters choose
these actions of their own accord, and nothing has forced them to follow the paths they have chosen for
themselves. What, then, is the “greater power” that the characters cannot contradict? The only definitive
answer is the same as it is for any story: their author.
Light and Dark in Romeo and Juliet
Light and darkness usually have very definitive meanings in human psychology. Traditionally, light is
considered “good” because it allows us to perceive the world around us and to work within it. Conversely,
dark is usually viewed as “evil” due to our inability to see and the fear that such a state brings. Thus day and
night, which are distinguished by the amount of light available, have similar connotations. However, while
typical notions of light and dark do appear in Romeo and Juliet, day and night are reversed. Night becomes
good because it aids Romeo and Juliet, and day becomes evil because it brings death and destruction.
Light and dark are linked with the protagonists early in the play. When Romeo first appears in the play, he is
immediately associated with darkness. As Montague observes, Romeo walks around before the sun rises, and
Away from light steals home my heavy son
And private in his chamber pens himself,
Shuts up his windows, locks fair daylight out,
And makes himself an artificial night (I, i. ll.135−138).
Romeo does this, of course, because of Rosaline’s rejection. Romeo’s parents and cousin regard his darkness
as “black and portentous,” and consider it a reason for concern. And indeed it is troubling, as this is not
typical behavior for Romeo, nor is it expected of most people, and there is clearly something wrong with him.
Romeo’s relationship with the dark is also strengthened through the object of his love, Rosaline. When
Romeo explains his situation to Benvolio, he comments that Rosaline has “Dian’s wit” because she has sworn
to be a virgin for the rest of her life, ending, of course, any of Romeo’s romantic pretensions. This creates a
link between Rosaline and darkness because Diana is the Roman goddess of the moon, which appears at night
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and thus is connected to it. This association will become important later in the play when Romeo and Juliet
meet. Meanwhile, Romeo’s melancholy at Rosaline’s rejection and his desire to avoid light leads him to want
to be a torchbearer at the Capulet ball in Act I, scene iv:
Give me a torch. I am not for this ambling.
Being but heavy, I will bear the light (ll.11−12).
Because of his depression, Romeo sees light as a burden, and does not regard it as good. Romeo conforms to
the typical notions of light and dark; he keeps to the darkness because there is something wrong with him, and
he will be attracted again to light when he has overcome his depression.
When Romeo sees Juliet for the first time, he recovers from his unrequited love for Rosaline, and, as a result,
finds light good again. Romeo’s first words to describe Juliet are about light:
O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
As a rich jewel in an Ethiop’s ear (I, v. ll.44−46).
This observation serves two purposes: it indicates that Romeo’s pining for Rosaline is over (and thus his need
for hiding from light), and it creates an association between Juliet and light that will endure throughout the
play. This point is expounded further two scenes later, when Romeo sees Juliet on the balcony. Just as in Act
I, scene v, Romeo’s immediate reaction to seeing Juliet is to comment on the light she brings:
But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?
It is the East, and Juliet is the sun! (II, ii. ll.2−3).
Juliet is more closely bound to the concept of light by Romeo’s metaphor—not only is she luminous, but by
being the sun, she has become the primary source of Romeo’s light. This is in direct contrast to Rosaline,
who, as noted earlier, is associated with the moon. Romeo notes this distinction when he continues:
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief
That thou, her maid, art fair more fair than she (ll.4−6).
Juliet’s light, then, overshadows the darkness associated with Rosaline, and “kills” the passion that Romeo
once felt for her. Hoping to avoid another unrequited love, Romeo then expresses his desire that Juliet not be a
“maid” of the moon (i.e., not pledge to be a virgin as Rosaline did). He then continues to ponder the
brightness of Juliet’s eyes, which are stars, and her cheek, which he compares to daylight. Through the
wonder and the love of Romeo’s soliloquy in Act II, scene ii, we are provided with a strong bond between
Juliet and light that is beautiful and good. This bond is evident even in Act V, scene iii, when Romeo is about
to commit suicide: Juliet’s light makes the vault, a dark and death−filled place, a “feasting presence” (l.86).
Although light’s association with Juliet in this play gives it a positive connotation, it does not necessarily
follow that all things associated with light are benevolent, and all things associated with dark are detrimental.
Daytime, when light is strongest, becomes destructive in the play, and night, when darkness rules, becomes
loving. When the play opens, it is day in Verona, and thus the reason why the servants of the Capulets and the
Montagues are outside. They confront each other, which leads to the fight that eventually involves both
families as well. Likewise, the next day brings the fight between Tybalt and Mercutio, which ends in both of
their deaths and in Romeo’s banishment. Day becomes associated with violence—it lets life out, as Juliet
observes, because it brings the feud between the Montagues and the Capulets. Because of this, Romeo and
Juliet cannot be together during the day. The fact that day is their enemy is not lost on Romeo or Juliet,
especially in Act III, scene v, when they share their final moments alive in Juliet’s chamber. They describe
day as “envious,” and the lark, who sings in the day, “out of tune,” despite the traditional view that the lark is
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beautiful because of its singing and because it heralds dawn. They must separate or be discovered, which is
painful to them, as Romeo notes, “More light and light—more dark and dark our woes” (ll.36). The violence
that day brings, which is noted by various characters through their descriptions of day as “black” and “fiery,”
separates day from the other conceptions of light that exist in the play.
While day has lost its beneficial meaning in the play, nighttime takes a more positive turn. Night is the time of
Romeo and Juliet; it is when they can be together without being discovered, and when they can permit love to
overcome the hatred of the feud. Romeo calls night “blessed” in Act II, scene ii, and Juliet notes in the same
scene that their love is revealed by the night. Romeo delineates the relationship between light and Juliet in the
balcony scene and Juliet ponders the association between Romeo and night in Act III, scene ii. Juliet’s
soliloquy on the beneficial aspects of night in Act III, scene ii, occurs because both she and Romeo have come
to value night as their time. Juliet first describes night as “cloudy,” which denotes the fact that it obscures
their love from the eyes of their families. Juliet then begins to describe the wonders of night:
Spread thy close curtain, love−performing night,
That runaways’ eyes may wink, and Romeo
Leap to these arms untalked of and unseen.
Lovers can see to do their amorous rites
By their own beauties; or, if love be blind,
It best agrees with night (III, ii. 5−10).
Night becomes linked with love in this passage. Because of this link, it also becomes associated with sex, as
Juliet mentions in lines 10−16. The reversal of the meanings of day and night is also clearly stated in line 17,
when Juliet calls Romeo “thou day in night,” similar to the metaphor Romeo uses in Act I, scene v, when he
calls Juliet the jewel in Ethiop’s ear. Darkness allows the love of Romeo and Juliet to shine as brightly as the
sun, and therefore becomes more beneficial than daylight.
The connotations of light and dark in Romeo and Juliet, then, stay consistent with their traditional meanings,
while day and night, which should mean the same as light and dark, are reversed. This may be because, as
Capulet notes upon Juliet’s apparent death, all things in this play are “changed to the contrary” (IV, v. l.90).
The reversal of day and night occurs because of the feud. The destruction that occurs during the day does not
permit the love of Romeo and Juliet to surface, making day black and dark. However, at night, Romeo and
Juliet can allow their love to appear, thus permitting them to generate their own light.
Mercutio's Queen Mab Speech
Mercutio’s speech about Queen Mab in Act I, scene iv, seems to have nothing to do with Romeo and Juliet
whatsoever. In fact, some Shakespearean scholars have argued that it was added to the script during the
printing of the Second Quarto and was not, therefore, a part of the play as it was originally written. Other
scholars argue that even if the speech was in the original script, it contradicts what we know of Mercutio: a
hot−tempered and lusty youth who has no patience for the dreams and visions discussed in the Queen Mab
speech. The Queen Mab speech, however, does hold consistent with Mercutio’s character in some ways, and it
also points to some important aspects of the play in general.
Let’s begin with a summary of the speech itself. When Romeo is reluctant to attend the Capulet ball because
he has had a bad dream (probably because he has been pining for Rosaline), Mercutio makes fun of him for it
by telling him that “Dreamers often lie” (l.51). Romeo puts out a witty retort to Mercutio’s joke, and Mercutio
replies with a 42−line speech about Queen Mab, the “fairies’ midwife,” or the fairy responsible for bringing
dreams that fulfill the wishes of the dreamer (l.54). It should be noted that the name “Mab” was an insult in
Shakespeare’s time because it was synonymous with “prostitute.” Queen Mab’s name is also different from
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Titania, the name Shakespeare used for the fairy queen in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which was written
during the same period as Romeo and Juliet. Once he identifies Queen Mab, Mercutio then describes her
appearance and carriage. She is the size of a stone in a ring, and she rides in a coach pulled by atomies, or tiny
creatures. This indicates Queen Mab’s importance because during Shakespeare’s time, only the rich had
coaches. The coach itself is made of natural things: spider legs, grasshopper wings, spider webs, moonbeams,
cricket bone, and filament. All of these items draw a connection between Queen Mab and nature, although
coaches are artificial. We also learn that her driver is a gnat and that the seat is a hazelnut made by a “joiner
squirrel” or a “grub,” whose job it has traditionally been to make these coaches for fairy royalty (l.68).
Once Mercutio finishes describing the Queen and her coach, he then turns to what Queen Mab actually does
as the fairies’ midwife. Queen Mab and her coach gallop through the minds of lovers, courtiers, lawyers,
parsons, soldiers, and maids, occasionally pulling pranks as she goes. When she gives lovers dreams, they
dream of love and kisses, which sometimes angers Queen Mab because of their bad breath. If they do have
bad breath, then Queen Mab blisters their tongues. For courtiers, or members of the royal court, Queen Mab
brings dreams that they will receive money in order to bribe officials and gain power in court. If Queen Mab
brings a dream to a parson, or minister, it is one of advancement in the church. This second section of the
Queen Mab speech, then, describes the effect of Queen Mab on humans.
The third section of the speech begins with describing another dream of wish fulfillment, but then moves to
another aspect of Queen Mab’s character −− her desire to play tricks. Mercutio gives a relatively long account
of the dreams Queen Mab brings to soldiers:
Sometimes she driveth o’er a soldier’s neck,
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
Of healths five fathom deep; and then anon
Drums in his ear, at which he starts and wakes,
And being thus frighted, swears a prayer or two
And sleeps again (ll.82−88).
Soldiers dream of killing enemies and of having adventures, which conforms to the stereotype of a soldier.
However, just as with the ladies with the bad breath, Queen Mab cannot resist tricking the soldiers as well.
Just when the soldiers begin to enjoy their dreams, Queen Mab drums in their ears and scares them. Another
trick she pulls is braiding the manes of horses during the night, which tangles their hair. As Mercutio points
out, “much misfortune bodes” when the owners of the horses attempt to untangle the manes, because horses
buck (kick) when they are in pain, and usually hurt anything nearby. Although this trick will certainly bring
harm, it is not as terrifying as the last jest Mercutio describes:
This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs,
That presses them and learns them first to bear,
Making them women of good carriage (ll.92−94).
In this section of the speech, Queen Mab becomes a hag, or nightmare, who rapes maidens in their sleep.
Mercutio attempts to continue his description of Queen Mab’s activities, but Romeo interrupts him by telling
him that he speaks of nothing.
Now that we have summarized the speech, let’s take a look at its importance to the play as a whole. In terms
of the actual plot of the play, the Queen Mab speech has little significance. The only thing the speech does is
actually slow down the action of the play, as Mercutio delays his party’s arrival at the ball because of his
verbosity. Mercutio complains earlier on in Act I, scene iv, that Romeo’s misery is “burning daylight” by
making them late for the ball. But Mercutio makes them even later for the party by burning daylight with his
lengthy diatribe about Queen Mab, which contradicts what he was attempting to do. This seemingly
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hypocritical action points to an important aspect of Mercutio’s character −− he talks and acts first and then
thinks afterward. It is this trait that will lead to Mercutio’s death in Act III. The speech also shows us
Mercutio’s wit, which we will see much of in Acts II and III. His description of the desires of soldiers also
gives us insight into Mercutio’s personality, as he is a soldier who, as we will see in Act III, does desire fights
against enemies. Although the Queen Mab speech only slightly affects the plot, it does give us an introduction
to Mercutio, who appears for the first time in this scene.
Mercutio may also be giving us a different perspective on other characters in the play through the Queen Mab
speech. To Mercutio, love is little more than sex, an opinion which surfaces in this speech through the
description of the lovers’ dreams and Queen Mab’s malevolent acts as a hag. This view of love is in direct
contrast with the next scene in the play, Act I, scene v, when Romeo and Juliet meet. The language used by
Romeo and Juliet in scene v is “holy” in nature, suggesting that their love is on a spiritual plane. Mercutio,
had he known about their relationship, would have viewed it in the same way that he does Romeo’s love for
Rosaline in scene iv: one of sexual desire. Mercutio also provides insight into two other characters with this
speech. The parson, who dreams of an additional living, will surface in the character of Friar Laurence, who
does have support outside of the church as Romeo’s mentor. The soldier, who as we have already seen
parallels Mercutio, also relates to Tybalt, who, like Mercutio, desires a fight. All of these characters will get
what they dream of—love, support, or battle—but none will be happy for getting their wish by the end of the
play.
The Queen Mab speech also brings to the fore an important theme of the play. By describing Queen Mab and
her tricks, Mercutio is contradicting Romeo’s belief that dreams have meaning because Queen Mab produces
dreams in order to fool the people that have them. When Romeo stops Mercutio’s speech by telling him that
he is talking of nothing, Mercutio clearly states his opinion of the importance of dreams:
True, I talk of dreams;
Which are the children of an idle brain,
Begot of nothing but vain fantasy;
Which is as thin of substance as the air,
And more inconstant than the wind (ll.96−100).
Because dreams are so fleeting and are produced by the imagination (or Queen Mab), Mercutio argues that
they should not be taken seriously. Romeo’s belief in dreams as omens is a critical issue in the play, and
Mercutio’s comments serve as a counterpoint to Romeo’s opinion.
The presence of the Queen Mab speech in Romeo and Juliet is almost chaotic. It does not further the plot nor
directly mention any character in the play. It also complicates Mercutio’s character through its poetry and
imagination, which can hardly be expected of someone who has the temperament of a soldier. Whether or not
the Queen Mab speech was actually a part of Shakespeare’s original script for the play, it does have its place
in Romeo and Juliet. Through his description of Queen Mab, Mercutio tells us about the dreams of several of
the characters, which, when realized, bring their downfall. Perhaps that is Queen Mab’s greatest trick of all.
The Balcony Scene in Romeo and Juliet
Act II, scene ii of Romeo and Juliet is commonly known as the "balcony scene," and although this designation
may be inaccurate (Shakespeare's stage directions call for Juliet to appear at a "window," not on a balcony),
this scene has been quoted from, played, and misplayed more than any other in all of the Bard's works. It is
proceeded by some astoundingly beautiful verse in Mercutio's "Queen Mab" speech of Act I, scene iv., and by
the individual and joint speeches of Romeo and Juliet at the banquet which concludes the first act and includes
a wonderful exchange in which the lovers author a sonnet together. But the balcony scene rises even above
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these brilliant flashes and is indelibly etched in our memories. Here Shakespeare's genius is evident even at a
relatively early stage in his career, and while the characters of Romeo and Juliet predominate, the playwright
employs certain key dramatic devices and stage techniques that amplify the scene's impression.
There is, to begin, a deliberate heightening of dramatic suspense immediately before Romeo enters into
Juliet's orchard. Before the beginning of Act II proper, Shakespeare inserts a second appearance by the Chorus
(II, chorus 2, ll.1−14). Taking the same sonnet form as the play's Prologue, this speech is meant to heighten
the narrative tension, suggesting, that Romeo, "being held a foe," may not have access to his Juliet. The
dissonance is intensified still further when a lone Romeo asks aloud, "Can I go forward when my heart is
here?" (II, I, l.1). When Mercutio and Benvolio enter just as Romeo withdraws, there is a mild sense of pursuit
that lends even greater urgency to the moment. But the search for Romeo is broken off, with Romeo then
emerging in Act II, scene ii to mark a line between the outside world and the lovers' world at hand by having
the last word in the discourse of his friends: "He jests at scars that never felt a wound" (II, ii, l.1).
The second line of the balcony scene stands in sharp relief to the first. "But soft, what light through yonder
window breaks?" (l.2), Romeo proclaims and not only does the level of diction now rise to the formally
poetic, unlike the first line, Romeo is not simply inserting his own wit but describing to the audience the
impression that Juliet makes upon him. Romeo now becomes a guide to the spectator. He sees Juliet in profile
and remarks, "She speaks but she says nothing, what of that?" (l.12). The questioned asked is addressed to
both Romeo himself and to us, the sympathetic spectator, so that we share directly in Romeo's joy to find "She
speaks!" (l.25). Unaware of Romeo's presence below, Juliet utters the famous lines: "O Romeo, Romeo,
wherefore art thou Romeo?/Deny thy father and refuse they name/Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my
love/And I'll no longer be a Capulet." (ll.33−36). Romeo addresses an anonymous (but sympathetic) spectator,
Juliet addresses a known (but absent) Romeo. When he continues his role as a guide, saying in a stage aside
that he wants to hear Juliet speak more, she fulfills his wish (and that of the audience he guides) by
elaborating on the what's in a name theme and saying that a rose "by any other word would smell as sweet"
(l.44).
Romeo now sheds his attachment to the spectator and is immersed in poetic discourse with his beloved. In
what follows, virtually all of the play's main figurative strands−−−references to brilliant light, to planetary
bodies, to birds singing at night and the like−−−surface in exquisitely wrought verse. Romeo comes forward
from the shadows in response to Juliet's call that he "doff" his name and is "new baptized," the rebirth going
beyond Juliet's suit and allowing Romeo to develop into a new man, shedding the pretentious, self−absorbed
persona that he has displayed in the first Act. Juliet is playful with this newborn Romeo, asking him "what are
thou?" (after she has presumably recognized him as the youth she saw hours ago and has openly pined for
since), more as an opportunity for Romeo to wax poetic than as actual inquiry.
A fine equilibrium is achieved between the lovers when Juliet is given an extended speech (ll.85−107) that
balances nearly with Romeo's opening "But soft" monologue. The balance here is dynamic, as they come
together against centripetal forces. She first asks Romeo to affirm that he shares her love for him, but then
draws back and speaks of false lovers. She moves forward once more, in offering to alter her behavior to his
sense of decorum, but when Romeo swears by the "inconstant moon," she again withholds full union by
asking him to not swear at all, or by they self, "the god of my idolatry" (l.113). Just as he begins to swear as
she commands, Juliet interrupts again, asking him not to swear and saying that she has no joy in their romance
because it is "too rash, too unadvis'd, too sudden." She then bids him an adieu, Romeo says that he will leave
him, and this provokes Juliet to ask, "What's satisfaction can'st thou have tonight?" (l.126). What Romeo
wants is an exchange of vows to seal their union, but again, the playful Juliet first speaks about withdrawing
the vow that Romeo had already heard.
This finely orchestrated verbal pattern of promising approach and soft withdraw between the lovers is
animated in Juliet's physical movements in the last portion of the scene and, at the same time, in a
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recapitulation of the mutual sonnet writing process of the banquet meeting in Act I. There is a dimension of
ballet in the balcony scene, as Juliet is called in by the nurse, comes back on stage, and then repeats the action.
The structure of Structure of II, ii, ll.142−157, is, in fact, that of another sonnet broken and misshapen by the
Nurse's interjections, but Juliet leaves before the final rhyming couplet is spoken by Romeo as "Love goes
toward love, as schoolboys from their books/But love from love, toward school with heavy looks"
(ll.156−157). This is unsatisfactory, and so Juliet appears for a third time, with a decidedly non−poetic "Hist,
Romeo, hist!" and wishing for a falconer's voice. Having little else of substance to say, Juliet asks about time
tomorrow when shall send for Romeo, and then offers the alternative couplet: "Good night, good night!
Parting is such sweet sorrow / That I shall say good night till it be morrow" (ll.184−185). When she departs,
Romeo now alone concludes scene with two rhymed couplets: "Sleep dwell upon they eyes, peace in thy
breast! / Would I were sleep and peace, so sweet to rest! / Hence will I to my ghostly (sire's) close cell, / His
help to crave, and my dear hap to tell" (ll.186−189). Thus, in addition to the natural sympathy that Romeo and
Juliet evoke and to the beauty of the language they exchange, Shakespeare employs a number of technical,
even experimental devices to increase the power of the balcony scene.
Why does Friar Laurence's plan fail?
Friar Laurence's dramatic function as a "helping" character who will assist the star−cross'd lovers of Romeo
and Juliet is established even before we see the Franciscan brother at work in his garden. At the conclusion of
the balcony scene (Act II, scene ii), Romeo's mind turns from the reverie of repeated farewells with Juliet to
the practical issue of how they can overcome parental opposition to the lovers' union and tells us that he will
hie to his spiritual father for direction. Thereafter, we see Friar Laurence gathering herbs and are kindly
disposed toward him. His initial banter with Romeo about the youth's abandonment of Rosaline is both jocular
and sensible, and his quick agreement to preside at the marriage of his protégé to Juliet stands in sharp relief
to the antagonism that the lovers face from the adults of Verona. Nevertheless, not only does Friar Laurence's
plan to rescue the pair fail, we have good cause to believe that the fault here does not lie in the stars, but in
Friar Laurence himself. In retrospect, Friar Laurence cooks up a half−baked scheme to advance his own
agenda, exhibits both ignorance and arrogance in concocting a needless ruse, and then twists his own role in
the tale of Romeo and Juliet as he relates it to the Prince in the play's last scene.
Act II, scene iii opens before sunrise in the garden of Friar Laurence who speaks to himself as he gathers
"baleful weeds and precious−juiced flowers" (II, iii. l.8) by moonlight. The good father approaches this task
philosophical and positing that among herbs at hand, none are so vile as to be devoid of value while none are
so good as to be invulnerable to abuse. When he asserts that this is his view of human beings as well, the
extension is logical but needless. Moreover, Friar Laurence is not as learned as he believes himself to be. In
his first speech, he speaks of the "gray−eyed moon," botching an Homeric allusion to "gray−eyed Athena,"
the Greek goddess of wisdom who is associated with the dawn, not the moon.
The errors here are subtle, and when Friar Laurence mildly chastises Romeo for the instantaneous switch of
his affections from Rosaline to Juliet with "Holy Saint Francis, what a change is here!" (II, iii. l.64), Romeo
has it coming and the audience shares the clergyman's amusement. The Friar then justifies his willingness to
marry Romeo and his Juliet that same afternoon, suggesting that while Romeo's love for Rosaline was mere
"doting," his new romance is true love, even though he has no factual basis for such a distinction. The Friar's
rationale is bolstered by his view of the larger picture of Verona's Christian society: he says that he will
perform the marriage because this alliance may turn rancor between the city's warring families into love.
Precisely how this lower case City of God will come about, however, is left unspoken. Nevertheless, after the
marriage ceremony (which is not performed on stage) has taken place, the Friar first asks for God's blessing
upon this holy act (now a done deal) but distances himself from its outcome by asserting that "These violent
delights have violent ends" (II, vi. l.9).
Why does Friar Laurence's plan fail?
81
We see the Friar again in Act III, scene iii as he conveys the ill tidings of the Prince's banishment sentence to
Romeo. Laurence expresses relief that the penalty is mere exile, rather than the capital punishment indicated
by the Prince and when Romeo's objects, Friar Laurence adopts a philosophical−rhetorical posture, saying to
the youth, "Let me dispute with thee of thy estate" (l.63). He prevents Romeo's half−hearted suicide with
"Hold thy desperate hand! / Art thou a man?" adding, paradoxically that Romeo's tears are womanish while
his actions evidence the unreasonable fury of a beast (III, iii. ll.108−111). The Friar Laurence, with no input
from Romeo, reveals that Romeo will ho to Mantua and stay there until a time comes when "we" can "blaze
your marriage, reconcile your friends, / Beg pardon of the Prince and call thee back" (III, iii. ll.151−152). This
is a complex and tall order, and again, the Friar leaves the details of its implementation to the future. When
Juliet appears at his cell in the first scene of Act IV, Friar Laurence has a brilliant flash, saying Friar "Hold,
daughter! I do spy a kind of hope" (IV, i. l.68). He conveniently has a vial of poison that will allow Juliet to
feign death for forty−two hours right at hand. The plan is that after she has been sealed in the ancient burial
vault of the Capulets, he and Romeo will await the hour and then Juliet will go with Romeo to Mantua. In
retrospect, this scheme may buy time, but it hardly overcomes the forces that block the lovers' union; indeed,
it has very little advantage over the alternative of Juliet simply eloping to Mantua at once.
This aside, Friar Laurence's plan appears to go awry as a consequence of happenstance. Friar John encounters
an unexpected delay and is unable to deliver his brother's explanatory missive to Romeo. In Mantua, Romeo
learns from Balthasar that Juliet is dead, the servant affirming that he saw Juliet's corpse with his own eyes.
Multiple questions arise: Why was Balthasar (a not too bright servant) able to reach Romeo while Friar
Laurence's messenger runs into a quarantine? Why does Friar John not know of Romeo's precise
whereabouts? And, given Friar Laurence's remark that the forestalled letter is "not nice but full of charge" (V,
ii. l.18), why didn't he impress its importance upon the bearer before Friar John's departure for Mantua?
Seeing the possible tragic consequences ahead and knowing that Juliet will awake in just three hours, Friar
Laurence dispatches Friar John to obtain a crowbar while he initially writes another letter to Romeo. Just what
the value of this second letter may be is not evident: plainly, it will not reach Romeo until after Juliet's
awakening. In any event, after speaking with Balthasar, Friar Laurence goes forth into the tomb alone and
finds a trail of blood leading to the bodies of Romeo and Paris. He ascribes their deaths to Fortune: "Ah what
an unkind hour / Is guilty of this lamentable chance!" (V, iii. ll.145−146). Immediately thereafter, Juliet
awakes and is told by the Friar "Come, come away: Thy husband in thy bosom there lies dead; and Paris too"
(ll.154−156). Although he expresses concern about Juliet's psychological state, he nevertheless exits the scene
when he is distracted by noise from outside Capulet tomb. Juliet then spies Romeo's dagger, which the Friar
has left laying about, and stabs herself.
Friar Laurence recaps the mechanics of the lovers' tragedy to the Prince at the end of Act V, in a prolonged
speech that begins, "I will be brief" (l.229) and concludes, "and if aught in this/Miscarried by my fault, let my
old life / Be sacrific'd some hour before his time/Unto the rigor of the severest law" (V, iii. ll.266−269). To
this, the expedient Prince Escalus gives no response, turns to Balthasar, and to a letter to Romeo that "doth
make good the friar's words" (l.286). But the Prince lets Friar Laurence off the hook too easily, and the cleric's
words are not, in fact, "good." Most significant, in his final speech, Friar Laurence recounts that the poison
scheme arose when Juliet "bid me to devise" a plot; in fact, not just the plot but the very idea of using a ruse
did not arise from Juliet's request, but from a brilliant hope that the Friar saw on his own and without any
prompting. He also says that he was scared from the tomb by a noise, although why the sound of people
coming toward the crypt should frighten him is unclear. Lastly, when he refers to the (absent) Nurse as
witness and says that she is privy to all this, we must observe that this too is false; the Nurse is completely
unaware that Juliet is not really dead but merely under the influence of the Friar's sleeping potion. In the end,
Friar Laurence's scheme fails do to shortcomings rooted in Friar Laurence himself, faults that he fails to
acknowledge even as he offers to assume some blame.
Why does Friar Laurence's plan fail?
82
Character Analysis of the Nurse
In Act II, scene v, after returning from her first mission to Romeo, Juliet's Nurse tells her impatient mistress,
"I am the drudge, and toil in your delight" (II, v. l.75). At this juncture, we are inclined to take the Nurse at
her word. When we first encounter her in Act I, scene iii, the Nurse of Romeo and Juliet appears to be a comic
figure given to bawdy humor and innuendo, but this coarse character is sofened by her fondness for Juliet.
Thereafter, she proves a reliable go−between, taking a message to Romeo in Act II, scene iv, and then
apprising first Juliet and then Romeo of events in the wake of Act III's dueling scene. But in Act III, our
perception of the Nurse as a "helping" figure undergoes a sharp reversal as she changes her views of Juliet's
suitors, favoring the proper County Paris over the "dishclout" Romeo. In doing so, the Nurse displays a highly
unattractive penchant for the calculation of immediate advantage, weighing in on the side that seems most
likely to prevail, and to favor her own interests, here Juliet's parents and their support of Paris with Romeo
exiled to Mantua. The question naturally arises: Whose side is the Nurse on?
In Act I, scene iii, the Nurse's role as a functionary is established at once as Lady Capulet goes through the
older woman to get to her daughter, telling the Nurse to call Juliet forth. We learn a great deal about the Nurse
from her very first remarks: "Now by my maidenhead at twelve year old, I bade her come. What lamb! What
ladybird! God forbid! Where's the girl? What, Juliet! (I, iii. ll.2−3). The Nurse's language is vulgar, and even
when she utters terms of endearment she relies upon conventional and easily available oaths. That much
apparent, our opinion of the Nurse firms as she speaks about Lamas−tide (1 August), Juliet's upcoming
fourteenth birthday and then reminisces about breast−feeding the girl when she was an infant (I, iii. ll.16−49).
Lady Capulet rankles at these musings, proclaiming "enough of this," but the Nurse proceeds with her story (I,
iii. ll.50−57) intent upon relating her own reaction to the events described, and ends her speech by avowing
Juliet to have been the "prettiest babe I ever nursed" (l.60). By nature rather than intent, the Nurse
demonstrates that she can violate the commands of Lady Capulet, and this identifies her as a possible ally in
Juliet's efforts to forestall marriage to the Prince's cousin. There are, however, some notes in her early
speeches that resonate with a dangerous irony. In passing, the Nurse mentions that she had a daughter, Susan,
who died eleven years ago, is now in heaven, and was, in the Nurse's own words "too good for me." She also
says that it is her fondest wish is to see Juliet "married once" (I, iii. l.61), a comment that rings forward when
a secretly married Juliet faces a bigamous, second marriage to Paris.
The Nurse becomes handmaiden to the budding romance between her mistress and Romeo in Act II, scene iv.
Accompanied by Peter, she asks Romeo himself about Romeo's whereabouts and is immediately impressed by
the youth's capacity for wordplay. There is, however, a confusing exchange between the Nurse and Mercutio,
as he calls her a "lady" in light−hearted jest and she becomes offended at this "scurvy knave," protesting that
"I am none of his flirt−gills (loose women) / I am none of his skain−mates" (l.154), before scolding the silent
Peter for standing idle while she is insulted. She recovers her composure and asks Romeo if he intends to lead
Juliet into a "fool's paradise, as they say." When he objects to her suspicions above his intentions, the Nurse
assures Romeo that she will tell Juliet of his "gentleman−like offer." In short order, Romeo gives the Nurse
penny, she initially demurs, protests, he insists, and she predictable takes it with a perfunctory "God in heaven
bless thee!" (II, iv. l.194). Now in possession of her hire, the Nurse relaxes. She touts Juliet's unsurpassed
beauty, crudely mentions that Paris would like to "lay knife aboard" but that her mistress would rather see a
toad, and then adds that she angers Juliet by telling her that Paris is a proper man.
In the next scene (II, v.), Juliet awaits Nurse's return with word from Romeo, complaining that her emissary
must be lame, since she has been gone three hours after promising to return in thirty minutes. When the Nurse
arrives, Juliet asks about the matter of the moment, but she complains about her aching bones. Unasked, the
Nurse proceeds to give her appraisal of Romeo, who has a face and legs unsurpassed, is not the flower of
courtesy but is still gentle as a lamb. She then passes her blessing on their union in characteristically ribald
terms, saying "Go thy ways, wench, serve God" (II, v. ll.44−45). In Act III, scene ii, the Nurse brings news to
Character Analysis of the Nurse
83
Juliet saying "he's dead" and the confusion persists until the Nurse makes it plain that it is not Romeo who is
dead, but the most bellicose of the Capulets "O Tybalt, Tybalt, the best friend I had / O courteous Tybalt,
honest gentleman" (ll.61−62). Knowing Tybalt's character and never suspecting any kind of bond between
him and the lowly nurse, these protestations of grief by the Nurse ring hollow. Moreover, despite her grief for
Tybalt, she nonetheless volunteers to find Romeo. When she does so in Act III, scene ii, she describes Juliet's
reaction to Romeo as "blubb'ring and weeping," saying that her mistress "Tybalt calls and then on Romeo
cries." The characterization is inaccurate, for Juliet is more far more concerned with Romeo than with Tybalt.
Our growing misgivings about the Nurse's allegiance become overwhelming in the last scene (v.) of Act III.
The Nurse weighs the situation and finds that with Romeo banished and the wedding to Paris in the works,
she will switch camps, so to speak. She says to Juliet, "I think its best you married with the County, / Oh, he's
a lovely gentleman! / Romeo's a dishclout to him" (III, v. ll.217−219). The Nurse has previously supported
Paris's cause in Act I, saying of Romeo's rival that he is "a flower, in faith, a very flower" (I, iii. l.78). But in
the interim, she has as much as called Paris a toad.
The Nurse's change of heart is clearly not a matter of altered opinion as much as it is a matter of altered
circumstance. It is not that Romeo has killed Tybalt that causes the Nurse to call him a "dishcloth" but the fact
that the immediate prospects for a union between Romeo and Juliet that is favorable to the Nurse are now
clouded. We see the Nurse a final time as she tries to awaken the drugged Juliet, pulls back the curtain to the
girl's bed and cries out, "Alas, alas! Help, help! My lady's dead / O, weraday, that ever I was born!" (IV, v.
l.15). It is a "lamentable" day, the Nurse raves on, stressing not the tragedy of Juliet's death but the pain that
this event evokes for herself. The Nurse is absent from the tomb scene that concludes the play, but Friar
Laurence refers to her as a witness who is privy to the story that he tells to the Prince. In fact, the Nurse does
not know all: she has been kept in the dark about the sleeping potion ruse by Juliet. The reason is that the
Nurse has shown herself to be untrustworthy. At bottom, the Nurse is not on the side of the lovers, nor in the
camp of the parental authorities who oppose their union. She is on her own side, an opportunist bound to the
course of least resistance.
The Growth of Shakespeare's Tragic Technique in Romeo and Juliet
Although Romeo and Juliet appears early in the sequence of Shakespeare's tragedies, it represents a
considerable improvement over his very first attempts at tragedy, the historical Tragedy of Richard III and
Titus Andronicus. These two works follow in the tradition of a crude, though powerful, form of revenge drama
perfected by Marlowe and Kyd in the 1580's. Richard III and Titus Andronicus contain the typical
conventions of this form: ruthless Machiavellian villains, bloody spectacle, and long speeches debating the
nature of villainous ambition and revenge.
The content of Romeo and Juliet differs greatly from that of Shakespeare's early revenge tragedies. No
character in Romeo and Juliet can be clearly designated as a villain. The deaths emphasize the cruelty of a
prejudiced society, rather than the horror caused by overtly destructive individuals. The language of the play
is richly poetic and full of imaginative symbolism. Most likely, the exploration of themes of love and
reconciliation inspired this blossoming of Shakespeare's poetry. A comparison of passages typical of Titus
Andronicus and Romeo and Juliet demonstrates the growing beauty and sophistication of Shakespeare's style:
Aar. Madam, though Venus govern your
desires,
Saturn is dominator over mine:
What signifies ay deadly−standing eye,
My silence and my cloudy melancholy,
The Growth of Shakespeare's Tragic Technique in Romeo and Juliet
84
My fleece of wooly hair that now uncurls
Even as an adder when she doth unroll
To do some fatal execution?
(Titus Andronicus, II, iii. 30−37.)
Rom. ... But, soft! what light through yonder
window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
That thou her maid art far more fair than
she:
(Romeo and Juliet, II, ii. 2−6.)
The images of light and dark and heavenly bodies in this speech appear throughout the play. The contrast of
light and dark adds to the impression that the love of Romeo and Juliet brings enlightenment to a world
clouded by destructive feuds. This imagery often takes subtle turns. After the union is consummated, the dark
night becomes the lovers' friend, and the light of day is their enemy:
Jul. ... 0! now be gone; more light and light
it grows.
Rom. More light and light; more dark and dark our
woes.
(III, v. 35−36.)
With this reversal of the feelings normally associated with darkness and light, Shakespeare suggests the
negative aspects of the clandestine relationship, which has already indirectly led to the deaths of the lovers'
kinsmen, Mercutio and Tybalt.
Romeo and Juliet is also one of the first plays in which Shakespeare develops major characters as sources of
comic relief for a serious situation. In his earliest tragedies and histories, minor characters provide some
humor in brief scenes. Richard III is the first of Shakespeare's major tragic characters to have wit as an
element of his personality. The addition of humor to important characterizations makes the comedy a more
integral part of a play's structure, and adds interesting dimensions to the characters. Life is not entirely
desolate, so why should a tragedy create the impression of a desolate universe? The hilarity provided by the
Nurse and Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet endears them to the audience and make the Nurse's grief and
Mercutio's wasteful death all the more poignant. This ability to combine comedy and tragedy is one of the
hallmarks of Shakespeare's great tragedies. Shakespeare asks us to laugh with Hamlet, Lear's fool, lago, and
Cleopatra, as well as to grieve for the tragic heroes.
Mercutio is a witty, young gentleman with seemingly boundless mirth and energy. His clever taunting of
Romeo's unrequited passion for Rosaline develops into one of the most famous passages of the play:
Mer. 0! then I see Queen Mab hath
been with you.
She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate−stone
On the forefinger of an alderman.
Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep:
(I, iv. 53−58.)
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85
Yet Mercutio also blends into the tragic tone of the play when his approaching death prevents him from
maintaining his humorous facade:
Rom. Courage, man; the hurt cannot be much.
Mer. No, 'tis not so deep as a well, nor so
wide as a church door; but 'tis enough, 't
will serve: ask for me tomorrow, and you shall
find me a grave man. I am peppered, I warrant, for this world.
—A plague O' both your houses!
(III, i, 97−104.)
The Nurse's humor grows mainly from her rambling, colorfully common speech:
Jul. It is an honor I dream not of.
Nur. An honor! were not I thine only nurse, I would say thou had suck'd wisdom from thy
teat.
(I, iiii. 65−67.)
In the face of Juliet's death, the Nurse retains her
basically foolish nature without detracting from the tragic
tone, and her hysterical cries add to the dramatic tension:
Lady Cap. What noise is here?
Nurse. 0 lamentable day!
Lady Cap. What is the matter?
Nurse. Look, look! 0 heavy day!
Lady Cap. 0 me! 0 me! my child! my only life!
(IV, iv. 17−19.)
Romeo and Juliet represents a definite growth in Shakespeare's art. He deals skilfully with a theme far more
subtle than the rise and destruction of a cruel hero villain, which he dealt with in his earlier tragedies, Titus
Andronicus and Richard III. In Romeo and Juliet Shakespeare demonstrates more clearly that all participants
in a tragic situation must accept part of the blame for the suffering they bear. The elder Montagues and
Capulets, who stand apart from the bloodshed caused by their younger kinsmen, are partially responsible the
tragic events because they attempt to impose their wishes on Romeo and Juliet, while ignoring the desires of
their children. Romeo must be blamed for murdering Tybalt during an outburst of rage over Mercutio's death.
Shakespeare suggests that both Romeo and Juliet deserve some censure for the secretive methods they employ
to consummate their union and for their hasty suicides.
The poetry and characterizations have grown in appeal and complexity. The language can be lyrical,
symbolic, and humorous, as well as fierce and powerful. Characters can be funny and tragic simultaneously.
Perhaps the reason for this growth lies in Shakespeare's choice of a source for the play. The source of Romeo
and Juliet is an obscure English poem written in doggeral verse and based on an Italian romance. Shakespeare
no longer relied on imitating an established tragic tradition, but gave his fertile imagination the challenge of
transforming mediocre poetry with hints of interesting themes and characters into outstanding poetic drama.
The Growth of Shakespeare's Tragic Technique in Romeo and Juliet
86
The Character of Mercutio Analyzed
Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet is one of his earliest dramatic plays. Most critics believe that it was written in
1595 although there is some debate over the exact date. The plot is a simple one which revolves around the
story of two families who are engaged in pursuing an ancient and senseless family feud. While the two main
characters in the play are clearly Romeo and Juliet, others contribute to the action and are important in
bringing out the characters of the other players as well as making a statement in their own right. Romeo's
friend, Mercutio, is one such character. After a brief explanation of the plot which will place the play's events
in context, we will examine the character of Mercutio to determine what kind of friend he was to Romeo.
What is his role in the play? Why does he die? How important is his character in the course of the drama?
Would the play be changed dramatically if his character were removed? It is questions like these that will
determine the course of our analysis of the character of Mercutio.
The plot of Romeo and Juliet is not complex: Two households, the Montagues and the Capulets, have been
fueding for years. Their ancient grudge finds renewed fuel at the beginning of the play and the Prince of
Verona, Escalus, threatens Capulet and Montague with death if they cannot keep their families and the
feuding under control. Thus when Romeo and Juliet meet and fall in love and then find out that they are from
opposing sides in the dispute, there is reason for concern. But the two are young and impetuous and too much
in love to let the complexity of their situation stop them. Within the space of twenty−four hours they agree to
wed. They are wed the next day by Romeo's friend the Friar. After their wedding the two lovers must part but
they promise to join each other soon. Unfortunately, as Romeo is walking with his two friends one of Juliet's
cousins, Tybalt, insults Romeo, and Mercutio comes to his defense. The two enter into a duel wherein
Mercutio is fatally wounded. Although Romeo does not want to have anything to do with fighting now that he
is married to Juliet, he is forced to defend his dead friend's honor, and he kills Tybalt. For this he is banished
from the city. Juliet's father, meanwhile, has arranged for her to marry Paris and preparations for this big
wedding are underway. So she won't have to marry Paris she takes a potion which makes her appear dead
even though she is only asleep. When Romeo finds her in her family's burial vault he believes that she is
really dead and he kills himself so he can be with her in heaven. When Juliet awakes and finds Romeo dead
beside her she stabs herself to death. The two families discover the two young lovers dead beside each other
and they agree to end their senseless feud.
In Act I, scene iv, Mercutio is introduced as he and Romeo and Benvolio set off together to crash a party at
the Capulet's house. At this point in the play Romeo is still mourning his unrequited love for an older woman
named Rosaline. Mercutio cannot stand listening to what he believes is a false and foolish set of feelings. For
this reason he makes fun of Romeo. It is in this way that we get a strong taste of Mercutio's sense of humor
and his philosophy about life. Unlike Romeo's other friend, Benvolio, Mercutio does not pamper Romeo nor
does he necessarily believe that Romeo's love for Rosaline is as pure as Romeo likes to think it is. Mercutio is
smart and he realizes that at this point Romeo is more in love with the idea of being in love than that he is
really in love. Mercutio doesn't encourage Romeo's false moaning. He says that when they go to the party
Romeo should dance and have fun. When Romeo protests that he doesn't want to Mercutio teases him and
says that since he is a lover he should borrow Cupid's wings, "And soar with them above a common bound."
After more verbal jostling between the two men Mercutio delivers one of his most famous speeches, called the
"Queen Mab" speech. After Romeo has talked about lovers and their dreams Mercutio retorts thus:
I see Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes in shape no bigger than an agate−stone
On the fore−finger of an alderman, drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep
Her waggon−spokes made of long spinners' legs.
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87
The cover of the wings of grasshoppers
The collar of the moonshine's watery beams
Her whip of cricket's bone, the lash of film
Her waggoner a small grey−coated gnat...
And in this state she gallops night by night
Through lovers' brains and then they dream of love.
(I, iv. 53−71)
This speech is often seen as a ploy by Mercutio to humor Romeo into joining into their spirit of adventure as
they prepare to go uninvited to the party. The speech is really about fanciful dreaming—like the dream of love
that Romeo has for Rosaline. There is a big build−up of the fantasy and then there is a sudden undercutting of
such fancy by coarseness. In a sense, Mercutio is trying to jolt Romeo back into reality. He is trying to give
him a glimpse of himself as he appears to others. Romeo finally tells Mercutio to hush up, "Peace, peace,
Mercutio, peace! Thou talk'st of nothing." Mercutio finishes his speech by saying that although he speaks of
dreams he does not speak of "nothing."
Even though Mercutio isn't entirely successful in cheering Romeo up and getting him into the frame of mind
for the party his presence and vocalization at this point in the play are very important because they point up
the falsity of Romeo's claim to be in love with Rosaline. Mercutio ensures that even though Romeo still
believes that he is truly in love the reader has a chance to see how idealistic and romantic Romeo is and to
realize that his expression of feelings are just a part of his character rather than an accurate testimony of true
love. This is of primary import to the play. For if at this point we really believed that Romeo is deeply in love
with Rosaline it would affect our perception of him when just a few hours later he appears to be deeply in love
with Juliet as well. Since Romeo is not meant to be seen as a shallow character it is important that Mercutio is
able to act as a foil to Romeo's character and to provide the reader with a more accurate picture of him.
After Romeo has fallen in love with Juliet and the three friends leave the party in Act II, scene I, Mercutio still
believes that Romeo is just continuing his same foolish lamentations about Rosaline even though he is now
truly in love with Juliet. But at this point, because of the information we have received earlier via Mercutio,
readers now realize the truth and can see the reaction of Mercutio as simply a realistic response on his part.
Mercutio continues his jesting and bawdy joking and although his wit is still apparent it is not quite as funny
as it was in the beginning.
In Act II, scene iv, Benvolio and Mercutio reveal that Tybalt has sent Romeo a challenge to a duel. Mercutio
then goes on to make sarcastic comments about Romeo's alleged love for Rosaline. When Romeo joins his
two friends he and Mercutio are once again engaged in a witty exchange of puns and quips. Although
Mercutio is sarcastic he is also entertaining and likeable. He provides an interesting foil to the character of
Romeo and is in fact, an interesting character in his own right. He has a strong zest for life and a passionate
approach to everything that he does. It is for this reason that some critics have said that the playright had to
'get rid' of him — otherwise he might have shifted some of the attention away from Romeo and Juliet who are
the central figures in this story. In any case, Mercutio proves his steadfast and passionate friendship when he
dies trying to defend the honor of his friend Romeo. In Act III, scene I, Mercutio and Benvolio run into Tybalt
who is looking for Romeo. When Romeo chooses to ignore Tybalt's insults, because as Juliet's new husband
he doesn't want to fight with her cousin, Mercutio comes to his defense and fights his opponent for him.
Unfortunately, he is mortally wounded in the process.
Mercutio's character remains strong and fiesty to the very end. Even as he lays dying he makes jokes and puns
about his wound. He seems to have the most regret for the fact that he does not even respect the man who is
causing his death rather than for the death itself. Mercutio is not a coward. He is strong and brave and loyal.
He is a character for whom the reader has genuine empathy and sorrow for when he dies. Although part of
Mercutio's part in the play is to act as a foil for the character of Romeo he is also a character in his own right.
The Character of Mercutio Analyzed
88
He is likeable and engaging; because of this the reader is able to gain a better perspective on the events in the
story. Apart from the young lovers, Mercutio is a vital force in the story. His death is tragic as are the deaths
of his friend Romeo and Romeo's wife, Juliet.
Romeo and Juliet: An Analysis of the Main Characters and Their Views
on Love
Romeo and Juliet, the tragic play by William Shakespeare, centers around the love story between Romeo, the
young heir of the Montagues, and Juliet, the daughter of the house of Capulet. Because of an on−going feud
between the two families, Romeo and Juliet are forced to keep their love a secret, marry in secret and, due to
ill−fated consequences, they die together in the tomb of the Capulets.
As the story unfolds, a great variety of moral assumptions and explanations as to the value of love are
explored. Romeo is first presented as a lover creating poetical phrases in honor of his present love, the chaste
and unattainable Rosaline. As he states to his friend, Benvolio, "She'll not be hit / With Cupid's arrow. She
hath Dian's wit, / And, in strong proof of chastity well armed,...." He goes on to admit: "She hath foresworn to
love; and in that vow do I live dead that live to tell it now." Romeo's purity and inexperience are thus
exemplified by Rosaline's (whose existence is not portrayed, but rather revealed through Romeo) rejection of
him − for it is love she is rejecting rather than her actual dislike of Romeo.
It is Romeo's friend, Benvolio, who represents more experienced love, being more realistic in his assessment
of Romeo's over−indulgent longings. He reasonably proposes to Romeo that he can forget Rosaline "By
giving liberty unto thine eyes. Examine other beauties." Benvolio further entices Romeo to go to a feast at the
Capulets, Juliet's family, stating: "Go thither, and with unattained eye / Compare her face with some that I
shall show / And I will make thee think thy swan a crow." What Benvolio foresees takes place. Romeo's sight
of Juliet obliterates Rosaline from his mind. As he says to the servingman at the Capulets, upon seeing Juliet:
"Did my heart love till now? / Forswear it, sight! / For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night."
Juliet responds equally ardently to Romeo. She says to her Nurse: "Go ask his name. If he be married, / My
grave is like to be my wedding bed." It is a particularly eloquent and telling phrase, since their own marriage
does end in their tragic deaths.
Romeo remains poetically ardent in his expressions of love, as in his speech to Juliet, when he views her upon
her balcony: "What light through yonder window breaks? / It is the East, and Juliet is the sun! / Arise, fair sun,
and kill the envious moon, / Who is already sick and pale with grief / That thou her maid art far more fair than
she." He continues: "See how she leans her cheek upon that hand! / 0 that I were a glove upon that hand, /
That I might touch that cheek!"
It is Juliet who, in spite of her self−abandonment to love, "0 Romeo, Romeo! − wherefore art thou Romeo? /
Deny thy father and refuse thy name. / Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,/ And I'll no longer be a
Capulet," remains strong and practical, increasingly so during the course of the play. Even in their
conversation by the moonlight, Juliet, on her balcony, presents questions that are directly to the point, while
Romeo's responses are poetically phrased compliments. Juliet says to Romeo: "The orchard walls are high and
hard to climb, / And the place death, considering who thou art." Romeo replies: "With love's light wings did I
o'erperch these walls. For stony limits cannot hold love out...." The youthly passion of Romeo and Juliet is
contrasted with the mature outlook of the other characters, whose views regarding love take different forms.
The Friar is presented as kindly and good−humored, as when he responds to Romeo's telling of his
new−found love for Juliet: "Holy Saint Francis! What a change is here! / Is Rosaline, that thou didst love so
Romeo and Juliet: An Analysis of the Main Characters and Their Views on Love
89
dear, / So soon forsaken? − Young men's love then lies/Not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes.... / Thy old
groans yet ring in mine ancient ears." When Romeo asks if he is chiding him, the Friar replies: "For doting,
not for loving, pupil mine." Though for the Friar love is an accompaniment of life, reprehensible if violent or
unsanctified by religion, he is compassionate to the lovers' dilemma. Realizing their torment, when Juliet
refuses to marry another (Paris) and Romeo has been banished by the Prince of Verona to Mantua for the
slaying of Tybalt, nephew of Lady Capulet, he offers Juliet a sleeping potion to put her in a death−like state,
saying to her: "No warmth, no breath, shall testify thou livest / Shall Romeo by my letters know our drift. /
And hither shall he come. And he and I / Will watch thy waking, and that very night / Shall Romeo bear thee
hence to Mantua." However, due to circumstance, he fails to avert the disaster which befalls the two lovers,
exemplifying the fact that the worldly wisdom of others cannot always avert the consequences of violent
passion.
Mercutio, kinsman to the Prince and Romeo's friend, remains vigorous and ribald in his commentary on love,
ridiculing the concept of an all−absorbing, exclusive passion. Commenting on Romeo's leaping the orchard
wall to go to Juliet, he states: "0, Romeo, that she were, 0 that she were/An open−arse and thou a peppering
pear!" Responding to Benvolio, who tells Mercutio of Tybalt's challenge to Romeo, he says: "Alas, poor
Romeo, he is already dead! − stabbed with a white wench's black eye; run through the ear with a love song;
the very pin of his heart cleft with the blind bow−boy's butt−shaft." Mercutio acts as a foil to Romeo: his
sense of reality provides a contrast to Romeo's sentimentality. Gay, brave and mocking, he is not involved in
family feuds, being a friend to both the Montagues and Capulets. When he has received a death−wound due to
Romeo's ineptitude, his vivacity of wit still shines through: "Ask for me tomorrow, and you shall find me a
grave man." But it is Mercutio's final curse, "A plague a 'both your houses!" which speaks of the ominous
events to follow.
Father Capulet's love, on the other hand, is two−fold. While talking courteously to Paris, he is a kindly father,
regardful of his daughter's affections: "But woo her, gentle Paris, get her heart. / My will to her consent is but
a part, / And, she agreed, within her scope of choice / Lies my consent and fair according voice." However, he
is also a self−willed, obstinate man who denounces his only daughter when she speaks of refusing to marry
Paris: "God's bread! It makes me mad / Day, night; hour, tide, time; work, play; / Alone, in company; still my
care hath been / To have her matched." It is an anger, however, which turns to remorse upon Juliet's death:
"Dead art thou − alack, my child is dead, / And with my child my joys are buried!"
For Lady Capulet, love is a matter of wordly wisdom. She is never shown in a sympathetic relationship with
her daughter nor her husband. It is Lady Capulet who promises Juliet that she will send someone to Mantua
with poison to finish off Romeo. When Juliet appeals to her, she replies: "Talk not to me, for I'll not speak a
word. / Do as thou wilt, for I have done with thee."
The Nurse, meanwhile, regards love as something natural and sometimes lasting, part of the routines of a
woman's life. She, too, provides a contrast to concepts of romantic love. When Lady Capulet says to Juliet,
regarding her marrying Paris, "So shall you share all that he doth possess, / By having him making yourself no
less", the Nurse replies: "No less? Nay, bigger! Women grow by men." Further, when contemplating Juliet's
marriage to Paris, she remarks: "Sleep for a week. For the next night, I warrant, / The County Paris hath set up
his rest / That you shall rest but little."
Juliet is shown in a family circle consisting of her father, her mother and her nurse. It is the Nurse who
encourages Juliet's affair with Romeo. It is she whom Juliet sends to speak to Romeo regarding their marriage,
to take place in Friar Laurence's cell. She returns, stating: "Hie you to church. I must another way, / To fetch a
ladder, by which your love / Must climb a bird's nest soon when it is dark." Though the Nurse advises Juliet to
abandon Romeo to marry Paris, nevertheless she remains Juliet's confidante helping in her efforts to console
Juliet. When the Nurse relates to a grief−stricken Juliet that Romeo has slain Tybalt and is banished, she
offers to bring Romeo to her: "Hie to your chamber. I'll find Romeo / To comfort you."
Romeo and Juliet: An Analysis of the Main Characters and Their Views on Love
90
The forebodings of Romeo and Juliet, as if they had impending notions of their doom, are manifest in their
dialogue. From her balcony, Juliet says to Romeo: "Although I joy in thee, I have no joy of this contract
tonight. / It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;...." When Romeo leaves Juliet after their bridal night to
banishment in Mantua, she looks down from her balcony upon him, exclaiming: "Methinks I see thee, now
thou art so low, / As one dead in the bottom of a tomb." Romeo, in Mantua, before he hears the false news of
Juliet's death, thinks: "I dreamt my lady came and found me dead."
With the play's progression, Juliet changes from an inexperienced girl of near−fourteen to a married woman
caught in a web of passionate events. Though Romeo and Juliet understand each other's love, it is in their love
that they become isolated from friends and family. In the end, however, their love becomes public as all
mourn their loss—a loss which serves to reunite their feuding families. It is Capulet, a character with whom
one has not been particularly sympathetic, who first speaks: "0 brother Montague, give me thy hand." In
summation, it is the concept of their love:, rather than their death, which, contrasting with the cynicism and
disillusion of the other characters, remains in the mind.
Darkness in Romeo and Juliet
In Romeo and Juliet Shakespeare uses darkness to perform a variety of functions. Darkness sets the tone of
the play as the tragedy proceeds with a dark and inexorable determinism. Many of the scenes in the work are
set in darkness, with the alternation of day and night serving to propel the drama's narrative line. Darkness is
employed, moreover, as a reflection of mood and character in the figures of Romeo, Juliet and Mercutio. The
dark acts as a foil in images in which light represents the illumination of romantic love. Finally, the contrast
between light and dark allows Shakespeare to elevate the dimensions of the tragedy to cosmic proportions.
Romeo and Juliet is, of course, a tragedy, and images of darkness give the work an ominous character from
the outset. In the play's first scene, for example, we find that Romeo’s shutting himself from the light of day
is,"black and portentous," for there is, from the beginning of the work, a darkly portentous nature to the
work.1 The tragedy moves along with an irreversible determinism, ultimate demise careering like a
juggernaut. Romeo gives expression to the deterministic caste of the drama in his observation: "And feckled
Darkness line a drunkard reeling / from forth days path and Titan's burning wheels" (II, i. 232−233). For
Shakespeare's star−crossed lovers fate seems to have been determined in advance. We find Juliet seeking to
alter the deterministic progression of the plot when she implores Fortune to, "be fickle" (III, v. 62). Indeed, at
salient points in the play we consistently here precognition of doom in terms of darkness. After Mercutio's
death Romeo makes the joyless prophecy, "This day's black fate on moe days doth: depend / This but begins
the woe others must end," (III, i. 123−124), and, in similar fashion Romeo describes the progress of the play’s
action at the end of Act III, "more light and light—— more dark and dark our woes." (III, v. 36) While the
narrative does have its brighter moments, even the light sequences of the plot appear but a prelude before the
darkness, as, "a lightning before death" (V, iii. 90).
As one critic has remarked, Shakespeare in Romeo and Juliet sets numerous scenes in the dawn, at the time of
the division between light and dark.2 Indeed, numerous scenes in the work are set by torchlight, moonlight, or
virtually in the absence of light. The alternation between night and day provides the outlines of the plot's
scene−by−scene structuring. In a play with constant reference to the importance of time, the revolution of the
hours becomes of upmost significance. As Friar Lawrence informs Romeo, the fate of the protagonists rests
largely on timing:
And here stand all your state
Either be gone before the watch be set
Or by the break of day disguis'd from hence.
Darkness in Romeo and Juliet
91
(III, iii. 165−167)
The opportunities which Romeo and Juliet find to defy their ultimate doom are given in terms of the
alternation of night and day. Juliet declares, "Come night, come Romeo, come thou day in night," (III, ii, 20)
and the banter of the lovers at the beginning of Act III, scene v, in which they dispute the time, underscores
the importance of the contrast between night and day in terms of the drama’s narrative line.
Dark and light are also employed by Shakespeare as a mirror of the character and mood of the play’s central
figures. Romeo, at the outset of the work, is associated with a melancholy darkness, or, as Montague puts it,
"Away from light steals my heavy son" (I, i. 140). Before he meets Juliet, Romeo is viewed by himself as one
who has been struck blind, and the transformation of Romeo from a figure of darkness, lurking in the
background of the play’s action, to a figure of light, in the foreground of the stage, reflects the change in the
youth's character. Juliet is also a figure of the dark, although hers is no melancholy darkness, but rather a
demure and withdrawn aspect.3 Juliet herself gives expression to the withdrawn nature of her character in the
famous balcony scene, "Therefore pardon me / And not impute this yielding to light love / Which the dark
night hath so discovered." (II, i. 146−148) Like Romeo, love produces a change in Juliet's character from
darkness to light. Mercutio is a figure associated with the light of a firebrand,4 and his early demise gives us
some early indication of just how rapidly a bright candle can be snuffed.
Darkness also plays a seminal role in Shakespeare's use of imagery. Darkness is most consistently used as a
foil or contrast to light, with light being used as a symbolic representation of love. As a critic asserts, "the
dominating image is light, every form and manifestation of it... the background, both of things seen, and of the
imagery, is of light against darkness."5 Light is employed as an image of light and love repeatedly cast against
a dark background. Thus we have Romeo describing Juliet's beauty, "It seems she hangs upon the cheek of
night/ As a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear" (I, iv. 161−162). Later Juliet will make use of the light and dark
contrast in her expression of idealized love, "Love's heralds should be thoughts / Which ten times faster glides
than the sun's beams / Driving back the shadows over lowerring hills" (II, v. 4−6). Darkness is the unrelieved
field in which the light of beauty and love is made to shine more brightly, although the darkness will,
ultimately, subsume the light, and, "the sun for sorrow will not show his head" (V, iii. 306).
This use of dark and light in association with love permits Shakespeare to promote the romance of Romeo and
Juliet to cosmic proportions. The lovers, as the Prologue informs us, are star−crossed, Juliet being referred to
by her paramour as a "sun." The figures of Romeo and Juliet are like, "Earth−treading stars that make dark
heaven light" (I, ii. 25). Juliet's beauty is likened by Romeo to the sidereal glow of the stars:
Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven.
Having some business, do entreat her eyes
To twinkle in their spheres till they return.
(III, i. 57−59)
Thus, Romeo and Juliet are like bright stars and heavenly bodies, with an all−encompassing darkness of the
night marking their outlines.
Notes
1. Roland Mushat Frye, Shakespeare: The Art of the Dramatist. Boston: Houghton−Mifflin, 1970, p. 81.
2. John Erskine, "Romeo and Juliet," Shakespearean Studies, eds. Brandler Matthews and Ashley Horace
Thorndike. New York: Russell and Russell, 1962, p.221.
3. Harry Levin, Shakespeare and the Revolution of the Times. New York: Oxford University, 1976, p.105.
Darkness in Romeo and Juliet
92
4. Harry Granville−Barker. Prefaces to Shakespeare. Princeton: Princeton University, 1947, p.307.
5. Caroline F. E. Spurgeon, "Shakespeare's Iterative Imagery," Studies in Shakespeare, ed. Peter Alexander.
London: Oxford University, 1964, p. 171.
Bibliography
Erskine, John. "Romeo and Juliet," Shakespearean Studies. Eds. Brandler Matthews and Ashley Horace
Thorndike. New York: Russell and Russell, 1962, pp. 215−237.
Frye, Roland Mushat. Shakespeare: The Art of the Dramatist. Boston: Houghton−Mifflin, 1970.
Granville−Barker, Harry. Prefaces to Shakespeare. Princeton: Princeton University, 1947.
Levin, Harry. Shakespeare and the Revolution of the Times. New York: Oxford University, 1976.
Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet. Ed. Richard Hosley. New Haven: Yale University,
1917.
Spurgeon, Caroline F. E. "Shakespeare’s Iterative Imagery," Studies in Shakespeare. Ed. Peter Alexander.
London: Oxford University, 1964, pp. 171−200.
Evolution of Love in Romeo and Juliet
There is a great deal written about the nature of the love relationships involving Romeo in Romeo and Juliet.
In analyzing the relationship which opens the play, namely, Romeo and Rosaline, with the one which quickly
replaces it, Romeo and Juliet, we see a progression in the characters from innocence to maturity, from
love−sickness to the authentic experience of love.
The change from one relationship to another is a forced change from childhood innocence to adult awareness.
Hence, Northrop Frye refers to Romeo and Juliet as a play whose theme is love, bound up with and part of,
violent death.1
As the lovers meet and find themselves bound by love, they are surrounded by the intruding world which
brings with it a feud, family pride, loyalty for friends and the tragic death of the lovers.
In examining this change, we first consider Romeo as we first meet him in the play.
Romeo's love for Rosaline has long been taken to be an internal preparation; it is−−for an
external contrast and surprise. ...The Rosaline affair has...the purely dramatic or poetic
advantage of offering an interesting contrast between Romeo's demeanor now and before.2
Romeo's view of Rosaline is what Frye calls the Petrarchan convention of love. This technique of describing
the pristine, unrequited love from afar was altered when it reached the 17th Century. Writers explored the
relationship, particularly its sexual aspects more deeply. Romeo's relationship followed the tradition. It
involved a proud, disdainful mistress quite out of reach of the lover, but allusions are made to sexual desires
and innuendo. Rosaline, the unavailable mistress, is not seen and does not engage in conversations with
Romeo. Romeo is the lovesick youth "isolated and immature, self−absorbed and serious, a young man not yet
Evolution of Love in Romeo and Juliet
93
awake to the possibilities of life or the dangers of death."3 He shows little actual awareness of Rosaline, and
never speaks to her, but spends all his time writing poetry to her, wearing rumpled clothing and elaborating
upon the "cruelty of his mistress, wept and kept 'adding to clouds more clouds with his deep sighs.’"4
This emotional affliction is more akin to melancholy, which, as noted above, was common to Shakespeare's
time. At the play's beginning Romeo has no time for the street brawl, since he is immersed in the Petrarchan
lament for his mistress who "has sworn to 'live chaste.’”5
Romeo's language at this point reflects his shallow relationship. His language is artificial and non−dramatic
when speaking of Rosaline:
Love is a smoke made with fume of sighs;
Being purg'd, a fire sparkling in lovers' eyes;
Being vex'd, a sea nourish'd with lovers' tears.
(I, i. 196−198)
Romeo's "condition of love" for Rosaline is one of subjugation. He will not allow himself to become involved
in the feud, he does not dance or even exchange witty remarks with his closest friend Mercutio, and refuses to
be enticed into jocularity. Romeo is a lovesick lover who cannot simply enjoy life and is, as Stoll indicates,
"in love with love."6
Both the lovers−to−be are representative of the stage of adolescence. Their "adolescence is quieter and
moodier than Mercutio's or Benvolio's but they are not strikingly unusual until love transforms them."7 All
that changes when Romeo meets Juliet. Going to a dance where he expects to meet Rosaline, he suddenly
confronts Juliet and miraculously he forgets about the mistress who had absorbed so much of his interest. His
language displays a new richness which underscores his emotion rather than the melancholia he felt with
Rosaline:
0, she doth teach the torches to turn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
As a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear;
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!
So shows a snowy drove trooping with crows,
As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows. (I, v, 46−51)
Hart points out in his analysis of this passage that it:
suggests a sensuousness in the apprehension of Juliet that gives vitality to their relationship.
Romeo is at once awe−struck, humble, physically conscious of her from this very first glance.
And she in turn is always aware of him.8
Perhaps Hart states it more succinctly when he says that Romeo "changes from a moping adolescent to a
young man of action."9
Juliet is just as dramatically transformed. She is but a child without even Romeo's imaginative experiences to
stimulate her. Yet she is transformed by her sudden love for Romeo and develops a fullness of character
which never is surrendered. She moves from obedient child and innocent little girl to an independent young
woman who is committed in trust and devotion to her love.
Her actions are quite revolutionary for the time. First she speaks of setting aside her name. Then she assumes
the role of one who woos the other. Unlike Rosaline, Juliet is a participant in this relationship. She is willing
Evolution of Love in Romeo and Juliet
94
to speak of her love rather than coyly denying it. She immediately assumes an independence from family
traditions and loyalties which will alter her life. Yet, Juliet's intense love brings with it an insight into the
tragedy that awaits the lovers when she states, "It is too rash, too unadvis'd, too sudden" (II, ii. 118).
Juliet ultimately follows the female tradition of the times, that is to accept the lead offered by her lover, and to
acquiesce to his decisions, regardless of their consequences. He will lead and she will follow. Herein lies her
tragedy. Juliet must rely on Romeo to make their arrangements. She must await his return and must suffer for
his loyalty to his slain friend Mercutio. Even as she awaits the dawn after their one night together, Juliet can
do nothing but remain loyal to Romeo, even if such loyalty results in death.
Yet this change in the nature of the two lovers is Shakespeare's way of making them sympathetic characters.
He contrasts them with other lovers who are skeptical, and absorbs Romeo and Juliet in the feud between the
two families. Their love is so innocent, intense and perfect that it can only be destroyed by the imperfect
world which surrounds it.
Rosaline cannot be compared with Juliet, whose character is rich, full of love, wit, and humor. She is at once
both playful, and caressing, confiding and resolved. It is not Juliet who panics and acts rashly... that is Romeo.
Yet she is strong in her resolve when she must be separated from her lover. Left alone and having rejected her
family in favor of her lover, she must now sacrifice everything for the sake of that love. She calmly makes the
decision to take the Friar's potion and risk the results.
Yet when she finds that her commitment results in the death of her lover, she accepts the fact that death will
be her only triumph over life and her only means to attain her ultimate love. Hers is not a hysterical reaction,
rather a realistic acceptance that she cannot have her love in this life and yet life without him is not life at all.
There remains only one action to take, and Juliet willingly embraces the death which will reunite her to
Romeo.
Hart points out that this love relationship, the perfect love between Romeo and Juliet is "pure love put into
such a framework that love can be believed in and accepted as the one truth in that world. The very names
Romeo and Juliet testify to Shakespeare's success."10
NOTES
1. Robert Sandler, Ed., Northrop Frye on Shakespeare. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1986,
p. 19.
2. Elmer Edgar Stoll, Shakespeare’s Young Lovers. London: Oxford University Press, 1935, p. 19.
3. John A. Hart, "Romeo and Juliet," in Lovers Meeting: Discussion of Five Plays by Shakespeare. Carnegie
Series in English, Pittsburgh: Carnegie Institute of Technology, 1964, p. 27.
4. Frye, p. 21.
5. Ibid., p. 21.
6. Stoll, p. 8.
7. Francis Fergusson, Shakespeare: The Pattern in his Carpet. New York: Delacorte Press, 1970, p. 89.
8. Hart, p.27.
9. Hart, p.28.
Evolution of Love in Romeo and Juliet
95
10. Hart, p.27.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Fergusson, Francis. Shakespeare: The Pattern in His Carpet. New York: Delacorte Press, 1970.
Hart, John A., "Romeo and Juliet," in Lovers Meeting: Discussion of Five Plays by Shakespeare. Carnegie
Series in English. Pittsburgh: Carnegie Institute of Technology, 1964.
Stoll, Elmer Edgar. Shakespeare’s Young Lovers. London: Oxford University Press, 1935.
Sandier, Robert, Ed., Northrop Frye on Shakespeare. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1986.
Criticism
Time and Haste
Tom F. Driver
[Driver examines Romeo and Juliet in terms of the necessity of condensing "real" time into stage time in such
a way that the audience will believe the events of the play have actually taken place. The critic points out that
Shakespeare compressed the action of Romeo and Juliet in two ways: first he considerably shortened the
length of the action as it appeared in his source, Arthur Brooke's The Tragicall Historye of Romeus and
Juliet; second, he used very brief scenes to account for longer periods of time. This compression, Driver
asserts, underscores the theme of haste in the play. The critic also notes how Shakespeare varies the rhythm
of the drama, slowing down or speeding up the action to match its meaning.]
In Romeo and Juliet the young Shakespeare learned the craft of creating on stage the illusion of passing time.
The Prologue is a kind of author's pledge that we are to see something that really happened. At least, and for
technique it amounts to the same thing, it could have happened.
Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
[Prologue, 1−4]
The story is further summarized, and the Prologue ends with this couplet:
The which if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.
[Prologue, 13−14]
Once such a beginning is made, the author is under obligation to be as faithful to the clock as possible. He
must show one thing happening after another, according to its proper time, and he must keep the audience
informed as to how the clock and the calendar are turning. Shakespeare was well aware of the obligation,
Romeo and Juliet contains no less than 103 references to the time of the action—that is, 103 references which
inform the audience what day things take place, what time of day it is, what time some earlier action
happened, when something later will happen, etc. In every case but one Shakespeare was thoroughly
Criticism
96
consistent.
It is not enough, however, for the dramatist to be consistent. He also must be able to make us believe that in
the short time we sit in the theater the whole action he describes can take place. He must compress the action
of his story into the length of a theatrical performance.
The fearful passage of their death−marked love,
And the continuance of their parents' rage,...
Is now the two−hours' traffic of our stage. [Prologue, 9−10, 12]
Faced with a dramatic necessity, Shakespeare decided to make capital of it. If he has much business to set
forth in a short time he will write a play about the shortness of time. In Granville−Barker's words, Romeo and
Juliet is "a tragedy of precipitate action." No little part of the attraction of the play is due to this frank
exploitation of a dramatic necessity.
Come, Montague; for thou art early up
To see thy son and heir more early down.
[V, iii. 208−09]
In addition to the 103 chronological references noted above, the play contains 51 references to the idea of
speed and rapidity of movement.
I shall mention only briefly the two ways by which Shakespeare has achieved the uncommonly tight
compression of action in this play. His first stratagem was to shorten the length of the action, as found in his
source, from nine months to four or five days. With this he achieved two results: he heightened the sense of
"o'er hasty" action considerably, and he enabled himself more easily to appear to account for all the "real"
time in the story. He did not, of course, account for every hour, but he came nearer to a correspondence
between stage time and "real" time.
His second stratagem was to make very short scenes on the stage account for comparatively long periods of
"real" time. This effect, which has been called "double" time, was mastered by Shakespeare in the course of
writing Romeo and Juliet. The play has two notable scenes in this respect: I. v, the feast at Capulet's house,
and V. iii, the final scene. In both, the technique is to focus attention upon a series of small scenes within the
major scene, one after another, so that we are forgetful of the clock, and then to tell us at the end that
so−and−so−much time has gone by. Because the story has advanced, we are willing to believe the clock did
also.
So much for the problem of compressing "real" time into stage time and for Shakespeare's use of the resulting
rapidity as a theme in his play. There remains a further complexity owing to the drama's being a performed
art. That is the problem of tempo. The sense of rapidity in the movement of the action must be varied. The
play must have a rhythm different from the movement of the clock, however that clock may have been
accelerated. There must be a fast and slow, and that fast and slow will account for much of the subtle form
which the play assumes under the hand of the dramatist. Here is a major difference between art and life. In
life, time is constant. The dull days last as long as the eventful ones, if not longer. In a drama time speeds up
or slows down according to the meaning of the action. The excitement of dramatic art lies very largely in the
tension thus established between chronological tempo and artistic, or dramatic, tempo.
Roughly speaking, Romeo and Juliet has four periods or phases—two fast and two slow. It opens in a slow
time. True, there is a street fight to begin with; but that is in the nature of a curtain−raiser skillfully used to set
the situation. Basically, the first period is the "Rosaline phase", and it moves as languidly as Romeo's
mooning. The second period, of very swift action, begins to accelerate in I. iii. with talk of Paris as a husband.
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It rushes headlong, with only momentary pauses, through love, courtship, and marriage until Tybalt is
impetuously slain. Here there is a pause, while the audience waits with Juliet to see what will happen, and
while Friar Laurence cautions Romeo to be patient until he can "find a time" to set matters straight. It is
important to notice that this pause accounts for only a very small period of "real" time. The pause is purely
psychological—or rather, dramatic. In the midst of it Shakespeare prepares to accelerate the action once more
by inserting between two of the lovers' andante [moderately slow] scenes the very remarkable staccato
[abrupt and disjointed] scene iv of Act III, in which Capulet arranges with Paris for Juliet's marriage. In this
short scene of 35 lines there are no less than 15 specific references to time and haste. The scene is all about
how soon the marriage can take place—counterpoint to the mood of the lovers, who would turn the morning
lark into a nightingale. In the final phase of the play, speed takes over again and we rush to the catastrophe.
It is in the last phase that the most interesting relations between dramatic rhythm and chronological clarity
may be seen. Two or three days of "real" time are required to pass in order to make sense of the action:
Romeo must be exiled, Friar Laurence must put his plan for Juliet's false death into effect, messengers must
travel, family must grieve, and a funeral be held. But the drama, once Juliet takes the sleeping potion, requires
a swift conclusion. Therefore, after that event, references to exact time, which hitherto have been profuse,
almost entirely disappear from the text. There is no way for an audience to know when any of the scenes in
Act V begins. There are no clues as to what day it is, let alone what time of day, until line 176 of scene iii,
when the Watch informs us that Juliet has been buried two days. The vagueness is deliberate. The "real" time
is comparatively long, but the play wants to move swiftly. Therefore the audience is given an impression of
speed, but specific time references are withheld.
The foregoing remarks should make it clear that in such a play as Romeo and Juliet, where the story demands
a setting more or less realistic, Shakespeare strings his art between two poles: on one side, accurate imitation
of what would really happen; on the other, bold shaping of events into an aesthetic pattern. We may say that
the play results from a tension between these two. The actual technique is to move from one to the other.
Tension, however, expresses our feeling about the play. Imagination and reality seem to be combined in a
system of stresses and strains. Time is real, and to imitate action is to imitate time. But there is also in men a
capacity for transcending time, which the playwright−artist and his audience know well. Time and its events
alone do not produce an action; the imagination, transcending but not escaping time, may do so. (pp. 364−66)
Tom F. Driver, "The Shakespearian Clock: Time and the Vision of Reality in 'Romeo and Juliet' and 'The
Tempest'," in Shakespeare Quarterly, Vol. XV, No. 4, Autumn, 1964, pp. 363−70.
Brents Stirling
[Stirling offers a detailed analysis of numerous elements that contribute to the theme of haste in Romeo and
Juliet. Concentrating on Acts I, II, and III, the critic shows how Shakespeare underscores the theme through
such devices as the characters' dialogue, the chorus's commentary, the effect of sound and movement on
stage, and plot development.]
The unguarded haste of youth as a tragic motive of both Romeo and Juliet appears repeatedly in their lines
and in those of characters who describe them. Our common understanding of this needs to be accompanied,
however, by an understanding of the haste theme as it marks all aspects of the tragedy. Romeo and Juliet is
perhaps unique in its clear−cut and consistent expression of theme through character, choric commentary, and
action.
The opening scene of the play establishes the pace at which tragic fate will unfold. In little more than a
hundred lines the Capulet−Montague feud is introduced with the thumb−biting scene, is extended by
infiltration of the gentry, and is dramatically stayed with choric judgment by the Prince of Verona. This
quality of events hurrying to a decision is expressed, moreover, by incidental dialogue: in the beginning,
Sampson's line, "I strike quickly, being mov'd" [I, i. 6], and Gregory's response, "But thou art not quickly
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mov'd to strike" [I, i. 7], comically introduce the theme of impetuous speed, and at the conclusion of the brawl
even the interviews decreed by Escalus appear in terms of dispatch: "You, Capulet, shall go along with me; /
And, Montague, come you this afternoon" [I, i. 99−100].
Scene ii now presents haste as a theme governing the betrothal: Capulet declares that Juliet "hath not seen the
change of fourteen years" and urges Paris to "let two more summers wither in their pride, / Ere we may think
her ripe to be a bride" [I, ii. 9−11 ]. From this is derived the well−worn exposition device of tragic irony
which points significantly at a misfortune which will come "too soon."
Paris. Younger than she are happy mothers made.
Capulet. And too soon marr'd are those so early made.
[I, ii. 12−13]
In scene iii the headlong quality continues both in plot movement and thematic dialogue. The question is put
to Juliet: "Thus then in brief: / The valiant Paris seeks you for his love. / . . .What say you? Can you love the
gentleman? / This night you shall behold him at our feast" [I, iii. 73−4, 79−80]. Twenty lines later, the feast is
not only shown as imminent but as characterized by the haste and confusion through which comic characters
will express the theme. A servant enters:
Madam, the guests are come, supper serv'd up, you call'd, my young lady ask'd for, the nurse
curs'd in the pantry, and everything in extremity. I must hence to wait; I beseech you, follow
straight.
[I, iii. 100−03]
Scene iv opens with lines which continue the theme ingeniously in terms of a masking. The maskers reject
slow and measured "prologue" [I, iv. 7] entries as "prolixity" [I, iv. 3], and propose to give their performance
"and be gone" [I, iv. 10]. … (pp. 10−11)
Here also is the first entry of Mercutio who both as a character and as a name will point up the quick, the
mercurial, mood of the play. And now a scene which began with the maskers as symbols of dispatch ends
with a further thematic turn; a feared lateness of arrival at the feast is first made suggestive and then direct in
disclosing untimeliness as a tragic theme:
Benvolio. This wind you talk of blows us from ourselves.
Supper is done, and we shall come too late.
Romeo. I fear, too early; for my mind misgives
Some consequence, yet hanging in the stars,
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night's revels, and expire the term
Of a despised life clos'd in my breast,
By some vile forfeit of untimely death.
But He that hath the steerage of ray course
Direct my sail! On, lusty gentlemen!
Benvolio. Strike, drum. They march about the stage.
[I, iv. 104−14]
The theme appears clearly here in exposition which goes beyond dramatic irony into conscious prophecy, and
becomes a formulation of the tragedy itself: in the "consequence yet hanging in the stars" the passage echoes
the "star−cross'd lovers" line of the Prologue [1. 6], and it expresses Christian elements of tragedy through
Romeo's reference to his "despised life" and his ascription of "steerage" to God's will. Romeo's lines are thus
plainly designed for choric purposes, and any thematic material in them may be taken seriously. So it is
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notable that the passage arises from a quip implying haste (Benvolio's line) and adds earliness, untimeliness,
to the conventional tragic themes of fate, contemptus mundi [contempt of the world], and divine providence.
A concern over exposition as a "validating" factor should not, however, obscure the art by which Shakespeare
supports his prophetic lines with dramatic action: as Romeo, sensing untimely death, consigns the steerage of
his course to God, his sudden final words, "On, lusty gentlemen!" evoke Benvolio's command, "Strike, drum,"
and the march about the stage. Choric comment upon speeding fate is thus succeeded instantly by the
peremptory drum and a quick−time march of maskers which present the theme in sound and movement.
As scene iv closes with this expression of the haste theme, the next scene continues it with a comic device
already noted in scene iii—servants hastily preparing for the feast:
First Servant. Where's Potpan, that he
helps not to take away?
He shift a trencher! He scrape a trencher!
Second Servant. When good manners shall lie all in one or two men's hands, and they
unwash'd too, 'tis a foul thing.
First Servant. Away with the joint−stools, remove the court−cupboard, look to the plate.
Good thou, save me a piece of marchpane; and, as thou loves me, let the porter let in Susan
Grindstone and Nell. Antony and Potpan!
Second Servant. Ay, boy, ready.
First Servant. You are look'd for and call'd for, ask'd for and sought for, in the great chamber.
Third Servant. We cannot be here and there too. Cheerly, boys; be brisk a while, and the
longer liver take all.
[II. 1−15]
In Elizabethan staging this passage would come immediately after the close of scene iv and hence would
follow Romeo's speech and the lively exit march begun with Benvolio's "Strike, drum." Thus, in the sequence,
I. iv. 104 ff. through I. v. 1−17, actual, physical pace issues from Romeo's lines on tragic pace, and this in turn
is expanded into lines and action presenting haste on the comic plane. It is also interesting, whether
Shakespeare "meant it" or not, that the servant who ends the passage just quoted comically modifies Romeo's
speech on swift, untimely tragedy: "be brisk a while, and the longer liver take all."
In the next portion of scene v old Capulet and his kinsman who are met for the feast immediately supplement
the theme with dialogue on the rush of time since their last masking; over thirty years it has been since the
nuptial of Lucentio whose son's age thus points to the unbelievable passage of a generation. Plot movement
then extends this statement of theme with a quick sequence composed of Romeo's first glimpse of Juliet,
Tybalt's threat of violence which is restrained by his uncle, and the meeting of the lovers which brings
discovery that one is a Montague, the other a Capulet. In attending to verbal expressions of theme it is easy to
forget that plot structure can thus silently do its work. In Macbeth, for example, the compressed action leading
to Duncan's murder parallels the quality of rash obsession which is so dominant in the lines. The structure of
Romeo and Juliet is similar; from Act I, scene ii onward, audience attention is centered upon a progressively
imminent event, the Capulet feast, which in scene v is suddenly presented for a casting of the tragic die. Here
Romeo and Juliet meet, their fate becomes implicit in the discovery of their lineage, and prophetic Death in
the person of Tybalt is barely restrained from a harvest before the seed is planted. The action itself embodies
Romeo's choric lines on fated, fatal dispatch.
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The Prologue of Act II continues the theme in its opening passage,
Now old Desire doth in his death−bed lie,
And young Affection gapes to be his heir,
[Prologue II, 1−2]
suggestive lines which are translated into action by the pursuing of Romeo, who "ran this way, and leap'd this
orchard wall" [II, i. 5]. The balcony scene now brings a necessary lull or resting point in the fast pace, but the
famous exchange between the lovers continues the theme of haste. In II. ii Juliet implies it:
My ears have yet not drunk a hundred words
Of thy tongue's uttering, yet I know the sound.
[II, ii. 58−9]
And her lines presently become explicit:
Although I joy in thee,
I have no joy of this contract tonight;
It is too rash, too unadvis'd, too sudden,
Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be
Ere one can say it lightens.
[II, ii. 116−20]
As before, plot supplements thematic statement; events become imminent as calls by the Nurse end the tryst
and induce dialogue which expresses haste compounded with a desire to linger:
Juliet. What o'clock to−morrow
Shall I send to thee?
Romeo. By the hour of nine.
Juliet. I will not fail; 'tis twenty year till then.
I have forgot why I did call thee back.
Romeo. Let me stand here till thou remember it.
Juliet. I shall forget, to have thee still stand there,
Rememb'ring how I love thy company.
Romeo. And I'll still stay, to have thee still forget.
Forgetting any other home but this.
Juliet. Tis almost morning, I would have thee gone;—
And yet no farther than a wanton's bird. …
[II, ii. 167−77]
If it is to give the illusion of pace, episodic action must have fluidity, a quality Shakespeare maintains here by
beginning II. iii on a note carried over from II. ii. Romeo and Juliet have closed the later scene with lines on
morning and the haste it brings. Then, as the next one commences, we hear Friar Laurence:
The grey−ey'd morn smiles on the frowning night,
Chequ'ring the eastern clouds with streaks of light,
And flecked darkness like a drunkard reels
From forth day's path and Titan's fiery wheels.
Now, ere the sun advance his burning eye,
The day to cheer and night's dank dew to dry. . . .
[II, iii. 1−6]
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It is important to note that this is the first appearance of the Friar and that his role is a distinctly prophetic one.
After the lines just quoted he moralizes aptly on tragic symbolism in the herb which "strain'd from that fair
use, / Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse" [II. iii. 19−20]:
Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied;
And vice sometime's by action dignified.
[II, iii. 21−2]
Then as Romeo silently enters, Friar Laurence produces the plant which delights when smelled but kills when
tasted. After thus establishing the Friar's role as chorus for the tragedy, Shakespeare then makes him
spokesman of the haste theme: his greeting dwells solely upon Romeo's "earliness" and the "distemp'rature"
from which it arises:
Benedicite!
What early tongue so sweet saluteth me?
Young son, it argues a distempered head
So soon to bid good morrow to thy bed.
Care keeps his watch in every old man's eye,
And where care lodges, sleep will never lie;
But where unbruised youth with unstuff'd brain
Doth couch his limbs, there golden sleep doth reign;
Therefore thy earliness doth me assure
Thou art up−rous'd with some distemp'rature.
[II, iii. 31−40]
Friar Laurence's thematic moralizing now extends to Rosaline, "so soon forsaken" [II. iii. 67]:
Lo, here upon thy cheek the stain doth sit
Of an old tear that is not wash'd off yet.
[II, iii. 75−6]
And as scene iii closes, the Friar's admonition by indirection changes to an outright statement of the haste
theme:
Romeo. O, let us hence; I stand on sudden haste.
Friar. Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast.
[II, iii. 93−4]
The next scene presents dialogue between Romeo, Benvolio, and Mercutio, in which an accelerated badinage
continues the theme of oppressive haste: at the end of the exchange, as Mercutio complains that his "wits
faint" [II, iv. 67−8] from the quick give−and−take, we hear Romeo exclaiming, "Switch and spurs, switch and
spurs, or I'll cry a match" [II, iv. 69−70], and Mercutio observing, "Nay, if our wits run the wild goose chase, I
am done..." [II, iv. 71−2]. Then, as the scene ends with Romeo's urging of speed in arranging the lovers'
meeting, we hear the Nurse commanding Peter, "Before and apace" [II, iv. 217].
Again, as Juliet introduces II. v by reference to the overdue Nurse, there is a lively "run−on" from the exit
lines of one scene to the entry lines of another. Juliet's soliloquy and the Nurse's appearance then combine to
assert the haste theme fully and impressively:
The clock struck nine when I did send the nurse;
In half an hour she promis'd to return.
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Perchance she cannot meet him; that's not so.
O, she is lame! Love's heralds should be thoughts,
Which ten times faster glide than the sun's beams
Driving back shadows over louring hills;
Therefore do nimble−pinion'd doves draw Love,
And therefore hath the wind−swift Cupid wings.
Now is the sun upon the highmost hill
Of this day's journey, and from nine till twelve
Is three long hours, yet she is not come.
Had she affections and warm youthful blood,
She would be as swift in motion as a ball;
My words would bandy her to my sweet love,
And his to me; But old folks, marry, feign as they were dead,
Unwieldy, slow, heavy and pale as lead.
[II, v. 1−17]
The Nurse enters here with comically labored breathing (a device also of scene iii) which accompanies here
exclamation of "Jesu, what haste!" [II, v. 29] and the scene shifts back to the cell of Friar Laurence who plays
a "slowing" role opposite Romeo analogous to the Nurse's role with Juliet. But the lovers meet in the cell and
their marriage is arranged with the dispatch which is now coloring all aspects of the play; Friar Laurence
speaks:
Come, come with me, and we will make short work;
For, by your leaves, you shall not stay alone
Till Holy Church incorporate two in one.
[II, vi. 35−7]
Act in, scene i now brings the street fight in which Mercutio is killed, and speed in the action is again
accompanied by lines which express the haste theme. Mercutio's challenge comes in such terms: "Will you
pluck your sword out of his pilcher by the ears? Make haste, lest mine be about your ears ere it be out" [III, i.
80−2]. And at Mercutio's death the lament of Romeo points to the rush of events within a single hour:
This gentleman, the Prince's near ally,
My very friend, hath got this mortal hurt
In my behalf; my reputation stain'd
With Tybalt's slander,—Tybalt, that an hour
Hath been my cousin!
[III, i. 109−13]
Even the notion of death appears in a metaphor of souls ascending in quick succession:
Now, Tybalt, take the "villain" back again
That late thou gav'st me; for Mercutio's soul
Is but a little way above our heads,
Staying for thine. …
[II, i. 125−28]
At this point citizens enter in pursuit which results in an episode similar to Li as the Prince, with full retinue,
quiets the disorder and pronounces judgment on it. One might expect here a speech which would slow the
movement, but at this stage of the play all characters, even those rendering judicial decrees, are given lines
which carry the theme of immediacy and hurry. Escalus closes the scene:
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And for that offence
Immediately we do exile him hence. …
Let Romeo hence in haste,
Else, when he's found, that hour is his last.
Bear hence this body and attend our will.
Mercy but murders, pardoning those that kill.
[III. i. 186−87, 194−97]
Once more, as a scene is closed with the haste theme, the next one is begun on the same note. The transition,
moreover, contains irony which has the Prince's decree which ends III. i. He has banished Romeo "hence in
haste" and Juliet, unaware of this, calls for Romeo's return with all speed and urgency:
Gallop apace, you fiery−footed steeds,
Towards Phoebus' lodging; such a waggoner
As Phaethon would whip you to the west,
And bring in cloudy night immediately.
Spread thy close curtain, love−performing night,
That runaway's eyes may wink, and Romeo
Leap to these arms untalk'd of and unseen! …
Come, night; come, Romeo; come, thou day in night;
For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night,
Whiter than new snow on a raven's back.
Come, gentle night, come, loving, black−brow'd night. …
So tedious is this day
As is the night before some festival
To an impatient child that hath new robes
And may not wear them.
[III, ii. 1−7, 17−20, 28−31]
The Nurse then enters and increases the effect of haste by maddening the impatient Juliet with confused
quibble in reporting Tybalt's death and Romeo's banishment.
It is unnecessary to discuss the full extent to which dispatch appears as a theme in Romeo and Juliet.
Interpretation need not cover an entire work if it adequately suggests a way of perceiving it. The last half of
the play [also] shows a wide range of action, character, and line devoted to the haste theme. … (pp. 12−21)
Brents Stirling, "'They Stumble that Run Fast'," in his Unity in Shakespearian Tragedy: The Interplay of
Theme and Character, 1956. Reprint by Gordian Press, Inc., 1966, pp. 10−25.
Aspects of Love
Leonora Leet Brodwin
[Brodwin studies Romeo and Juliet in relation to the courtly love tradition in Elizabethan romance. Courtly
love is a philosophy that was prominent in chivalric times and had a significant influence on Renaissance
literature. Though the precise origins of this tradition are not known, the ideas on which it was based were
summarized by Andreas Capellanus at the end of the twelfth century in his The Art of Courtly Love.
Capellanus explained the doctrine of courtly love in thirty−one "rules." In essence, it is illicit and sensual and
is accompanied by great emotional suffering. The lover, usually a knight, falls in love at first sight and, until
his love is reciprocated, agonizes over his situation. Once his affection is returned, he is inspired to perform
Aspects of Love
104
great deeds. Moreover, the lovers pledge their fidelity to one another and vow to keep their union a secret.
The ideas of courtly love, were frequently expressed by the fourteenth−century Italian poet Petrarch in his
love sonnets. His exaggerated comparisons and oxymora (the pairing of contradictory terms) describing the
suffering of the lover and the beauty of the lady have come to be known as "Petrarchan conceits." In the
excerpt below, Brodwin details the aspects of Romeo and Juliet that conform to the conventions of courtly
love: Romeo and Juliet fall in love at first sight; their love is intensified by the feud that threatens it; they meet
secretly; and, although they marry, they see each other only at night lending an illicit dimension to their love.
In addition, they quickly resolve to commit suicide upon learning of each other's death. The critic stresses,
however, that Romeo and Juliet transcends these stock conventions through its dramatization of the "spiritual
mystique" of the hero and heroine's passion. Shakespeare depicts Romeo and Juliet's love as divine, Brodwin
asserts, for the protagonists approach death cheerfully, confident that they will at last achieve peace and
freedom from the restrictions of mortal existence. Furthermore, their faithfulness in love is virtuous because
their deaths bring about an end to the feud.]
Shakespeare's tragic masterpiece of Courtly Love was written in 1595, when the vogue of courtly
sonneteering was at its height. In considering "the fearful passage of their death−mark'd love," critics like E.
E. Stoll have been at considerable pains to show that the love of Romeo and Juliet was the normal product of
youthful innocence, that "not because there is anything wrong with them do the youth and maiden perish but
only because 'love is strong as death,' and 'fate unfriendly' [see Sources for Further Study]. Granville−Barker
has written with greater insight into the specific characteristics [in his Prefaces to Shakespeare] of the youth
and maiden which have made their love "strong as death," but he, too, misses the fuller implications of this
love. At the opposite extreme is Franklin Dickey who argues, from the vantage point of the Renaissance
moralists, that Romeo and Juliet are afflicted with a love disease the evil consequence of which is death:
"fortune has operated here to punish sin and … this avenging fortune is the work of heaven" [see excerpt in
section on Tragic Design]. While Dickey performs a service in stripping the play of its romanticism and
showing that the quality of its love leads inevitably to death, he is untrue to the tone of the play. Romeo and
Juliet is not a tract against Courtly Love, but a supreme expression of its spiritual mystique. Of this Paul N.
Siegel is clearly aware for, in relating the play to the conventions of a courtly "Religion of Love," he has
indicated the literary tradition through which this extraordinary work must be approached and so come closest
to an understanding of the precise nature of this love.
The love of Romeo and Juliet, while ever in fatal interaction with the feuding world of Verona, yet exists on a
plane of experience totally divorced from its normal expectations. The capsular quality of this love, which can
run its complete course without betraying its secret existence, is, in fact, the subject of much of the play's
dramatic irony, Romeo's confidants patronizing his love for Rosaline while his true love for Juliet is flowering
and Juliet's father bustling about her marriage while still believing that it is an honor that she dreams not of.
While this counterpointing of the brawling, bawdy, and festive and practical world with the lovers' poetic
night world is meaningful, the vitality of the naturalistic presentation tends to obscure the poetic symbolism.
The quasi−comic treatment of much of the play puts readers on their guard against taking the lovers'
utterances with too much seriousness, and the lovers' occasional playfulness seems to confirm the impression
of youthful impetuousness, singing bird−like of its joy.
But if Shakespeare has endowed romance convention with an unusual naturalism, he, no less than the
romancers, is vitally concerned with "the allegory of love." Though his lovers react with greater psychological
realism to their dilemmas than do the cardboard lovers of romance, they follow as un−questioningly an
implicit code of love and, in their poetic utterances, point to its symbolic implications. Although the
psychological and symbolic levels are often interpenetrating, there are moments when the symbolism becomes
completely divorced from naturalistic presentation. When, for instance, Romeo refers to Juliet as his
"conceal'd lady" [III. ill. 98], the rhetoric of human love has been completely displaced by one appropriate to
a mystical religion of love.
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105
The tragedy which is to so transcend the ordinary conventions of romance begins with a caricature of them.
Romeo's love for Rosaline has been "rais'd with the fume of sighs" [I. i. 190] and "nourish'd with lovers' tears"
[I. i. 192]. He has carefully conformed to all the prescribed rules of Courtly Love, spending the night with
tears and making "himself an artificial night" [I. i. 140] with the coming of day. But this stylized behavior is
not so different from the convention which allows Romeo and Juliet to fall irrevocably in love at first sight
and for Juliet quite naturally to say: "Go ask his name.—If he be married, / My grave is like to be my wedding
bed" [I. v. 134−35]. These two loves are not different, then, in kind but in the quality of the poetry in which
they are expressed, the earlier a patchwork of conventional Petrarchanisms, the later a profoundly mystical
exploration.
Through this conventional behavior, however, suggestions of character do emerge. Romeo is a youth in search
of an infinitely thrilling love, a love for which he is prepared to face suffering and even death. Though the
indulgence of his feelings for Rosaline causes him to feel slightly ridiculous— "Dost thou not laugh?" [I. i.
183]— he cherishes "the devout religion of mine eye" [I. ii. 88] and longs to put it to the test. Hitherto sinking
passively "under love's heavy burthen" [I. iv. 22], he is suddenly jarred from a purely imaginative to an active
role by the suggestion that he compare his beloved's beauty with that of others at the Capulet feast.
Although he had only wished to view his love and prove the constancy of his heart, a sudden premonition of
the danger of thus venturing into the enemy's camp elicits from him his first profoundly personal utterance:
. . . my mind misgives
Some consequence, yet hanging in the stars,
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night's revels and expire the term
Of a despised life, clos'd in my breast,
By some vile forfeit of untimely death.
But he that hath the steerage of my course
Direct my sail! On, lusty gentlemen!
[I. iv. 106−13]
In this speech the character of Romeo emerges from the role of conventional courtly lover to reveal a deeper
quality of doom. In terms of the action Romeo rightly fears that in so venturing to see Rosaline he may be
forfeiting his life to fate, for it is from Tybalt's recognition of him at the feast that the fatal consequences of
his exile are to issue. But however eager he was to nourish his "lover's tears," the prospect of possible death
for the love of Rosaline is another thing. Suddenly faced with this prospect, he recognizes that such death
would be a "vile forfeit." If he nonetheless continues his fatal voyage, it is no longer the desired sight of
Rosaline but the challenge of fate which spurs him on. If fate has marked him out, he will not be "fearful" but
hold his "despised life" in as much contempt.
Although it was earlier acknowledged that his immediate love for Juliet was a stock romance convention, this
crucial speech, which just precedes his first sight of Juliet, may suggest a motivation for the fatal urgency with
which he approaches his love. As he is risking his life in the name of a love which has not inspired him to the
point where he can consider his life's loss as more than a "vile forfeit," his need for a truly inspirational love
becomes urgent. Having accepted fate's challenge, he is now concerned to transmute this "vile forfeit" into a
glorious surrender.
And this inspiration comes to him at the radiant sight of Juliet:
O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear—
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Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!
[I. v. 44−7]
Where Rosaline's beauty had left him in the utter darkness of an unhappy human love, Juliet's beauty, because
it seems to him too precious for the usages of life, can truly illuminate the night. From this first encounter,
however, Romeo conceives of his lady not as an ordinary mortal but as a symbol of divine beauty, which, in
the "touching," can make him "blessed" [I. v. 51]. His earlier premonition of death has been displaced by this
intimation of heavenly blessing; but the close association of these two in "this night's revels" is significant.
From what has just been shown, we can see the way in which Shakespeare invests a stock convention of
romance, 'that of love at first sight, with suggestions of both human motivation and symbolic implication. And
what he has done for Romeo he does in lesser measure for Juliet: if Romeo meets Juliet at a fateful moment in
his life, the same is true for her. She had just been informed by her mother that she must "think of marriage
now" [I. iii. 69]. And, although she had said that "it is an honour that I dream not of " [I. iii. 66], she is forced
for the first time to consider marriage as a real and imminent possibility. In doing so, her maiden heart gains a
new susceptibility which will cause her to look at men differently this night: "I'll look to like" [I. iii. 97].
As Romeo had come to the feast to behold Rosaline, feeling that in venturing thus into the enemy's camp he
was forfeiting his life to fate, so does Juliet come to inspect the man to whom her parents would likewise have
her dedicate her fate. Both, however, instead of looking where they had intended, seem compelled to make a
last desperate comparison before their fate is irrevocably sealed.
Under a similarly fatal urgency, Romeo finds in Juliet's radiant beauty the inspiration he had been seeking;
and Juliet suddenly finds herself inspired by Romeo's passionate prayers. This love at first sight, then, is not
simply a submission to fate but a choosing of their fate. When Romeo learns that "my life is my foe's debt" [I.
v. 118] and Juliet the same, they can therefore accept their fate with a commitment that redeems it from being
a "vile forfeit."
Their love has been born in the heart of obstruction, and if their knowledge of this crucial fact was "muffled
still," the passionate need by which they found each other out could "without eyes see pathways to his will" [I.
i. 171−72]. For this central obstruction to their love, rather than deterring their passion serves only to intensify
it: "Temp'ring extremities with extreme sweet" [II. Pro., 14]. Romeo had chanced such an extremity in coming
to the feast and Juliet in choosing another than the one her parents had appointed before they were aware of
the true extremity they had embraced, and, when they do become aware of the obstruction to their love, they
accept its necessity without question. Though Romeo and Juliet marry, their marriage so approximates the
adulterous union of night that it even borrows from the troubadours the traditional verse form of the aubade or
dawn song, which celebrates the adulterous lovers' hour of parting. "More light and light—more dark and dark
our woes" [III. v. 36] is not the language of marriage but of lovers who "steal love's sweet bait from fearful
hooks." [II. Pro., 8]. The marriage of Romeo and Juliet... in no way changes the obstructed situation which
makes the necessity of their partings "such sweet sorrow" [II. ii. 184].
If their meetings can only take place in the night, night has for the lovers a special significance. They do not
covet night for itself but because it is only then that the power of love can be truly illuminating. As has been
seen, it is Juliet's radiance which first strikes Romeo. Again, as he stands beneath the balcony, she appears to
irradiate the night:
But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?
It is the East, and Juliet is the sun! … her eyes in heaven
Would through the airy region stream so bright
That birds would sing and think it were not night. …
O, speak again, bright angel! for thou art
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As glorious to this night, being o'er my head,
As is a winged messenger of heaven …
[II. ii. 2−3, 20−2, 26−8]
Juliet converts the terrors of night to glory. It is for this reason that Romeo can say:
I have night's cloak to hide me from their sight;
And but thou love me, let them find me here.
My life were better ended by their hate
Than death prorogued, wanting of thy love.
[II. ii. 75−8]
In a night containing Juliet's love, death need not be dreaded and is far preferable to his otherwise uninspired
life. He eagerly ventures into the night since it is only in "the dark night" that Juliet's "true−love passion" [II.
ii, 104−06] can be revealed. But if Juliet's love robs death of its terror, it nonetheless is in intimate association
with death. As Juliet informs Romeo, in a statement loaded with symbolic as well as practical meaning, the
place where she abides is "death, considering who thou art" [II. ii. 64]. Though Romeo faces a practical
danger in approaching thus close to her feuding kinsmen, it is also true on the symbolic level that the approach
to a Juliet who is heavenly "light" and "bright angel"—that is, to a love object beyond the mortal
condition—must ultimately be made by way of death.
Realizing that the way to his "bright angel" is barred by his name, Romeo exclaims:
Call me but love, and I'll be new baptiz'd;
Henceforth I never will be Romeo. . . .
Had I it written, I would tear the world.
[II. ii. 50−1, 57]
Though Romeo feels that the receipt of Juliet's love would be a rebirth for him, the rebirth in the heavenly
love which Juliet represents requires not simply the tearing of his name but of the mortal self which that name
identifies. Yet however much it may be symbolic of death, he embraces the night in which the infinitude of
Juliet's love has been disclosed as a "blessed, blessed night!" [II. ii. 139].
As Juliet symbolizes a divine love to Romeo, even answering him with a celestial accent, so he assumes a
similar role to her. In Juliet's invocation to night, the full implications of this worship of night are revealed:
Come night; come, Romeo; come, thou day in night;
For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night
Whiter than new snow upon a raven's back.
Come, gentle night; come, loving, black−brow'd night;
Give me my Romeo; and when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night
And pay no worship to the garish sun.
[III. ii. 17−25]
Romeo is a creature of night, and, as such, Juliet coaxes night to loan her Romeo until such time as he shall
die and be returned to night, arguing that when such a true lover should be returned by death he would impart
a special glory to the love of night. Though night and death are here seen to be interrelated and Romeo in their
power, it is yet his special virtue to irradiate their darkness. As Juliet had emblazoned the night for Romeo, so
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he to her is "day in night." While disdaining "the garish sun," that which exhibits all the concreteness and
limitations of terrestrial life, it is not the annihilating darkness of night in itself which they worship but the
special radiance of the limitless which shines for them in the heart of darkness. If night is symbolic of death,
death itself is but the other face of the Infinite, (pp. 44−50)
While Romeo has shown no hesitation in pursuing his love, he soon finds it not such a simple matter to tear
his name. However fully his spirit may assent to the aims of his love, his human situation does cause some
resistance to it.
This is fully brought out in the duel between Romeo and Tybalt. Romeo first counters Tybalt's overtures in the
conviction that he is "new baptiz'd" by love. With Mercutio's death on his hands, however, Romeo realizes
that he is a Montague still and that, in wishing to deny this fact, he had proved false to himself: "O sweet
Juliet / Thy beauty hath made me effeminate / And in my temper soft'ned valour's steel!" [III. i. 113−15].
Juliet had called her place "death, considering who thou art." and now Romeo once again has a premonition
that, being Romeo, his pursuit of love into the enemy's camp will prove fatal: "This day's black fate on moe
days doth depend; / This but begins the woe others must end" [III. i. 119−20]. And again he accepts his fate
and challenges Tybalt. Having killed him and understood that the consequences will be disastrous, however,
his old fear arises once more and causes him to cry out: "O. I am fortune's fool!" [III. i. 136]. As before he had
feared, when accepting fate's challenge, that his "untimely death" would be a "vile forfeit," so, now that fate
lowers once again, the prospect of his death seems inglorious. The Prince will immediately ask: "Where are
the vile beginners of this fray?" [III. i. 141]. And this is Romeo's fear, that his death will not be a glorious
martryrdom for love but the vile execution of a street brawler. Even so, he would prefer vile execution to
banishment: "Ha, banishment? Be merciful, say 'death'; / For exile hath more terror in his look, / Much more
than death" [III. ill. 12−14].
In his discussion of the implications of banishment, the essential quality of his love is again revealed:
"Tis torture, and not mercy. Heaven is here.
Where Juliet lives. . . . More validity,
More honourable state, more courtship lives
In carrion flies than Romeo. They may seize
On the white wonder of dear Juliet's hand
And steal immortal blessing from her lips …
|III. iii. 29−30, 33−7]
Although viewed from one aspect, the place where Juliet lives is death, from another it is "Heaven." the
source of purity and "immortal blessing." In the "courtship" of this "immortal blessing" Romeo sees the only
basis for "validity" and "honourable state." "Death, though ne'er so mean" [III. iii. 45], would be preferable to
the continuance of a meaningless life, exiled from even the possibility of "immortal blessing," this indeed a fit
symbol of hell: "'banished'? / O friar, the damned use that word in hell; / Howling attends it:" [III. iii. 46−8].
(pp. 53−4)
Exiled from his love, he sees no alternative but to "fall upon the ground, as I do now. / Taking the measure of
an unmade grave" [III. iii. 69−70]. Juliet, likewise, does not distinguish between his exile and his death.
Thinking he is dead, she says: "Vile earth, to earth resign; end motion here, / And thou and Romeo press one
heavy bier!" [III. ii. 59−60]. Learning he is exiled, she nonetheless exclaims: "I'll to my wedding bed; / And
death, not Romeo, take my maidenhead!" [III. ii. 136−37]. Rejecting her life as "vile earth," she immediately
leaps to the thought of lying with Romeo in death. Like Romeo, she is "wedded to calamity" [III. iii. 3], and in
her decision to fulfill her wedding not with Romeo but with death, the meaning of this wedding becomes
clear. It becomes yet clearer after the wedding's earthly consummation. Romeo's alternatives, "I must be gone
and live, or stay and die" [III. v. 11] exist not only for this dawn but for as long as their love shall last. A
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premonition of this causes Juliet to see even the departing Romeo "as one dead in the bottom of a tomb" [III.
v. 56]. (pp. 54−5)
Upon learning of Juliet's supposed death, Romeo resolves with conventional promptitude upon his own. But it
is in his treatment of Romeo's confrontation with death that Shakespeare most fully illuminates the accepted
conventions of Courtly Love. Though Romeo is dying in order to be united with Juliet, it is with a Juliet who
has at last discarded all earthly vestiges to become pure symbol. And now the supreme symbolic function of
Juliet becomes clear; she is the means which permits Romeo to confront his fate as a man with joy. If he has
made "a dateless bargain to engrossing death" [V. iii. 115], this steadfast commitment to something beyond all
mortal contingency raises him above the normal human condition. Juliet had earlier said of him:
He was not born to shame.
Upon his brow shame is asham'd to sit;
For 'tis a throne where honour may be crown'd
Sole monarch of the universal earth.
[III. ii. 91−4]
As in his dream love made him an "emperor" [V. i. 9], so does the honor of his love make him the universal
monarch, raise him to godhead. It is through love of a Juliet symbolically raised to divine status that he
redeems his own divine birthright from the "shame" of mortality's yoke.
But the paradox of this desire for the Infinite is that it can only be fully embraced in death. … Death for him is
"love−devouring," "engrossing"; it is a final fact but a finality irradiated by joy. It is the infinite freedom
experienced in the ecstatic instant of self−annihilation. But to this note of ecstasy, Romeo now adds a deeper
note of defiance: "Is it e'en so? Then I defy you, stars!. … Well, Juliet, I will lie with thee to−night" [V. i.
24,34]. Romeo defies the stars and all mortal contingency by accepting the worst they have to offer, thereby
transmuting it into a spiritual triumph.
The love−death as a defiance of fate becomes the dominant note as he approaches the tomb:
Thou detestable maw, thou womb of death,
Gorg'd with the dearest morsel of the earth,
Thus I enforce thy rotten jaws to open,
And in despite I'll cram thee with more food.
[V. iii. 45−81]
Romeo here reveals what is probably his truest attitude toward death. Whereas before he had interpreted every
symbolic identification of his love with death as a sign of its infinite glory, betraying no anxiety toward the
actual fact of death, he now reveals a deep revulsion toward death. Far from glorious, death here is profoundly
felt to be "detestable" and "rotten," and this not in reference to a death vilely brought about through
insufficient inspiration or irrelevant accident but chosen by himself under the greatest of inspirations.
Why then, we may well ask, has he been so fatally hasty in choosing his present death? Paradoxical as it may
seem, the source of his headlong rush toward death appears to lie not in a love of death but a horror of death
so extreme that it has poisoned his life. Unable to accept the anxieties of a contingent mortal existence, he has
advanced upon hateful death, daring it to do its worst. Rather than appear fearful of death and give death the
victory, he triumphs over death by bringing it upon himself. Not in love of death, but, as he says "in despite
I'll cram thee with more food." The ecstasy of self−annihilation at its profoundest level, then, is not due to a
feeling of surrender to death but to the triumph of the unconquerable spirit over death, achieving the Infinite
in its assertion of ultimate freedom.
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It is in this spirit that he views not only his own approaching death but the death of Juliet:
I'll bury thee in a triumphant grave.
A grave? O, no, a lanthorn, slaught'red youth,
For here lies Juliet, and her beauty makes
This vault a feasting presence full of light.
[V. iii. 83−6]
Juliet's irradiation of the night has been but a prelude to her radiance in death. When Romeo had earlier said
that "her eyes in heaven / Would through the airy region stream so bright / That birds would sing and think it
were not night," he did not think that such irradiation made the night less real but that it converted its terrors
to glory. So is it now with death. To Romeo, Juliet has rot outlived death but she has overwhelmed its horror
in radiance. Romeo's exhilaration at the radiance of his love in death produces a "lightning" [V. iii. 90] of his
antagonistic mood. In Juliet's triumph over mortality, Romeo sees his own, her excessive beauty in death
proving an irresistible goad to his own triumphant conquest of death. (pp. 57−60)
Juliet's death speech has not the poetic grandeur of Romeo's but, as she was ever "light a foot" [II. vi. 16], so
she has that "lighting before death" [V. iii. 90] of which Romeo spoke. Seeing Romeo dead, all previous fears
are overcome and she moves to death with cheerful alacrity:
O churl! drunk all, and left no friendly drop
To help me after? I will kiss thy lips.
Haply some poison yet doth hang on them
To make me die with a restorative. . . .
Yea, noise? Then I'll be brief. O happy dagger!
This is thy sheath; there rest, and let me die.
[V. iii. 163−70]
Meeting death with a kiss, she dies "with a restorative," the joyous restoration of her initial freedom from
constraint and contingency.
The play ends on this final note of the redemptive quality of a death so amorously embraced. Romeo and
Juliet had both embraced death as the redemption of their ultimate freedom from mortality's "yoke"; in so
doing, their deaths prove to be redemptive as well for the living. In love with the infinite peace they could find
only in death, they had spurned the world of strife that gave them being. Now, in the radiant light of their pure
sacrifice, the petty futility of that strife is seen. Their deaths not only restore the peace of Verona but confer
upon them the special glory of being forever upheld as the city's most shining example of admired virtue. The
city immortalizes the "Poor sacrifices of our enmity" [V. iii. 304] who, almost as in a religious ritual, have
vicariously atoned for the multiple sins of the populace. The example of their heroic transcendence of the
compromises of life and the terrors of death illuminates the more humble path of the ordinary citizen as he
attempts to justify, by a more consecrated life, the martyrdom of the gloriously "faithful" [V. iii. 302]. Thus
does Shakespeare conclude his great tragedy of a love that has throughout been vehicle and symbol of the
"immortal blessing" conferred in the kiss of death. Though the character and reactions of the lovers have been
explored in all their earthly reality, they … have embarked on a spiritual journey which finds its promised
haven only in a death transfigured by their religious devotion to the dictates of Courtly Love. (pp. 61−2)
Leonora Leet Brodwin, "The Classic Pattern of Courtly Love Tragedy," in her Elizabethan Love Tragedy:
1587−1625, New York University Press, 1971, pp. 39−64.
Mark Van Doren
[Van Doren contrasts Romeo and Juliet's attitude toward love with that of the other characters. While the
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hero and heroine view love as holy and solemn, the critic observes, Mercutio considers it pornographic, the
Capulets prudent, and the Nurse practical, though, unlike the Capulets, with a "certain prurient interest."
According to Van Doren, the Friar comes closest to sharing Romeo and Juliet's perception of love, though he
speaks of it in terms that are foreign to them.]
One of the reasons for the fame of Romeo and Juliet is that it has so completely and clearly isolated the
experience of romantic love. It has let such love speak for itself; and not alone in the celebrated wooing
scenes, where the hero and heroine express themselves with a piercing directness, but indirectly also, and
possibly with still greater power, in the whole play in so far as the whole play is built to be their foil. Their
deep interest for us lies in their being alone in a world which does not understand them; and Shakespeare has
devoted much attention to that world.
Its inhabitants talk only of love. The play is saturated with the subject. Yet there is always a wide difference
between what the protagonists intend by the term and what is intended by others. The beginning dialogue by
Sampson and Gregory, servants, is pornographic on the low level of puns about maidenheads, of horse−humor
and hired−man wit. Mercutio will be more indecent … on the higher level of a gentleman's cynicism.
Mercutio does not believe in love, as perhaps the servants clumsily do; he believes only in sex, and his
excellent mind has sharpened the distinction to a very dirty point. He drives hard against the sentiment that
has softened his friend and rendered him unfit for the society of young men who really know the world. When
Romeo with an effort matches one of his witticisms he is delighted:
Now art thou sociable, now art thou
Romeo, now art thou
what thou art, by art as well as by nature.
[II. iv. 89−91]
He thinks that Romeo has returned to the world of artful wit, by which he means cynical wit; he does not
know that Romeo is still "dead" and "fishified" [II. iv. 38], and that he himself wil soon be mortally wounded
under the arm of his friend—who, because love has stupefied him, will be capable of speaking the inane lines,
"I thought all for the best" [II. i. 10−4]. (pp. 70−1)
The older generation is another matter. Romeo and Juliet … will be sadly misunderstood by them. The
Capulets hold stiil another view of love. Their interest is in "good" marriages, in sensible choices. They are
match−makers, and believe they know best how their daughter should be put to bed. This also is cynicism,
though it be without pornography; at least the young heart of Juliet sees it so. Her father finds her sighs and
tears merely ridiculous: "Evermore show'ring?" [III. v. 130]. She is "a wretched puling fool, a whining
mammet" [III. v. 183−84], a silly girl who does not know what is good for her. Capulet is Shakespeare's first
portrait in a long gallery of fussy, tetchy, stubborn, unteachable old men: the Duke of York in Richard II,
Polonius [in Hamlet], Lafeu [in All's Well that Ends Well], Menenius [in Coriolanus]. He is tart−tongued,
breathy, wordy, pungent, and speaks with a naturalness unknown in Shakespeare's plays before this, a
naturalness consisting in a perfect harmony between his phrasing and its rhythm:
How how, how how, chop−logic! What is this?
"Proud," and "I thank you," and "I thank you not;"
And yet "not proud." Mistress minion, you,
Thank me no thankings, nor proud me no prouds,
But fettle your fine joints 'gainst Thursday next,
To go with Paris to Saint Peter's Church,
Or I will drag thee on a hurdle thither.
[III. v. 49−55]
(pp. 71−2)
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The Nurse, a member of the same generation, and in Juliet's crisis as much her enemy as either parent is, for
she too urges the marriage with Paris [III. v. 212−25], adds to practicality a certain prurient interest in
love−business, the details of which she mumbles toothlessly, reminiscently, with the indecency of age. Her
famous speech concerning Juliet's age [I. ill. 12−57], which still exceeds the speeches of Capulet in the virtue
of dramatic naturalness, runs on so long in spite of Lady Capulet's attempts to stop it because she has become
fascinated with the memory of her husband's broad jest:
Nurse. And since that time it is eleven years;
For then she could stand high−lone; nay, by the rood,
She could have run and waddled all about;
For even the day before, she broke her brow;
And then my husband—God be with his soul!
'A was a merry man—took up the child.
"Yea," quoth he, "dost thou fall upon thy face?
Thou wilt fall backward when thou hast more wit;
Wilt thou not, Jule?" and, by my holi−dame,
The pretty wretch left crying and said, "Ay."
To see, now, how a jest shall come about!
I warrant, an I should live a thousand years,
I never should forget it. "Wilt thou not, Jule?" quoth he;
And, pretty fool, it stinted and said, "Ay."
Lady Capulet. Enough of this; I pray thee, hold thy peace.
Nurse. Yes, madam; yet I cannot choose but laugh,
To think it should leave crying and say, "Ay."
And yet, I warrant, it had upon it brow
A bump as big as a young cockerel's stone;
A perilous knock; and it cried bitterly.
"Yea," quoth my husband, "fall'st upon thy face?
Thou wilt fall backward when thou comest to age;
Wilt thou not, Jule?" It stinted and said, "Ay."
The Nurse's delight in the reminiscence is among other things lickerish, which the delight of Romeo and Juliet
in their love never is, any more than it is prudent like the Capulets, or pornographic like Mercutio. Their
delight is solemn, their behavior holy, and nothing is more natural than that in their first dialogue [I. v.
93−110] there should be talk of palmers, pilgrims, saints, and prayers.
It is of course another kind of holiness than that which appears in Friar Laurence, who nevertheless takes his
own part in the endless conversation which the play weaves about the theme of love. The imagery of his first
speech is by no accident erotic:
I must up−fill this osier cage of ours
With baleful weeds and precious−juiced flowers.
The earth, that's nature's mother, is her tomb;
What is her burying grave, that is her womb;
And from her womb children of divers kind
We sucking on her natural bosom find.
[II. iii. 7−12]
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The Friar is closer to the lovers in sympathy than any other person of the play. Yet this language is as alien to
their mood as that of Capulet or the Nurse; or as Romeo's recent agitation over Rosaline is to his ecstasy with
Juliet. The lovers are alone. Their condition is unique. Only by the audience is it understood. (pp. 72−4)
Mark Van Doren, "Romeo and Juliet," in his Shakespeare, Henry Holt and Company, 1939, pp. 65−75.
Maurice Charney
[Charney places Romeo and Juliet in the context of love and lust as it is traditionally represented in
Shakespeare, ultimately arguing that love in itself does not produce the tragedy in the play.]
The introduction of inauspicious signs sometimes seems not only inappropriate but also mechanical and
artificial. After Mercutio's magnificent Queen Mab oration, Romeo is troubled by unmotivated forebodings.
His anxieties precede his meeting with Juliet in the next scene:
my mind misgives
Some consequence yet hanging in the stars
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night's revels and expire the term
Of a despised life, closed in my breast,
By some vile forfeit of untimely death. (1. 4. 106−11).
Why does Romeo have these fears—only to help Shakespeare out in his heroic effort to inject a feeling of
tragedy into this play? Likewise, Juliet surprises us with her trepidations in the magnificent Orchard Scene:
Although I joy in thee,
I have no joy of this contract tonight.
It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;
Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be
Ere one can say it lightens. (2. 2. 116−20)
But love in Shakespeare is traditionally represented as sudden, immediate, and lightning−like. It comes at
once and is not the product of mature deliberation. It is hard to know, therefore, what Juliet's fears are based
on, unless, like Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, she has already read the play and knows how it
will turn out. She has no way of discerning at this point that the comedy of love culminating in marriage will
take a bad turn and end in tragedy. Admittedly, there is the feud between the Capulets and the Montagues, but
that seems to be dissipating, so it seems another comic plot device to prevent the course of true love from
running smooth.
Friar Lawrence also does much to develop the sense of fatality in the love affair. In the scene before
Mercutio's death in 3.1, the lovesick Romeo comes to ask the Friar to perform the marriage ceremony.
Already Romeo is speaking of "love−devouring death" (2. 6. 7), as if his love for Juliet were naturally
associated with death. Friar Lawrence continues in the same vein:
These violent delights have violent ends
And in their triumph die, like fire and powder,
Which, as they kiss, consume.
The sweetest honey
Is loathsome in his own deliciousness
And in the taste confounds the appetite.
Therefore love moderately: long love doth so;
Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow. (9−15)
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"Love moderately" is surely bad advice in the context of all the love affairs in Shakespeare before Romeo and
Juliet. It is a contradiction in terms. Shakespeare is making such a strenuous effort to pull the play into
tragedy that the many portentous statements about the love of Romeo and Juliet seem misconceived. The
tragedy of the lovers seems generated by their intense and abrupt passion rather than by the feud between the
houses. This is an idea that the play is promoting in many different, misguided ways.
Romeo too is made to fear the absoluteness and suddenness of his love. Shakespeare makes a continuous
association of love and death — the Liebestod — in this play despite a comic context of search and
fulfillment. Inauspicious astrological signs are inserted into Romeo and Juliet like the portents in the early
scenes of Julius Caesar. Even before he meets Juliet, Romeo fears that "this night's revels" shall inevitably
lead to "some vile forfeit of untimely death" (1. 4. 109−11). There is no real basis for his feelings, except that
we onlookers know the play will take a sudden turn toward tragedy. I am arguing that this turn, or peripeteia,
is overprepared, as if Shakespeare were worried that the audience would not properly accept the way the play
moves into tragedy. Romeo and Juliet love each other deeply and truly, and they want naturally to get married
and consummate their passion as soon as possible, like all the other lovers in Shakespeare's comedies. There is
nothing wrong with any of this.
What we have to fall back on is the fact that love in itself does not produce the tragedy in Romeo and Juliet.
The protagonists are always represented as pure and innocent and devoted to each other. They are clearly
victims of the feud between the houses. This explanation is explicitly set forth in the Prologue. In his didactic
sonnet, the Chorus begins with the "Two households" in fair Verona and their "ancient grudge" whose causes
are never explained. It is "From forth the fatal loins of these two foes" that "A pair of star−crossed lovers take
their life." "Star−crossed" means astrologically fated or unlucky; it doesn't imply that there is any thing wrong
with the lovers or that they do anything to incur disastrous consequences. According to the Chorus, the death
of the lovers is necessary to end the feud between their families. Their "misadventured piteous overthrows /
Doth with their death bury their parents' strife," "And the continuance of their parents' rage, / Which, but their
children's end, naught could remove." It sounds as if Romeo and Juliet are specifically marked as scapegoats.
This idea is taken up again at the end of the play. Capulet announces that Romeo and Juliet are "Poor
sacrifices of our enmity" (5. 3. 304), and the Prince deals with the love death as a sacrifice:
Capulet, Montague,
See what a scourge is laid upon your hate,
That heaven finds means to kill your joys with love. (291−93)
So the tragedy by rights belongs to Capulet and Montague rather than to Romeo and Juliet, who are required
to die for love because true love is not possible in a world of senseless blood feuds. They are "Poor sacrifices"
of the feud, victims and scapegoats, rather than tragic protagonists.
(From Shakespeare on Love and Lust by Maurice Charney ©1999 Columbia University Press. Reprinted by
permission of the publisher.)
Imagery and Language
E. C. Pettet
[Pettet examines how imagery reinforces two of the central concerns of Romeo and Juliet: the role of fate in
determining the lovers' tragedy and the feud between the families. The influence of fate, the critic argues, is
developed through the use of star imagery, in which stars serve as a metaphor (an implied analogy which
imaginatively identifies one object with another) for destiny, and through the "pilot" imagery which is used to
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115
describe Romeo's maturation and attempts to control his own destiny. Pettet also demonstrates how the
paradox (a statement which while seemingly contradictory or absurd may actually be well−founded and true)
of Romeo and Juliet's love arising out of the hatred between the Montagues and the Capulets is accentuated
by the repeated references to opposition and contradiction, particularly the contrasts between love and death
and between light and darkness.]
With so much emphasis on Fate [in Romeo and Juliet] there is nothing surprising in the fact that Shakespeare
makes frequent use of the time−old symbol of the stars in his imagery. Nor, in such a story of romantic love,
is it remarkable to find the star−image employed in a second conventional way—as a metaphor for feminine
beauty (especially for the eyes of the Lady) and for the attraction of lovers. What is, however, of interest is the
way in which Shakespeare subtly fuses these two sorts of star−image; and perhaps the most striking example
of this interpenetration is to be observed in some of the lines spoken by Romeo as he watches Juliet at her
balcony:
Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven,
Having some business, do entreat her eyes
To twinkle in their spheres till they return.
What if her eyes were there, they in her head?
The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars
As daylight doth a lamp; her eyes in heaven
Would through the airy regions stream so bright
That birds would sing and think it were not night.
[II. ii. 15−22]
No doubt this passage could be dismissed as yet another typical conceit [an elaborately fanciful idea or
metaphor] of the time. But the scene in which the lines occur is singularly free from the extravagant conceits
and artificialities of Petrarchan love−poetry, which Shakespeare appropriately reserves for the early Romeo,
the youth in love with love; and if we submit our imagination to the full effect of the scene, this sustained
star−image transcends the mere conceit to assume a new meaning. Juliet is now Romeo's star, his fate; and, as
his star, she has the magical power of transforming night into day, of changing his wretchedness into radiant
joy and the bitter hatred of their families into love.
There is a similar, though slighter overtone earlier in the play, when old Capulet says to Paris:
At my poor house look to behold this night
Earth−treading stars that make dark heaven bright.
[I. ii. 24−5]
Here, too, it is of course possible to skip the image of 'earth−treading stars' as a familiar cliche for beautiful
women; but, taking it in conjunction with the phrase 'dark heaven', we may perhaps catch in it a faint
announcement of one of the fundamental themes of the play—of the hardness and misery of human destiny,
sweetened, if but for a brief moment, with beauty and love.
In the star−imagery of Juliet's speech when she is waiting vainly, after the killing of Tybalt, for Romeo to
come to her—
And, when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night,
And pay no worship to the garish sun
Imagery and Language
116
[III. ii. 21−5]
we certainly have, so far as Juliet herself is concerned, a playful, fanciful conceit, for in her passion and
fulfilment she cannot really think of her lover as dead. Yet—once more merging into the symbol of the star as
fate—how intense this apparent conceit is, with its irony and prophecy. Little as Juliet knows it, heaven and
its crossing stars are in reality soon to lay claim to Romeo; and their way will be just that cruel way of
violence that she hints, and Romeo will be nothing but a symbol of the lover, a bright, remote star.
Side by side with these delicate combinations of the star−image we should note, as another effect of the Fate
motif on the imagery of the play, the triple 'pilot' image, which, emerging at three key−points, illuminates and
focuses the development of Romeo.
The first instance of this image is to be found at [I. iv. 112−13]. Though there is something that warns Romeo
that it is perilous to accompany Mercutio and Benvolio to the Capulet banquet, he decides at last to follow
them:
But He, that hath the steerage of my course,
Direct my sail! On, lusty gentlemen.
Here, without experience or thought as yet, and certainly without any religious conviction, Romeo vaguely
believes himself to be under the guidance of some exterior force; but he submits to his destiny without
resistance, even confidently. Later, when he is assured of Juliet's love and is growing to a rapid maturity, he is
bolder and more self−willed, active rather than passive. So, when it occurs for the second time, the
pilot−image changes:
I am no pilot; yet, wert thou as far
As that vast shore wash'd with the farthest sea,
I would adventure for such merchandise.
[II. ii. 82−4]
Once more there is the lack of complete self−possession: he will dare anything, but still with a modest,
hesitant doubt of his own powers to shape a course entirely to his own determination—'I am no pilot.' And
indeed, in the first rapture of Juliet's avowed love, why should he think of rocks and insidious currents? But,
transformed by harsh experience, Romeo continues to grow, and when the pilot−image recurs for the last
time, just before his death, the pilot is at last himself: the determining force that challenges and defies his stars
is something within:
Come, bitter conduct, come, unsavoury guide!
Thou desperate pilot now at once run on
[V. iii. 116−18]
This image is the exact antithesis of the first version, as Romeo is the antithesis of his old self.
Another salient characteristic of Romeo and Juliet, is the simple, single, and all−pervading nature of its
conflict. Its basic theme is that of love arising out of family feud, challenging it, momentarily triumphing over
it, and ultimately destroyed by it. From beginning to end the play reflects the eternal struggle between Eros
(Love and Life) and the forces of Death.
This being so, it is not surprising that the play abounds in images of strife, contrast, contradiction, and
paradox. Most of these arise directly and inevitably from the story and its situations, while. . . much of the
tedious antithesis and paradox of Romeo's speech in the first Act springs inevitably from Shakespeare's
Imagery and Language
117
representation of him as a typical lover of contemporary, mainly Petrarchan, love−poetry. But beside these
straightforward conflict−images there is another group in which Shakespeare, often subconsciously no doubt,
uses the poetry of the play to reinforce and illuminate its themes and motifs.
The most impressive concentration of these strife and contradiction images occurs in Friar Lawrence's speech
shortly before the marriage ceremony, which emphasizes, in a resonant Chorus manner, some of the essential
implications of the play. To begin with, there is the detached and generalizing, though no less impressive,
restatement of the eternal life−death struggle, which is represented as something absolute:
The earth that's nature's mother is her tomb;
What is her burying grave, that is her womb.
[II. iii. 9−10]
Nor, possibly, is this statement entirely general, for 'womb' suggests love, procreation, perhaps Romeo and
Juliet, while 'tomb', once we come to know the play, is a key−word with a charged, peculiar significance: it is
the 'detestable maw', the 'rotten jaws' [V. iii. 47], that is soon to swallow Romeo and Juliet, and it is to be
noticed that in the last scene 'tomb' is once more associated with 'womb':
Thou detestable maw, thou womb of death. . . .
[V. iii. 145]
Then, both deepening and extending this theme, follows the Friar's meditation on the contradictory properties
of nature's fruits and products, leading, through an inevitable transition, to the contraries and contradictions of
human life—the good that may change into evil and the vice that may change into virtue, and the intermingled
stuff of man's nature:
Two such opposed kings encamp them still
In man as well as herbs, grace and rude will;
And where the worser is predominant
Full soon the canker death eats up that plant.
While the words 'canker death' are still ominously echoing in jtsur ears, Romeo enters.
There are several other passages where the incidental imagery serves to illuminate the contradiction or
paradox of the situation from which it arises. For instance, the bold conceit struck out by Romeo at the
opening of the Balcony scene—
What light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!—
[II. ii. 1−2]
concentrates the essential meaning of the whole scene. In truth a miracle has taken place: the warm,
life−giving sun of love has broken unexpectedly, through the dark night of family hatred and strife. But, next
to the Friar's soliloquy, the most striking example of imagery that crystallizes the spirit of conflict and
contradiction in the play is the recurrent association of bridal−bed and grave, Death and the lover:
I'll to my wedding−bed;
And death, not Romeo, take my maidenhead!
[III. ii. 136−37]
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118
I would the fool were married to her grave!
[III. v. 140]
O son, the night before thy wedding−day
Hath Death lain with thy wife: see, there she lies,
Flower as she was, deflowered by him.
Death is my son−in−law,
Death is my heir;
My daughter he hath wedded.
[IV. v. 35−9]
Shall I believe
That unsubstantial Death is amorous,
And that the lean abhorred monster keeps
Thee here in dark to be his paramour.
[V. iii. 102−05]
The tone and the immediate purpose of these passages of course vary considerably; but at the core of them all
is the powerful, paradoxical image of the play's basic motif—the passionate, interlocking wrestle of love and
death. The 'lean abhorred monster' is the ultimate lover; the final wedding−bed is the grave.
Lastly in this poetic elaboration of the play's fundamental motif we may notice the highly evocative use that
Shakespeare makes of light and darkness, though this is as much a matter of setting and stage−properties as of
imagery. To suggest the first dramatic movement, of love arising out of and challenging family feud, he
creates the illusion of light irradiating and finally shattering darkness. First, faintly and remotely anticipating
the Capulet feast and its aftermath, we have old Capulet's
At my poor house look to behold this night
Earth−treading stars that make dark heaven light.
[I. ii. 24−5]
A little later we see Romeo as the torch−bearer and hear old Capulet raising his cries (the more impressive
because they are widely separated) for 'More lights' [I. v. 27] and 'More torches' [I. v. 125]. But the effect of
such torches as these is slight compared with the light−drenched imagery, the contrasts of brightness and
darkness, in Romeo's first entranced vision of Juliet:
O, she doth teach the torches to shine bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear …
So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows.
[I. v. 44−8]
This brilliant radiance of imagery completely floods the following scene, so that the darkness of night is
utterly negated. In this scene, apart from the incidental images of the moon and the lightning, there are the
sustained images of Romeo's magnificent opening speeches. First Juliet is the dazzling sun of dawn—then
two brilliant stars— then his 'bright angel' [II. ii. 26],
As glorious to this night, being o'er my head,
As is a winged messenger of heaven
Unto the white−upturned wondering eyes
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119
Of mortals.
[II. ii. 27−30]
As he leaves, assured of her love, day begins to break, and the image of it is memorably fixed for us by the
vivid opening lines of Friar Lawrence's soliloquy:
The grey−eyed morn smiles on the frowning night,
Chequering the eastern clouds with streaks of light;
And flecked darkness like a drunkard reels
From forth day's path and Titan's fiery wheels.
[II. iii. 1−41]
The central image of this passage, of dark−dispersing sunlight, is repeated a little later by Juliet:
Love's heralds should be thoughts.
Which ten times faster glide than the sun's beams
Driving back shadows over louring hills.
[II. v. 4−6]
The second movement of the play consists of a violent recrudescence of the Capulet−Montague feud, leading
to bloodshed, in which the lovers are whirled helplessly apart: 'black fate' suddenly overshadows the bright
day of love and sunshine. This development, too, is partly suggested by the imagery, through the invocation of
night and darkness, especially in Juliet's soliloquy in the orchard. Here, because of its echoes and lyrical
fervour, her speech reminds us of Romeo's rhapsody at the opening of the Balcony scene; but where Romeo's
words had been drenched with images of light, Juliet's are, in contrast, sombre and portentous with images of
darkness:
such a waggoner
As Phaethaon would whip you to the west,
And bring in cloudy night immediately.
Spread thy close curtain, love−performing night. …
Come, civil night,
Thou sober−suited matron, all in black. …
Hood my unmann'd blood, bating in my cheeks,
With thy black mantle. …
Come, gentle night, come, loving, black−browed night.
[III. ii. 2−5, 10−11, 14−15, 20]
The wonderful aubade [a song of lovers parting at dawn] of Act III, Scene v, also turns on the lovers'
desperate longing for the continuance of the night and darkness, and though in both instances the imagery
derives to some extent from the situation since Juliet wants the night to come because it will with the help of
Friar Lawrence's drug, 'Or bid me go into a new−made grave / And hide me with a dead man in his shroud'
[IV. i. 84−5]. An ugly image for any youngster to dream up and utter, isn't it? I had to take a chance on that
grotesqueness because I was setting up my big dress−rehearsal scene for the actual deaths of both youngsters
in the Capulets' tomb."
"Which is that, the dress rehearsal?"
"When Juliet is found by her parents, and thought to be dead, I produce a kind of ritual mourning
sequence—from father to fiance to Mom to nurse and round again—which I don't suppose you in your laconic
times could be expected to appreciate. It probably even sounds humorous to you, but the thing to look out for
Imagery and Language
120
is that image of Death returning as Juliet's partner in sex: my grotesque linking of what should be
life−producing and exalting with its opposite, in mortuary decay. The foolish old father starts things up (and if
you still believe that puns have to be entertaining and amusing, listen in), in such a way that not even the
gentility could miss it.
O son, the night before thy wedding day
Hath Death lain with thy wife. There she lies,
Flower as she was, deflowered by him.
Death is my son−in−law, Death is my heir;
My daughter he hath wedded."
[IV. v. 35−9]
"Now I see the significance of the speech that old Capulet made just before that. It's sexual again, isn't it?
'Death lies on her like an untimely frost / Upon the sweetest flower of all the field' [IV. v. 28−9]. Poor Juliet.
So this was the rehearsal for the actual death scene between our lovers, you say?"
"That's so, but don't leave the fake−death quite so fast, good friend. If you listen closely, you'll hear the
culminating oxymoron in my whole play, coming from the unlikely source of the old gaffer's mouth":
All things that we ordained festival
Turn from their office to black funeral—
Our instruments to melancholy bells,
Our wedding cheer to a sad burial feast. . .
Our bridal flowers serve for a buried corpse;
And all things change them to the contrary.
[IV. v. 84−7, 89−90]
There you have it: and all things change them to the contrary. Can you think of a more succinct description of
my play? The flames of sex turn to the ashes of death. My oxymorons would have made my old grammar
school instructor in rhetoric proud of me. But I've gone beyond my oxymoronic device to a kind of macabre
reality in these two young people's lives, notice. I've given them destinies in which the very seeds of their
physical attraction to each other (and observe that Juliet hasn't even seen Romeo's face clearly until they meet
to marry in Lawrence's cell: just his 'gracious self,' in becoming hose) are all along ripening to their blighted,
inevitable climax together in that tomb. The big death grows inexorably from out of the little death that we
spoke of when I first joined you at this pleasant table. And by now you certainly ought to recognize that not
all of my puns are for laughter among the penny−admissions."
"All right, so when Romeo is about to buy the poison and says 'Well, Juliet, I will lie with thee tonight' [V. i.
34], he, too, like her—but unlike her mother and evidently many in your audience—has come to understand
the inextricable blending of sex and death in their story."
"Yes, precisely. And you can point out to your classes that there really couldn't be a more appropriate ending
to my love−death drama than Juliet's reaching there to kiss the poison she prays remains on Romeo's
just−stilled lips. 'Haply some poison yet doth hang on them' she hopes [V. ill. 165], and Death can now take
them both—my famous youthful lovers—into his eternal embrace. I've made a special sort of tragedy out of
the very materials of comedy, don't you see? They die, and then they die."
"Just think of it! Those kids of yours met at the Sunday dinner−dance and were dead in each other's arms by
Thursday midnight. Four brief days in which they hardly had time to be wedded and bedded, much less get to
know each other— except in the Bible's sense. Not so much 'love in terms of purity and innocence' as
sentimental oldsters would like to think [in the Pelican Shakespeare edition of Romeo and Juliet], was there,
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121
Will? For that matter, both the compactness and the raciness of the action put me in mind a few years back of
the limerick, a verse form that we speakers of English invented after your day but which you would've found
delightful. Since the first half of your play, up to the sudden death of Mercutio, is like one super limerick, an
unending series of bawdy jokes using sexual slang and double entendre, I've encouraged students to write
limericks on what's going on, according to their perceptions, in Romeo and Juliet. I find that I get some pretty
honest and pretty good ones."
"I'll need an exemplum, since I don't know the form of this limerick as you call it."
"It's hard to remember a limerick verbatim when you've been drinking (unlike everyday dirty jokes, which are
almost all content and no form), but I think I can give you the idea with one or two here. Let's see:
There once were a couple of teens
Who aspired to commingle their genes
But, in trying to mate,
Were the victims of fate
And succumbed in the saddest of scenes.
Some of my students really pick up on the punning side of your poetry, Will, which I figured would please
you. They miss being as nimble−witted as Mercutio, of course, but that also means that they truly miss him as
a character once he's gone from the piay—miss his ribald intelligence, which they've been learning how to
listen for.
At the Friar's the kids tie the knot.
And it puts Juliet on the spot:
Will the feuders unite.
Or continue to fight—
And is Romeo coming, or not?
Because Tybalt, her cousin, was dead
And her Romeo now banished.
Juliet could have cried
That her lover had died.
But she kept, after losing, her head.
Well, we've been enjoying ourselves, as you can see. And the students turn out to have been right all along
about Juliet and her teenage boyfriend, whom she helps to become a man, as they say. overnight. 'Stand, and
you be a man. / For Juliet's sake, for her sake, rise and stand!" [III. iii. 88−9], as the nurse so happily puts it.
Now, there's a woman! Why, when . . .
"Oh, you have to be on your way: no time for another round? That's too bad; I've enjoyed your company.
Well, thanks, and I'll be, uh, hearing you around." (pp. 70−3)
C. Webster Wheelock, "'Not Life, but Love in Death': Oxymoron at the Thematic Heart of 'Romeo and
Juliet'," in English Journal. Vol. 74, No. 2. February, 1985, pp. 70−3.
Romeo and Juliet
Clifford Leech
Romeo and Juliet
122
[Leech views Romeo and Juliet's love as a maturing experience for the hero and heroine and demonstrates
how the development of their language, in particular, marks their entry into adulthood. Although the critic
notes several humorous elements in the couple's declarations of love, he points out that they also frequently
speak with authority, suggesting the seriousness of their commitment to one another. In Leech's opinion,
Juliet's language displays both her inexperience and her newfound maturity as she struggles to find images to
express her love for Romeo. Her maturation is more pronounced than Romeo's, the critic asserts: Juliet's
language firmly establishes her adult status in Act III, and it is not until Act V that Romeo's language
approaches hers in terms of maturity.]
Romeo and Juliet has proved a problem for Shakespeare critics. Franklin M. Dickey (see excerpt in section on
Tragic Design has seen it as exhibiting a simple moral lesson: to be taken up wholly by one's passion for
another human being would, he argues, be seen by an Elizabethan as a moral imperfection, as likely to induce
a general disregard of the moral law: so Shakespeare's play, despite its sympathy with the lovers, must be seen
in relation to the contemporary idea of moral responsibility. But to argue in this way is to take Romeo and
Juliet as Roy Battenhouse has taken [Christopher] Marlowe's Tamburlaine [in his Marlowe's Tamburlaine: A
Study in Renaissance Moral Philosophy]: Battenhouse tries to disregard the grandeur that goes along with the
evil in Marlowe's hero; Dickey misses the sense of an enhanced degree of life which Shakespeare's lovers
experience along with the danger they freely encounter. Nicholas Brooke is aware of the problem that faced
Shakespeare: he suggests that the love of . . . Romeo and Juliet is tested against the presentation of the normal
current of life … . [T]he insistence on [the] wish for darkness, with its reiterated images, has the effect of
emphasizing the precariousness, the desperation, and−−circumstances being what they are−−the unnaturalness
of Romeo and Juliet's love. Their love cannot—which is the mark of its doom—exist in the sun, its natural
element; and something of this contradiction, is brought out by the paradox of Romeo's line
More light and light; more dark and dark our woes!
[III. v. 36]
The climax of the play takes place in darkness, the darkness of night, the tomb, and—for we cannot fail to
sense his presence—of black, shadow−casting Death. Once again the darkness is challenged ana momentarily
broken by the small, flickering light of torches; and the torch image instantly recalls the Romeo who first went
through the night to Juliet as a torchbearer. But this time darkness is triumphant, and even the dawning day is
ominously overcast;
A glooming peace this morning with it brings;
Tile sun, for sorrow, will not show his head.
[V. iii. 305−06]
Yet light and the love of which it is the symbol are not completely extinguished, even in the catastrophe. A
faint radiance lingers. In Juliet's memory there is to be raised a shining statue—'in pure gold' [V. iii. 299]. (pp.
123−26)
E. C. Pettet, "The Imagery of 'Romeo and Juliet'," in English, Vol. VIII, No. 45, Autumn, 1950, pp. 121−26.
C. Webster Wheelock
[Wheelock cites numerous passages in support of his theory that the paradoxical blending of sexual love and
death is the central theme in Romeo and Juliet. (A paradox is a statement which while seemingly
contradictory or absurd may actually be well−founded and true.) Wheelock's essay is written in a humorous
vein and is structured as a conversation between himself and Shakespeare in an English tavern in 1598.]
The figure who filled the doorway of the Mermaid Tavern wasn't the man I'd been expecting. Since I don't
teach Ben Jonson's poetry to my high school students, I'd calculated that an evening spent with the dapper,
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123
rather acerbic chief of the famous "tribe of Ben" would be social: no business talk, just good wit and good ale.
But this fellow now crowding up against my table in the corner snug still carried the surprised look of the
countryside on him, something I would not have anticipated for 1598.
He surprised me with the rough edge to his speech, a kind of midlands burr which I won't be able to duplicate
in recollecting all he said that night. He broke the awkward silence.
"I came over from the Boar's Head because I heard that one of you teaching types from the far future was
around. You the man I'm after?"
I confessed that I must be the one, but that all I'd wanted was a quiet evening of talk, some drinks, no trouble.
"I've just come from a performance of my Romeo" he said, "and what beats me is that nobody up in the
galleries seems to understand the thing, or not hardly, at all. I know that I took some chances with it, upset the
usual business they're looking for in comedies, but you'd think that all of that grotesque image−making
would've smoked out my meaning, wouldn't you?"
"Be plain, good son, and homely in thy drift" [II. iii. 55], I ventured.
"You know the piece? You teach it to young people, too?" he asked. "Then maybe you can help. The young
don't turn a deaf ear to what really interests them. Mine don't, at any rate; yours, too? Here, let me get you
another of those pints. Stay put. You've got some thirsty listening to do, my friend. I don't begrudge a
tuppence or two for a pair of good ears."
I sipped appreciatively at the dark−brown, vaguely sweet liquor in the fresh glass before me.
"We both know what the young people are interested in most of all. Well, I thought to give it them in my story
from Verona. The trouble is, though, I know their elders wanted a wordplay at least as much as, shall we say,
swordplay—if you take my meaning—so I let out all the stops. I did too good a job with all that light and fire
imagery, and everybody thinks that all I was after was what you might call the ardor of young love. Damn!
Somebody is even supposed to have counted 80 or 90 images of fire or light or astral bodies, all sorts, which
adds up to 'the beauty of young love. Except that nobody seems to have noticed who my main, my triumphant
lover really is in the play. Maybe it was too grotesque an idea to begin with."
"Look, Will—I may call you Will, mayn't I?—what are you driving at? What is it about Romeo and Juliet that
disappoints you? Now you've gotten me curious."
"All right. Since you seem to know the play well enough, I'm going to throw a few quotations at you, like an
exercise we go through with our prompt books. Let's begin with one of our erotic puns, since that's where my
weirdest idea came from anyway. I think you still use, in your time, the old verb, 'to die' to mean the little
death, a sexual climax, isn't it so? Well, I started from there, since I was going to be using other bawdy slang
to keep the groundlings amused, and I came up with the idea that Death—I mean in person, as a spectral
figure—would have to come into my comedy of young lovers and, finally, replace Romeo as the physical
lover of darling Juliet. Not on stage, of course, but in the minds of the characters, all of them, young and old.
So I started putting in clues in the most incongruous places I could find so that they'd be noticed."
"Wait a minute, Will. You say you made Death the lover of Juliet: actually I do remember that, from the final
scene in the Capulet tomb. I was a bit shocked at the idea, I'll admit, but that late in the play I didn't really pay
too much attention. Let me remember. Romeo says to Juliet,
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124
Shall I believe
That unsubstantial Death is amorous
And that the lean abhorred monster keeps
Thee here in dark to be his paramour?
[V. iii. 102−05]
Then he drinks the apothecary's poison."
"Yes, but didn't you notice, before that, all the times I linked death with having sex? And didn't you pick up
the oxymoronic nature of the young lovers' reality? Why, I brought Romeo onstage for the first time spouting
absolute rot as the first clue: 'Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health,' etc. [I. i. 180]. Juliet, too,
although she had better reason to be distracted and babbling after hearing Romeo had skewered her cousin
Tybalt, she was given her share of oxymoronic nonsense. 'Dove−feathered raven! wolvish−ravening lamb! …
, A Damned saint, an honorable villain!' [III. ii. 76, 79]."
"That's right. 'Just opposite to what thou justly seem'st' [III. ii. 78]. She was indicting Romeo for blowing their
whole scene, just when it seemed that they might have a chance to get their parents to come around."
"Right, my teacher friend. The oxymoron—the yoking of two contraries, two apparently contradictory
ideas—rules my play from almost the start. And the main oxymoron is the linkage of death and sexual
love—just as in the pun, remember? I intended to have Juliet stop the whole scene at the end of the Capulet
dance, after she's fallen for the masked boy in tights, when she asks her nurse for Romeo's name:
Go ask his name.—If he is married,
My grave is like to be my wedding bed.
[I. v. 134−35]
Maybe you didn't pick that one up because it was so short—and everybody likes the lovers' doing their sonnet
together just before that. Well, look again: 'my grave my wedding bed.' This from a smitten 13−year old?"
"Okay. I see that better now. And I remember that Romeo had a premonition just before crashing the party:
we say that we feel someone walking across our grave—it's a kind of chill. But did you put in any longer hints
than Juliet's one−liner?"
"Here, let's fill that up again …
"What did you ask? Oh, yes. Do you recollect when Juliet is waiting for her wedding night and doesn't know
yet that the two young hotheads have been killed on the streets? Listen to what she says. She goes on for a
while with some delicious puns on night / knight and so forth ('Come, gentle night; come, loving,
black−browed night' [III. ii. 20]). Hah! And then she switches terms as abruptly as I could make it; really, it's
a shocking incongruity if you think about it.
Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stare,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine.
[III. ii. 21−3]
and so forth. Die? Cut him out in little bits? Unless you're buying oranges or something, you've got to be hit
by this little bride, dreaming about the bliss of her first night with Romeo, suddenly seeing him dead and
scattered about in little pieces. What sort of sense does that make? Unless you go back to my fundamental
pun, my oxymoronic double entendre, you're going to have a certain amount of trouble with that one, eh?"
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"Yeah, and not long afterwards Juliet does it again, if I remember. She finds out about the killings of Mercutio
and Tybalt and that her groom of only hours has been banished, and she says to the nurse (who's too dim to
pick it up, anyway), 'come, nurse. I'll to my wedding bed; / And death, not Romeo, take my maidenhead!' [III.
ii. 136−37]. Am I right?"
"Good on you. That's right, and the next time I used what I call my love−death theme was something of a con.
I put it in the mouth of a character who didn't mean what she was saying, and whom as a consequence you
couldn't really believe at the time. Recall that when Lady C, who doesn't know what you do—that Juliet can't
marry him— encounters opposition from her daughter to the proposal that she wed that man of wax, Paris, she
turns to her husband in exasperation and seems to curse Juliet grotesquely: 'I would the fool were married to
her grave!' [III. v. 140]. Not 'I would the fool were dead,' mind you, but married to her death. Note that. Then
in the same scene poor Juliet's reply completes the curse:
Delay this marriage (to Paris) for a month, a week;
Or if you do not, make the bridal bed
In that dim monument where Tybalt lies.
[III. v. 199−201]
Or, as the bewildered bride somewhat later directs, having desperately resolved to dissemble death itself
acceptable as an achieved good [Shakespeare's Early Tragedies]. Indeed, when we remember the likely date
of Shakespeare's play, we shall not be surprised at this. In Love's Labour's Lost he had made fun of the
devotion that the King of Navarre and his three lords had manifested to the Princess of France and her three
ladies: the men are made to endure a year−long penance, and Berowne's required sojourn in a hospital is,
Berowne himself recognizes, almost an impossible demand. Can love outlast the waiting−time? Can it be
related to the agony of the sick and the dying? In any event it must, the ending of the play suggests, be put
into a total context, not being capable of replacing that context. In The Two Gentlemen of Verona love is
juxtaposed with the idea of friendship, which, being as it was alleged purely altruistic, had a high standing
indeed in the Renaissance, and love was there mocked through the figures of Launce and Speed, who took a
more commonplace view of relations between the sexes. At the end it is the sympathetically opportunistic
Julia who gets things straightened out. If the heroic lover and friend Valentine had been solely in charge of the
play's termination, only disaster would have been possible. In writing a play in which the love of a young man
and a young woman was to be considered a proper motive for tragedy, Shakespeare was bound to draw on his
earlier treatments of love in comedy, but he would need to make a major departure too.
Certainly there is plenty of comedy here. Were it not for the declaration of the Prologue, with its references to
"star−cross'd, lovers" [1.6] and to the ending of the feud through their deaths, we might well take the first two
acts as moving toward a fortunate issue for the young people. The atmosphere is here generally one of
pleasurable excitement, although Shakespeare has given Juliet a moment of premonition in the first balcony
scene:
Although I joy in thee,
I have no joy in this contract to−night.
It is too rash, too unadvis'd, too sudden;
Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be
Ere one can say 'It lightens.'
[II. ii. 116−20]
More of such premonitions will be noted later. But, until the moment when Mercutio is killed, the threat is not
anywhere heavy. When Romeo and Juliet declare their love, there are moments of pure comedy. Thus Romeo
compares himself to a schoolboy, reluctant to go to his books as Romeo is reluctant to leave Juliet: "Love
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goes toward love as schoolboys from their books; / But love from love, toward school with heavy looks" [II.
ii. 156−57]. And there is a touch of absurdity, which we shall applaud when we remember what we all have
done in distantly comparable circumstances, when Juliet says she has forgotten why she called him back, and
he says he is ready to stay till she remembers:
Jul. I have forgot why I did call thee back.
Rom. Let me stand here till thou remember it.
Jul. I shall forget to have thee still stand there,
Rememb'ring how I love thy company.
Rom. And I'll still stay, to have thee still forget,
Forgetting any other home but this.
[II. ii. 170−75]
We may remember too that Romeo has wished to be the glove on Juliet's hand, a mildly ludicrous idea, and
that both lovers would like Romeo to be Juliet's pet bird:
Jul. Tis almost morning. I would have thee gone— .
And yet no farther than a wanton's bird,
That lets it hop a little from her hand,
Like a poor prisoner in his twisted gyves.
And with a silk thread plucks it back again,
So loving−jealous of his liberty.
Rom. I would I were thy bird.
Jul. Sweet, so would I.
Yet I should kill thee with much cherishing.
[II. ii. 176−83]
They will speak differently in the second balcony scene, but even there they will only dimly apprehend the
world that threatens them.
Before this, of course, Romeo had been almost totally a figure of fun when he was giving voice to his love for
Rosaline, and after meeting Juliet he is in a situation of some embarrassment when he goes to tell the Friar of
his new love and of his wish for a secret marriage. When he admits that he has not been in his bed during the
night that has just passed, he has to hear the Friar exclaim "God pardon sin! Wast thou with Rosaline?" [II. iii.
44], and there is a particularly ludicrous touch when the Friar claims to see on Romeo's cheek a tear shed for
Rosaline's love and not yet washed off. Even so, Shakespeare makes it plain that the new love is a thing of
true moment. This is made evident not only in the authority of language that the lovers are sometimes
allowed, during their interchange of words at their first meeting in the Capulet house and in the first balcony
scene, but also in Romeo's premonition of disaster when he is on his way to the first meeting:
my mind misgives
Some consequences, yet hanging in the stars,
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night's revels and expire the term
Of a despised life, clos'd in my breast,
By some vile forfeit of untimely death.
But he that hath the steerage of my course
Direct my sail! On, lusty gentlemen!
[I. iv. 106−13]
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Because we have hints enough that disaster lies ahead, we cannot see the love merely in terms of comedy.
Moreover, Romeo's behavior when he meets Mercutio and Benvolio again after he has talked with the Friar
shows him as a young man ready to cope with danger for his love's sake and also ready, as now an adult lover,
to give over affectation and to feel able to parry Mercutio's jests. Then, after the marriage, he has dignity both
in his first refusal to fight with Tybalt, his new kinsman, and in his entering into the fray because he has by ill
luck been responsible for Mercutio's death. At least, it may at first seem like ill luck, but we are made to see
that Romeo's refusal to fight, Mercutio's indignation, and Romeo's revenge for his friend's death all arise, by
necessity or at least probability, out of the nature of the characters and their situation in Verona. "O, I am
fortune's fool!" [in. i. 136]—Romeo's cry after Tybalt's death—is comment enough on his inability to cope
with the situation engendered by the feud, which previously he had been overconfident about. How precarious
is his hold on his new adult status is underlined in the scene in the Friar's cell, where his love is expressed
again in ludicrous terms:
More validity,
More honourable state, more courtship lives
In carrion flies than Romeo. They may seize
On the white wonder of dear Juliet's hand
And steal immortal blessing from her lips,
Who, even In pure and vestal modesty,
Still blush, as thinking their own kisses sin;
But Romeo may not—he is banished.
This may flies do, when I from this must fly;
They are free men, but I am banished.
[III. iii. 33−42]
The poor girl, with those flies on her hand and lips; those lips, so beautifully red because they are kissing each
other; that shocking pun of "flies" and "fly": Romeo had uttered no more immature lines when the thought of
Rosaline was on him. His extravagance here is similar to that of Valentine in The Two Gentlemen of Verona,
who was similarly banished from the town where Silvia lived. And the mocker or rebuker is present with
both; Launce the clown makes fun of Valentine; Romeo is described by the Friar as "with his own tears made
drunk" [m. iii. 83]. He will recover dignity before the play's end, but he has lost hold of it here.
Juliet, on the other hand, has not Romeo's initial disadvantage of a previous, and ludicrous, love−attachment.
We see her first as the dutiful daughter, ready to prepare herself to fall in love with Paris, as her parents would
like her to. But Romeo is her first true commitment, and if she expresses herself comically at times in the first
balcony scene, that is only a reminder of her extreme youth. And she is much more practical than he is: it is
she who suggests how the wedding shall be arranged. Shakespeare has, moreover, given two almost parallel
scenes in which she is the central figure: II. v, when she awaits the Nurse's return from her mission to Romeo,
and III. ii, when she is looking forward to the coming wedding night. In both instances we have first a
soliloquy from Juliet, expressing impatience that time goes for her so slowly, then the Nurse entering and
delaying the news she has to give, and finally the Nurse's assurance that things after all will be well. But the
differences between the scenes are remarkable. The news that the Nurse withholds is good in the first
instance: everything is in order for the secret wedding. In the second instance it is bad news: Tybalt is dead
and Romeo banished. The Nurse's delay, moreover, is a matter of teasing in the first scene, the result of
incoherent grief in the second. And, although at the end of the second scene the Nurse promises to find
Romeo and bring him to comfort Juliet, there is now true darkness here. Act II, scene v ended with Juliet's cry
"Hie to high fortune! Honest nurse, farewell" [II. v. 78]. The pun is evidence of pure excitement, and we can
imagine Juliet giving the Nurse a quick and affectionate embrace as she goes off to her wedding. The second
scene ends also with words from the girl: "O, find him! give this ring to my true knight / And bid him come to
take his last farewell" [III. ii. 142−43]. The echo of Courtly Love in "true knight" has something forced and
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pathetic in it, and "last farewell" will prove to be a fact. Now, too, it is the Nurse who goes. Juliet must wait.
Yet in both scenes Juliet's youth is most poignantly brought out. Her impatience in II. v is of course amusing:
for the moment we forget the omens, and know that the Nurse will truly impart her good news. And III. ii
opens with one of the most famous speeches in the play, Juliet's soliloquy beginning "Gallop apace, you
fiery−footed steeds. / Towards Phoebus' lodging!" [III. ii. 1ff.]. Here we find Juliet trying out image after
image to give appropriate expression to her love, her desire to be wholly at one with Romeo. There is an
overelaborateness in her invocation of Phoebus and Phaeton, of the "sober−suited matron," "civil night"
("civil" because she gives privacy to her citizens), who will teach Juliet "how to lose a winning match, / Play'd
for a pair of stainless maidenhoods"/; there is a playing with the idea of contrast when she sees Romeo as
lying "upon the wings of night / Whiter than new snow upon a raven's back"; and she reaches a grotesque
extravagance in the famous lines:
Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night
And pay no worship to the garish sun.
[III. ii. 21−5]
The extravagance is, of course, understandable: we do not have to forgive it. Juliet has seen Romeo only at
night: she will never see him by daylight except for the brief moment of their wedding and that half−light of
dawn in the second balcony scene. So she can reject the "garish sun" that has never shone on them out of
doors. Something more mature immediately follows: "O, I have bought the mansion of a love, / But not
possess'd it; and though I am sold, / Not yet enjoy'd" [III. ii. 26−8]. … The change of sex is interesting here:
Juliet knows that the man is possessed by the woman while he merely penetrates her. Yet we still feel that this
inexperienced girl is straining after an appropriate image, trying to be more "grown up" than she really is.
Suddenly the speech ends with an image wholly fitting this character who so recently was heself a child:
So tedious is this day
As is the night before some festival
To an impatient child that hath new robes
And may not wear them.
[III. ii. 28−31]
She is no longer a child, but her childhood memory is here linked with the new experience. Because the
memory is now only a memory (yet a vivid one), because Romeo's body will be so startingly her new clothes
(Donne said: "What needst though have more covering than a man," Elegy XIX), she is using this image from
childhood [and] grows suddenly mature as we hear her speak. It will take a good deal longer for Romeo to
produce any comparable utterance. Doubtless Shakespeare realized that he had gone further with the girl than
with the boy: it was convenient therefore to give the whole of act IV to her concerns, Romeo leaving for
Mantua before act III is over and not entering the play again till act V begins. (pp. 61−6)
In act V of Romeo and Juliet Romeo at once shows signs of a new status. His response to the false news of
Juliet's death has a directness very different from his behavior hi the Friar's cell when he was lamenting his
banishment: "Is it e'en so? That I defy you stars!" [V. i. 24]. And he at once gives directions to Baithasar on
the journey he plans to Verona and Juliet's tomb. Of course, he could have explored the matter more fully. It
occurs to him to ask if no letters from the Friar have come with Baithasar, but when he receives a negative
answer his "No matter. Get thee gone / And hire those horses" [V. i. 32−3] shows the rashness we have seen
in him throughout Left alone, with the desire for poison in his mind, he turns his attention to the apothecary's
shop and to the situation of poor men. This is psychologically true, for in a moment of anguish we naturally
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tend to take refuge in a thought of something other than a demand that is immediately on us. After that,
Romeo's recognition that the gold he gives is a worse poison than the one he buys is largely a Renaissance
commonplace, but the eloquence with which he expresses it gives him an authority he has previously lacked:
There is thy gold—worse poison to men's souls.
Doing more murther in this loathsome world,
Than these poor compounds that thou mayst not sell.
I sell thee poison; thou hast sold me none.
Farewell. Buy food and get thyself in flesh.
[V. i. 80−4]
Earlier Romeo had to face the distinction between "loving" and "doting" [II. ill. 82] that the Friar insisted on:
the young man "doted" on Rosaline, which the Friar could not approve, and he must love Juliet "moderately"
[II. vi. 14]. Yet of course he did not follow the Friar's advice, though he thought that his love for Juliet was
something the Friar could understand. Shakespeare suggests another distinction between love and love: the
kind you simply like to maunder over, the kind that ultimately commits you. We do not, as Romeo does,
usually kill ourselves for love, but we remember to the end a girl that truly mattered. The utterances from the
sympathetic Friar, who thinks the Capulet−Montague feud may come to peace through the marriage, are an
echo of the church's view of love in the Middle Ages. The total commitment to another person is, we have
seen, in that view a dangerous thing if not kept properly subordinate to one's love of God. Romeo cannot
follow the Friar in this: he is so totally committed to Juliet that he will kill himself in her tomb. There is
indeed a threefold presentation of love here, not a dichotomy: there is the affected, superficial concern with
Rosaline, there is the fatal commitment to Juliet, and there is the "moderation" counseled by the Friar and
illustrated in the play's older married couples. Shakespeare gives utterance to the church's counsel, neither
endorsing nor rejecting it. If the play's lovers could have lived, some different things would have conditioned
their relations to each other … (pp. 67−8)
Clifford Leech, "The Moral Tragedy of 'Romeo and Juliet'," in English Renaissance Drama: Essays in Honor
of Madeline Doran &Mark Eccles, Standish Henning, Robert Kimbrough, and Richard Knowles, eds.,
Southern Illinois University Press, 1976, pp. 59−75.
Alice Shalvi
[Shalvi asserts that although Romeo and Juliet appears to be a tragedy of fate in which the protagonists are
"helpless, innocent victims of arbitrary powers," the play can be more properly regarded as a tragedy of
character. In the critic's opinion, Shakespeare designed the tragic outcome to be the result of the lovers'
"passionate rashness," and particularly Romeo's "passionate nature and his lack of moderation." Noting that
Elizabethans considered moderation essential to balancing one's passion and maintaining one's rational
senses, Shalvi discusses Romeo's failed attempt to follow this course after his marriage to Juliet. Once he
abandons restraint and avenges Mercutio's death by killing Tybalt, the critic observes, he is governed by
passionate recklessness throughout the rest of the play. As a result, Romeo's "lack of moderation, the
readiness with which he succumbs to all forms of passion, his failure to guide and protect his young wife,
bring both of them to their untimely death." Despite Romeo's flawed nature, Shalvi continues, both he and
Juliet have our full sympathy, for their experience ultimately conveys the beauty and sincerity of young love.]
[Romeo and Juliet] appears to be a tragedy of fate, showing its protagonists as the helpless, innocent victims
of arbitrary powers. Several incidents in the play contribute to this impression. The Prologue refers to 'a pair
of star−crossed lovers' [Prologue, 6]. Romeo's misgivings, aroused in him by an ominous dream, are not
wholly dismissed by his friends' jesting mockery as they urge him on to the feast at the house of Capulet.
Intuitively he fears the outcome of the evening's adventures:
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my mind misgives
Some consequences yet hanging in the stars
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night's revels and expire the term
Of a despised life closed in my breast
By some vile forfeit of untimely death.
But He, that hath the steerage of my course,
Direct my sail!
[I. iv. 106−13]
Explicitly, Romeo surrenders himself to the guidance of God and the imagery which he employs stresses his
view of himself as entirely helpless in determining his own destiny. So, when his awkward attempt to
intervene in the fight between Tybalt and Mercutio leads to the fatal wounding of his friend, Romeo
despondently asserts 'I thought all for the best' [III. i. 104]; the implication is that man's motives and plans fail
to bring about the desired end where Fate decrees otherwise. After he has killed Tybalt, Romeo refers to
himself as 'fortune's fool,' the helpless victim and plaything of Fortune, and after killing Paris he speaks of
both himself and his victim as being 'writ in sour misfortune's book' [V. iii. 82]. Finally, Romeo refers to
suicide as the shaking off of 'the yoke of inauspicious stars' [V. iii. 111].
Indeed, an inimical Fate does seem to guide the lovers' lives. It is by unhappy chance that Romeo happens to
meet Tybalt and it is unfortunate that his movement to part the duelists results in Mercutio's being wounded. It
is unfortunate that old Capulet decides to move Juliet's marriage to Paris forward by one day, thereby making
it necessary for her to take Friar Laurence's potion a day earlier and thus shortening the time allowed for
bringing Romeo news of the Friar's plan. It is by chance that the Friar's messenger is delayed by the plague
while Romeo's own servant reaches Mantua safely to report the supposed death of Juliet. It is unfortunate that
Romeo finds Paris at Juliet's tomb, that Friar Laurence trips over the tombstone and arrives too late to prevent
Romeo's suicide by revealing the truth. It is unfortunate that the Friar leaves Juliet alone in the tomb upon her
awakening, thus giving here the opportunity to kill herself. Fate or Chance do seem to have a hand in
determining what happens to these two young lovers and we may well find ourselves futilely wishing 'If only.
. . , if only..."
But not only Fate determines the events and outcome of the play. It is noteworthy that in adapting his plot
from The Tragical History of Romeo and Juliet, a poem by Arthur Brooke published in 1562, the major
change that Shakespeare made was drastically to reduce the duration−time of the action from two months to
five days. Shakespeare takes great care to impress the speed and swiftness of the action upon his audience and
he does this in two ways. Firstly, the days of the week are several times mentioned, so that we may never for
one moment forget how quickly the lovers fall in love, marry and are forever parted. The play opens on a
Sunday and that same evening Romeo, hitherto infatuated by the fair Rosaline, meets Juliet at the Capulets'
ball. Their love is instant and mutual and before dawn they are betrothed. The next morning, Monday, the
Nurse comes to Romeo at 9 o'clock and by her he sends word to Juliet, bidding her meet him that same
afternoon at the cell of Friar Laurence. Here they are secretly married and on his way home from the
ceremony Romeo becomes involved in the quarrel with Tybalt. Having killed Juliet's cousin, Romeo flees to
his father−confessor, Friar Laurence, and it is at the Friar's cell that the nurse finds him and bids him come to
Juliet that night—their wedding night. The next morning, Tuesday, Romeo leaves for Mantua and Juliet's
parents tell her that she must marry her suitor Paris on Thursday or else be turned out of their house. She seeks
for counsel in her dilemma from the Friar, who gives her a potion that, if taken on Wednesday evening, will
enable her to feign death until Friday, by which time he will have sent for Romeo to take her in secret to
Mantua, there to await the pardon of the Prince of Verona. Juliet is so much cheered by the Friar's plan that
she returns home, blithe and gay, to consent to the proposed marriage with Paris. Her change of mood so
overjoys her father that he moves the wedding forward to Wednesday and Juliet therefore has to drink the
potion on Tuesday evening, waking up on Thursday. Meanwhile the Friar's messenger to Romeo is delayed
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and he hurries off to smuggle Juliet away, not knowing that Romeo, believing his wife dead, has himself
hastened back to Verona. On Thursday night—four days after their first meeting—the two lovers are united in
death.
The swiftness of the action is emphasised by the tremendous mobility facilitated by the open stage of the
Elizabethan playhouse, with its several levels permitting incessant movement from one location to another.
The action moves from the front of the stage to the curtained recess at the back, from the lower recess to the
upper, with such wonderful fluidity and continuity that there need be not a single pause in what the Prologue
refers to as 'the two−hours' traffic of our stage' [Prologue, 12].
The whole effect of the play, then—an effect produced both by the plot and by the stagecraft—is of speed, a
speed which is itself in accord with the sudden, swift passion that is being enacted before our eyes. What the
play describes is a fierce, passionate love that leads the two young lovers to defy the long−standing feud
between their houses, a love that leads both of them to death.
Despite the explicit stress on fate, Romeo and Juliet is more a tragedy of character than is generally realised. It
seems to me that Shakespeare is here showing the tragic outcome to be the consequence of the passionate
rashness of the lovers and, particularly, the result of Romeo's passionate nature and his lack of moderation.
At the opening of the play Romeo is deeply in love with Rosaline, but since she has vowed to remain chaste
his love is a hopeless one and we find him indulging in the traditional excesses of the forelorn lover: he is
melancholy, shuns company, walks in the woods by night and locks himself in his darkened room by day. To
cure him of his love his sensible kinsman Benvolio suggests that he attend the Capulet ball in order to see for
himself that Rosaline is not the only pretty girl in the world. Romeo accepts the challenge and Benvolio is
proved right. No sooner does Romeo see Juliet than he falls in love with her:
Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight!
For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night.
[I. v. 52−3]
Overhearing Juliet's soliloquy, as she stands on her balcony after the guests' departure, Romeo learns that his
love is requited. It is at this point that the fact of Juliet's youth emerges as so important; she is not yet fourteen
and her youth, innocence and naivete are what emerge most clearly from the famous balcony−scene. Partly
because she has no experience of, or desire for, the formal ceremonies of flirtation and courtship, the lovers
are contracted even before there has been any wooing. And yet it is the youthful Juliet who has her doubts
about the speed of the betrothal:
I have no joy of this contract to−night:
It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;
Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be
Ere one can say 'It lightens.'
[II. ii. 117−20)
Romeo, however, seems to have no such fears or presentiments of ill and he hastens off to Friar Laurence to
make arrangements for their immediate marriage.
It is now, in Act II, scene iii, that there occurs one of the play's key scenes, a scene which, though it is often
excised in modern productions or else performed so as to evoke a response of laughter in the audience,
nevertheless affords important clues as to how we are to interpret the play and judge its major protagonists,
Friar Laurence, who has been gathering herbs, comments upon the paradoxical duality of Nature:
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The earth that's nature's mother is her tomb;
What is her burying grave that is her womb.
[II. iii. 9−10]
All the creatures upon the earth are of an equally mixed quality:
For nought so vile that on the earth doth live
But to the earth some special good doth give,
Nor nought so good but strain'd from that fair use
Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse:
[II. iii. 17−20]
As an example, he points to one of the flowers in his collection, the scent of which has cordial powers even
though to taste of it is fatal. The human parallel is then explicitly stated: grace, the divine power of goodness,
and 'rude will', man's natural desire for evil, both exist within man, eternally at war with each other,
And where the worser is predominant,
Full soon the canker death eats up that plant.
[II. iii. 29−30]
When Romeo bursts in, full of his new tempestuous passion, Friar Laurence's remarks first remind us of the
old infatuation for Rosaline, now so startingly and suddenly cast off in favour of a newer love, and then stress
the conclusion to be deduced from this change of heart:
young men's love then lies
Not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes.
Jesu Maria, what a deal of brine
Hath wash'd thy sallow cheeks for Rosaline!
How much salt water thrown away in waste,
To season love, that of it doth not taste!
The sun not yet thy sighs from heaven clears,
Thy old groans ring yet in my ancient ears;
Lo, here upon thy cheek the stain doth sit
Of an old tear that is not wash'd off yet:
If e'er thou wast thyself and these woes thine,
Thou and these woes were all for Rosaline:
And art thou changed? pronounce this sentence then.
Women may fall, when there's no strength in men.
[II. iii. 67−80]
Nevertheless, aware that an alliance between Romeo and Juliet may bring about a reconciliation between their
families, he consents to marry the lovers, only chiding Romeo's 'sudden haste' once more with the warning
counsel 'Wisely and slow. They stumble that run fast' [II. iii. 94]. That last line, reminiscent of Juliet's own
qualms, should remain in our minds throughout the rest of the play, for the lovers fail to heed the Friar's
warning, even though he repeats it in II. vi, where, trying to temper Romeo's almost manic joy, he says:
These violent delights have violent ends
And in their triumph die, like fire and powder.
Which as they kiss consume: the sweetest honey
Is loathsome in his own deliciousness
And in the taste confounds the appetite:
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133
Therefore love moderately; long love doth so;
Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow.
[II. vi. 9−15]
Moderation is what the wise Friar counsels; moderation, which the Elizabethans considered essential in all of
life because it balances the passions and maintains the rule of reason, the rational will which is the divine
element in man that distinguishes him from the beasts.
The scene that follows [III. i] stresses the need for moderation in social transactions, switching away from the
love of Romeo and Juliet to the family feud which serves as its background. Meeting the quarrelsome Tybalt,
Romeo exercises admirable self−control and obstinately refuses to be drawn into a senseless quarrel. But his
fiery friend Mercutio, unable to bear such an insult to his friend's honour, challenges Tybalt and is killed. It is
then that Romeo decides to dispense with moderation—and the decision, the choice, that leads to Romeo's
action is explicitly stressed as he says:
Away to heaven, respective lenily,
And fire−eyed fury be my conduct now!
[II. i. 123−24]
Romeo explicitly dismisses 'respective levity',— sensible, considerate moderation—and allows himself to be
guided by the 'fire and fury' which are associated with Hell. Though it is at this point that he refers to himself
as 'fortune's fool', it is precisely here that he has chosen his own course of action, giving way to the angry
passion which leads to revenge.
It is by senseless passion that Romeo continues to be ruled. Learning that his sentence is to be banishment
rather than death, Romeo is neither grateful nor happy at his prince's mercy. Dismissing 'Adversity's sweet
milk, philosophy' [III. iii. 55], he rants and raves in suicidal despair, refusing rationally to consider how his
situation may be unproved. Again it is the Friar who urges moderation, chiding Romeo's 'womanish' tears and
the 'wild acts' which denote the 'unreasonable fury of a beast' [III. iii. 110−11], stressing the grounds for hope
and optimism. Though Romeo is temporarily moved to heed the Friar's advice, he remains, essentially, the
'slave of passion', for when he learns of Juliet's supposed death his spontaneous, unreflecting action is to
purchase poison and hasten to a romantic death in the arms of his beloved.
The tragic end that befalls the lovers is more the outcome of Romeo's character than the work of a cruel,
senseless fate. Romeo's lack of moderation, the readiness with which he succumbs to all forms of passion, his
failure to guide and protect his young wife, bring both of them to their untimely death. Just so is it lack of
moderation, a senseless pursuit of passion's dictates, that causes the drawn−out family feud, which
Shakespeare so brilliantly mocks and satirizes in the opening squabble of the families' servants and in the fiery
valour of Tybalt the 'courageous captain of compliments' [II. iv. 20], but the full horror and severe social
implication of which he nevertheless brings out in those scenes [I. i; III. ii and V. iii] in which the Prince
appears, threatening and reprimanding the culprits. Here, as elsewhere in his plays, Shakespeare sees the lot of
the individual in a total social context. To a large extent, the foolish family feud is responsible for the death of
the young lovers and the same immoderate passions are responsible both for the feud and for the disastrous
outcome of the love−affair. Friar Laurence's hope that the love of Romeo and Juliet will bring peace to their
warring parents is fulfilled in all too bitter a manner and 'All are punished' [V. iii. 295].
Despite Romeo's flawed nature, both Romeo and Juliet have our full sympathy. We neither despise nor reject
Romeo because of his flaw of passion. It is primarily by conveying the beauty and sincerity of young love that
Shakespeare wins over sympathy for the doomed lovers; clearly the lyrical poetry of their exchanges and the
intensity of feeling revealed in their final speeches are intended to stress that the love of Romeo and Juliet is
not a shallow infatuation like that of Romeo for Rosaline. In fact, it is almost the nature of young love to be as
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134
ungoverned by reason as is the love of Romeo and Juliet. But we should not let our sympathy for the lovers
blind us to the ultimate moral of the play, to the positive values which Shakespeare here reasserts. And that
ultimate moral, here as in others of Shakespeare's plays, is the paramount need for moderation in every aspect
of life—the need for man to follow not the dictates of his 'rude will' but the dictates of that 'grace', that divine
reason, which God has implanted within him. Reason is most easily upset and distracted by love and this is
what we see happening in the case of Romeo. It is not the stars that bring about the lovers' death but rather
their passion and the passion of their kinsmen—the destructive passions of unreasonable, immoderate,
excessive love and equally unreasonable, immoderate and excessive hatred. (pp. 120−26)
Alice Shalvi, "The First Tragedy: 'Romeo and Juliet'," in The World &Art of Shakespeare by A. A. Mendilow
and Alice Shalvi, Israel Universities Press, 1967, pp. 119−26.
The Nurse
Harley Granville−Barker
[Granville−Barker praises the Nurse as a well−conceived, rich, and natural character and compares her with
Falstaff (in 1 and 2 Henry IV and The Merry Wives of Windsor), one of Shakespeare's greatest comic
creations. Remarking on the consistency of the Nurse's portrait the critic notes that all facets of her
personality fall into perspective at III. v. 212−17 when she advises Juliet to marry Paris and forget Romeo.]
The Nurse ... is a triumphant and complete achievement. She stands four−square, and lives and breathes in her
own right from the moment she appears, from that very first
Now, by my maiden−head at twelve year old,
I bade her come.
[I. iii. 2−3]
Shakespeare has had her pent up in his imagination; and out she gushes. He will give us nothing completer till
he gives us Falstaff [in 1 and 2 Henry IV and The Merry Wives of Windsor]. We mark his confident, delighted
knowledge of her by the prompt digression into which he lets her launch; the story may wait. It is not a set
piece of fireworks such as Mercutio will touch off in honour of Queen Mab. The matter of it flows
spontaneously into verse, the phrases are hers and hers alone, character unfolds with each phrase. You may,
indeed, take any sentence the Nurse speaks throughout the play, and only she could speak it. Moreover, it will
have no trace of the convention to which Shakespeare himself is still tied (into which he forces, to some
extent, every other character)— none, unless we find her burlesquing it; and then we might fancy that he
himself, in half−conscious mischief, is thus forecasting his freedom. But the good Angelica—which we at last
discover to be her perfect name—needs no critical expanding, she expounds herself on all occasions; nor
explanation, for she is plain as daylight; nor analysis, lest it lead to excuse, and she stays blissfully
unregenerate. No one can fail to act her well that can speak her lines. Yet they are so supercharged with life
that they will accommodate the larger acting—which is the revelation of a personality in terms of a part— and
to the full; and it may be as rich a personality as can be found. She is in everything inevitable; from her
My fan, Peter,
[II. iv. 106]
when she means to play the discreet lady with those gay young sparks, to that all unexpected
Faith, here 'tis; Romeo
Is banished; and all the world to nothing
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135
That he dares ne'er come back to challenge you;
Or if he do, it needs must be by stealth.
Then, since the case so stands as now it doth,
I think it best you married with the county.
[III. v. 212−17]
—horrifyingly unexpected to Juliet; but to us, the moment she has said it, the inevitable thing for her to say.
This last turn, that seems so casually made, is the stroke that completes the character. Till now we have taken
her—the 'good, sweet Nurse' [II. v. 21]— just as casually, amused by each comicality as it came; for so we do
take the folk that amuse us. But with this everything about her falls into perspective, her funniments, her
endearments, her grossness, her good−nature; upon the instant, they all find their places in the finished
picture. And for a last enrichment, candidly welling from the lewd soul of her, comes
O, he's a lovely gentleman;
Romeo's a dishclout to him; an eagle, Madam,
Hath not so green, so quick, so fair an eye
As Paris hath. Beshrew my very heart,
I think you are happy in this second match,
For it excels your first; or if it did not,
Your first is dead, or 'twere as good he were
As living hence and you no use of him.
[III. v. 218−25]
Weigh the effect made upon Juliet, fresh from the sacrament of love and the bitterness of parting, by the last
fifteen words of that.
Juliet. Speak'st thou from thy heart?
Nurse. And from my soul too,
Or else beshrew them both.
Juliet. Amen.
[III. v. 226−28]
It is gathered into the full−fraught Amen. But best of all, perhaps, is the old bawd's utter unconsciousness of
having said anything out of the way. And when she finds her lamb. Her ladybird, returning from shrift with
merry look—too merry!—how should she suppose she has not given her the wholesomest advice in the
world?
We see her obliviously bustling through the night's preparations for this new wedding. We hear
her—incredibly!—start to stir Juliet from her sleep with the same coarse wit that had served to deepen the
girl's blushes for Romeo's coming near. We leave her blubbering grotesquely over the body she had been
happy to deliver to a baser martyrdom. Shakespeare lets her pass from the play without comment. Is any
needed? (pp. 42−4)
Harley Granville−Barker, "Romeo and Juliet," in his Prefaces to Shakespeare, second series, Sidgwick
&Jackson, Ltd., 1930, pp. 1−66.
Martin Stevens
[Stevens examines the Nurse's role as a messenger who acts as a go−between for the young lovers in Romeo
and Juliet. Initially focusing on the humorous aspects of the Nurse's errands, the critic maintains that her
encounter with Mercutio in Act II, scene iv provides one of the comic highlights of the play. The two
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136
characters reflect vastly different comedic properties—the Nurse embodies romantic comedy whereas
Mercutio represents satire—and the meeting sparks a hilarious conflict between their opposing
temperaments. Stevens also compares the Nurse to her counterpart in Shakespeare's source, Arthur Brooke's
Tragicall Historye of Romeus and Juliet, noting that tidings before the lovers' tragic separation. The critic
further traces the Nurse's role as messenger by closely examining three key passages— II. v, III. iv, and IV. v.
According to Stevens, this triad of "messenger scenes" reflects the progress of love in the play, and the Nurse
plays a central role in this development, for she acts as love's herald first to arrange the marriage, second to
promote its consummation, and third to lament its expiration. Contrary to many scholars' perceptions, the
critic concludes, it is the Nurse's exit in Act IV, not Mercutio's death in Act III, which marks the end of
romantic comedy and the beginning of tragedy in Romeo and Juliet.]
It is well known that the Nurse in Romeo and Juliet has her ancestry in Roman comedy. … It is not to the
point to trace this ancestry in its particulars here, but it is important to recognize its presence. Significantly,
the Nurse in Romeo and Juliet is a liaison character much like her Roman ancestor, and her humor arises from
her role as an inarticulate messenger who acts as go−between for the young lovers.
A close examination of the play will reveal that the Nurse is on stage or audibly off stage in twelve scenes. In
no less than nine of these [I. v; II. iii, iv, v; III. ii, iii, v; IV. ii, v] her primary function is to convey
information or warning, while in two others [IV. iii, iv] she lends her presence, uncharacteristically silent, to
the domestic settings inside the Capulet household. The one remaining scene [I. iii] is primarily concerned
with introducing her as Juliet's devoted guardian who is spontaneously given to effuse and ribald outpourings.
It's opening line, however, spotlights her customary function as messenger with Lady Capulet's command:
"Nurse, where's my daughter? Call her forth to me." The Nurse replies with an immodest oath and the verbal
blunder we come to expect of her (in this case on ladybird which can mean "a pretty creature" and "a tart"):
Now by my maidenhead at twelve year old,
I bade her come. What lamb! What ladybird!—
God forbid!—Where's this girl? What Juliet!
[I. iii. 2−4]
Thereupon Juliet appears and the stage is set. The Nurse, hereafter, serves as the aged herald to the impetuous
young lovers. Hers is the Dyonesian errand; she is there to assure that Juliet will "grow by men" [I. iii. 95].
The humor of her role arises in large part from the contrast between the reality of her earthbound
lameness—she is "unwieldy, slow, heavy and pale as lead" [II. v. 17]—and the lovers' fancy of Cupid's
wind−swift dispatch. It arises further from the contrast between expectation and performance: between the
demand for the messenger's precise and lucid tidings and the delivery of an aged gossip's prolix ramblings.
Several scenes in which the Nurse appears as messenger are simply designed to carry forward the progress of
the action. In Act I, Scene v, she serves to identify each of the lovers to the other. Later, in the two balcony
scenes [II. ii. and III. v.], she is present to protect Juliet from discovery, adding on both occasions a note of
urgency to the parting of the lovers. (I shall speak later of Juliet's repudiation of the Nurse at the conclusion of
the second scene.) In two other instances, the Nurse serves primarily to bear tidings and hence to advance the
action: once when she brings news of Juliet to Romeo at Friar Lawrence's cell [III. iii] and another time when
she heralds to Capulet the arrival of Juliet from shrift [IV. ii]. Though most of these scenes give edge to the
characterization of the Nurse as love's herald, especially as they reveal her complicity in the consummation,
they do not especially focus attention on her comic qualities. These qualities are emphasized in the remaining
scenes in which she takes part: the first meeting with Romeo which is also the only meeting with Mercutio [II.
iv], the two scenes in the Capulet orchard in which she brings news to Juliet [II. v and III. ii], and her last
appearance, the lamentation [IV. v].
The meeting of Mercutio and the Nurse provides one of the comic highlights of the play. As Thomas Marc
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137
Parrott has observed [in his Shakespearean Comedy], Mercutio is the play's embodiment of "conscious wit"
while the Nurse, in striking contrast, is its "unconscious humorist." The scene which brings them together thus
sparks the inevitable conflict between the two antithetic comic temperaments, the satiric and the romantic, of
which Mercutio and the Nurse, respectively, are the figureheads in the play. Mercutio, from the beginning, is
the critic of stale custom: his wit stabs into many conventional respectabilities, from the absurd stance of the
bookish melancholic lover to the pretentious pose of the Italianate fencer. He epitomizes the comic spirit
which governs Romeo's first and false love, just as clearly as the Nurse personifies the wordly comic spirit
which presides over Romeo's second and true love. Like all satire, Mercutio's wit is analytic; and as such it
serves to break up, in the words of Northrop Frye, "the lumber of stereotypes, fossilized beliefs . . . oppressive
fashions, and all other things that impede the free movement of society" [in "The Nature of Satire," University
of Toronto Quarterly, XIV (1944)]. In contrast, the Nurse's humor is synthetic; in her province lies the happy
union of the lovers with all its traditional life−cycle overtones. It is right, therefore, that Mercutio must perish
when Rosaline and Tybalt, the two figureheads of "oppressive fashion," have surrendered their tyranny. So
too is it right that the Nurse must be absent when the lovers are brought to their tragic separation. With
Mercutio's death, satire comes to an end; with the Nurse's exit, all comedy quits the stage.
The meeting of Mercutio and the Nurse is, consequently, a culminating moment in the play. As must be the
case, high comedy is nourished by the low: Mercutio's wit flashes, but the laughter that it provokes derives
more from its object than its source. It is the Nurse's outrage—"What a man are you" [II. iv. 114]—which
turns Mercutio's obscenities—"the bawdy hand of the dial is now upon the prick of noon" [II. iv.
12−13]—into sheer hilarity. The Nurse is thus unintentionally "the cause that wit is" in others; in fact, as a
loquacious messenger she is consistently the butt of other people's jokes. But where most others will gently
amuse themselves at the expense of the Nurse's outer nature—her garrulity, for example—Mercutio cuts deep.
He alone is able to goad her into pretentiousness. With his string of obscenities, he bullies her into
self−deception; she cannot stand by listening to his "man−talk" without considering her respectability
assailed. And so Shakespeare has her resort to that most hilarious verbal device of affectation, the
malapropism [a frequently humorous misapplication of a word]. It is testimony to Shakespeare's dramatic skill
that he allows the Nurse to utter malapropisms only during the scene in which Mercutio maligns her character.
After Mercutio exits, the Nurse, now provoked to act the grande dame [great lady], reprimands her man Peter
for failing to come to her defense. Peter lickerishly assures her that his "weapon should quickly have been
out" [II. iv. 158] had he seen his mistress used at another's man's pleasure! She is, however, still so angry at
Mercutio that she remains ironically oblivious to the similar taunts of her servingman. Mercutio's spirit thus
continues to dominate the stage even as the Nurse, quivering with vexation, comes to state her business with
Romeo. Here Shakespeare follows Arthur Brooke's account rather closely, though in Shakespeare's version
the Nurse is more apprehensive for the honorable treatment of her "gentlewoman" and more concerned for the
need of secrecy. In both versions, she takes a liberal tip from Romeo, but in Brooke's she appears more
mercenary in accepting it, partly because she is less concerned over her mistress' welfare and partly because
she deliberately neglects, in her report to Juliet, to mention "the taking of the golde." The emphasis
Shakespeare places on the Nurse's selfless good will thus helps to sustain her role as a catalyst in the
consummation of the romance.
At this point, it may be well to compare and contrast other details of characterization and narration in the two
versions of the story. Source studies have made clear that Shakespeare is directly indebted to Brooke's poem,
which, in fact, is his only known source. One study specifically concerned with Shakespeare's use of Brooke's
poem concludes that in almost every scene involving the Nurse, "Shakespeare is merely following the details
of Brooke's story" [Robert Adger Law, "On Shakespeare's Changes of his Source Material in Romeo and
Juliet," University of Texas Studies in English, No. 9 (1929)]. While, on the surface, most details do indeed
derive from Brooke's poem, the total effect that Shakespeare creates with the Nurse's part is in fact quite
different from that created by Brooke. Shakespeare sharpens the impact of the messenger function by making
the Nurse the bearer of all tidings prior to the lovers' tragic separation. In Brooke's version, not the Nurse but
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138
an unnamed person discloses Juliet's identity to Romeo. Later, again, it is not the Nurse but general rumor that
informs Juliet of Tybalt's death. The Nurse, moreover, is absent from the first balcony scene. In Shakespeare's
play, then, the Nurse's role as messenger and herald is noticeably expanded.
Another change is the reduction of servants and confidants who attend the two lovers. Brooke sends not only
the Nurse but also another maid "almost of equal trust" to accompany Juliet on her way to the Friar. He also
makes a larger part of Romeus' servant Peter, who becomes Balthasar in the play and who bears no relation to
the Nurse's servant. Moreover, Shakespeare quite clearly restricts the intermediaries in the love plot to two:
the Nurse and the Friar. These two characters, however, serve two entirely contrary philosophies. The Nurse is
a worldly figure; her interests are immediate and material. Her commitment is to eros, and, therefore, toward
the physical union of the lovers. She is in the age−old sense queen of misrule and priestess of fertility. The
Friar, in contrast, is spiritual father, the bestower of holy matrimony. The love he serves is agape; it is "pure"
[II. ill. 92], intransitory. pious. It exists outside the limits of Verona's fleeting time and enveloping space. The
Nurse and the Friar, therefore, are each necessary confidants of both lovers, and it is thus that Shakespeare
depicts them. In contrast, Brooke emphasizes in his portrayals of the Nurse and the Friar their separate, more
intimate allegiance to Juliet and to Romeus, respectively. Thus, after Tybalt's death and Romeus' banishment,
Brooke's Nurse entreats Juliet and not Romeus—as in Shakespeare's version [in. iii. 88|—to stand up against
the force of adversity. The Friar in like manner exhorts Romeus to forbearance, and hence leaves the
impression that each of the lovers has his own minister of consolation. In fact, Brooke makes clear this
division of roles:
The old mans woords have fild with joy our Romeus brest,
And eke the olde wives talke, hath set our Juliets hart at rest.
Later in the poem, moreover, Brooke's Friar makes special reference to his very close bond with Romeus, a
bond that implicitly finds its parallel in the affectionate and life−long relationship of the Nurse and Juliet.
Before giving Juliet the potion, Brooke's Friar explains:
Even from the holy font thy husband have I knowne,
And, since he grew in yeres, have kept his counsels as myne owne . . .
And sith thou art his wife, thee am I bound to love,
For Romeus frinships sake, and seeke thy anguish to remove,
Shakespeare's Friar, in contrast, does not refer to any special bond, nor does he act in Juliet's behalf simply for
the sake of friendship with Romeo.
It is well to bear in mind then that Shakespeare changes his source to highlight the intermediary function of
the Friar and, even more pointedly, that of the Nurse. Both characters are made to appear less subjective in
their relations to the lovers, and both, in consequence, become more effective manipulators of the plot.
Though it is risky to make guesses about Shakespeare's reasons for effecting these changes, it does seem clear
that the limitations of the stage and the need to hold down the number of supernumerary parts must have been
partially responsible for his concentration on the Nurse as the messenger figure in the love plot. (pp. 195−200)
Up to the end of the third act, Romeo and Juliet might well be considered a romantic comedy in the medieval
sense of the word: namely as a rising action culminating in the good fortune of the principal characters. It is,
significantly, at the end of the third act that Juliet repudiates the Nurse with the malediction "Ancient
Damnation" and the vow "Thou and my bosom henceforth shall be twain" [III. v. 234−40]. Up to that point
the main action of the play has to do with the bringing together of the lovers, an achievement which owes its
success in large part to the labors of the Nurse. As long as she is on stage in her role of intermediary, there is
the prospect of "basic harmony," the assertion of which Nevill Coghill finds central to Shakespeare's comic
version ["The Basis of Shakespearean Comedy," Essays and Studies, New Series, III (1950)]. The rejection of
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the Nurse thus occurs at the moment when the romantic comedy has come to its fruition and the repudiation
serves as prelude to the ensuing tragedy. The Nurse's ultimate disappearance adumbrates the tragic separation
and demise of the lovers. (pp. 200−01)
There remains yet a consideration of the Nurse's role in three focal scenes—II. v, III. iv, and IV. v—which
highlight her part as inarticulate messenger. In their related structures, one traces a descent from the high
ribald humor of the successful matchmaker to the tragicomic pathos of a rejected confidante. The first of these
scenes arises from the frenzy of unspeakable anticipation and the last, from the sobriety of ineffable
recollection. It is customary to regard two of these scenes as parallel actions. Much like the two riot scenes [I.
i and III. i], those in which the Nurse brings tidings to Juliet [II. v and III. iv] have been called "twin−born
scenarios." There is justification, however, to regard the latter set, if not the former, as part of a triad which
serves to accentuate the progress of the dramatic action.
In each of the three scenes, apprehension or consternation results from the delivery of a message by the Nurse.
In the first of them, it is only the manner of the delivery, not the news itself, which creates disturbance. At the
beginning of II. v, Juliet feverishly awaits word from her lover. The Nurse enters, winded and aching from her
errand, and there follows an amusing exchange in which the Nurse's prolixity is matched only by Juliet's
eagerness to hear the news. This verbal tug of war is prompted by Brooke, but Shakespeare, as he does in
many other passages, intensifies it. Notably, Brooke's Nurse, unlike Shakespeare's, is neither out of breath nor
weary from her "jaunce"; she simply toys with Juliet for a fleeting moment. In Shakespeare, the situation
arises wholly from the Nurse's human limitations in the part of Cupid. Coming as it does, at the height of
youthful expectation, the delay of the news simply provokes mirthful anxiety in Juliet. Shakespeare takes the
opportunity to let love's aged herald stammer the wedding banns.
The second scene of the triad [III. iii] has much in common with the first. In it, Juliet again opens with a
soliloquy revealing her feverish excitement; again the Nurse returns from a "jaunce" with news for Juliet; and
again consternation results from the delivery of her tidings. The main difference, of course, is in the news
itself, which, in sharp contrast to that of the first scene, is unhappy and ominous in what it forebodes. To
sharpen this contrast, Shakespeare provides close verbal parallels as the Nurse appears on stage. In the earlier
scene, Juliet greets her with happy exclamation:
Oh, God, she comes! O honey Nurse, what news?. . .
Now, good sweet Nurse—Oh, Lord, why look'st thou sad?
Though news be sad, yet tell them merrily:
If good, thou shamest the music of sweet news
By playing it to me with so sour a face.
[II. v. 18−24]
The second scene echoes the first in the framework of its greeting, though it is stripped of Juliet's
commentary, which, ironically, would have been more appropriate here than in the context in which it was
uttered. Juliet anxiously inquires:
Now, Nurse, what news? . . .
Ay me! What news? Why dost thou wring thy hands?
[III. ii. 34; 36]
This time the news is indeed sad, and the Nurse, true to her nature, makes it even sadder by her inept report.
Unable to make a forthright statement, she so misleads Juliet that even after thirty lines are spoken, Juliet can
still ask "Is Romeo slaughtered, and is Tybalt dead?" [in. ii. 65]. All the time, Shakespeare treads the dim
boundary between joy and pain. The news that Juliet eventually hears is indeed dire—Tybalt is dead and
Romeo banished—but it is not so dire, she and the audience come to realize, as it might have been. The heavy
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rhetoric and the elaborate punning ease, from the first, the burden of the sad news. The courier of romance is
thus able to bring bitter news without totally destroying the comic tone. Juliet responds to false death with the
same ornate and artificial rhetoric with which Romeo had responded to false love earlier in the play. One can
see the similarity vividly in the string of oxymorons that each utters in the two scenes: Romeo's "O brawling
love! O loving hate" and Juliet's "Beautiful tyrant! Fiend angelical!" [I. i. 176; III. ii. 75].
The last scene in the triad [IV. v] is sometimes known as the "Lamentation." In it, once more, the Nurse bears
adverse tidings, though this time to the elder Capulets and not to Juliet. Once more, too, her report misleads its
hearer to express heavy grief. But it misleads in a way different from that of her previous report, as indeed that
report had differed, too, from its antecedent. In the first scene there was only momentary anxiety prompted by
the messenger's blissful though frenzied pursuit of love's tidings, in the second, there was consternation, grief,
and anger caused by the inept report of bad news made worse in its hapless iteration. In the last, there is horror
and despair occasioned this time not by the messenger's infelicitous report but by the semblance of
grief−laden reality. It is, of course, manifest to the audience that Juliet is not dead, just as it was apparent that
Romeo was not dead in the earlier scene. One is reminded of that fact by the similarity of the elaborately
rhetorical laments in the two scenes:
Ah, welladay! He's dead, he's dead, he's dead.
We are undone, lady, we are undone.
Alack the day! He's gone, he's killed, he's dead.
[III. ii. 37−9]
Alas, alas! Help, help! My lady's dead!
Oh, welladay that ever I was born! …
She's dead, deceased, she's dead, alack the day! …
[IV. v. 14−15; 23]
The appropriateness of the Nurse's comic lament has often been questioned. Alfred Harbage, for example,
feels that the scene "is the least successful in the play" and that it might better have been relegated to a
messenger's report [see Sources for Further Study]. There is no denying that the scene contains a difficult
dramatic problem: namely, for the actors to play out a comic lamentation. Yet Juliet's false death is a dramatic
fact, and, as such, it gains impact from dramatic treatment. With its acknowledgment through the lamentation,
the Nurse can be dismissed as a catalyst in the romance plot, in Brooke's poem, where the Nurse is less
directly linked with the progress of the romance, her exit can be less effusive (in fact, she is unable, at first, to
speak a word, and finally she can only choke out the plain lament: "Dead is my childe").
The triad of "messenger scenes" reflects the progress of the love plot. In each scene, the Nurse plays a central
role. She is there as love's herald first to arrange the marriage, then to promote its consummation, and finally
to lament its expiration. The humor of her part arises largely from her personal involvement in the affairs
which she ought to conduct with detachment, and the result is that she cannot deliver a straightforward,
neutral report. In the first instance, her message misleads only momentarily, and she alone is responsible for
the sweet anxiety that its delay occasions. In the second, the message misleads more seriously, and she shares
with the conspiring events the blame for the resulting misapprehension. In the last, the message misleads
egregiously, but only false circumstances—and not the Nurse—are responsible for its effects. The Nurse is
thus seen declining as an agent of the dramatic action; gradually she must, along with all others, give way to
the ineluctable power of Fortune.
In a recent article, Stephen A. Shapiro observed that "up to Mercutio's death Romeo and Juliet is a romantic
comedy. After it, it becomes a tragedy" ["Romeo and Juliet: Reversals, Contrarieties, Transformations, and
Ambivalence," College English, XXV (April 1964)]. I believe otherwise. In Mercutio's death, I see the
culmination of comedy of manners; it is not until the Nurse makes her exit in Act IV that romantic comedy
The Nurse
141
comes to an end. Her exit thus properly comes at the end of the plot unit which Renaissance commentaries
called the epitasis, after which the stage is cleared for the enactment of the catastrophe. It is in this last unit,
the catastrophe, that the lovers are left to their own devices and that their worldly fortunes are hopelessly
reversed. Tragedy comes with the absence of intermediaries and the failure of messengers, e.g., the
unsuccessful mission of Friar John. Harry Levin has said that "tragedy tends to isolate where comedy brings
together, to reveal the uniqueness of individuals rather than what they have in common with others" ["Form
and Formality in Romeo and Juliet," Shakespeare Quarterly, XL (I960)]. It is this uniqueness of individuals,
their social isolation, which gives substance to the tragedy of Act V in Romeo and Juliet. With the Nurse
silent, and the Friar rendered ineffective, Juliet's earlier words ring as prophecy for the chilling tragic end:
"My dismal scene I needs must act alone" [IV. iii. 19]. (pp. 202−06)
Martin Stevens, "Juliet's Nurse: Love's Herald," in Papers on Language &Literature, Vol. 2, No. 3, Summer,
1966, pp. 195−206.
Mercutio
Harold C. Goddard
[Goddard declares that Mercutio, like the Nurse, is an extreme sensualist and heathen. The critic
concentrates primarily on Mercutio's crude sexual humor, noting that the character's obscene language
underscores the purity of Romeo's passion for Juliet. Goddard then addresses the issue of Mercutio's Queen
Mab speech (I. iv. 53−103), which several critics have considered out of character because of the beauty of
its language. The critic asserts that the speech is in fact representative of Mercutio's style because compared
with the imagination and delicacy of the lovers' verse, it appears superficial. According to Goddard, the
Queen Mab speech is a device used by Shakespeare to show what constitutes true poetry.]
Mercutio and the Nurse are simply youth and old age of the same type. He is aimed at the same goal she has
nearly attained. He would have become the same sort of old man that she is old woman, just as she was
undoubtedly the same sort of young girl that he is young man. They both think of nothing but sex—except
when they are so busy eating or quarreling that they can think of nothing. (I haven't forgotten Queen Mab; I'll
come to her presently.) Mercutio cannot so much as look at the clock without a bawdy thought. So permeated
is his language with indecency that most of it passes unnoticed not only by the innocent reader but by all not
schooled in Elizabethan smut. Even on our own unsqueamish stage an unabridged form of his role in its
twentieth−century equivalent would not be tolerated. Why does Shakespeare place the extreme example of
this man's soiled fantasies precisely before the balcony scene? Why but to stress the complete freedom from
sensuality of Romeo's passion? Place Mercutio's dirtiest words, as Shakespeare does, right beside Romeo's
apostrophe to his "bright angel" [II. ii. 26] and all the rest of that scene where the lyricism of young love
reaches one of its loftiest pinnacles in all poetry—and what remains to be said for Mercutio? Nothing—except
that he is Mercutio. His youth, the hot weather, the southern temperament, the fashion among Italian
gentlemen of the day, are unavailing pleas; not only Romeo, but Benvolio, had those things to contend with
also. And they escaped. Mercury is close to the sun. But it was the material sun, Sol, not the god, Helios, that
Mercutio was close to. Beyond dispute, this man had vitality, wit, and personal magnetism. But personal
magnetism compined with sexuality and pugnacity is one of the most dangerous mixtures that can exist. The
unqualified laudation that Mercutio has frequently received, and the suggestion that Shakespeare had to kill
him off lest he quite set the play's titular hero in the shade, are the best proof of the truth of that statement.
Those who are themselves seduced by Mercutio are not likely to be good judges of him. It may be retorted
that Mercutio is nearly always a success on the stage, while Romeo is likely to be insipid. The answer to that
is that while Mercutios are relatively common, Romeos are excessively rare. If Romeo proves insipid, he has
been wrongly cast or badly acted.
Mercutio
142
"But how about Queen Mab?" it will be asked. The famous description of her has been widely held to be quite
out of character and has been set down as an outburst of poetry from the author put arbitrarily in Mercutio's
mouth. But the judgment "out of character" should always be a last resort. Undoubtedly the lines, if properly
his, do reveal an unsuspected side of Mercutio. The prankish delicacy of some of them stands out in pleasing
contrast with his grosser aspects. The psychology of this is sound. The finer side of a sensualist is suppressed
and is bound to come out, if at all, incidentally, in just such a digression as this seems to be. Shakespeare can
be trusted not to leave such things out. Few passages in his plays, however, have been more praised for the
wrong reasons. The account of Queen Mab is supposed to prove Mercutio's imagination: under his pugnacity
there was a poet. It would be nearer the truth, I think, to guess that Shakespeare put it in as an example of
what poetry is popularly held to be−and is not. The lines on Queen Mab are indeed delightful. But
imagination in any proper sense they are not. They are sheer fancy. Moreover, Mercutio's anatomy and
philosophy of dreams prove that he knows nothing of their genuine import. He dubs them
the children of an idle brain,
Begot of nothing but vain fantasy.
[I. iv. 97−81]
Perhaps his are—the Queen Mab lines would seem to indicate as much. Romeo, on the other hand, holds that
dreamers "dream things true" [I. iv. 52], and gives a definition of them that for combined brevity and beauty
would be hard to better. They are "love's shadows" [V. i. 11]. And not only from what we can infer about his
untold dream on this occasion, but from all the dreams and premonitions of both Romeo and Juliet throughout
the play, they come from a fountain of wisdom somewhere beyond time. Primitives distinguish between "big"
and "little" dreams. (Aeschylus makes the same distinction in Prometheus Bound.) Mercutio, with his
aldermen and gnats and coach−makers and sweetmeats and parsons and drums and ambuscadoes, may tell us
a little about the littlest of little dreams. He thinks that dreamers are still in their day world at night. Both
Romeo and Juliet know that there are dreams that come from as far below the surface of that world as was that
prophetic tomb at the bottom of which she saw him "as one dead" [III. v. 56] at their last parting. Finally, how
characteristic of Mercutio that he should make Queen Mab a midwife and blemish his description of her by
turning her into a "hag" whose function is to bring an end to maidenhood. Is this another link between
Mercutio and the Nurse? Is Shakespeare here preparing the way for his intimation that she would be quite
capable of assisting in Juliet's corruption? It might well be. When Shakespeare writes a speech that seems to
be out of character, it generally, as in this case, deserves the closest scrutiny.
And there is another justification of the Queen Mab passage. Romeo and Juliet not only utter poetry; they are
poetry. The loveliest comment on Juliet I ever heard expressed this to perfection. It was made by a girl only a
little older than Juliet herself. When Friar Laurence recommends philosophy to Romeo as comfort in
banishment, Romeo replies:
Hang up philosophy!
Unless philosophy can make a Juliet. . .
It helps not, it prevails not. Talk no more.
[III. iii. 57−60]
"Philosophy can't," the girl observed, "but poetry can—and it did!" Over against the poetry of Juliet,
Shakespeare was bound, by the demands of contrast on which all art rests, to offer in the course of his play
examples of poetry in various verbal, counterfeit, or adulterate estates.
This precious book of love, this unbound lover,
To beautify him, only lacks a cover.
[I. iii. 87−8]
Mercutio
143
That is Lady Capulet on the prospective bridegroom, Paris. It would have taken the play's booby prize for
"poetry" if Capulet himself had not outdone it in his address to the weeping Juliet:
How now! a conduit, girl? What, still in tears?
Evermore showering? In one little body
Thou counterfeit'st a bark, a sea, a wind;
For still thy eyes, which I may call the sea,
Do ebb and flow with tears; the bark thy body is,
Sailing in this salt flood; the winds, thy sighs;
Who, raging with thy tears, and they with them,
Without a sudden calm, will overset
Thy tempest−tossed body.
[III. v. 129−37]
It is almost as if Shakespeare were saying in so many words: That is how poetry is not written. Yet, a little
later, when the sight of his daughter, dead as all suppose, shakes even this egotist into a second of sincerity, he
can say:
Death lies on her like an untimely frost
Upon the sweetest flower of all the field.
[IV. v. 28−9]
There is poetry, deep down, even in Capulet. But the instant passes and he is again talking about death as his
son−in−law—and all the rest. The Nurse's vain repetitions in this scene are further proof that she is a heathen.
Her O−lamentable−day's only stress the lack of one syllable of genuine grief or love such as Juliet's father
shows. These examples all go to show what Shakespeare is up to in the Queen Mab speech. It shines, and
even seems profound, beside the utterances of the Capulets and the Nurse. But it fades, and grows superficial,
beside Juliet's and Romeo's. It is one more shade of what passes for poetry but is not. (pp. 122−24)
Harold C. Goddard "Romeo and Juliet," in his The Meaning of Shakespeare, The University of Chicago Press,
1951, pp. 117−39.
Harley Granville−Barker
[Granville−Barker characterizes Mercutio as a supreme realist and egoist, commenting on his individuality
and his freedom from affectation. At many points throughout the following excerpt, the critic refers to
Mercutio as an Elizabethan version of a "young John Bull." The term "John Bull" is derived from a character
of the same name in John Arbuthnot's satire Law Is a Bottomless Pit (1712); over time the phrase came to
represent an individual Englishman who best typifies the favorable qualities of England.]
Mercutio, when Shakespeare finally makes up his mind about him, is in temperament very much the young
John Bull of his time; and as different from the stocky, stolid John Bull of our later picturing as Capulet from
the conventional heavy father. There can be, of course, no epitomising of a race in any one figure. But the
dominant qualities of an age are apt to be set in a pattern, which will last in literature, though out−moded, till
another replaces it.
We learn little about Mercutio as he goes racketing to Capulet's supper, except that John Bull is often a poetic
sort of fellow, or as he returns, unless it be that a man may like smut and fairy tales too. But he is still in the
toils of conventional versifying, and a victim besides, probably, to his author's uncertainty about him. The
authentic Mercutio only springs into life with
Mercutio
144
Where the devil should this Romeo be?
Came he not home to−night?
[II. iv. 1−2]
when he springs to life indeed. From now on he abounds in his own sense, and we can put him to the test the
Nurse abides by; not a thing that he says could anyone else say. He asks as little exposition, he is what he is
with perfect clarity; the more so probably because he is wholly Shakespeare's creation, his namesake in
Brooke's poem giving no hint of him. And (as with the Nurse) we could transport this authentic Mercutio into
the maturest of the plays and he would fall into place there, nor would he be out of place on any stage, in any
fiction.
A wholesome self−sufficiency is his cardinal quality; so he suitably finds place among neither Capulets nor
Montagues. Shakespeare endows him. . . with a jolly sensuality for a set off to Romeo's romancings; and, by a
later, significant touch, adds to the contrast. When their battle of wits is ending—a breathless bandying of
words that is like a sharp set at tennis—suddenly, it would seem, he throws an affectionate arm round the
younger man's shoulder.
Why, is not this better now than groaning for love?
Now art thou sociable, now art thou
Romeo, now art thou what thou art. ...
[II. iv. 88−90]
Mercutio's creed in a careless sentence! At all costs be the thing you are. The more his—and the more John
Bullish—that we find it dropped casually amid a whirl of chaff and never touched on again! Here is the man.
No wistful ideals for him; but life as it comes and death when it comes. A man of soundest common−sense
surely; the complete realist, the egoist justified. But by the day's end he has gone to his death in a cause not
his own, upon pure impulse and something very like principle. There is no inconsistency in this; such vital
natures must range between extremes.
Rightly to be great
Is not to stir without great argument,
But greatly to find quarrel in a straw,
When honour's at the stake.
[Hamlet, IV. iv. 53−6]
That is a later voice, troublously questioning. Mercutio pretends neither to greatness nor philosophy. When
the moment comes, it is not even his own honour that is at stake; but such calm, dishonourable, vile
submission is more than flesh and blood can bear. That the Mercutios of the world quarrel on principle they
would hate to be told. Quarrel with a man for cracking nuts having no other reason but because one has hazel
eyes; quarrel, with your life in your hand, for quarrel−ing's sake, since quarrelling and fighting are a part of
life, and the appetite for them human nature. Mercutio fights Tybalt because he feels he must, because he
cannot stand the fellow's airs a moment longer. He'll put him in his place, if no one else will. He fights
without malice, not in anger even, and for no advantage. He fights because he is what he is, to testify to this
simple unconscious faith, and goes in with good honest cut and thrust. But "alia stoccata carries it away" [III.
i. 74]; and he, the perfect realist, the egoist complete, dies for an ideal. Extremes have met.
No regrets though; nor any hypocrisy of resignation for him! He has been beaten by the thing he despised, and
is as robustly angry about it as if he had years to live in which to get his own back.
Zounds, a dog, a rat, a mouse, a cat, to scratch a man to death!
A braggart, a rogue, a villain, that fights by the book of arithmetic.
Mercutio
145
[III. i. 100−02]
He is brutally ingenuous with Romeo:
Why the devil came you between us?
I was hurt under your arm.
[III. i. 102−03]
He says no more to him after that, quite ignores the pitifully futile
I thought all for the best.
[III. i. 104]
He dies with his teeth set, impenitently himself to the last. (pp. 48−51)
Harley Granville−Barker, "Romeo and Juliet," in his Prefaces to Shakespeare, second series, Sidgwick
&Jackson, Ltd., 1930, pp. 1−66.
Friar Lawrence
Bert Cardullo
[Cardullo focuses on Friar Lawrence's actions to demonstrate that the play's catastrophe results from the
rash behavior of several characters. The critic argues that had the priest acted with less haste, the lovers'
tragic deaths might have been prevented. Cardullo also contends that Friar Lawrence's rashness is
underscored by the Nurse's hesitation in informing Juliet of the arrangements of her secret marriage and of
Tybalt's death. Furthermore, the impulsiveness of Romeo, Capulet, and the Friar was bred by the feud, which,
according to the critic, accounts for the characters' failure to recognize their flaw.]
"It has been objected," writes Frank Kermode [in his introduction to Romeo and Juliet in The Riverside
Shakespeare, ed. G. Blakemore Evans], "that [Romeo and Juliet] lacks tragic necessity— that the story
becomes tragic only by a trick. … [There is a conviction that] Shakespeare offends against his own criteria for
tragedy by allowing mere chance to determine the destiny of the hero and heroine." We learn of the "trick"
when Friar John, whom Friar Laurence has sent to Mantua with a letter telling Romeo to come and take Juliet
away when she awakens from her long sleep, returns and says:
Going to find a barefoot brother out,
One of our order, to associate me,
Here in this city visiting the sick,
And finding him, the searchers of the town,
Suspecting that we both were in a house
Where the infectious pestilence did reign,
Seal'd up the doors and would not let us forth
So that my speed to Mantua there was stay'd … ,
I could not send it—here it is again—
Nor get a messenger to bring it thee,
So fearful were they of infection.
[V.ii. 5−12, 14−16]
The trick, supposedly, is the plague that has afflicted Verona and delayed Friar John, because he just
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146
happened to choose for a traveling companion a brother who had been attending the ill. R. G. Moulton is one
of those who argue that "the … tragedy has all been brought about by [chance, by the] accidental detention of
Friar John" [The Moral System of Shakespeare]. Brian Gibbons [in the Arden edition of Romeo and Juliet]
argues similarly of Romeo's discovery that a feast is to take place at Capulet's house: "[Here] Shakespeare
emphasizes the element of chance in the action. The servant Capulet has chosen [to deliver invitations]
happens to be illiterate, a fact which his master has forgotten. … The meeting with Romeo is sheer accident
and after the servant turns away, by chance Romeo regrets his off−hand answer and takes the list."
Character, not chance, is at work at this point in the play. Capulet, in his typically rash manner, sends an
illiterate servant on an errand that requires reading. The servants meeting with Romeo may be an accident, but
Shakespeare undercuts this aspect of it and emphasizes Romeo's own impulsiveness. He teases the servant,
claiming to be able to read "if I know the letters and the language" [I. ii. 61]—the servant interprets this to
mean that Romeo cannot read, when it really means that he can read only the language he knows. When the
servant starts on his way to find someone who can read, Romeo suddenly decides to help him and calls him
back; he reads the list aloud and learns that the people on it are invited to Capulet's house. Capulet repeats this
pattern in Act III, Scene iv: Paris starts to leave and he impulsively calls him back, offering him Juliet's hand.
Friar Laurence repeats it again in Act IV, Scene i. After telling Juliet that nothing can postpone her marriage
to Paris and hearing her declare that she will kill herself rather than break her vow to Romeo, he says, "Hold,
daughter" [1. 68], echoing Romeo's "Stay, fellow" [I. ii. 63] to the servant, and on the spur of the moment
offers her, in the sleeping potion, a desperate way out of her dilemma.
Romeo's and Capulet's impulsiveness or rashness has been well documented. Capulet's offer of Juliet in
marriage to Paris without first consulting his daughter is followed by the equally impulsive, and ultimately
disastrous, action of advancing the wedding from Thursday to Wednesday. The most obvious example of
impulsive behavior on Romeo's part occurs when, upon hearing from Balthasar that Juliet is dead, he goes
immediately to the Apothecary's to buy poison with which to kill himself at her side, instead of first
investigating the circumstances of her "death." Unlike Romeo's and Capulet's, Friar Laurence's rashness has
not been explored; it is, however, essential to an understanding of the play as tragic as opposed to pathetic.
Just as the illiterate servant, Paris, and Juliet in the above examples are not offered what they desire by
chance, neither is Friar John detained by the plague by chance. The first cause of his delay is Friar Laurence's
rashness. He sends John to Mantua alone, when he should remember, as Brian Gibbons points out, that "the
rule of the [Franciscan] order forbade [Friar John] to travel without the company of another [Franciscan]
friar." John is detained because the companion that he finds has had contact with the sick; as a precaution,
both he and the other friar are quarantined to prevent the spread of the disease. Even if it is argued that it was
Friar John's responsibility to find a traveling companion, not Friar Laurence's to find one for him, the latter
should still have foreseen the improbability of his confrere's choosing a "safe" Franciscan companion in a city
beset by the plague (the Franciscans would be ministering to the sick, and would therefore be capable of
spreading the infection). He should have gone to the trouble of providing a Franciscan companion for Friar
John who had not had contact with the disease, or perhaps he should even have gone with him himself. Surely
Friar Laurence knew of the plague's existence in Verona. Had Friar John left the city immediately in the
company of a "safe" member of his order, he would never have been delayed and would have been able to
deliver the letter to Romeo. (pp. 404−07)
In my view, the flaw of impulsiveness or rashness … [explains] the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet Friar
Laurence's rashness is responsible for Friar John's detention, not chance. And it is equally responsible for
Balthasar's reaching Mantua, undeterred, with news of Juliet's "death." It is the Friar's fault that Balthasar is
unaware of her feigned death. In Act III, upon sending Romeo to spend the night with Juliet and then to flee to
Mantua, Friar Laurence says to him, "I'll find out your man, / And he shall signify from time to time / Every
good hap to you that chances here" [III. iii. 169−71]. We know that, before departing for Mantua, Romeo tells
Balthasar of his role as happy go−between, since the latter says to him in Act V, "O pardon me for bringing
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147
these ill news, / Since you did leave it for my office, sir" [V. i. 22−3]. It is another mark of Romeo's
impulsiveness that he does not question this "ill news" from a source whose office it was to "signify from time
to time / Every good hap to [him] that chances [in Verona]." Romeo asks if Balthasar has been sent by the
Friar, but he gets no reply and neglects to ask again. He never inquires what his servant or Friar Laurence
knows about the circumstances surrounding the death of one so young as Juliet.
The Friar, of course, never does find Balthasar and apprise him of the plan to get Juliet out of the marriage to
Paris so that she can be reunited with Romeo. Had he sent Balthasar instead of Friar John to Mantua with the
letter, the deaths of Romeo and Juliet would have been prevented. Presumably, Romeo would have returned to
Verona at the appointed time to take Juliet away. Just as, in his haste to aid Romeo and Juliet, Friar Laurence
forgets about the infectious disease that afflicts Verona and that will ultimately detain Friar John, he forgets to
send Balthasar in John's place (as he had told Romeo he would) and even to inform him of the plan to reunite
the lovers. Friar Laurence and Balthasar are acting independently to serve Romeo, whereas they should be
acting together. Similarly, Friar John is acting "independently" when he leaves Friar Laurence's cell without a
Franciscan companion. The image of John and a fellow friar, finally acting together but quarantined for it, and
helpless to prevent the tragedy, is the opposite of that of Friar Laurence and Balthasar at the end of the play,
finally discovering each other's separate actions but "freed" or pardoned for them by the Prince, and able to
join in the two families' reconciliation.
The most obvious example of Friar Laurence's rashness or impulsiveness occurs in Act II, when he decides to
honor Romeo's request to marry Juliet. The Friar's intentions are good; he hopes, by joining the lovers in
marriage, "to turn [their] households' rancour to pure love" [II. iii. 92]. But he acts without considering fully
the possible consequences of such a secret marriage between members of feuding families. Ironically, he
violates his own dictum: "Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast" [II. iii. 94]. In order to make Friar
Laurence's rashness stand out, Shakespeare contrasts it with the hesitation or delay of the Nurse—the only
other character (except perhaps Balthasar) with knowledge of Romeo and Juliet's secret union, and one who
exhibits her own bit of impulsiveness in switching her preference of husbands for Juliet from Romeo to Paris
once the former has been banished from Verona. Like the other characters' impulsiveness, the Nurse's turns
out to have tragic consequences: her sudden disparagement of Romeo is the immediate cause of Juliet's
decision to ask the Friar how she can remain faithful to him, how she can avoid marriage to Paris.
In Act II, Scene v, the Nurse returns home to give her mistress Romeo's message: Juliet is to "... devise / Some
means to come to shrift this afternoon, / And there ... at Friar Laurence's cell / Be shriv'd and married" [II. iv.
179−82]. But, contrary to our expectations, the Nurse does not give her the happy news right away. The scene
consists of 78 lines; the Nurse enters on line 17 and does not give her message until lines [68−9]. She claims
that she is tired and aching and needs to catch her breath; she is also, of course, teasing the impatient Juliet.
But the Nurse's behavior here has an underlying meaning: Shakespeare delays the giving of the message as
long as possible, in contrast with his hastening the Friar's agreement to marry Romeo and Juliet two scenes
before, in order to suggest that the message is something Juliet should not want to hear and abide by. Marriage
to Romeo will mean her doom, yet she rushes to it. Throughout Act II, Scene v, she is "hot" to hear what her
lover has to say (the Nurse says to her on line 62, "Are you so hot?"; similarly, Lady Capulet tells her husband
in Act III, when he is insisting that Juliet marry Paris, "You are too hot" [III. v. 175]).
In Act III, Scene ii, the Nurse hesitates in announcing the sad news of Tybalt's death to Juliet. Although this
scene is almost twice as long as Scene v of Act II (143 lines to 78), and the Nurse consequently enters on line
31 instead of 17, she waits only until lines 69−70 to give her message. … The Nurse's delay is long enough,
however, to provoke this response from Juliet: "What devil art thou that dost torment me thus?" [III. ii. 43].
The Nurse is naturally in shock over the death of Tybalt; she barely acknowledges Juliet upon entering. But,
as in Act II, Scene v, her behavior here has an underlying meaning. Shakespeare has her hesitate in giving the
news of Tybalt's death, in contrast with his having Friar Laurence rush to get the news of Juliet's seeming
death to Romeo four scenes later [IV. i], in order to connect Juliet's own impulsiveness with Romeo's and to
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148
prefigure both their deaths at the end of the play. The Nurse's delay brings out a quality in Juliet that the
Friar's haste helps to bring out in Romeo. When the Nurse does not immediately reveal who has been slain,
Juliet assumes that Romeo is dead and vows to join him: "Vile earth to earth resign, end motion here, / And
thou and Romeo press one heavy bier" [III. ii. 59−60].
She does not commit suicide until the last scene of the play, of course; here she is foreshadowing that suicide
and Romeo's own. Wrongly believing her dead because Balthasar reached him and Friar John did not, Romeo
poisons himself beside her bier; awaking to find him dead, Juliet stabs herself. The Nurse's delay, unlike Friar
Laurence's haste, is not itself lethal. She corrects Juliet's erroneous assumption and tells her that "Tybalt is
gone and Romeo banished. / Romeo that kill'd him, he is banished" [III. ii. 69−70]. Juliet will live to love
Romeo before being parted from him once and for all in Act III, Scene v. Once he receives Balthasar's fateful
report, Romeo will not live to love her again.
Character, then—Friar Laurence's, Capulet's, Romeo's—determines the destiny of Romeo and Juliet, not
chance. It has often been said that the play is in part about the hastiness of youth. I would say that it is in part
about the hastiness of everyone, of the old as well as the young. One of the oddities of this tragedy is that the
flaw of impulsiveness or rashness is shared by at least three characters. (Juliet's and the Nurse's impulsive
moments are not as numerous and significant as the three men's. Clearly Tybalt and Mercutio are impulsive,
though not as central to the action as the trio; the impulsiveness of Capulet extends all the way to his servants,
who start the fight with Montague's men in the first scene.)
Another oddity is that neither Capulet, Romeo, nor Friar Laurence ever has any recognition of his flaw. This
suggests, less that they are not fully tragic or sufficiently introspective, than that their impulsiveness was bred
by the unnatural state in which they lived—by the long−standing feud between the two families, which
affected even non−family members like Friar Laurence. This may help to explain Shakespeare's curious
mention only one time of the "infectious pestilence" afflicting Verona. The infectious pestilence may be seen
as a metaphor for the spiritual one—the feud and its resultant impulsiveness—bedeviling two prominent
families in the city and their circles. Friar John is confined so as to prevent the spread of infection and kill the
plague. His confinement leads to the deaths of Romeo and Juliet and as a result, paradoxically, to the killing
of the spiritual plague afflicting their families.
Once the feud is about to end as a consequence of the deaths of the lovers, impulsiveness in characters like
Capulet and Friar Laurence disappears; tranquility rules in its place. Impulsiveness nearly possesses a life of
its own in Romeo and Juliet; to the extent that no one mentions the original cause of the feud, the flaw that it
bred appears almost as one disconnected from character. It comes to Verona, one does not know exactly
whence, and it goes. Romeo gives the following speech before going to the feast at Capulet's house:
I fear too early, for my mind misgives
Some consequence yet hanging in the stars
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night's revels, and expire the term
Of a despised life clos'd in my breast
By some vile forfeit of untimely death.
But he that hath the steerage of my course
Direct my suit. . . .
[I. iv. 106−13]
Perhaps the "despised life" enclosed in Romeo's breast is the very impulsiveness that I have been speaking of.
And perhaps the "consequence yet hanging in the stars" is its destruction at its own hands. Impulsiveness has
spread among the members of both families, and to their friends, to the point that it must conflict with itself:
Romeo and Juliet's marriage, with Capulet's intention to give his daughter to Paris; Friar Laurence's plan to
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save Juliet from a second union, with Capulet's desire to see her wed even earlier than planned; Juliet's
feigned death, with Romeo's suicide.
Impulsiveness is the real villain in this play that has no villains. It finally extinguishes itself, but not before
Mercutio, Tybalt, Paris, Romeo, and Juliet are killed by it. Obviously, we do not lament impulsiveness'
passing at the end at Romeo and Juliet. But we may have been fascinated by its having afflicted almost
everyone in the circumscribed world of the drama, instead of isolating itself in a single tragic figure. This may
have something to do with the play's origins in comedy. The reconciliation of two feuding houses through
marriage is normally a subject of comedy; Shakespeare made it a subject of tragedy. Furthermore, as H. B.
Charlton has observed [in his Shakespearian Tragedy], unlike the figures of Shakespeare's other tragedies,
Romeo and Juliet have "none of the pomp of historic circumstance about them; they [are] socially of the
minor aristocracy who … stock [the] comedies. ... To choose such folk as these for tragic heroes was
aesthetically wellnigh an anarchist's gesture." To afflict a miniature society with the flaw of impulsiveness,
instead of a single tragic hero, was probably aesthetically well−nigh an anarchist's gesture, too. But it had the
effect of making the flaw seem endemic to the society and thus of allowing the characters to exhibit it without
final awareness, in much the same way that comic characters frequently exhibit foibles without ever being
aware of them. Accordingly the thought and the talk at the end of Romeo and Juliet are of reconciliation of the
Montague and Capulet families, not of full tragic recognition; no one identifies the flaw that led to the
catastrophe, or any individual manifestations of it (Friar Laurence admits that he married Romeo and Juliet
and gave her the sleeping potion, but he does not connect these actions with impulsiveness or rashness,
leaving it to the Prince to decide if he has done anything wrong). Shakespeare has his "comic" ending, arrived
at by a tragic route. (pp. 407−13)
Bert Cardullo, "The Friar's Flaw, the Play's Tragedy: The Experiment of 'Romeo and Juliet'," in CLA Journal,
Vol. XXVIII, No. 4, June, 1985, pp. 404−14.
Overview
Douglas Cole
[Cole outlines the major elements of Romeo and Juliet that have typically generated the most commentary in
an attempt to explain both the play's significance and its enduring appeal. The critic discusses the tragedy in
relation to Shakespeare's other writings; how the playwright adapted the drama from the sources and
traditional dramatic and poetic models available to him; the play's language, structure, and themes; and its
adherence to conventional tragic dramaturgy, or theatrical representation. In addition, Cole analyzes three
principal thematic readings of Romeo and Juliet —(1) a tragedy of character in which the lovers are punished
for their reckless passion; (2) a tragedy of destiny in which fate is responsible for Romeo's and Juliet's deaths;
and (3) a tragedy of divine providence in which God sacrifices the lovers to reconcile the feuding families.
The critic then asserts that the play presents a synthesis of all three issues in its emphasis on the idea that
tragic disaster is an inescapable consequence of the precarious balance between good and evil in the world.]
How does one create an enduring literary myth out of a sentimental romance, a love story already rehearsed in
prose and verse in several languages? How does one turn a pair of young lovers into figures of such
imaginative stature that they will fire the emotions of audiences for centuries to come and even obscure the
competing images of lovers from classical mythology and medieval legend? Shakespeare never had to ask
such questions of himself when he began to write Romeo and Juliet, but the response of the world audience to
his play since that time has made them inevitable. No case has to be made for the continuing vitality of Romeo
and Juliet. Its stage history (outmatched only by Hamlet's) reveals a nearly unbroken chain of performances
for more than three and a half centuries. It has inspired music, opera, ballet, literature, musical comedy, and
film. Modern criticism, taking the play's impact for granted, attempts to elucidate some of the things that
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made Shakespeare's achievement possible (his source materials, his era's literary and dramatic conventions,
and his own earlier writing, for example); to define the qualities of its structure and language; and to explore
its relationships to Shakespeare's later tragedies. The results of this critical effort help us understand some of
the answers to our opening questions, but not yet all. (p. 1)
Transformation of Sources and Conventions
It was common dramatic practice in Shakespeare's day to draw upon known history, legend, and story for the
plot material of plays. Shakespeare did not have to invent the basic story of Romeo and Juliet. Nor did he have
to invent a totally new kind of poetic language for handling the theme of love. Such a language lay at hand in
contemporary love poetry, with its stock of characteristic metaphors, paradoxes, and conceits derived from
Petrarch's famed Italian love poems. Neither was the combination of a lyrically developed love story and
dramatic tragedy altogether novel, although it was far more common in the early Elizabethan theater to find
love themes treated in comedy. Whatever hints were provided for Shakespeare by all these traditions he was
able to refashion into something uniquely superior.
The story of Romeo and Juliet was already an old one when Shakespeare decided to dramatize it for the
Elizabethan stage. There were at least half a dozen versions circulating earlier in the century in Italy and
France, and two of them had been adapted by English translators. Shakespeare apparently relied chiefly on
Arthur Brooke's long poetic version, The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet, first published in 1562 and
reissued twenty−five years later. (pp. 2−3)
Many modern readers of Shakespeare may be unaware of the immense difference between the ordinary verse
of the Elizabethan age and Shakespearean poetry. They are likely to be even more unfamiliar with the usual
quality of dramatic speech written for the developing Elizabethan stage. (pp. 3−4)
The lyricism of Shakespeare's play lifts it far above the stumbling verse of other Elizabethan playwrights, and
places it closer to the more literary traditions of love poetry, especially to the flourishing cult of the sonnet.
The verse in Romeo and Juliet borrows heavily from sonnet conventions of metaphor and feeling, but
manages also, as critics never tire of pointing out, to move beyond the conventions to something still more
impressive. When Romeo and Juliet at their first encounter share the lines of a sonnet, Shakespeare shows us
how a poetic convention can take on entirely new life in a dramatic context.
There is new life as well in Shakespeare's approach to the subject of young love itself. When the Elizabethans
wrote tragedies of love, they were likely to emphasize the more lustful and obsessive qualities of passion,
aspects which Shakespeare also had taken up in his long poems Venus and Adonis (1593) and The Rape of
Lucrece (1594). The fashion in Italian tragedy, imitated both in France and in England, was to stress the
mastery of the god Cupid, who was often portrayed as a malevolent, gloating tyrant. Some of this feeling
filters into Dido, Queen of Carthage, the love tragedy written by Shakespeare's influential contemporary
Christopher Marlowe. In Dido the heroine is more a victim than a celebrant of love, and the pattern of action
stresses frustration and the pains of love denied or abandoned. The predominant strategy of Elizabethan
dramatists was to present characters who were "love−crossed" rather than star−crossed. Their figures lack the
sense of mutual dedication and individual purpose that inspires Romeo and Juliet. The love of Shakespeare's
characters is conveyed with more compassion and innocence than can be found anywhere else in Renaissance
drama.
Although Shakespeare's lovers are more idealized than those found either in Brooke's poem or in Elizabethan
love tragedies, and although they speak with a language more lyrical than that of their counterparts in these
earlier works, they never become ethereal fantasies. One major reason for this (and another distinguishing
element in Romeo and Juliet) is the way in which passion and sentiment are modulated with both comic gusto
and tragic irony. Mercutio and Juliet's Nurse, for example, are original comic developments of characters
mentioned in the source story; in the play they not only become vital and amusing in themselves but also help
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to link the romance of Romeo and Juliet with an earthy sense of reality. On the tragic side, Shakespeare
establishes thematic patterns of greater subtlety and paradox than the usual irony of "destructive passion"; his
patterns suggest that even the virtues of loyalty, peace−making, and total personal dedication can unwittingly
cooperate to bring about disaster.
Perhaps even more important is the way Shakespeare uses both comedy and tragedy to enhance each other in
one play. His earlier Titus Andronicus had relied all too heavily on the sensationalistic devices of the
neo−Senecan fashion in tragedy: wholesale slaughter, severed hands, rape, children's bodies cut up and served
as part of their parents' meal. In Romeo and Juliet, thankfully, Shakespeare was trying something new. The
tragic pattern he employed was imposed on materials, characters and moods appropriate to comedy and
fashion: a comic nurse and clown, obstructing parents, duels of wit and parodic banter, the playful humor of
hero and heroine. Shakespeare seems characteristically intent on stretching the range of tone usually assumed
in early tragedy. He gives us not a comic play that somehow turns out tragically, but a more complex
experience that weaves together intense, lyrically celebrated young love, vivacious and often bawdy wit, and
the threatening, obstructive forces of ignorance, ill will, and chance—a combination which expresses the
human impulse to affirm what is precious and beautiful in life in the very midst of a more pervasive hostility
and baseness in the conditions and circumstances of life itself.
When compared with Shakespeare's later tragedies, the play may reveal a certain lack of profundity, a less
far−reaching and momentous drive to open up the disturbing depths of human conduct and capacity. For some
critics Romeo and Juliet is not yet "mature" tragedy; but we must remember that their norm is based on what
Shakespeare himself did afterwards, not on what anyone in the Elizabethan theater had done earlier. It is
perhaps fairer to say that the kind of tragic experience Romeo and Juliet offers us is different rather than
immature, an experience less morally complex than others, but no less valid as an image of deeply moving
aspects of our own awareness of life's promises and betrayals.
Poetic and Dramatic Language
If Romeo and Juliet marks Shakespeare's first original movement toward serious tragedy, it also marks a
movement toward a dramatic language of increasing flexibility and expressiveness. The play shows the poet
trying to integrate his skills of verse structure, rhyme, metaphor, and ingenious wordplay with dramatic skills
of characterization through style of language and gesture, exposition through action as well as declamation,
and imagery patterns that function to blind a diversified scenario into a unified thematic order. Shakespeare's
work here displays a texture of marked formality, notable in the abundant rhyme, extended conceits, and
above all in a wide range of "set pieces"— among them Mercutio's Queen Mab passage, Friar Lawrence's
sermons, Juliet's epithalamion [a song or poem written to celebrate a wedding], Paris's elegy, the sonnet
shared by the lovers at their first meeting, and the aubade [a song of lovers parting at dawn] at their farewell.
In patterning so much of the dialogue on these very literary models, Shakespeare was clearly stretching his
medium to see what it could do. He was writing this play in the period that included the highly elaborated
language of Love's Labour's Lost, the extended complaints of Richard II, the lavishly decorative erotic poems
Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece, and his own contribution to the sonnet−cycle fashion. In Romeo
and Juliet we find Shakespeare's virtuosity with formal poetic language extended not only by the demands of
dramatic contect, but also by an awareness of how easily formality may slip into artificiality. Shakespeare
seems to have delighted in trying his hand at many different kinds of verbal play, but always with some tact
about crossing the boundaries of what is truly acceptable. More than any other dramatist of the period, he is
capable of inserting near−parodies of the conventional themes and devices he is exploiting. By such means he
seems to remind his audience, as Juliet reminds Romeo: "Conceit [i.e., true understanding or invention], more
rich in matter than in words, / Brags of his substance, not of ornament" "[II, vi. 30−1].
[Samuel Taylor] Coleridge was perhaps right when he claimed that in this play the poet had not yet "entirely
blended" with the dramatist, implying that these elements of poetic formality do not always seem to work
effectively in dramatic context. Samuel Johnson much earlier had complained that the characters were always
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left with a conceit [i.e., an elaborate parallel or metaphor] in their misery—"a miserable conceit"; and actors
and actresses in every generation have had their problems with the labored lamentations of Juliet and Romeo
in Act Three. Critics move from such examples of awkwardness (only awkwardly justified by the Elizabethan
taste for that sort of thing), to matters of tired convention or excessively developed imagery, such as we find
in Romeo's first speeches on love or Lady Capulet's comparison of Paris to a book. Here there is more room
for argument that Shakespeare knew what he was doing in supplying the love−sick pup Romeo with the most
familiar catalogue of Petrarchan oxymora [a combination of contradictory terms] ("O brawling love, O loving
hate, . . . O heavy lightness, serious vanity, . . . Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health. ..." [I. i.
176, 178, 180]), or giving Lady Capulet such artificially toned sentiments, or providing such a bathetic chorus
of grief in the Capulet household when Juliet's "death" is discovered. One can sense in the kind of language
used at such points a corresponding emotional or imaginative immaturity in the character, a weakness which
will help define later a strength or intensity somewhere else. In a play that works so well with contrasts in
theme and mood, contrasts in language have a fit place.
Most critical skepticism disappears in response to the lyrical language of the balcony scene or of the farewell
at dawn. Many playgoers know the purple passages from these scenes by heart, but what is often forgotten is
the way Shakespeare has rendered his poetry effective by constructing the scene which contains it so that
theatrical dimensions (setting, timing, entrances and exits, interplay between characters, etc.) provide the real
foundation for the charm and power of the words. There is a "language" in the scenario itself, and in the
sequence of actions and reactions within a given scene, which enables the poetic language to convey its
maximum meaning and feeling. (pp. 4−8)
Structure
Critical commonplaces regarding the structure of Romeo and Juliet tend to emphasize a handful of its
characteristics: the swift pace of the action, which Shakespeare compresses into a few days' duration
dramatized in two dozen scenes, many of which center on sudden reversals and the need for quick decisions;
the emphatic juxtaposition of comic characters and attitudes with foreboding and destructive situations; the
heightening of the young lovers' purity of feeling by contrast both with the lustier attitudes of the Nurse and
Mercutio and with Romeo's studied infatuation with Rosaline; the more obvious contrasts between love and
hate, youth and age, impetuous action and helpless wisdom; the efficiency and impact of the central reversal
scene of Mercutio's death; and finally, for critics with allegiance to Aristotelian tragic formulas, the excessive
reliance on sheer accident or chance in order to move the events toward a disaster which seems less inevitable
than tragedy demands.
Qualities of pace and contrast are best sensed in performance, where it becomes clear how increasingly
masterful Shakespeare's theatrical skill is becoming. He is able to convey more by the pace and proportion of
action than he had been even in the violent early history plays. "Proportion" is perhaps a vague term, but it
does cover the skill by which Shakespeare shapes his presentation of the lovers' destiny. We are never directly
aware, for example, that Romeo and Juliet are actually together to share only 330 lines throughout the whole
play, about one−ninth of the play's length; but that proportion helps nevertheless to accent the intensity and
rarity of feeling embodied in their encounters, as well as to impress upon us the weight and complexity of the
outside world's "doings" which obstruct the couple and aid in destroying them. (pp. 10−11)
The comic texture of the play is also kept under a fine control. Roughly one−sixth of the total dialogue can be
called comic, and practically all of it is confined to that part of the play before Mercutio's death. It helps to
build, even within the more threatening outlines of the family feud, a hearty atmosphere of comradeship, wit,
gaiety and high spirits—an atmosphere which seems to hold out a promise for the budding love of Romeo and
Juliet, but which turns out to be explosive. Each comic character or event is made to harbor an ironic
counterthrust: the gaiety at the ball is marred by a vengeful Tybalt; the witty Mercutio harbors a fatal itch to
fight; the sympathetic Nurse betrays her drastic lack of sensitivity when she urges Juliet to forget Romeo and
marry Paris. The unifying symbol for these comic people and events, as well as for the lovers themselves and
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the bustling world about them, can be found in the Friar's osier cage: those flowers, plants, and weeds—some
beautiful, many capable of both healing and destroying, all very natural and part of the mortal earth.
The earth that's nature's mother is her tomb;
What is her burying grave, that is her womb;
And from her womb children of divers kind
We sucking on her natural bosom find:
Many for many virtues excellent
None but for some, and yet all different.
O mickle is the powerful grace that lies
In plants, herbs, stones, and their true qualities;
For nought so vile that on the earth doth live
But to the earth some special good doth give;
Nor aught so good but, strained from that fair use,
Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse.
Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied.
And vice sometime by action dignified.
[II. iii. 9−22]
That comedy and tragedy lie down together in this play not only points up the reversal in mood that takes
place with the killing of Mercutio and Tybalt, but illustrates again the inner paradox of our mortal nature.
Theme
I take that paradox, as stated by the Friar, to be at the heart of this play, and also a foreshadowing of a theme
given further embodiment in Shakespeare's later tragedies. Others have suggested differing central themes for
Romeo and Juliet, ranging from a literal insistence on the lovers' star−crossed fate, to a Freudian view of their
experience as an embodiment of the death−wish; from a neo−orthodox−Elizabethan lesson in the dangers of
passion, to a providential triumph of love over hate.
The reasons for such diversity are discoverable in the play, which seems to hold out a number of keys to
interpretation. If we look only at the conclusion, with the reconciled parents and the promise of a golden
monument, we may be inclined to see the mysterious ways of Providence working toward good. If we listen
chiefly to the Friar's moral admonitions, rather than to his reflections on the natural condition cited above, we
may agree that haste and lack of wise forethought bring about the disaster. If we catalogue all the tricks played
by chance (particularly Friar John's undelivered message and the unhappy timing of arrivals and awakenings
in the final scene), we may see it all as the workings of a hostile external Fate. Tragic theorists become
disheartened at the lack of a more highly developed moral consciousness in the central figures and the
corresponding lack of close cause−and−effect integration between such characterization and the destructive
outcome. And students of Elizabethan piety (both familial and religious) are inclined to feel more harshly
about Romeo and Juliet themselves than even Friar Lawrence does at his most chiding moments. The
interpretive problem is a problem involving proportion and balance: a balanced view of the play must rest on
an awareness of the delicate balance of its diverse elements. To emphasize one to the exclusion of the rest will
not give us a theme worthy of the play's actual structure or the dramatic experience it yields in performance.
It is undeniable that the strategy of the play generates strong sympathy for the lovers, heightens their
superiority in richness and purity of feeling, and awakens our compassion for their plight. It is also undeniable
that Romeo in particular is both reckless and desperate at the wrong moments; partly because he is in love,
partly because he is young, partly because he is the histrionic Romeo. By the end of the play Shakespeare
makes more of a man of him than the miserable boy (of Act III) grovelling in tears on the Friar's floor, but he
also gives him a cruel power with that added strength and determination: the slaying of Paris is the dramatic
proof. The combination is deliberate: Shakespeare's sources contain neither the heightened sense of the lovers'
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innocence nor Paris's murder. The play does not prove that Romeo and Juliet should not have yielded to their
love for one another, or disobeyed their parents, or been so quick to marry or to kill themselves. It does
suggest that the flower of an innocent love, because of the earth in which it was planted, could foster its own
destruction. Shakespeare hints at a natural disaster rather than a moral one, but his conclusion urges something
beyond disaster: that such a destruction may in turn foster the reconciliation ofthe elders who do not
understand love. The beauty and harmony of the lovers does not die with them. (pp. 11−13)
The envy, ill will, and aggressiveness that characterize the feud do not represent the total threat to the love of
the central figures. The feud is always present as a dangerous obstructing condition; it is a reason for keeping
things secret which if known would resolve many complications. But it is not of itself a villainous thing that
destroys the lovers intentionally. To understand its limitations as an element in the whole balance is to realize
that the play cannot be summed up as a conflict between the forces of young love and old hate. Tragic
destruction results from a pattern which includes as well the unaccountable element of chance and the more
pervading element of unawareness. So many incidents in the play exhibit people who do not know what they
are really doing, people who are both agents and victims of an unthinking impetuosity. The spectrum ranges
from the vulgar servants of the opening scene through Mercutio's duel, Capulet's marriage−planning, the
murder of Paris, to Romeo's suicide and the Friar's fear of being discovered at the tomb. Clearly this kind of
unawareness leads to an irony often associated with tragedy (although it is also a standard tool of the comedy
writer who builds a complication out of interlocking misunderstandings), but in the context of Shakespeare's
play it does more than heighten suspense and trigger an agonized "If only he knew!" audience reaction. It
serves to impress upon us a basic condition of human interaction— our unconscious limitations in
understanding the motives of others (and of ourselves), our ultimate helplessness in the face of the multiple
possibilities of things going awry. Once this quality is fully felt, we cannot be content with condemning either
stupidity or "rude will" as the basis of destructive evil. We are led once more to an insight or a perception of
the mortal world which is broader than the strictly moral one: tragic destruction, though often the consequence
of human decision, is beyond that an irremediable aspect of the natural world and man's limited
consciousness. That perception is somewhat muted by Shakespeare's concluding reconciliation, but because it
is grounded in the conditions of human interaction in the play, it cannot be an element totally "resolved" by
this or any other kind of ending.
Fate and Coincidence
Two final problems related to this quality or insight remain. One is the problem of Fate. The other is the
feeling that Romeo and Juliet lacks tragic inevitability precisely because so much of the action turns on
ignorance that might have been remedied and on sheer mistiming. The prologue, the foreboding dreams and
intimations of death, and the futility of the elaborately planned attempts to restore Romeo and Juliet to one
another all tend to stress that the destiny of the lovers is fated. Each move that they make toward each other is
matched by some counterthrust; and though there is no villain or human agent behind the opposition, some
readers have felt that Fate itself takes on the quality of a destructive agent, moving events and characters in
cruel combination to produce the disastrous outcome. Romeo may want to defy the stars, but in that very
defiance he is unwittingly cooperating in his own doom. The trouble with this interpretation again lies in what
it must leave out or ignore. If we are to judge the reconciling conclusion of the play as inappropriate to the
major design of the tragedy, as a last−minute excrescence that does not fit well with earlier motifs, then
perhaps we may rest content with the vision of inimical Fate. But if we see the ending as purposeful, and as an
evocation of the paradoxical good that can spring from a lamented destruction, the simple view of Fate will
not satisfy. Nor can we ignore what Shakespeare characteristically stresses in all his tragic drama: the
connections between the character of men and the disaster that may befall them. In this case, we have only to
recall the care Shakespeare has taken to show us Romeo in an unheroic and desperate hysteria after he has
killed Tybalt: a scene frequently embarrassing to actors but nevertheless integral to the play. It shows us the
emotional proclivity in Romeo without which the external misfortunes and mischances would not have
culminated in his death. If Shakespeare had wanted to put full strength into the Fate motif, he could also have
employed such allegorical devices as had appeared in the contemporary play Soliman and Perseda [by
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Thomas Kidd], in which choral figures called Love, Death, and Fortune debate the relative power of their
influence on the human lives in the story. The personification of a hostile Fate or Fortune was a fashionable
convention in the neo−Senecan tragedy of the Elizabethans; the theme was equally conventional. In Romeo
and Juliet however, Shakespeare was moving in another direction. His developing vision of a tragic universe
was not to be defined by hostile fatality, but by a paradoxical and all too precarious balance of good and evil.
(pp. 14−16)
Time is the enemy even more than chance; it presses in upon the lovers in countless ways—the dawn brings
the threat of discovery; a bare second enables the envious sword of Tybalt to fell Mercutio; the marriage date
foreshortened by a capricious Capulet demands swift counterplans and decisions, which bring, in turn,
disaster. The fast−paced world that Shakespeare builds up around his characters allows little possibility for
adherence to Friar Lawrence's counsel of "Wisely and slow" [II. ill. 94]. In such a world to stumble tragically
is surely no less inevitable than it is for Lear to go mad in the face of human ingratitude. In a vivid
performance of the play, things happen so swiftly and suddenly that issues of probability hardly arise. Add the
fact that the emotions behind the catastrophe have been made probable, and we readily see why we do not
look upon the death of Romeo and Juliet as merely a terrible accident.
It is possible to step back from the immediate emotional grip of Romeo and Juliet and discover that we have
somehow been taken in, that the swiftly moving world of sudden love and sudden death has been arbitrarily
contrived, that the mechanism of the plot and the ingenious conceits of the language display a rather
self−conscious artistry. At this second level of response, we may become aware that, for all its virtues, the
play does not exhibit the power, range, and deeply probing qualities of Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth or Lear. Its
reflective, philosophical dimensions are confined rather tightly to a few discourses by Friar Lawrence, where
they remain detached from the emotional intensity of the chief characters; in Hamlet and Lear those who
question the dignity of man and the nature of the gods are those who also suffer the greatest torments. Romeo
and Juliet is surely a more honest expression of human tragedy than the grotesque Titus Andronicus or the
melodramatic Richard III, but it has not yet found the most potent articulation for the paradox of good and
evil in the natural world. If we feel finally that the play is not major tragedy, it is for such reasons rather than
for defects in probability. A moving and compassionate expression of intense and vital passions, it burns with
a flame more luminous than searing.
To a certain extent, it cannot do otherwise, granted its subject. As a close−up study of a breath−taking young
love, it has little time or place for the probing inner conflicts of Shakespeare's more mature and deeply
disillusioned characters. Indeed, one of the marks of the lovers' innocence is that they remain untouched by
the experience of disillusionment, the experience that sounds the bass note of tragic anxiety from Julius
Caesar on and echoes throughout Shakespeare's so−called "problem plays" and later romances as well.
Romeo and Juliet are all in all to one another; the radiance of their shared love illumines them with glowing
beauty, but casts little light on the world around them. Their experience, and ours as an audience, is thus
intense but circumscribed. Shakespeare's structure of contrasts and paradoxes sets off that experience in a rich
and colorful design, but he does not choose to emphasize in it the more disturbing deeper shadows that he was
soon to explore with such comprehension. Here he was content to temper extremities with extreme sweet, and
in view now of the world's reaction to his play who is to say he chose wrongly? (pp. 16−18)
Douglas Cole, in an introduction to Twentieth Century Interpretations of Romeo and Juliet: A Collection of
Critical Essays, edited by Douglas Cole, Prentice−Hall, Inc., 1970, pp. 1−18.
Tragic Design
Franklin M. Dickey
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156
[Dickey asserts that fate, divine will, and the lovers' passion are inseparably linked in Romeo and Juliet and
all of these agents contribute to the catastrophe. According to the critic, the work is "a carefully wrought
tragedy which balances hatred against love and which makes fortune the agent of divine justice without
absolving anyone from his responsibility for the tragic conclusion." In this sense, Dickey contends, Romeo
and Juliet reflects the Elizabethan concept of moral responsibility, a tenet which stressed that all sinners must
endure the punishment of God, whose will is carried out through the operation of fate.]
Romeo and Juliet, above everything a play of love, is also a play of hatred and of the mysterious ways of
fortune. Although love in the first part of the play amuses us, in the end we pity the unhappy fate of young
lovers, a fate which critics find embarrassingly fortuitous or, in the Aristotelian sense, unnecessary, the
accident of chance to which all human life is subject. Despite the compelling poetry of the play and
Shakespeare's skill at creating the illusion of tragedy, the play is said to succeed "by a trick." Whereas
Aristotle demanded a "glimpse into the nature of things" beyond theatrical sensationalism and required of
tragedy "an overwhelming sense of inevitability," Romeo and Juliet die, critics often tell us, only as the result
of a series of mistakes and misunderstandings. In this light the lovers' death is pathetic rather than really
tragic.
Critics are also embarrassed by Shakespeare's paradoxical treatment of the three great themes of the tragedy.
On the one hand it can be demonstrated that the catastrophe develops from faults of character: Romeo's
impetuous nature leads him to despair and die. On the other hand the text also gives us reason to believe that
the love of Romeo and Juliet comes to a terrible end because of the hatred between the two families. And yet a
third view makes fate the main cause of the final disaster: Romeo and Juliet had to die because they were
"star−cross'd."
The seeming conflict of these themes and the division among critics has given support to the belief that
Shakespeare reveals no consistently moral view of the universe in this tragedy but gives us a slice of life
without comment, standing apart from the great guiding ethos which dominates both Tudor philosophy and
literary criticism. If the play has any final meaning it is to be found in the passionate rhetoric of love with
which Shakespeare expresses his own youthful ardor.
Against these prevailing views... [I] propose that Romeo and Juliet is a true mirror of the Elizabethan concept
of a moral universe although Shakespeare does not preach morality. Judged by Elizabethan standards, the play
is not merely a gorgeous and entertaining melodrama but a carefully wrought tragedy which balances hatred
against love and which makes fortune the agent of divine justice without absolving anyone from his
responsibility for the tragic conclusion. Unlike his source Shakespeare attempts a solution to the problem of
evil by fitting the power of fortune into the scheme of universal order. Although Shakespeare's viewpoint is
not Greek, Romeo . . . is an agent of God's justice but remains responsible for his own doom. (pp. 63−64)
One of the most solid features in the unchanging ground of Shakespeare is the belief in a just Providence.
Mysterious as the ways of this Providence are, the pattern remains visible. Although the innocent suffer, the
guilty are always punished. Not fate but the corrupt will makes men the agents of their own destruction. . . .
There is no blind fate in Shakespearean tragedy nor in the Elizabethan universe. Behind what looked like
chance stood God in control of his creation. Fortune was a figure of speech devised by men to explain the
inexplicable operations of the Deity, (p. 91). . . .
[A] belief in individual responsibility forms the philosophical background of mature Elizabethan tragedy. The
Renaissance God used fortune as the instrument of his vengeance. In Shakespeare the wayward passions of
men subject them to the whims of fate. Thus Hamlet, praising Horatio, equates fortune and the will:
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blest are those
Whose blood and judgement are so well commingled.
That they are not a pipe for Fortune's finger
To sound what stop she please. Give me that man
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him
In my heart's core. . .
[Hamlet, III, ii. 68−73]
While viewing drama, especially Romeo and Juliet, we often respond passionately as the doomed heroes
respond, and this is, as critics have always known, one of the secrets of tragic catharsis. But beneath these
passions the ground bass of an unshakable system continues to move, adding harmonies which we who have
rejected that ethic no longer hear. Tragic tension results from the contest between human passion and will
which work with and against fate in the elaborate Elizabethan harmony.
This condition humaine [human condition] helps to explain what otherwise are glaring faults in the progress
of Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare has promised us at the very beginning that we are to see a pair of
star−crossed lovers. Romeo himself first dreads the influence of the stars and then curses them for his
misfortune. Both he and Juliet have forebodings of the sorrow to come. Again and again the characters
gropingly predict the course of the future. Accident and coincidence add to our feeling that blind fate
dominates the action.
But to offset this feeling Shakespeare has provided two commentators to remind us that the terrible things we
have seen are all the work of divine justice. When Friar Laurence cries,
A greater power than we can contradict
Hath thwarted our intents . . .
[V, ii. 153−54]
it seems most natural to suppose that the holy Friar is invoking God rather than blind fate, for he has denied
that fate is the cause of Romeo's wretchedness. Earlier he has warned frantic Romeo that his fortune depended
upon his own virtue and moderation, that the man who flies in the face of fortune is to blame for his own
misery. "Why rail'st thou," he asks Romeo after Tybalt's death,
Since birth, and heaven, and earth, all three do meet
In thee at once, which thou at once wouldst lose.
Fie, fie...
A pack of blessings light upon thy back;
Happiness courts thee in her best array;
But, like a misbehav'd and sullen wench,
Thou pout'st upon thy fortune and thy love.
Take heed, take heed, for such die miserable.
[III, iii. 119−22, 141−45]
And when he discovers Juliet in the tomb, we learn that he has begged her to come forth
And bear this work of heaven with patience.
[V, iii. 261]
According to the Friar Romeo's actions must determine his ultimate felicity or doom, and yet at the end he
finds Romeo's death to be the "work of heaven," It would seem that. . . the Friar does not dissociate human
actions and the power of fortune which represents God's will.
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The second commentator Shakespeare gives us to point up the meaning of the tragedy is Prince Es−calus, who
at the ending of the play and at the point of greatest emphasis, sums up the significance of all that has
happened:
See, what a scourge is laid upon your hate,
That Heaven finds means to kill your joys with love.
[V, iii. 292−93]
After hearing these words and contemplating the evenhanded justice which has leveled parent with parent,
child with child, and friend with friend, would not the audience sensitive to providential fortune and its use in
tragedy understand without any tedious explication that fortune has operated here to punish sin and that this
avenging fortune is the work of heaven? Such an audience would not have stuck at applying pitiful
Rosamond's words to the lovers [in Samuel Daniel's The Complaint of Rosamond],
fate is not prevented, though foreknown,
For that must hap, decreed by heavenly powers
Who work our fall yet make the fault still ours.
In Romeo and Juliet then fortune may be considered not the prime mover but the agent of a higher power. If
fortune is not the independent cause of the catastrophe, then we must look behind fortune for the actions
which set it in motion. Friar Laurence warns Romeo that his own folly in love will doom him. Prince Escalus,
speaking as chorus, attributes the tragedy to hate. Both are right, for it is the collision of these passions which
dooms the lovers.
Of these two forces love overshadows the other dramatically, since it is the passion of the protagonists and
since Shakespeare has lavished his most moving poetry upon the love scenes. But the fact remains that this is
not a play centered on one passion but a play of carefully opposed passions. The prologue informs us that we
are to see a drama of love and hate. Hatred is the first passion to threaten tragedy in the comic opening of the
play; hatred brings about the actual climax of the action, Mercutio's death; and hatred is the theme which
Shakespeare introduces with love at the end of the play to explain the workings of fate.
The theme of hatred involves more than the opposition of two private families; because of the street brawls,
because of the murderous intrigues of the two opposed parties, it involves the whole state. Romeo and Juliet,
whose love would unite the two houses, are forced apart by the quarrel which they seek to avoid. Thus the
love story in the play, as in Antony and Cleopatra and Troilus and Cressida, is more than a tale of love, and
the problems of the play are not only ethical but in the broadest sense political. (pp. 92−5)
Thus, although our main interest is in Shakespeare's handling of love, we must also inquire into Shakespeare's
use of the complementary theme of hatred. Romeo and Juliet is built about two passions traditionally opposed,
and the interweaving of these two themes, like the ambiguous balance between comedy and tragedy, adds to
the peculiar irony which pervades the play. (p. 96)
The full power of hatred comes out ... in Escalus's speech which sums up the meaning of the action. He calls
the miserable fathers from the crowd:
Capulet! Montague!
See, what a scourge is laid upon your hate,
That Heaven finds means to kill your joys with love.
And I for winking at your discords too
Have lost a brace of kinsmen. All are punish'd.
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[V, iii. 291−95]
This speech does not make sense unless we take into account the close interaction of fate, hatred, and love in
the play.
Escalus's gloomy judgments give us a true criticism of the whole tragedy. The phrase "your joys" must refer
to the lovers, the hope of each of the two warring houses. Their death through love is the punishment of
heaven, working through fate, upon the families who have carried on the feud. (p. 100)
When we look back over the course of hatred, we see the truth of Escalus's sentence, "All are pun−ish'd." Fate
has worked to produce an evenhanded justice. The force of Mercutio's dying imprecation on the houses
appears at the end of the tragedy in the mysterious death of Lady Montague on the night of her son's suicide.
Her death, Shakespeare's addition to his source as are the deaths of Paris and Mercutio, evens the score
between the families. Partisan pays for partisan and kinsman for kinsman. Just as love holds families and
nations and indeed the whole universe together, so hatred breaks up families, destroys commonwealths, and,
represented by Satan, constantly works to unframe God's whole handiwork. It is precise and ironical justice
that quenches the one passion by means of its opposite. Romeo and Juliet, no less than Shakespeare's mature
tragedies, celebrates the great vision of order by which the English Renaissance still lives. (p. 101)
The play is uniquely constructed in that the same passions which make us tearful or indignant before the
action ends, do amuse us with little interruption for almost half the acting time. Even the events leading up to
Mercutio's death promise comedy rather than tragedy, and it must have startled the first audience to see
laughter so quickly turn to mourning. Yet the play is an exceptionally powerful tragedy, even if it sometimes
embarrasses critics. Where the first half delights us with love comedy, the last three short acts explore the
tragic potentialities of young love. Fortune and hatred threaten to turn the lovers' bliss to ashes, but the
immediate cause of their unhappy deaths is Romeo's headlong fury and blind despair. Thus in both the
beginning of the play and at the end Shakespeare's view of love remains sound philosophically and
dramatically. (p. 102)
Throughout Romeo and Juliet Romeo is precipitate in love. Juliet, who loves as faithfully, is much less
subject to the gusts of passion which blind Romeo. Romeo never examines the consequence of his actions, but
Juliet fears that their love may be "too rash, too unadvis'd, too sudden" [II, ii. 118]. Romeo never shares
Juliet's insight. After they have pledged love at Juliet's window, his only concern is that the love he feels
seems too delightful to be true. It is Juliet not Romeo who thinks practically of arranging for marriage and
who remembers to ask what time she is to send her messenger in the morning.
On Romeo's inability to control either his passionate love or his passionate grief, his death and Juliet's depend.
The boundless love which Romeo felt at the sight of Juliet turns as suddenly to despair, just as any
well−versed Renaissance philosopher might have predicted, for the man in the grip of one passion was easily
swayed by another. (pp. 105−06)
Romeo therefore is a tragic hero like Othello in that he is responsible for his own chain of passionate actions.
When we first see him he is already stricken with love. This first love is comic, but nevertheless it is a real
attack of the sickness of love, as his father makes clear when he complains that Romeo's humor will turn
"Black and portentous" [I, i. 141] unless checked.
Since the man stricken with passion could not readily defend himself against new onslaughts of passion,
Romeo's sudden passionate about−face when he sees Juliet would have seemed realistic to an Elizabethan
audience. Romeo's transports for Juliet differ from his first melancholy because she returns his affection. For a
time he is cured and conducts himself so reasonably that even Mercutio comments on the change in his
temper.
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But with Mercutio's death Romeo casts aside all reason and begins a chain of passionate action which leads to
death. Rejecting the reasonable conduct with which he had first answered his enemy, he attacks and kills
Tybalt. It would certainly have spoiled the play for Romeo to have waited for the law to punish Tybalt, but the
fact remains that this reasonable action would have turned tragedy into comedy. In this choice between
reasonable and passionate action lies one great difference between the genres. Forgiveness produces the happy
ending of comedy; revenge produces the catastrophe of tragedy.
Romeo's next passionate mistake is to fall into frantic despair after the Prince sentences him to banishment.
When Romeo cries out against his lot, Friar Laurence, the consistent voice of moderation and wisdom, warns
him that he is truly unfortunate only in giving way to uncontrolled grief.
The next step in Romeo's march to destruction is his sudden and complete despair when he learns that Juliet is
dead. The direct result of Romeo's frenzied desire to kill himself is his killing of Paris, an incident which
Shakespeare adds, like the death of Lady Montague and the death of Mercutio, to his source. Thus Brooke's
Romeus dies with less on his conscience than does Shakespeare's hero. In Brooke Romeus kills Tybalt only to
save his own life, not to revenge a friend, and at the end of the play dies guiltless of any additional blood save
his own. In our play, however, Shakespeare is careful to make Romeo guilty of sinful action under the
influence of passion, while at the same time making us sympathize with Romeo's agonies of despair. In his
encounter with Paris Romeo announces both his own mad desperation and the fact that in bringing the chain
of passionate folly to its close, he puts one more sin upon his head.
Romeo's last passion−blinded act is to kill himself just before Juliet awakes, and her suicide may be thought
of as the direct result of his. Although Shakespeare does not preach, the Elizabethan audience would have
realized that in his fury Romeo has committed the ultimate sin. (pp. 114−16)
[The] tragedy of Romeo and Juliet is a true tragedy, preserving the ambiguous feelings of pity and terror
which produce catharsis. Romeo remains a free agent even though he scarce knows what he does. Those who
allowed passion to carry reason headlong were guilty of the very fault that Elizabethan ethics were designed
to prevent. It is exactly because love could unseat the reason that few men who loved excessively could look
forward to a virtuous life and a happy death. (p. 116)
Does this mean that. . . the spectators in [Shakespeare's] day, or that Shakespeare himself, looked upon the
play as an edifying lesson in how not to conduct oneself in love? I hardly think so. The pattern of the action,
given shape by Friar Laurence's warnings, Mercutio's satiric ebullience, and the Prince's scattered judgments,
revolves around two of the most attractive young lovers in all literature. But the patterns of moral
responsibility are necessary to give the action its perspective, and it is these patterns of the destructive as well
as the creative force of love and the dependence of fate upon the passionate will which most contemporary
criticism neglects or denies. We, who have moved so far from Shakespeare's world, need to be reminded of
these things. They would have touched his audience far more deeply than they touch us today. (p. 117)
Franklin M. Dickey, in his Not Wisely but Too Well: Shakespeare's Love Tragedies, The Huntington Library,
1957, p. 161.
Lorentz Eckhoff
[Eckhoff maintains that Romeo's and Juliet's tragic deaths result from their own impulsiveness. The critic then
provides several examples from the play to substantiate this claim.]
Romeo and Juliet are in a precarious situation, like two children playing with fire near a barrel of gunpowder.
They should be careful, prudent, mindful of the future, but they are all too prone to be the very opposite. They
are too strongly infected with the hectic spirit of Verona, they have the hot blood and the hot temper of their
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race. They are like two flames which merge into one.
Romeo is lyrical, ecstatic, a man who approves of his emotions and revels in them, goes in search of them,
exaggerates them almost. He is what we should call one of Love's lovers. He allows his feelings to direct his
actions, as he proves, when despite his many forebodings about a premature death, he sets off for the feast at
Capulet's house:
But he, that hath the steerage of my course,
Direct my sail! On, lusty gentlemen.
[I, iv. 112−13]
At the beginning of the play we hear that he is in love with Rosaline, but this love affair is not really to be
taken seriously, it is … something he has invented, or possibly imagined. At any rate we find it difficult to
believe in it. He speaks in outworn antitheses and forced, artificial similes. The truest word he speaks about it
is the very passage which shows how airy and artificial it is.
Love is a smoke raised with the fume of sighs. . . .
[I, i. 190]
Romeo is the born lover who has not yet found the real object of his affections, and is wandering about,
conscious or unconscious of the fact, looking for it.
In Juliet's eyes Romeo is not only the lover but the liberator. She is only fourteen years old, but she has been
waiting for him even before she meets him. She has yearned to get away from a house which is no home,
merely an uncongenial place of residence, sometimes almost a prison. She has no one to love, there is no
human being with whom she has any intimate contact, neither her nurse, whose broad remarks and stories
make no impression on her, nor her subdued mother, nor her hot−tempered father, jovial, fond of festive
occasions and brutal to boot, a domestic tyrant, who is convinced that it is the child's duty to love and the
parent's duty to command; a father who threatens her with chastisement and expulsion, if she refuses to obey
his orders on the instant.
Juliet has preserved all the tenderness of her feelings, and has learnt to conceal those feelings when occasion
demands. She is beautiful and wise, courageous and quick to act—admirably equipped, in fact, to play the role
which circumstances force her to adopt.
Romeo and Juliet are made for one another, dearer to one another than life itself, and instinctively know this
the very moment they meet. They are carried away by the force of fate, they burn and glow with a new
intensity, every moment they are tensed and proved to the uttermost of their beings, and in the course of a few
summer days they blossom and develop from callow youth to the maturity of man and woman, to an
all−conquering and all−besetting passion.
Their very words become music, poetry, fancy. As scholars are quick to remind us, the first words they
exchange are in the form of a sonnet, and Juliet's soliloquy on the eve of her bridal night is a nuptial hymn,
while their conversation the next morning is a hymn to dawn, an aubade. Their life, pulsing hotly, beats to a
hectic rhythm. Practically every word Juliet utters in the balcony scene marks a step forward, an action, a
decision. She is brisk, and anxious at the dizzy whirl of events:
Dost thou love me? I know thou wilt say "Ay"
In truth, fair Montague, I am too fond,
And therefore thou mayst think my haviour light:
But trust me, gentleman, I'll prove more true
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Than those that have more cunning to be strange. . . .
Well, do not swear. Although I joy in thee,
I have no joy of this contract to−night:
It is too rash, too unadvis'd, too sudden;
Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be
Ere one can say "It lightens." Sweet, goodnight!
This bud of love, by summer's ripening breath,
May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet.
Good−night, good−night!
[II, ii. 90, 98−101, 116−23]
She is impatient when she is waiting for the nurse to return with an answer from Romeo, and for that reason a
highly comic effect is achieved by the irritatingly dilatory manner of the nurse, and the stream of irrelevancies
with which she crams her reply. She is more impatient still before the bridal night, as she waits for Romeo:
Gallop apace, you fiery−footed steeds,
Towards Phoebus' lodging, such a waggoner
As Phaeton would whip you to the west,
And bring in cloudy night immediately.
Spread thy close curtain, love−performing night!
That rude day's eyes may wink, and Romeo
Leap to these arms, untalk'd of and unseen!
Lovers can see to do their amorous rites
By their own beauties; or, if love be blind,
It best agrees with night. Come, civil night,
Thou sober−suited matron, all in black,
And learn me how to lose a winning match,
Play'd for a pair of stainless maidenhoods:
Hood my unman'd blood, bating in my cheeks,
With thy black mantle; till strange love, grown bold,
Think true love acted simple modesty.
Come, night! come, Romeo! come, thou day in night!
For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night,
Whiter than new snow on a raven's back.
Come, gentle night; come, loving, black−brow'd night,
Give me my Romeo!
[II, ii. 1−21]
Friar Laurence, who is most likely the poet's mouthpiece, tries in vain to brake the headlong speed:
Romeo:
O! let us hence; I stand on sudden haste.
Friar Laurence: Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast.
[II, iii. 93−4]
Friar Laurence:
These violent delights have violent ends,
And in their triumph die, like fire and powder,
Which, as they kiss, consume: the sweetest honey
Is loathsome in his own deliciousness
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And in the taste confounds the appetite:
Therefore love moderately; long love doth so.
[II, vi. 9−14]
Romeo too tries to check his ardour. As we have seen, he refuses to fight with Tybalt, and when Mercutio is
wounded he is at first calm, and hopes the wound is slight:
Courage, man; the hurt cannot be much.
[III, i. 95]
But when Benvolio returns, and tells him of Mercutio's death, and Tybalt returns in triumph, there is an end to
Romeo's patience, and his wrath floods his being, like a river that has broken its banks. It is worth noticing
how he approves his own wrath:
Benvolio:
Here comes the furious Tybalt back again.
Romeo:
Alive! in triumph! and Mercutio slain!
Away to heaven, respective lenity,
And fire−ey'd fury be my conduct now!
Now, Tybalt, take the villain back again
That late thou gav'st me; for Mercutio's soul
Is but a little way above our heads,
Staying for thine to keep him company:
Either thou, or I, or both, must go with him.
[III, i. 121−29]
Once again the mood of the moment runs away with him. When he hears, after Tybalt's death, that Juliet calls
his name and Tybalt's in her despair at what has occurred, he exclaims to Friar Laurence:
O! tell me, friar, tell me,
In what vile part of this anatomy
Doth my name lodge? tell me, that I may sack
The hateful mansion.
[III, iii. 105−08]
And once again he draws his sword; but this time his impetuosity provokes Friar Laurence's wrath in the
shape of a sharp rebuke.
Hold thy desperate hand:
Art thou a man? thy form cries out thou art:
Thy tears are womanish; thy wild acts denote
The unreasonable fury of a beast:
Unseemly woman in a seeming man;
Or ill−beseeming beast in seeming both!
Thou hast amaz'd me. ...
[II, iii. 108−14]
There is a break of a day and a half between Act III and Act V, but in the course of those forty odd hours
Romeo has aged many years. Reverie has gone and given place to grim determination. There is a crude vigour
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in his words to the apothecary who sells him the poison, and even more so in the last scene by the vault in the
graveyard, when he sends the servant away:
. . . therefore hence, be gone:
But, if thou, jealous, dost return to pry
In what I further shall intend to do,
By heaven, I will tear thee joint by joint,
And strew this hungry churchyard with thy limbs.
The time and my intents are savage−wild,
More fierce and more inexorable far
Than empty tigers or the roaring sea.
[V, iii. 32−9]
And again when he opens the tomb, and bids Paris retire:
I must (die); and therefore came I hither.
Good gentle youth, tempt not a desperate man;
Fly hence and leave me: think upon these gone;
Let them affright thee. I beseech thee, youth.
Put not another sin upon my head
By urging me to fury: O! be gone. . . .
[V, iii. 58−63]
Romeo and Juliet are in a hurry even when it comes to dying. There is no shadow of doubt in their souls that
they would rather die than live apart. But had Romeo been in less hurry to die, he would have found a living
Juliet.
We may be sure that Shakespeare loved Romeo and Juliet and their love as much as we do, but it is just as
certain that he wished to warn young people in his very discreet way not to follow their example. (pp. 51−6)
Lorentz Eckhoff, "Passion," in his Shakespeare: Spokesman of the Third Estate, translated by R. I.
Christophersen, Akademisk Verlag, 1954, pp. 48−86.
Irving Ribner
[Ribner provides a Christian interpretation of Romeo and Juliet in which he contends that the lovers' deaths
are ordained by God to reconcile the feuding families. The critic notes how Shakespeare altered the play into
something more meaningful than both a traditional Senecan tragedy, where arbitrary destiny causes the
catastrophe, and a tragedy of character, in which the lovers are punished for their reckless passion (the term
Senecan tragedy derives from the Roman statesman and philosopher Seneca, who in the first century A. D.
wrote a number of violent, catastrophic dramas that later became models for Renaissance tragedy).
According to Ribner, Romeo and Juliet mature as they experience evil, ultimately realizing that the world is in
fact ruled by a benevolent God. Further, the lovers' suicides reflect their acceptance of death, resulting in the
restoration of order and a "rebirth of love" in Verona.]
Critics have usually regarded Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet as . . . a Senecan tragedy of inexorable fate;
some have emphasized the sinfulness of the young lovers. We cannot deny the role of fate and accident in
Shakespeare's play; it is established in the prologue and it runs as a constant theme through all five acts. We
would not expect this to be otherwise, for this was the formula with which Shakespeare began. But
Shakespeare's play is far more than a tragedy of fate. It is, moreover, not at all a story of just deserts visited
upon young sinners, although some critics have found it so. The fate that destroys Romeo and Juliet is not an
arbitrary, capricious force any more than it is the inexorable agent of nemesis, which in Senecan tragedy
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executed retribution for sin. Shakespeare's play is cast in a more profoundly Christian context … ; the "greater
power than we can contradict" [V. iii. 153] is divine providence, guiding the affairs of men in accordance with
a plan which is merciful as well as just. Out of the evil of the family feud—a corruption of God's harmonious
order—must come a rebirth of love, and the lives of Romeo and Juliet are directed and controlled so that by
their deaths the social order will be cleansed and restored to harmony. Shakespeare uses the story of the lovers
to explore the operation of divine providence, the meaning of a fate which in the ordinary affairs of life will
sometimes frustrate our most careful plans. ... It is in Shakespeare's departure from the Senecan tradition he
inherited that the particular significance of Romeo and Juliet as tragedy lies. Here we see him groping for a
tragic design to embody a view of life far more significant and meaningful than what the Senecan stereotypes
could afford. (pp. 273−74)
In [the] emphasis upon youth which runs throughout Shakespeare's play, but which is not so evident in his
source, we may find a clue to the philosophical pattern Shakespeare imposed upon Senecan tradition. Romeo
and Juliet are children born into a world already full of an ancient evil not of their own making. The feud is
emphasized in the opening lines of the prologue, and in the opening scene of the play—before either hero or
heroine is introduced—the feud is portrayed in all its ramifications, corrupting the social order from the
lowliest serving man up to the prince himself, for just as it breeds household rancor, it disturbs also the very
government of Verona.
There is a universality in this situation; Romeo and Juliet epitomize the role in life of all men and women, for
every being who is born, as the Renaissance saw it, is born into a world in which evil waits to destroy him,
and he marches steadily towards an inexorable death. It is a world, moreover, in which his plans, no matter
how virtuous, may always be frustrated by accident and by the caprice of a seemingly malignant fate. It is this
universality that gives the play its stature as tragedy, for Romeo and Juliet in a sense become prototypes of
everyman and everywoman. They attempt to find happiness in a world full of evil, to destroy evil by means of
love, for with Friar Lawrence they see their marriage as the termination of the feud, but evil in the world
cannot be destroyed; their fate cannot be escaped, and thus, like all men and women, they suffer and die. This
is the life journey of all, but Shakespeare's play asserts that man need not despair, for he is a creature of reason
with the grace of God to guide him, and through his encounter with evil he may learn the nature of evil and
discover what it means to be a man. The ultimate message of Renaissance tragedy is that through suffering
man grows and matures until he is able to meet his necessary fate with a calm acceptance of the will of God.
The tragic vision and the religious vision spring ultimately out of the same human needs and aspirations.
Shakespeare saw in the legend of Romeo and Juliet a story which illustrated neither retribution for sin nor the
working out of a blind inexorable Senecan fatalism. He saw a story that might be used to portray the
maturation of youth through suffering and death. Romeo and Juliet may thus be called an "education" play,
drawing upon the established morality tradition of such plays as Nice Wanton and Lusty Juventus. Romeo and
Juliet learn the fundamental lessons of tragedy; the meaning of human life and death. Their education can
culminate only in death and then rebirth in a world in which evil has no place. We can thus see Shakespeare in
this play combining a story already cast for him in Senecan mold with a quite alien medieval dramatic
tradition, which in its origins was based upon peculiarly Christian assumptions.
Romeo and Juliet are foolish, of course. They are hasty and precipitous and they make many mistakes, but to
speak of a "tragic flaw" in either of them is to lead to endless absurdity. The impetuosity, haste, and
carelessness of the lovers are the universal attributes of youth. Their shortcomings are what make them the
ordinary representatives of humanity that this type of play must have as its tragic protagonists. Their errors,
moreover, are all committed with a virtuous end in view, the same end that leads the wise and mature Friar
Lawrence to marry them in spite of the dangers he sees both to them and to his own position. Unlike a later
Othello or Macbeth, they are guilty of no deliberate choice of evil.
Both Romeo and Juliet mature greatly as the play unfolds, but to demonstrate the particular progress of the
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human life journey, Shakespeare concentrates upon Romeo. The exigencies of drama required that he
concentrate upon one figure, and Romeo, of course, was the natural one. The Renaissance generally held that
woman's powers of reason were somewhat less than those of man, and the design of the play called for a
free−willed rational acceptance of the Christian stoic view of life to which Romeo comes at the end of the
play.
How can a man live in a world in which evil lurks on every side and in which the inevitable end of all man's
worldly aspirations must be death, a world in which the cold necessity of Fortune cannot be avoided? The
Renaissance had a very simple answer which it carried over from the consolation philosophy of the Middle
Ages, itself a Christian adaptation of the classical creed of Stoicism. Good and evil are in the world together,
but the entire universe is ruled by a benevolent God whose plan is deliberate, meaningful, and ultimately
good. The paradox of the fortunate fall taught that evil itself contributed to this ultimate good. Man, bearing
the burden of original sin, had evil within him, but as the chosen creature of God, he had good also. When the
evil within him predominated he was ruled by passion, but he had the gift of reason, which by proper exercise
could always keep passion under control. Reason, of course, lay in an acceptance of the will of God. This
central core of Renaissance belief is perfectly expressed by Friar Lawrence:
For naught so vile that on the earth doth live
But to the earth some special good doth give.
Nor aught so good but, strain'd from that fair use
Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse:. . .
Two such opposed kings encamp them still
In man as well as herbs, grace and rude will;
And where the worser is predominant,
Full soon the canker death eats up that plant.
[II, iii. 17−20, 27−30]
Grace, of course, is reason, and rude will is passion. Man can live happily in the world if he allows his reason
to guide his actions, to show him that the plan of the world essentially is good and just and that evil itself is
designed to further the ends of a divine providence. With reason thus guiding him, man can become
impervious to the blows of Fortune. He will accept his fate, whatever it maybe, as contributing to a divine
purpose beyond his comprehension but ultimately good and just. Through his encounter with evil Romeo
learns to accept his fate in just such a manner.
We first meet Romeo as a lovesick boy assuming the conventional role of the melancholy lover, playing a
game of courting a Capulet girl who he knows can never accede to his suit. We may well believe that it is
because Rosaline is a Capulet that Romeo pursues her, and that because she knows the basic insincerity of his
suit, she spurns him with her supposed vows of chastity. This is the boy Romeo, not yet ready to face the
responsibilities of life, unaware of the real sorrows that are the lot of man, but playing with a make−believe
sorrow that he enjoys to the fullest. We usually think that at his first sight of Juliet he abandons this childish
pose and experiences true love. This may be so, for the dramatist is forced to work rapidly even at the expense
of character consistency, but it is not really the sight of Juliet that causes him to change. It is his own
precipitous act of leaping out from the dark beneath her window with his
I take thee at thy word:
Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized;
Henceforth I never will be Romeo.
[II, ii. 49−51]
With this hasty speech the game of make−believe love becomes no longer possible. The hasty act of
impetuous youth is the means to maturity. Romeo must now face the realities of life with all its consequences
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both for good and evil. There may be a double meaning in that final line. Never again will he be the same
Romeo who had pined for Rosaline. Juliet too can no longer be the same once she has poured her heart out
into the night. She too must now face the world as it is. Her unpremeditated outpouring of her love parallels
the precipitous speech of Romeo.
Like all young people, Romeo and Juliet are uncertain and hasty in their first encounters with the problems of
reality. Their plans at best are foolish ones. The force of evil had already intruded into their world
immediately following Romeo's first sight of Juliet. His first poetic rapture [I. v. 44−53] had been echoed by
the harsh voice of Tybalt:
This, by his voice, should be a Montague.
Fetch me my rapier, boy.
[I, v. 54−5]
This is Shakespeare's unique poetic way of showing the ever−present juxtaposition of love and hate, good and
evil. Before the marriage may be consummated, Romeo must now face this evil force in the world. He is not
yet, however, able to accept it as he should. When Tybalt lies dead at his feet and a full awareness of what he
has done comes upon him, Romeo cries out in despair: "O, I am fortune's fool" [III. i. 136]. This is a crucial
line and all its implications must be understood. "Fool" had two common meanings in Shakespeare's age. On
the one hand it had the connotation of "dupe" or "plaything," and thus the word usually is glossed. On the
other hand it was a common word for "child." In three other places in the play it is used with this meaning.
When Romeo calls himself the "dupe" or "plaything" of Fortune, he is asserting a capricious, lawless Fortune,
and thus he is denying the providence of God, of which in the Christian view Fortune was merely the agent.
Romeo here sees the universe as a mindless chaos, without guiding plan; he is proclaiming a philosophy of
despair.
With this view of life the secondary meaning of "fool" is in complete accord. As long as man sees Fortune as
capricious and the universe as without plan, he must be the slave of Fortune. Romeo is the child of Fortune at
this point because he is governed by it as the child is governed by his father. He is constrained to blind
obedience. He has not yet learned the way of acceptance by which the control of Fortune maybe thrown off.
When Romeo's own will is in accord with the universal plan of God, he will no longer be the child of Fortune
in this sense. He will be the master of Fortune in that it can never direct him contrary to his own will. In this
secondary sense of "child" there is also the implication that Romeo is more fortunate than he himself
perceives, that he is protected as the child is by his father. The divine providence whose "fool" he is will lead
him, in spite of his present ignorance, to a self−mastery and wisdom, and it will use his present seeming
misfortune to restore harmony and order to the world.
From this low point Romeo must make his slow journey to maturity, and Shakespeare shows his progression
in three stages. First we find him in the friar's cell, weeping and wailing, beating his head upon the ground and
offering to kill himself. This abject surrender to passion is the behavior not of a rational man but of a beast, as
the friar declares:
Hold thy desperate hand:
Art thou a man?
Thy form cries out thou art:
Thy tears are womanish; thy wild acts denote
The unreasonable fury of a beast.
[III, iii. 108−11]
Romeo's education now begins at the hands of Friar Lawrence, who in a lengthy speech [III. iii. 108−54]
teaches him to make a virtue of necessity, that to rail on Fortune is foolish and fruitless, that careful reason
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will demonstrate to him that he is indeed far more fortunate than he might have been. When rather than kill
himself he stops his weeping and goes to comfort Juliet, he has taken the first step toward maturity.
That his growth is a steady one from that point forward we may perceive from a bare hint as Romeo climbs
from Juliet's window to be off for Mantua. "O, think'st thou we shall ever meet again?" [III. v. 51] asks Juliet,
and Romeo replies:
I doubt it not; and all these woes shall serve
For sweet discourses in our time to come.
[III, v. 52−3]
What is significant here is that Romeo has thrown off despair and can face the future with some degree of
hope in an ultimate providence. It is but the barest hint of a change in him, and we see no more of him until
the beginning of Act V, where in Mantua we perceive by his first words that he is a new man entirely. All of
Act IV had been devoted to Juliet. The dramatist has not had time to show in detail the growth of Romeo. The
change must be made clear in Romeo's first speech, and it must be accepted by the audience as an
accomplished fact. We immediately sense a new serenity about him as he walks upon the stage at the
beginning of Act V:
My dreams presage some joyful news at hand:
My bosom's lord sits lightly in his throne;
And all this day an unaccustom'd spirit
Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts.
[V, i. 2−5]
He expects joyful tidings, but the news Balthazer brings is the most horrible of which he can conceive.
Shakespeare gives his opening speech to Romeo, I believe, so that it may emphasize the shock of the news of
Juliet's supposed death coming when happy news is expected, and in the face of this shock to illustrate the
manner in which the new Romeo can receive the severest blow of which Fortune is capable. (pp. 274−81)
The design of the tragedy does not call at this point for a Byronic defiance of fate by Romeo, a daring of
Fortune to pour its worst upon his head. . . .The design calls for an escape from Fortune's oppression through
an acceptance of the order of the universe, and this meaning is implicit in "I denie you Starres" [V, i. 24].
We may ask first what the word "deny" means in the context in which Shakespeare here uses it. We do not
have far to look, for in the second act we find a significant clue. Here Juliet speaks:
0 Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou
Romeo? Deny thy father and refuse thy name.
[II, ii. 33−4]
She is asking wistfully that Romeo not be the son of his father, and her wish falls naturally into two parts: that
he give up the name of his father and that he break the bond which ties him to his father. To "deny" his father
is to negate the natural relationship of son to father, one, as the Renaissance saw it, of subjection and
obedience. It is thus, in Shakespeare's sense, to cast off his father's authority, to refuse to be ruled by him. "I
denie you starres," the line editors have consistently refused to accept as Shakespeare's, is the very line with
which Romeo attains the victory over circumstances which is the sign of the mature stoical man. It is probably
the most crucial single line of the play. To deny one's stars is to throw off the control of a hostile fortune, just
as a son might throw off the control of his father. To Renaissance man there was only one means by which
this might be accomplished: by an acceptance of the way of the world as the will of God, and by a calm,
fearless acceptance of death as the necessary and proper end of man, which releases him from all earthly evil
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and assures him of a true felicity in heaven. For Romeo this will be reunion with Juliet.
It has been argued, of course, that since the Anglican church taught that the punishment for suicide was
damnation, Romeo and Juliet in killing themselves are merely assuring the loss of their souls. We are not
dealing here, however, with Shakespeare the theologian illustrating a text, but rather with Shakespeare the
dramatist using symbolically a detail inherited from his sources in order to illustrate a greater and more
significant truth. The Senecan tradition in which the story came down to Shakespeare endorsed suicide as a
means of release from a world full of pain and as a means of expiration for complicity in the death of a loved
one. It was in these terms that suicide was so essential a part of the Romeo and Juliet story. There was in the
Renaissance, moreover, much respect for the classical notion of suicide as a noble act by which man fulfills
his obligations and attains a higher good than life itself, and on the stage suicide was often portrayed in such
terms. Only the most insensitive of critics could regard Romeo and Juliet as destined for damnation; their
suicide, inherited by Shakespeare as an essential part of the story, must be regarded as a symbolic act of
acceptance of inevitable death. Dramatically it is the most effective means by which such acceptance may be
portrayed. The results of the act are not damnation, but instead, the "destruction of evil by the ending of the
feud. Out of the self−inflicted deaths of Romeo and Juliet come a reconciliation and a rebirth of good, a
catharsis that would be well−nigh impossible were it bought with the souls as well as the lives of the young
lovers.
Shakespeare might easily have written "defy" instead of "deny," for that word might have conveyed a similar
meaning. It need not be taken to indicate a Byronic challenge to Fortune. To defy Fortune is to assert one's
independence of it, and that is what Romeo does. … Shakespeare might have written "defy" had he been a
lesser artist, but he wrote "deny" because of the deliberate echo and reminder it might furnish of that earlier
and equally crucial line, "O, I am fortune's fool" [III, i. 136]. The fool, or child of Fortune, has now thrown off
the authority of Fortune. These two lines mark the two poles of Romeo's development from creature of
passion to man of reason. In the meaning of the latter line there is a deliberate echo of the earlier one.
It would, of course, be foolish to measure Romeo's conduct in the final act against a consistent classical ideal
of stoicism [a philosophy founded by the Greek thinker Zeno in about 300 B.C. which holds that wise men
should be free from passion, unmoved by joy or grief, and submissive to natural law]. A true Stoic would not
have committed suicide, but Shakespeare's brand of Christian stoicism was rarely consistent philosophically.
The simple point Shakespeare wishes to make is that Romeo has grown to maturity, has learned to accept the
order of the universe with all it may entail, that he is ready for death, and that he can accept it bravely and
calmly as the necessary means toward the greater good of reunion with Juliet. He will, as he puts it:
shake the yoke of inauspicious stars
From this world−wearied flesh.
[V, iii. 111−12]
When Paris says to him in the graveyard, "for thou must die," it is not merely to Paris that Romeo replies: "I
must indeed; and therefore came I hither" [V, iii. 57−8]. In that simple line is a summation of Romeo's
development. He has come willingly to embrace the necessary end of life's journey.
The world of Romeo and Juliet is a somber, realistic one in which youth is born into evil and must struggle
against it ceaselessly until the conflict is ended by inevitable death. But Shakespeare's tragic vision is not one
of resignation or despair; it is one of defiance and hope, of pride in those qualities of man that enable him to
survive and achieve victory in such a world. It is this tension between pride in man and terror of the world's
evil which Clifford Leech [in his Shakespeare's Tragedies and Other Studies in Seventeenth−Century Drama]
has called the essence of the tragic emotion; and Shakespeare goes far toward achieving this tension in Romeo
and Juliet. There is a design for tragedy in this early play, a conception of man's position in the universe to
which character and event are designed by the artist to conform. There are, of course, inconsistencies in the
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design; Shakespeare has not yet been able entirely to escape the limitations imposed upon him by his sources,
but we can nevertheless perceive, governing and shaping the matter that Shakespeare took from Arthur
Brooke, the idea of tragedy as a portrait of man's journey from youth to maturity, encountering the evil in the
world, learning to live with it, and achieving victory over it by death. Like the tragedies of Aeschylus, Romeo
and Juliet proclaims also that man learns through suffering, but even more strongly than in Greek tragedy,
there is affirmation in Shakespeare that the ultimate plan of the universe is good, for out of the suffering of
individuals the social order is cleansed of evil. The deep−rooted family feud is finally brought to an end. (pp.
283−86)
Irving Ribner, "Then I Denie You Starres: A Reading of 'Romeo and Juliet'," in Studies in the English
Renaissance Drama, Josephine W. Bennett, Oscar Cargill, and Vernon Hall, Jr., eds., New York University
Press, 1959, pp. 269−86.
Harold S. Wilson
[Wilson regards Romeo and Juliet as a tragedy of fate involving "two lovers whose destiny it is to be
sacrificed to the healing of their families' strife." Furthermore, the critic claims, the feud is the central
concern of the play. Wilson argues that Shakespeare marred this design, however, by making his hero and
heroine so attractive that the audience loses interest in the dramatic action once they are dead, thus ignoring
the true culmination of the play in the resolution of the feud.]
The tragic conception of Romeo and Juliet is simply stated for us in the opening sonnet−prologue. By thus
announcing his theme and describing the central action, Shakespeare prepares us for the method he will
follow throughout the play. We are to watch a sequence of events as they move towards the catastrophe in the
full knowledge that they are tragic, that the tragic culmination is somehow inevitable. The tragic effect is to be
one of anticipation and its realization. The Greek tragedians … could count on their audiences' familiarity
with the story of the play. Shakespeare uses his opening prologue in Romeo and Juliet to establish the same
condition.
The action concerns not simply two lovers but two families. An ancient feud breaks forth anew, involving in
its course two lovers whose destiny it is to be sacrificed to the healing of their families' strife, "which, but
their children's end, naught could remove" [Prologue, 11]. The pathos is that the lovers' sacrifice is
inescapable; their love is "death−mark'd"; they are "star−cross'd" [Prologue, 9, 6], fated to die in the fifth act.
But the tragic outcome is not quite unrelieved. There is to be a kind of reconciliation at the end, though we are
not to expect a "happy" ending. Thus, carefully are we prepared to understand and anticipate the ensuing
action.
This method of foreshadowing the outcome is carried through the play, in the premonitions and misgivings of
the two lovers. "I dreamt a dream tonight" [I, iv. 50], says Romeo, as he goes with Benvolio and Mercutio
towards the Capulet party. Mercutio at once takes him up, rallies him, makes his melancholy remark the
occasion of his elaborate fancy of Queen Mab. Yet as Benvolio tries to hurry them on: "Supper is done, and
we shall come too late!" Romeo reflects,
I fear, too early; for my mind misgives
Some consequence, yet hanging in the stars,
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night's revels and expire the term
Of a despised life, clos'd in my breast,
By some vile forfeit of untimely death.
But he that hath the steerage of my course
Direct my sail! On, lusty gentlemen!
[I, iv. 105−13]
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As we are later to realize, Romeo's foreboding is all too well justified. Ere another day passes, Romeo will
have loved another maiden than the lady Rosaline who now has all his thoughts; he will have married Juliet,
anticipating only happiness; but Mercutio will be slain by Tybalt, Tybalt slain by Romeo, Romeo banished
from Verona; and the lives of Romeo and Juliet will be eventually sacrificed. (pp. 19−20)
All of these echoes and foreshadowings emphasize and reemphasize a single theme, a single conception: the
seemingly inscrutable necessity of the whole action, a necessity imposed by some power greater than men. (p.
22)
The play culminates with the reconciliation of the rival houses, as the prologue states. Old Capulet and
Montague, confronted by the terrible results of their hatred in the deaths of their children, are at length
brought to recognize their responsibility. The Prince sums it up:
See what a scourge is laid upon your hate,
That heaven finds means to kill your joys with love;
And I, for winking at your discords too,
Have lost a brace of kinsmen; all are punish'd.
[V, iii. 292−95]
The parents are truly penitent, and from this time forth, we are to understand, their hatred was turned to love.
The importance of this ending in Shakespeare's design maybe seen by contrasting the culmination of the story
in his principal source, Arthur Brooke's poem called Romeus and Juliet. In Brooke's version, the various
instruments of the outcome—the apothecary who sold Romeo the poison, the Nurse, the Friar—are punished
or pardoned, but neither the parents nor the enmity of the two houses is even mentioned in censure.
Shakespeare's revision of Brooke's ending and his different emphasis are eloquent of his different conception
of the point of the tale.
From another point of view, we may test the importance Shakespeare must have attached to the idea the play
is designed to express by observing the very arbitrariness with which he manipulates not merely the plot but
the characterizations as well, in the interest of working out his total design. The arbitrary insistence upon
ironic coincidence in the successive stages of the action is evident. But equally arbitrary is the lack of
coherent motivation in Friar Laurence's crucial role. Granted that Friar Laurence is timid and unworldly, and
proud of his herbalist's resources, besides; he is still an odd kind of spiritual adviser, without confidence in his
authority with the two families, and, we must surely add, without elementary common sense. In real life, any
man of sense in Friar Laurence's position would have reflected that the proposed marriage of Juliet with Paris
was impossible. Juliet was already married to Romeo. And he would have used this circumstance to force a
reconciliation upon the two families—a motive which he professed in marrying the young people in the first
place. It is evident that he could count upon the Prince's support in thus seeking to reconcile the feud, and
Romeo's pardon, and his own, would easily follow upon the achieving of this worthy end.
This sort of speculation is obviously not relevant to the play as we have it; for such a solution would have
given comedy, and Shakespeare was here intent upon tragedy. We must allow the author such arbitrary
means; the tragic idea, and the tragic effect, are more important than any mere question of psychological
verisimilitude. In observing the arbitrariness of the contrivance, however, we are able to gauge the more
accurately the author's central concern. It is with the idea of the play, and the artificial means are an index of
the length he is prepared to go in expressing it. Shakespeare neither blames Friar Laurence for his romantic
folly, nor allows the common sense solution of the lovers' difficulties to occur to him or to them; and we must
not consider that any such point is worth making in our criticism of the play except in so far as our
consideration of it may help us the better to understand what the play is about.
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If the cumulatively parallel episodes of Romeo and Juliet may be called the warp of the play's structural
design, the woof is a series of contrasts. It is a drama of youth pitted against age. … Correspondingly, youth
stands for love, and age for continuing hate. Most fundamental of all is the contrast, which is not fully
revealed until the end, of accident and design.
Arthur Brooke's Romeus and Juliet is a translated version of a familiar folk−tale rather clumsily worked up as
a popular romance in Pierre Boaistuau's Histories tragiques; in Brooke's version, as in Boaistuau's, the ironic
succession of reversals is attributed casually to "Fortune"—the customary resource of the romancer intent
only upon the turns of his plot. Shakespeare more ambitiously undertook to comprehend the relations of
chance and destiny in his tragic design.
Carefully, then, the responsibility of the lovers for their catastrophe, in Shakespeare's play, is minimized, as it
is not in Brooke's version. The fact of the feud is emphasized at the outset, and the involvement of Romeo and
Juliet is not only innocent but against their will. Even in the catastrophe itself, their self−destruction is hardly
more than their assent to compelling circumstance. Romeo, it is true, buys poison to unite himself with Juliet
in the grave; but before he reaches the tomb, Paris intervenes to seal with his death the one chance of Romeo's
pausing in his resolve. [Harley] Granville Barker oddly remarks that Paris's death "is wanton and serves little
purpose." Actually, it is calculated to enhance our sense of the pressure of circumstance upon Romeo. He was
distraught before he met Paris at the tomb of Juliet, but not utterly desperate, perhaps. Now, with the blood of
Paris upon his hands (again contrary to his will and his anguished protest), he has no remaining ground of
hope, no reason to delay his purpose. The death of Paris at Romeo's hands is Shakespeare's own addition to
the story and hence an especially significant clue to his conception. It is another irony that prepares us for the
most poignant irony of all, as Romeo, in his rapt intentness upon joining Juliet in the grave, fails to interpret
aright the signs of returning animation in the sleeping girl. … Juliet, as she plunges the knife in her breast,
thinks only of joining her lover. Shakespeare, of course, is not excusing their self−destruction; but it is no part
of his design to blame them. Their deaths are a donnée [known fact] of the story; the point of it lies elsewhere
than in their responsibility.
The blame lies with the families, with the elders. But what of the role of chance, of the fate which so evidently
has crossed the love of Romeo and Juliet from beginning to end? They fell in love by accident. Romeo went
to the Capulet party expecting to indulge his unrequited passion for Rosaline; Juliet came for the express
purpose of seeing and learning to love the County Paris. Amid their later difficulties, if Friar John had been
able to deliver Friar Laurence's letter; if Friar Laurence had thought to use Balthazar as his messenger, as he
first proposed to do [III, iii. 169−71], or if Balthazar too had been delayed; if Friar Laurence, even had been a
little quicker in getting to Juliet's tomb—if anyone of these possibilities had occurred, the outcome might have
been very different. We are meant to reflect upon this chain of seeming accidents, for they are prominently
displayed.
Here, then, in the play as we have it, is the design—an arbitrary one, to be sure—of "a greater power than we
can contradict" [V, iii. 153], that finds means to humble the rival houses "with love." It is a stern conception
of Providence, to the working of whose purposes human beings are blind, which fulfils the moral law that the
hatred of the elders shall be visited upon the children—"poor sacrifices of our enmity" [V, iii. 304], as Capulet
describes them—yet whose power turns hatred in the end to love. The design of the tragedy has been a
Christian moral, implicit but still sufficiently manifest to the thoughtful. Herein lies the rationale of the play's
structure. The three entrances of the Prince mark the three stages of the action intended to show a chain of
seeming accidents issuing in a moral design adumbrated in the sonnet−prologue, implicit from the beginning.
The final entrance of the Prince marks the logical climax of a tightly built narrative scheme. This concluding
stage of the action reveals, in recapitulation, the significance of the whole design, a design in which the
catastrophic deaths of the lovers contribute but a part; the punishment of the elders, and still more their
reconciliation, complete the pattern.
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But if the logical climax of the play's conception lies in this denouement, the emotional climax comes before,
with the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. In this, the world's favourite love story, Shakespeare has endowed his
young lovers with all the riches of his earlier lyrical style, with the music of his sonnets which echoes through
the play; and he has given them a grace and a purity of motive, in keeping with his larger design, that ensures
our complete sympathy from beginning to end. As we follow their story, we cannot help taking sides with
them against the elders—against the blind selfishness and perversity of their parents, against the stupid
animality, however amusing, of the Nurse, against the absurd ineptitude of Friar Laurence; and as we see them
hasten unwittingly to their destruction, we can only pity their youth, their innocence, and their ill luck. They
themselves have no awareness of a tragic misstep, of a price justly exacted for human pride or folly, and
neither have we: their story is full of pathos, but is has in itself little or nothing of tragic grandeur.
The tragic irony of the story, as Shakespeare tells it, lies in the blindness of the elders to the consequences of
their hatred until it is too late, in the reversal brought about by the power greater than they. Yet despite the
dramatist's efforts to direct our attention to this larger significance of the action—through the prologue and the
structural foreshadowing of his whole scheme; through the chain of unlucky coincidences and arbitrary
motives; through the reiteration of the theme of fortune and ill chance and fate—our feelings remain linked
with the story of the lovers throughout the play; and audiences and actors alike notoriously feel that with the
deaths of Romeo and Juliet the interest of the play is at an end, that the subsequent explanations are prolix and
anticlimactic and may well be abridged. This feeling is manifestly contrary to what the dramatist aimed at, but
he himself is chiefly responsible for our feeling, in having made his young lovers the centre of our regard.
Thus the play misses its full unity of effect because our sympathies are exhausted before the tragic design is
complete. The story of a young and idealistic love thwarted is not enough to make a great tragedy; but
Shakespeare, trying to place it within a grander conception, has not been able to achieve a larger unity. There
is no failure in any detail of execution, and the conception of the play as a whole is worked out with
remarkable regularity and precision. But the love story is not quite harmonious with the larger conception; our
sympathies do not culminate in this larger conception; they culminate in pity for the lovers. The awe that we
should feel as well is not inherent in their story but is indicated (rather than effected) in what seems to us like
an epilogue; it is something explained to us at the end rather than rendered immediately dramatic and
compelling as the heart of the design. Shakespeare never made this particular mistake again; and we must
surely add that, even though he overreaches himself in his play, he yet enchants us with the beauty of what he
holds in his grasp.
Even this judgment, perhaps, is too rigorous. If Romeo and Juliet is deficient by the severest standard—by the
standard of Shakespeare's own later achievements in tragedy—it yet remains one of the loveliest of all his
works. And if we consider it not too closely but as we yield ourselves to its lyrical appeal in the theatre, we
may find therein a sufficient argument of its unity. The lines from sonnet CXVI. . . :
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks.
But bears it out even to the edge of doom
commemorate the most lasting impression the play leaves with us, the impression of its imperishable beauty.
We distinguish between the transitory life and fortunes of Romeo and Juliet and their love, which remains
ideal, and, in a sense, beyond the reach of fortune or death. It is not their love that is blighted, after all, but
their lives. The tragic episode of their lives may thus be seen as participating in [Dante's] "Divine Comedy";
and, fundamentally, this is what we recognize as we are moved by their story. (pp. 25−31)
Harold S. Wilson, "Thesis: 'Romeo and Juliet and 'Hamlet,'" in his On the Design of Shakespearian Tragedy,
University of Toronto Press, 1957, pp. 19−51.
Tragic Design
174
Adherence to the Rules of Tragedy
G. H. Durrant
[In the following excerpt, three students (A, B, and C), guided by their teacher (Lecturer or Mr. X), debate
whether or not Romeo and Juliet adheres to the guidelines of Aristotelian tragedy; that is, in the instructor's
words, "does it show the fall of a good and great man, brought about by a flaw in his own nature, enforced by
Destiny or by the law of Nature, and arousing Pity and Terror, and so bringing about a state of tragic
purgation?" Students A and B consider the question in light of scholarly essays by H. B. Charlton, A C.
Bradley, Edward Dowden, Thomas Marc Parrott, Muriel C. Bradbrook, and G. B. Harrison, who generally
agree that Romeo and Juliet is not tragic in the Aristotelian sense of the term because the hero is ordinary
and the idea of an all−controlling fate is unconvincing. Student C, however, disagrees with the scholars and
offers an impressionistic Aristotelian debate is pointless because Shakespeare was not concerned with
sustaining an overall tragic design.]
Lecturer [Mr. X). As I told you, we are today to begin the study of Romeo and Juliet, a play that enjoyed a
great popularity both in Shakespeare's own day and throughout the following centuries. But since I have
frequently impressed upon you the need to consult the best critical opinion before forming your own
judgment, perhaps you will tell me now where you have sought for help in reading the play, and what the
result of your researches has been.
Student A. Well I've read Professor Charlton [Shakespearean Tragedy], and Professor Dowden [Shakespeare,
His Mind and Art] and Dr. Bradley [Shakespearean Tragedy] and Professor Parrott [William Shakespeare, a
Handbook], and they all speak very highly of the play. Only I'm not quite sure why they like it . . .
Student B. So do Professor Harrison [Shakespeare's Tragedies] and Dr. Bradbrook [Shakespeare and
Elizabethan Poetry], and the others I've read. But I must admit I'm still somewhat puzzled, too. I suppose that
is because I have always taken the play in a very simple−minded way as being a love−story with a sad ending.
But now I am beginning to realise that it isn't as easy as all that. You see, Romeo and Juliet is a Tragedy—it
was called so by Shakespeare. 'An Excellent conceited Tragedie of Romeo and Juliet' and 'The Most Excellent
and Lamentable Tragedie of Romeo and Juliet'—that is what it was called in Shakespeare's own day. Now it's
all right so long as you simply think that a Tragedy is a story that ends unhappily—I mean anyone can
understand it then—that is what Dr. Bradbrook calls 'a tragedy in the newspaper sense'. But it seems that,
according to the best academic minds, Shakespeare was trying to do something rather different.
Student A. But how can they know what Shakespeare was trying to do? Isn't it all guess−work, after all? I
mean, what evidence have they got?
Student B. Well, of course they haven't any direct evidence, but they can infer from what they know of
Shakespeare's later work. You see, if Shakespeare first of all wrote a Tragedy called Romeo and Juliet, and
later on wrote some other Tragedies that were very successful and yet quite different in some important
respects from Romeo and Juliet, doesn't it seem likely that he was really trying to write something like the
later tragedies at the time when he actually wrote Romeo and Juliet? I mean, isn't it probable that Romeo and
Juliet was a first shot that didn't quite come off?
Student A. Well, I must say I think that is pretty far−fetched. I can't see why we can't get on and read Romeo
and Juliet with Mr. X and see what we think of it. After all, Shakespeare has been dead for a long time, and
these guesses about what he was trying to do can't help us much.
Adherence to the Rules of Tragedy
175
Student B. Well, I think we ought to ask Mr. X first of all what he thinks of the ideas we found in the critical
works. . . .
Lecturer. I'm glad you're coming round to that. It won't do to go off on your own, spinning fancies about the
play out of your heads. A little contact with sound scholarship is essential if you are to get to the heart of the
matter. But as I want to be sure that you have really read the authorities, I'll ask you to tell me what they say.
Well, B. . . . ? (pp. 23−4)
Student B. . . .[The] worst feature of the play, according to Professor Harrison, is that it 'lacks the qualities of
deep tragedy.'
Lecturer. Now at last we are beginning to be really serious. Obviously, we can't simply go ahead and read the
play in a hopelessly unscientific spirit. We must begin by considering what Tragedy really is. Then when we
have decided that, we can find out whether Romeo and Juliet displays the quality of true Tragedy. If it doesn't
then obviously there must be some defect in it.
Student A. Yes, Mr. X, I think that must be right. At any rate, all the best authorities seem to think that's the
right way to study a play. Look what I've written down in my notebook. I spent Saturday morning in the
Library making notes of what the scholars say; and they all seem very doubtful about the play as a tragedy.
Here is what Professor Charlton says: First of all, he points out that there are a great many premonitions of
disaster in the play. He gives a good many examples of them; and he says that this is Shakespeare's way of
giving us the 'sense of an all−controlling Fate' so as to make the play tragic, and not merely a result of the
inconstancy of Fortune.
Student B. But Shakespeare does make Romeo say he is 'Fortune's fool' after he has killed Tybalt. And doesn't
Juliet cry out on 'fickle' Fortune when Romeo has gone? In the last scene the catastrophe is described as a
'mischance', a 'misadventure', 'some ill unlucky thing' [V. iii. 136]. Would Shakespeare have put those words
in if he had been anxious to put the stress on an 'all−controlling Fate' and not on the 'inconstancy of Fortune'?
Student A. I suppose Charlton would say that these were relics of [Arthur] Broke's poem, from which
Shakespeare took the story of the play. He says: 'Instead of letting his persons declaim formally, as Broke's
do, against the inconstancy of Fortune, he endows them with tragic premonitions.' But, as you say, it isn't
quite true. Shakespeare does add the 'tragic premonitions'; but he doesn't remove all the references to 'fickle
Fortune.'
Lecturer. But you can see what Charlton is getting at. He wants to show how Shakespeare added, or tried to
add, a feeling of inevitability to the events of the play, so as to add tragic Terror to the pity you feel for the
unlucky lovers of Broke's poem.
Student A. Yes, but Charlton thinks that it wasn't a success. He says that Shakespeare 'gives to the action itself
a quality apt to conjure the sense of relentless doom.' But he doubts whether 'the sense of an all−controlling
Fate is made strong enough to fulfil its tragic purpose.' He shows that the events in the play in themselves
provide no real basis for the 'sweep of necessity.' In the end he comes to the conclusion that the play is
radically unsound. It won't really bear careful examination, even though we may be carried away by it when
we see it on the stage. He says: 'And so, stirred to sympathy by Shakespeare's poetic power, we tolerate,
perhaps even approve, the death (of Romeo and Juliet). At least for the moment.' Then he goes on: 'But
tragedy lives not only for its own moment, nor by "suspensions of disbelief." Our sentiments were but
momentarily gratified. And finally our deeper consciousness protests. Shakespeare has conquered us by a
trick: the experiment carries us no nearer to the heart of tragedy.'
Lecturer. Yes, you see judged by the criteria that Aristotle and Bradley lay down for tragedy, the play hardly
Adherence to the Rules of Tragedy
176
succeeds. There are too many accidents in it. But what does Dowden say? He was a follower of Bradley, too.
Student A. He says: 'Thus it came about that Shakespeare at nearly forty years was the author of but two or
three tragedies. Of these, Romeo and Juliet may be looked upon as the work of the author's adolescence, and
Hamlet as the evidence that he had become adult, and in this supreme department master of his craft.'
Student B. But just a minute; doesn't Dowden give the earliest date for Romeo and Juliet as 1591?
Lecturer. Yes, I seem to remember that he does.
Student B. Well then, Shakespeare must have been at least twenty−seven when he wrote the play. Surely
Dowden didn't really think Shakespeare was still adolescent at that hoary old age?
Student A. Don't be silly—he only means that Romeo and Juliet is immature. It's unripe, compared with the
'true tragedies.' It was written in Shakespeare's salad days, when he was green in judgment.
Lecturer. Don't waste time quibbling. What else does Dowden say?
Student A. He also says that he thinks Shakespeare worked on the play for five or six years— there's the
answer to your question about his age—and that in the end 'there still appeared in the play unmistakable
marks of immature judgment.'
Student B. What marks?
Student A. Well, I suppose he relied on the good sense of the reader to spot them. ... He goes on: 'It is not
unlikely that even then he considered his powers to be insufficiently matured for the great dealing with human
life and passion, which tragedy demands; for, having written Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare returned to the
histories, in which, doubtless, he was aware that he was receiving the best possible culture for future tragedy.
..."
Student B. In other words, Shakespeare wasn't yet equal to the job, and was thoroughly disappointed with the
play when he'd finished. It does seem that if he had written it for an examination in Tragedy he wouldn't have
been given top marks by the professors. Of course, it's their job to judge by the very highest standards. … But
didn't people like it when it was produced?
Lecturer. It seems that it was a great success … ran into four editions before the First Folio, besides being
produced very often. But, of course, mere popular success has nothing to do with the artistic conscience.
Student A. I somehow can't see the Elizabethan audience putting up with the leisurely charm of stilted poetry
…, but we can always suppose that it was cut in Shakespeare's day, can't we?
Lecturer. Yes, that is what some scholars do suppose. It is the scientific method, you see. Go on, A.
Student A. Professor Parrott (he is or was at Princeton) has a book—this green one—on Shakespeare. . . .
William Shakespeare—A Handbook he calls it. He seems to agree with the others. Where am I? Oh, here it is:
Romeo and Juliet lacks the depth, the power, the tragic intensity, of the great plays of the
third period, and it may well be that Shakespeare, no doubt his own severest critic, felt he was
not yet ready to deal competently with great tragic themes. At any rate, in spite of the success
of Romeo and Juliet on the stage and with all lovers of poetry, he turned his back upon
tragedy.
Adherence to the Rules of Tragedy
177
Student B. I see—poor chap—he knew the play was no good. It must have been maddening for him to have
everybody praising it when he knew in his heart all the time that future Professors of English would consider
it a failure. I wonder he didn't blow his brains out.
Lecturer. That will do, B. We don't want unnecessary facetiousness. The only thing to do now is to go to the
fountainhead. What does Bradley say?
Student A. Well, perhaps they all got it from him. It's a bit difficult, because he doesn't deal much with this
play in Shakespearean Tragedy, which is what I read. But he does make some remarks about it, and they
agree with those we've heard so far. He says that Romeo and Juliet is a 'pure tragedy,' but in some respects, an
immature one. As far as I can make out, what he means is that the play is meant to be like Othello, Hamlet,
King Lear and Macbeth—to be a 'pure tragedy,' in other words, but that it doesn't succeed because
Shakespeare was still too immature for successful 'pure tragedy.' But Bradley talks of Romeo as though he
was a tragic hero of the same kind as the heroes of the later tragedies. He says:
How could men escape, we cry, such vehement propensities as drive Romeo, Antony,
Coriolanus to their doom? And why is it that a man's virtues help to destroy htm, and that his
weakness is so intertwined with everything that is admirable in him that we can hardly
separate them even in imagination?
Lecturer. Now we are beginning to see the light. Of course Bradley is considering whether the play is truly
tragic—does it show the fall of a good and great man, brought about by a flaw in his own nature, enforced by
Destiny or by the law of Nature, and arousing Pity and Terror, and so bringing about a state of tragic
purgation? That is the real question, and if we can answer that, Bradley realised, we have the answer to the
problem of Romeo and Juliet.
Student A. But Romeo isn't a great man. He's just an ordinary young chap who falls in love. . . .Oh, now I see
… that is one reason why the play isn't 'deep tragedy.' The hero isn't a representative figure.
Student B. And there is also this other business about the bad verse. All that tedious stuff about Rosaline, and
all those long speeches by Mercutio and the Friar. Most of the writers I've looked at think they can forgive
Shakespeare, because after all he was a poet, and poets can't always be businesslike. Professor Harrison, you
see, even finds a 'charm' in it, though he thinks it ought to be 'cut' in an acted version. But Dr.
Bradbrook—she's a Cambridge don, isn't she?—is very severe. Where are my notes? Here we are: 'Parts of
the play are in a manner so rhetorical as to be emptied of all feeling. Romeo like Titus moralises on a fly at the
height of his laments.' Incidentally, she thinks that the Elizabethans knew all the time that the play wasn't a
'full tragedy.' She says that 'if any Polonius [in Hamlet] had essayed its classification' (I wonder why she says
that?) he would have decided that the play was 'an amorous tragicomedy.' It seems that, according to Dr.
Bradbrook, the play wasn't really an attempt to write Tragedy at all, it was the beginning of Shakespeare's
comic style. And Mercutio and the Nurse are to be understood as comic characters.
Student A. Now you are getting me thoroughly mixed up. If we don't even know whether to take the play as
immature Tragedy or as immature Comedy, we are simply lost.
Lecturer. Well, we had better sum up, and see where we've got to. The general view is that Romeo and Juliet
is a good play, but that it is immature, and contains bad verse. It isn't truly tragic, because the hero is too
ordinary, and because we don't see any necessity in the action. It sometimes rings hollow, and Shakespeare
was probably disappointed with it. The only problem left is whether it is the beginnings of true Tragedy or the
beginnings of true Comedy. There is no reason to feel confused.
(A knock on the door. Enter Miss C.)
Adherence to the Rules of Tragedy
178
[Lecturer.] Oh, Miss C, there you are; you are very late.
Miss C. I'm very sorry, I didn't notice the time.
Lecturer. I see. Well, we have just been discussing the views expressed on Romeo and Juliet by informed
academic critics. Would you like to give us the benefit of your own studies?
Miss C. Oh! I'm very sorry. You see I've not really looked into that very carefully. I mean to say, I've been
reading the play again.
Lecturer. And what did you make of it? Can you help us with the problem?
Miss C. The problem? Is there a problem? I'm sorry, I seem to have been, so busy this week. . . .
Student A. We have been trying to decide why Romeo and Juliet is a comparative failure.
Miss C. But it isn't a failure is it? I mean I think it's simply a wonderful play.
Lecturer. Well, since you have some views after all, Miss C, perhaps you will expand them a little. But try not
to be too much carried away by enthusiasm. Impressionistic criticism is never really sound.
Miss C. Well, I expect this sounds very silly, but it seems to me that Shakespeare was writing a play about
Love. I think [Samuel Taylor] Coleridge says that he intended it to be a sort of love−poem—he doesn't quite
say that, but that is what he obviously means. So Shakespeare shows us two lovers; they have to be young
because it is their first love— their first serious love, I mean—and it has to take place very suddenly so that
the whole passion can develop to the fullest intensity. And then they must be unlucky and die—not to create
Pity and Terror, but simply because their death, and their foreseeing of it, add to the intensity of their love.
Student A. Ah, but you see it all depends too much on bad luck. Juliet's message goes astray by bad luck, and
she wakes up just a little too late, and there are lots of other examples. How can that be truly tragic?
Miss C. Well, does it matter whether it is 'truly tragic' or not? The question is: does it work in the play? Surely
it does. The lovers are unlucky (though of course they are rash too) and they die. Shakespeare doesn't need to
demonstrate that they had of necessity to die, because he isn't concerned with the laws of the Universe, and
with the tragic terror that these arouse. He only wants to make us realise the love as intensely as possible. And
the whole play is coloured with the sense of death so as to heighten the ectasy of love. There is no need for
tragic necessity. And Romeo isn't meant as a representative tragic hero, who has a 'flaw' and is punished for it
by the inexorable hand of Fate. He is a boy who is transformed by love into a man; he is unlucky and he dies.
He illustrates the nature of Love, not the nature of the Moral Law. I should have thought that anybody would
take the play in that way.
Student A. Ah, but you haven't read the critics. It all seems simple to you. It did to me too, before I read
Bradley and Dowden and Harrison and Charlton. But let me ask you one question. Wasn't the play called a
Tragedy? I mean by Shakespeare, or whoever published the Quarto?
Miss C. Yes, but I don't suppose that the Elizabethans were quite so well up in Aristotle as we are, and of
course they hadn't read Bradley or Charlton. It probably seemed quite simple to them, too. I suppose that they
regarded almost any story with a sad ending as a Tragedy. Anyway, what's in a name? Though I must say it
seems to have brought a great pother on Shakespeare's head. (pp. 24−9)
Adherence to the Rules of Tragedy
179
Student A. It seems to me that your way of looking at it is hopelessly uncritical. (p. 34)
Miss C. No, that isn't quite true. I think there may be weaknesses here and there in the play. …But the main
thing is that I am convinced that Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet at great speed, and with the fullest
knowledge of what he was doing. It isn't the sort of play that is written by a struggling adolescent mind.
Doesn't the play ring with triumphant poetry, and doesn't it all move with the greatest sureness? I think that
the critics who imagine Shakespeare giving up Tragedy in despair after experimenting with Romeo have
allowed their own ideas to muddle them. They approach the play by way of King Lear, and they measure it by
Othello and by Macbeth. It won't fit on that bed of Procrustes, and so they start to cut and bend, stretch and
twist it: and when they have finished they blame Shakespeare. They worry fearfully about Shakespeare's
development, but I don't believe that he himself worried so much. If he didn't write any more plays like Romeo
and Juliet for a time, it's more likely, to my mind, that he felt he had really done what he wanted to do and
could go on to something else.
Student B. Well, its your opinion against theirs.
Miss C. No it isn't. It is common sense and the almost unanimous opinion of readers and play−goers over
three hundred years against a few apostles of Bradley's. Everybody knows what Romeo and Juliet is about
until he has read these books. And I doubt whether we should take the academic critics so seriously if they
wrote in plain direct English. It's a kind of fog that gets into the mind of writers and readers. (pp. 34−5)
Lecturer. Well, Miss C, you seem to have very decided opinions. I hope your own essay, which is overdue,
will show none of the faults you find in the works of Shakespearean scholars. But you must not allow your
distaste for scholarship to make you arrogant. Humility is the best approach to literature. (p. 35)
G. H. Durrant, "What's in a Name? A Discussion of 'Romeo and Juliet'," in Theoria, Pietermaritzburg, No. 8,
1956, pp. 23−36.
Clifford Leech
[Leech discusses Romeo and Juliet in terms of what he views as the three principal elements of dramatic
tragedy: (1) the events of the plot proceed from no discernible cause; (2) the story focuses on an agonizing
situation that cannot be corrected; and (3) at least one of the central characters represents humankind's
capacity for evil and the destruction it engenders. Romeo and Juliet cannot properly be termed "tragic," the
critic argues, because it violates all three of these conditions. Specifically, the drama diverges from tragedy
because it fails to fully establish an element of "mystery" in the action, thereby forcing the reader to attribute
the progression of events to the operation of fate; the play suggests, through the "moral lesson" at the end,
that the lovers' deaths will reconcile the feuding families; and finally, it presents only "ordinary" individuals,
none of whom are truly evil.]
[Romeo and Juliet concludes with] a kind of "happy ending." The feud will be ended, the lovers will be
remembered. We may be reminded of the commonplace utterance that we have two deaths: the moment of
actual ceasing to be, and the moment when the last person who remembers us dies. These lovers have their
being enshrined in a famous play. So they are remembered in perpetuity, and their lives, according to the play
itself, will be recorded in their statues. Certainly this is a sad affair, like that of Paolo and Francesca in The
Divine Comedy. But we may ask, is it tragic?
Tragedy seems to demand a figure or figures that represent us in our ultimate recognition of evil. We need to
feel that such figures are our kin, privileged to be chosen for the representative role and coming to the
destruction that we necessarily anticipate for ourselves. The boy and girl figures in Romeo and Juliet are
perhaps acceptable as appropriate representatives for humankind: after all, they do grow up. What worries us
more, I think, in trying to see this play as fully achieved "tragedy," is the speech of the Duke at the end, which
Adherence to the Rules of Tragedy
180
suggests that some atonement will be made through the reconciliation of the Montague and Capulet families.
We are bound to ask "Is this enough?" It appears to be offered as such, but we remember that the finest among
Verona's people are dead.
Shakespearean tragedy commonly ends with a suggestion of a return to normality, to peace. Fortinbras [in
Hamlet] will rule in Denmark, Malcolm [in Macbeth] in Scotland, Iago [in Othello] will be put out of the way.
But these later tragedies leave us with a doubt whether the peace is other than a second−best, whether indeed
it is in man's power ever to put things right. In Romeo and Juliet the ending of the feud is laboriously spelled
out.
But there is also the matter of Fate and Chance. Romeo kills Paris: at first glance that was a quite fortuitous
happening. Paris was a good man, devoted to Juliet, who unfortunately got in the way of Romeo's approach to
Juliet's tomb. At this point Romeo's doom is sealed: he might kill Tybalt and get away with it; he could not get
away with killing an innocent Paris, who was moreover the Prince's kinsman. Now it is inevitable that he will
die, whatever the moment of Juliet's awakening. There is indeed a "star−cross'd" pattern for the lovers, there is
no way out for Romeo once he has come back to Verona. But perhaps Paris's important function in the last
scene is not sufficiently brought out: the spectator may feel that there is simple chance operating in Romeo's
arrival before Juliet wakes, in his killing himself a moment too early, in the Friar's belated arrival. Later I
must return to the matter of the play's references to the "stars": for the moment I merely want to refer to the
fact that tragedy can hardly be dependent on "bad luck."
Even so, though simple chance will not do, we may say that tragedy properly exists only when its events defy
reason. The Friar thought the marriage of the young lovers might bring the feud to an end, and that was a
reasonable assumption. Ironically, it did end the feud but at the expense of Romeo's and Juliet's lives, at the
expense too of Mercutio's, Tybalt's, and Lady Montague's lives. The element of non sequitur in the train of
events common to tragedy—despite the fact that, with one part of our minds, we see the operation of
"probability or necessity," as Aristotle has it—is well described by Laurens van der Post in his novel The
Hunter and the Whale:
I was too young at the time to realise that tragedy is not tragedy if one finds reason or
meaning in it. It becomes then, I was yet to learn, a darker form of this infinitely mysterious
matter of luck. It is sheer tragedy only if it is without discernible sense or motivation.
We may balk at "luck," as I have already suggested, but "mysterious" is right indeed (as Bradley splendidly
urged on us in the First Lecture of Shakespearean Tragedy), for what "sense" or "motivation" does there seem
to be in tragedy's gods? The sense of mystery is not, however, firmly posited in Romeo and Juliet. Rather, it is
laboriously suggested that the Montagues and the Capulets have been taught a lesson in a particularly hard
way.
Thus we have several reasons to query the play's achievement in the tragic kind. Do the lovers take on
themselves the status of major figures in a celebration of a general human woe? Is the ending, with its promise
of reconciliation, appropriate to tragic writing? We have seen that the lovers grow up. and they give us the
impression of justifying human life, in their best moments, more than most people do. But the suggestion that
their deaths will atone, will bring peace back, seems nugatory: no man's death brings peace, not even
Christ's—or the Unknown Soldier's. The play could still end tragically if we were left with the impression that
the survivors were merely doing what they could to go on living in an impoverished world: we have that in
Hamlet and the later tragedies too. Here the laboriousness with which Shakespeare recapitulates all the events
known to us, in the Friar's long speech, is surely an indication of an ultimate withdrawal from the tragic: the
speech is too much like a preacher's resume of the events on which a moral lesson will be based. We can
accept Edgar's long account of Gloucester's death in King Lear, because we need a moment of recession
before the tragedy's last phase, where we shall see Lear and Cordelia dead, and because no moral lesson is
Adherence to the Rules of Tragedy
181
drawn from Gloucester's death; but at the end of this earlier play, when Romeo and Juliet have already
eloquently died, we are with difficulty responsive to the long reiteration of all we have long known through
the play's action.
Shakespeare has not here achieved the sense of an ultimate confrontation with evil, or the sense that the tragic
figure ultimately and fully recognizes what his situation is. Romeo and Juliet die, more or less content with
death as a second best to living together. Montague and Capulet shake hands, and do what is possible to atone.
The lovers have the illusion of continuing to be together—an illusion to some extent imposed on the audience.
The old men feel a personal guilt, not a realization of a general sickness in man's estate. But perhaps only Lear
and Macbeth and Timon came to that realization.
We can understand why Shakespeare abandoned tragedy for some years after this play. It had proved possible
for him to touch on the tragic idea in his English histories, making them approach, but only approach, the idea
of humanity's representative being given over to destruction, as with the faulty Richard II, the saintly Henry
VI, the deeply guilty yet none the less sharply human Richard III. He had given his theater a flawed yet
impressive Titus Andronicus and in the same play an Aaron given almost wholly to evil but obstinately alive.
But in these plays the main drive is not tragic. The histories rely on the sixteenth−century chronicles, Titus on
that tradition of grotesque legend that came from both Seneca and Ovid. The past was to be relived and
celebrated in the histories; Titus was more of a literary exercise in antique horror than a play embodying a
direct reference to the general human condition. In Romeo and Juliet Shakespeare for the first time essayed
tragedy proper— that is, by wanting to bring the play's events into relation to things as they truly are—and he
used a tale often told but belonging to recent times and concerned with people whom the spectators were to
feel as very much their own kin. He may well have been particularly attracted to the story he found in
Brooke's poem for the very reason that its figures and events did not have the authority of history and
belonged to the comparatively small world of Verona. No major change in the political order can result from
what happens in this play's action. No individual figure presented here is truly given over to evil. Without any
precedents to guide him, he aimed at writing about eloquent but otherwise ordinary young people in love and
about their equally ordinary friends and families. Only Mercutio has something daemonic in him, in the sense
that his quality of life transcends the normal level of being. (pp. 68−71)
[If] Shakespeare had no useful dramatic precedents in this task, he had a manifold heritage of ideas about the
nature of love; and many parts of that heritage show themselves in the play. The immoderateness and rashness
that the Friar rebukes seem, on the one hand, to lead—in the fashion of a moral play—to the lovers'
destruction. On the other hand, not only is our sympathy aroused but we are made to feel that what Romeo
and Juliet achieve may be a finer thing than is otherwise to be found in Verona. Both views are strongly
conveyed, and either of them might effectively dominate the play. Of course, they could coexist and
interpenetrate—as they were to do much later in Anthony and Cleopatra—but here they seem to alternate, and
to be finally both pushed into the background in the long insistence that the feud will end because of the
lovers' deaths. The "moral" is thus finally inverted: the lovers' sequence of errors has culminated in the error
of suicide, but now we are made to turn to their parents' error and to the consolation that Romeo and Juliet
will be remembered through their golden statues. And it is difficult for us to get interested in these statues, or
to take much joy in the feud's ending.
Yet the deepest cause of uneasiness in our response to the play is, I believe, to be found in the relation of the
story to the idea of the universe that is posited. We are told in the Prologue of "star−cross'd lovers" [1. 6], and
there are after that many references to the "stars." So there is a sense of "doom" here, but we are never fully
told what is implied. Many coincidences operate: Romeo meets Tybalt just at the wrong moment; the Friar's
message to Romeo about Juliet's alledged death goes astray; Romeo arrives at the tomb just before Juliet
awakens; the Friar comes too late. I have already drawn attention to Shakespeare's device by which Romeo
has to kill Paris, so that, even if he had arrived at the right time, there would have been no way out for him.
We may feel that a similar sequence of chances operates in Hamlet. If Hamlet had not killed Polonius in a
Adherence to the Rules of Tragedy
182
scared moment, if he had not had his father's seal with him on the voyage to England, if he had not managed
to escape on the hospitable pirates' ship, if the foils had not been exchanged in the fencing bout with Laertes,
if Gertrude had not drunk from the poisoned cup, things might indeed not have been disposed so as to lead
him to Claudius's killing at the moment when it actually occurred. Even so, we can feel that, after all, the end
would have been much as it is. Hamlet was a man in love with death, far more in love with death than with
killing: we may say that only in the moment of death's imminence was he fully alive, freed from inhibition,
able to kill Claudius: somehow or other, whatever the chances, this play demanded a final confrontation
between the uncle−father and nephew−son. In Romeo and Juliet, on the other hand, we could imagine things
working out better: the lovers are doomed only by the words of the Prologue, not by anything inherent in their
situation. It is not, as it is in Hardy's novels, that we have a sense of a fully adverse "President of the
immortals": there is rather an insufficient consideration of what is implied by the "stars." Of course, in King
Lear, in all later Shakespearean tragedy, there is a sense of an ultimate mystery in the universe: "Is there any
cause in nature that makes these hard hearts?" [King Lear, III. vi. 77−8], Lear asks in his condition of most
extreme distress. Bradley recognized that this mystery was inherent in the idea of tragedy, as is implied too in
the passage from Laurens van der Post I have already quoted. But in Romeo and Juliet, we have to accept the
lovers' deaths as the mere result of the will of the "stars" (the astrological implication is just too easy), and
then we are exhorted to see this as leading to a reconciliation between the families.
The final "moral" of the play, as we have seen, is applied only to Old Montague and Old Capulet: they have
done evil in allowing the feud to go on, and have paid for it in the deaths of their children and of Lady
Montague. But, largely because Romeo and Juliet are never blamed, the children themselves stand outside the
framework of moral drama. They have, albeit imperfectly, grown up into the world of tragedy, where the
moral law is not a thing of great moment. They have been sacrificed on the altar of man's guilt, have become
the victims of our own outrageousness, have given us some relief because they have died and we still for a
time continue living. … To that extent, Romeo and Juliet is "tragic" in a way we can fully recognize. But its
long−drawn−out ending, after the lovers are dead, with the pressing home of the moral that their deaths will
bring peace, runs contrary to the notion of tragedy. There is a sanguineness about the end of it, a suggestion
that after all "All shall be well, and / All manner of thing shall be well," as Eliot quotes from Julian of
Norwich in Little Gidding, and we can hardly tolerate the complacency of the statement. (pp. 71−3)
[In Romeo and Juliet Shakespeare] attempted an amalgam of romantic comedy and the tragic idea, along with
the assertion of a moral lesson which is given the final emphasis—although the force of that lesson is
switched from the lovers to their parents. But tragedy is necessarily at odds with the moral: it is concerned
with a permanent anguishing situation, not with one that can either be put right or be instrumental in teaching
the survivors to do better. When Shakespeare wrote "love−tragedy" again, in Othello and in Antony and
Cleopatra, he showed that love may be a positive good but that it was simultaneously destructive and that its
dramatic presentation gave no manumission from error to those who contemplated the destruction and
continued to live. Nowhere, I think, does he suggest that love is other than a condition for wonder, however
much he makes fun of it. But in his mature years he sees it as not only a destructive force but as in no way
affording a means of reform. That Romeo and Juliet is a "moral tragedy"—which, I have strenuously urged, is
a contradiction in terms—is evident enough. It is above all the casualness of the play's cosmology that
prevents us from seeing it as tragedy fully achieved: we have seen the need for a fuller appreciation of the
mystery. As with Titus Andronicus, the nearest play to Romeo and Juliet overtly assuming a tragic guise in the
chronology of Shakespeare's works, the march toward disaster is too manifestly a literary device. (p. 73)
Clifford Leech, "The Moral Tragedy of 'Romeo and Juliet'," in English Renaissance Drama: Essays in Honor
of Madeline Doran &Mark Eccles, Standish Henning, Robert Kimbrough, and Richard Knowles, eds.,
Southern Illinois University Press, 1976, pp. 59−75.
Adherence to the Rules of Tragedy
183
Selected Quotes
From forth the loins of these two foes
A pair of star−cross'd lovers take their life;
Whose misadventur'd piteous overthrows,
Doth with their death bury their parents' strife. (Opening Prologue)
From the play's opening prologue we can garner the events of the play in a nutshell. The ill−fated union of
Romeo and Juliet will result in their (and others) deaths, but with this will come an end to the ancient feud
between the Montagues and Capulets.
My only love sprung from my only hate!
Too early seen unknown, and known too late!
Prodigious birth of love it is to me,
That I must love a loathed enemy (I, v)
Juliet speaks with her nurse after meeting Romeo at the conclusion of Act I. She remarks that she fell in love
with Romeo right away, and only later discovered that he is a Montague ("known too late"). This quote
highlights the heart of the theme in the play: the "star−crossed" lovers.
Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night (III, ii)
After their initial meeting, the lyrical and imaginitive quality of Romeo and Juliet's love reaches sublime
heights. Juliet speaks to herself here while waiting for Romeo, her imagination the stuff of "heaven" and
"stars".
O serpent heart, hid with a flowering face!
Did ever dragon keep so fair a cave?
Beautiful tyrant! fiend angelical!
Dove−feather'd raven! wolvish−ravening lamb! (III, ii)
Juliet learns that Romeo has killed Tybalt and vents her anger in good/evil terms. Thus Romeo, is a "serpent"
with the face of a flower, a "dragon" in a "fair" cave. Her love for Romeo overcomes her anger shortly after.
And world's exile is death,−−then banished
Is death mis−term'd: calling death banishment,
Thou cutt'st my head off with a golden axe,
And smil'st upon the stroke that murders me. ... (III, iii)
Romeo speaks with Friar Laurence after learning of his banishment from Verona. Juliet, in Verona, is his
"world" and he likens banishment to exile from the world, and thus death by means of a "golden axe."
Selected Quotes
184
O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear;
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear! (I, v)
Romeo's words upon seeing Juliet for the first time. Immediately his speech begins to transcend anything
earlier in the play. Love and the night are equated, just as Juliet will later speak of Romeo as fit to grace the
stars of the night.
The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars,
As daylight doth a lamp; her eyes in heaven
Would through the airy region stream so bright
That birds would sing and think it were not night (II, ii)
Another fine lyrical example of Romeo's love for Juliet. The light/dark motif (discussed in the critical
discussion) is evident here, with the contrasts between night and day, and the stars and the sun.
These violent delights have violent ends,
And in their triumph die; like fire and powder,
Which, as they kiss, consume: the sweetest honey
Is loathsome in his own deliciousness,
And in the taste confounds the appetite:
Therefore love moderately: long love doth so;
Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow (II, vi)
The voice of reason in the play, the Friar here speaks with Romeo. He remarks on the "violent" delights of
love and how they can have "violent ends" and he urges to love moderately. The quote highlights one of the
inherent contradictions of love and falling in love. His remarks, of course, are prescient.
O fortune, fortune! all men call thee fickle:
If thou art fickle, what dost thou with him
That is renown'd for faith? Be fickle, fortune;
For then, I hope, thou wilt not keep him long
But send him back
(V, ii)
Fortune is a prominent theme in the play, as in many of Shakespeare's works. Here, Juliet speaks to herself
after Romeo leaves, urging Fortune to send Romeo back to her. Her words suggest that no matter how much
faith one puts into something, we are, in some sense, at the whim of Fortune.
Suggested Essay Topics
Act I, Scenes 3−5
1. Explain the operation of fate and how it has worked in Scenes 1 and 2 of the play to help bring the two
lovers together.
Suggested Essay Topics
185
2. Explain the rules of marriage during the fourteenth century.
3. What major conflicts are established in the first scene?
4. Explain the purpose of the Prologue.
Act I, Scenes 3−5
1. Compare the love that Romeo feels for Juliet to the love that he felt for Rosaline.
2. Explain the imagery of light and dark in Act I and how it is used as symbols for Rosaline and Juliet.
3. How does Shakespeare use humor in Act I?
4. Trace how fate has brought the two lovers together.
Act II, Scenes 1 and 2
1. Explain how imagery and figures of speech make Scene 2 one of the most beautiful scenes in the play.
Describe the imagery and figures of speech and illustrate how they are used.
2. Explain the purpose of Scenes 1 and 2.
3. Discuss Juliet’s concerns in the balcony scene.
Act II, Scenes 3 and 4
1. Name the two other people in the play who know about the love between Romeo and Juliet and explain
how they help the lovers achieve their goals.
2. Explain Friar Laurence’s philosophy concerning the parts of a plant as compared to the potential actions of
man.
3. Describe Mercutio and his role in the play.
Act II, Scenes 5 and 6
1. Explain the relationship between the Nurse and Juliet.
2. Explain the rules of courtship during this time period. Compare and contrast the actions of Paris and of
Romeo in regard to courting and marriage.
3. Friar Laurence plays an important role in the lives of Romeo and Juliet. Explain his role in their lives—his
concerns and his hopes.
Act III, Scenes 1 and 2
1. Describe the events that foreshadow the death of Tybalt.
2. Define pun and explain how it is used in this act.
3. Act III is considered the climax of the plot. Explain why this is so.
4. Describe the character of Mercutio and the part he plays in the life of Romeo.
Suggested Essay Topics
186
Act III, Scenes 3 and 4
1. Discuss Friar Laurence’s plan to reunite Romeo and Juliet.
2. The nurse and Friar Laurence react differently to the situations presented in these scenes. Compare and
contrast these reactions.
3. What events take place that complicate Juliet’s life?
Act III, Scene 5
1. Explain the relationship between Juliet and her parents. How has it changed from the beginning of the play?
2. Explain how Juliet has changed from the beginning of Act I up until Act III. Give examples of her behavior
then and now.
3. Describe the role of the Nurse in Juliet’s life. How does this role change in Act III?
4. What event forms the climax or turning point of the play, and what complications does this event create for
Romeo and Juliet?
Act IV, Scenes 1−3
1. Write a character sketch of Juliet emphasizing the internal conflict she is experiencing in this act.
2. How has the Friar’s hobby contributed to the plot of the play?
3. Discuss the four fears Juliet experiences just before she drinks the sleeping potion.
Act IV, Scenes 4 and 5
1. Describe the reactions of Lord Capulet, Lady Capulet, the Nurse, and Friar Laurence to the death of Juliet.
2. Define dramatic irony and give examples from this act.
Act V, Scenes 1 and 2
1. What coincidences occur in this act?
2. Explain fully what goes wrong with Friar Laurence’s plan to reunite the lovers.
Act V, Scene 3
1. Describe the role of Friar Laurence in the play and how he contributes to the fate of the lovers.
2. Explain in detail how Romeo and Juliet both mature during the course of the play. Cite examples from their
speech or actions that illustrate your position.
3. How have the deaths of Romeo and Juliet affected the entire city of Verona?
4. Discuss the role of chance or coincidence in the play. How did it affect the ending of the play?
5. Discuss the role of Paris in the play.
Suggested Essay Topics
187
Sample Essay Outlines
The following paper topics are based on the entire play. Following each topic is a thesis and sample outline.
Use these as a starting point for your paper.
Topic #1
Impetuosity is a tragic flaw that affects character and action. This flaw within a character will ultimately cause
the death of the protagonist. Write an essay in which hasty decisions or actions result in the final tragedy of
the play.
Outline
I. Thesis Statement: Impetuosity is a tragic flaw present in the characters of Romeo, Juliet, Lord Capulet, and
Friar Laurence.
II. Impetuosity of Romeo
A. Love
1. Instant love for Juliet
2. Decision to marry
3. Preference to death rather than be parted from Juliet
B. Relationship with others
1. Reaction after he is banished
2. Kills Tybalt
3. Kills Paris
4. Purchase of poison from the apothecary
III. Impetuosity of Juliet
A. Love
1. Instant love for Romeo
2. Decision to marry
3. Her death
B. Relationship to others
1. Reactions after learning that she is to marry Paris
2. Her attitude toward her parents
IV. Impetuosity of Lord Capulet
A. Decision to give consent for Juliet to marry Paris
B. Reaction when Juliet refuses to marry Paris
C. Decision to move the date up one day
V. Impetuosity of Friar Laurence
A. Willingness to marry Romeo and Juliet
B. Sending Friar John with the letter to Romeo instead of Balthasar
C. Leaving Juliet in the tomb after she awoke
VI. Conclusion: Romeo, Juliet, Lord Capulet, and Friar Laurence all acted hastily at some point in the play
which contributed to the final destruction of Romeo and Juliet.
Topic #2
Because the entire play represents only five days in the lives of Romeo and Juliet, the time line is an important
element. Write an essay explaining the happenings on each of these days and explain how these influenced the
outcome of the play.
Sample Essay Outlines
188
Outline
I. Thesis Statement: Important situations occur in each of these five days of the protagonists’ lives that
influence the outcome of the play.
II. Day One—Sunday
A. The quarrel among the Capulet and Montague servants
1. Tybalt fights Benvolio
2. Prince issues warning
B. Romeo’s romantic nature
1. His infatuation for Rosaline
2. His love for Juliet is established
C. Paris asks to marry Juliet
D. Lord Capulet’s ball
1. Romeo and Juliet meet
2. Tybalt’s anger is ignited against Romeo
III. Day Two—Monday
A. Romeo incorporates Friar Laurence’s help
B. The Nurse meets with Romeo to get the wedding plans
C. Romeo and Juliet are married
D. The fights on the streets of Verona
1. Tybalt kills Mercutio
2. Romeo kills Tybalt
E. Romeo is banished
F. Friar Laurence devises a plan for Romeo and Juliet
G. Paris is granted permission to marry Juliet
IV. Day Three—Tuesday
A. Juliet refuses to marry Paris
B. Friar Laurence devises another plan for Juliet
1. Juliet drinks the sleeping potion
2. Friar Laurence sends a message to Romeo
V. Day Four—Wednesday
A. Juliet is found “dead”
B. Juliet is buried in the Capulet monument
VI. Day Five—Thursday
A. Romeo learns of Juliet’s death
B. Romeo buys poison
C. Romeo kills Paris and himself
D. Friar Laurence learns that his message to Romeo was not delivered
E. Juliet kills herself
VII. Conclusion: The plot of Romeo and Juliet is developed in the course of five days in the lives of the
protagonists.
Topic #3
The structure of a play is important to the development and ultimate resolution of the conflict. Write an essay
in which the five stages of a tragedy are examined showing a relationship to the story and its development.
Sample Essay Outlines
189
Outline
I. Thesis Statement: A tragedy can be organized by the dramatist into five components of dramatic structure
which enable the play to progress smoothly and logically to a conclusion.
II. Introduction or exposition
A. Tone is established.
1. Feud between the families
2. Love of Romeo and Rosaline
3. Love of Romeo and Juliet
B. Setting is evoked.
1. Streets of Verona
2. Capulet household
C. Characters are introduced.
III. Complication or rising action
A. Love between the children of the two feuding families
B. Marriage of Romeo and Juliet
C. Tybalt’s challenge to Romeo
IV. Climax or Turning Point
A. The murders
1. Mercutio
2. Tybalt
B. Romeo’s banishment
C. Lord Capulet’s decree that Juliet is to marry Paris
V. Falling Action
A. Juliet’s internal conflict
1. Conflict with her parents
2. Conflict with the nurse
3. Conflict concerning the compulsory marriage to Paris
4. Fears concerning the potion
B. Friar Laurence’s plan for Romeo and Juliet
VI. Conclusion or catastrophe
A. Friar Laurence’s message does not reach Romeo
B. Deaths
1. Paris
2. Romeo
3. Juliet
C. Feud ends with the deaths of Romeo and Juliet
VII. Conclusion: The introduction, the complication, the climax, the falling action, and the conclusion are
components of dramatic structure which enable the play to progress smoothly and logically to a conclusion.
Topic #4
Fate and coincidence are used extensively in Romeo and Juliet. Both these elements helped to bring about the
tragedy or destruction of the protagonists. Write an essay in which you give examples of how each element is
used.
Sample Essay Outlines
190
Outline
I. Thesis Statement: The elements of fate—chance, circumstance, and coincidence—are used in Romeo and
Juliet to advance the plot and bring about the ultimate deaths of the protagonists.
II. Examples of chance and circumstance
A. Romeo and Juliet are children of parents who hate one another
B. The servant given the list of names for Lord Capulet’s ball cannot read
C. Benvolio is able to talk Romeo into attending the ball to look at Rosaline
D. Lord Capulet allows Romeo to remain at the ball
E. Romeo meets and falls in love with Juliet
F. The lovers are separated because of an accidental fight
G. The Prince decrees that Romeo is to be banished instead of put to death
III. Examples of coincidence
A. Romeo is asked to read the invitation list for the illiterate servant
B. Tybalt recognizes Romeo’s voice at the ball
C. Lord Capulet moves the wedding day from Thursday to Wednesday
D. Balthasar happens to see Juliet’s funeral and tells Romeo of her death
E. Friar John is quarantined and Friar Laurence’s message never reaches Romeo
F. Friar Laurence arrives too late at Juliet’s tomb.
IV. Conclusion: The elements of fate work hand in hand with each other to bring about the inevitable deaths
of the protagonists.
Topic #5
Comic relief is used by Shakespeare to delight his audiences. It is often used after an intense scene to relieve
the tension brought about by the extremely emotional dialogue or actions in the play. Write an essay
describing the situations when comic relief or humor was used by different characters in Shakespeare’s
Romeo and Juliet.
Outline
I. Thesis Sentence: The use of comic relief or humor is used predominately by three of Shakespeare’s
characters to relieve some of the moments of tension in Romeo and Juliet.
II. Nurse
A. Her compulsion to talk
B. Her use of malapropisms
C. Her teasing of Juliet
III. Mercutio
A. His Queen Mab speech
B. The exchange between Benvolio and Mercutio in Act II, Scene 1
C. His use of puns and figurative language
IV. Lord Capulet
A. His remarks toward the young ladies at his ball
B. His behavior at the ball
C. His preparations for the wedding
V. Conclusion: Humor is used as a comic relief by the nurse, Mercutio, and Lord Capulet in order to relieve
the tension brought about by more intense scenes or situations.
Sample Essay Outlines
191
Modern Connections
One of the most prominent features of Romeo and Juliet is the love the two title characters have for one
another. In a number of ways the lovers' passion for each other demonstrates the practice of "courtly love."
Identifying some of the aspects of courtly love can also highlight the similarities between the relationship
between Romeo and Juliet and modern youthful romantic relationships. Courtly love flourished during the
Middle Ages and influenced Renaissance literature. Traditionally, the system of courtly love defined a code of
behavior for lovers. Under this system, love is seen as illicit, sensual, and marked by emotional suffering and
anguish. Typically, the lover falls in love at first sight and remains in agony until he is sure his love is
returned. Then, he is inspired to perform great deeds to demonstrate the depth of his love. Additionally, the
lovers vow their faithfulness to each other and promise to keep their love a secret. The love between Romeo
and Juliet follows this pattern. The two fall in love at first sight, they meet secretly and promise to conceal
their relationship, and they vow their everlasting faithfulness to each other. Modern teenagers in love similarly
may feel the need to meet secretly, to hide their relationships from their parents, and may often feel that their
parents do not or would not understand the depth of their feelings toward their girlfriends or boyfriends.
An additional hurdle faced by lovers in Shakespeare's time was the fact that many marriages were arranged by
parents who had economic and social considerations in mind. Romance and personal choice in the matter
were often ignored and could cause conflict between parents and young people. Juliet's parents initially hope
that Juliet will express interest in marrying Paris. When she does not, they become angered and verbally
abusive. For modern readers who are unfamiliar with the concept of arranged marriages, knowing that such
arrangements were common in Shakespeare's time may help students to better understand the actions of
Romeo, Juliet, and their parents. However, for many modern students, the idea of arranged marriages is not an
unfamiliar one, as the concept is a part of many religions.
Another prominent feature of the play is its presentation of the destructiveness of endless feuding between
groups of people forced to live near each other. In such self−perpetuating feuds, new insults are always being
made and old ones always being avenged. The score never seems to be settled, unless perhaps something
catastrophic occurs that forces the feuding people to look seriously at themselves and their responsibility
toward their families and each other. Tybalt, for example, grows enraged at the sound of Romeo's voice at the
Capulet party and wants to fight him immediately. Although Lord Capulet restrains Tybalt at the party, he
does not stop his wife's screams for revenge after Tybalt's death. Only after suffering the heavy, irreparable
losses of their children do Capulet and Montague join hands at the end of the play. Such tensions are also
common in modern times and have been dramatically presented by film makers. For example, the 1961 film,
West Side Story, is loosely based on Romeo and Juliet. In the film, the animosity that Shakespeare depicted
between the Capulets and Montagues, referred to by the Chorus as an "ancient grudge" (Prologue, 1.3), is
represented as gang rivalry and ethnic hatred between the family and friends of the two main characters, Tony
and Maria. Although Tony and Maria attempt to overcome these obstacles, they meet the same tragic fate as
Romeo and Juliet. Baz Luhrmann's 1996 version of the story is perhaps more familiar to modern readers than
is West Side Story. The 1996 film, William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, is set in present−day urban
California, but uses Shakespeare's original language.
FAQs
1. Who is to blame for the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet?
2. Is Juliet to young to marry?
3. Why doesn't old Capulet allow Tybalt to confront Romeo at the masque?
4. Is Paris a "good" character?
5. Why does Shakespeare insert the role of the Apothecary into the play?
FAQs
192
6. How genuine is the reconciliation of the Capulet and Montague families at the play's end?
Who is to blame for the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet?
Shakespeare makes it plain that although the story of the young lovers is a tragedy, they are in no way to
blame for the fate that befalls them. Instead, the responsibility for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet is assigned
to their warring families. Clearly, absent the long−standing and pointless feud between the Capulets and the
Montagues, Mercutio and Tybalt would not have died and Romeo would not have been exiled from Verona.
Within the families, Tybalt and Juliet's father, Old Capulet, are responsible for the immediate dilemma that
the lovers confront. But beyond this, the Prince of Verona bears a portion of the blame for his failure to
strictly enforce the ban on dueling between the two families. By the same token, Friar Laurence shoulders part
of the responsibility; he agreed to the conduct the clandestine marriage of the teenagers realizing the dangers,
and it is he who concocts the scheme of Juliet's feigning death. At the end of the play, the Prince asserts that
"some will be pardon'd and some punished" (V, iii, l.308) for the deaths of Juliet and her Romeo. But he does
not mete out responsibility, and in the end, the issue of "who" is to blame remains open−ended.
Is Juliet to young to marry?
In Act I, scene iii, we are twice told that Juliet is only thirteen years old, once by Old Capulet and again by the
Nurse. Scholarly research has determined that this was an unusually young age for girls to marry in
Elizabethan England, where women typically wed in their late teens or early twenties. Yet Lady Capulet tells
her daughter that, "younger than you/Here in Verona, ladies of esteem,/are made already mothers" (I, iii.,
ll.69−71). She proceeds to imperfectly recall that she herself was just thirteen when she gave birth to Juliet.
From the standpoint of Shakespeare's audiences, thirteen or fourteen was, in fact, an inordinately tender age
for marriage. Nevertheless, by the norms of Verona, a realm that is less orderly and more given to passion
than England under Elizabeth, Juliet's young age is a subject for discussion but not a sufficient cause to
forestall marriage.
Why doesn't old Capulet allow Tybalt to confront Romeo at the masque?
Romeo attends the night−time ball hosted by the Capulets and is recognized by the "fiery" Tybalt who tells
Old Capulet that he shall not endure the presence of a hated Montague in their midst. The head of the Capulet
family counters that Romeo shall be endured, refers disparagingly to Tybalt as "goodman boy," and then
declares to Tybalt "You'll make a mutiny among my guests!/You'll set cock−a−hoop! You'll be the man" (I,
v., ll.80−81). We note that Old Capulet could have allowed Tybalt to take Romeo and his hatred for him
outside, but forcefully opposes Tybalt's wrath. This seems odd since Capulet has shown his own willingness
(but not his ability) to duel with the Montagues despite the Prince's injunctions. Here, as in his initial
conversation with Paris, Old Capulet acts in an authoritarian and arbitrary manner. He seems to be more
interested in asserting his status as the head of the household than in preserving decorum or custom. Rather
than showing Old Capulet to be a reasonable man, the incident reveals him to be pre−occupied with remaining
in charge.
Is Paris a "good" character?
County Paris is juxtaposed with Romeo throughout the play, and by doing so, Shakespeare highlights the
extraordinary nature of Romeo's love for Juliet. Paris is completely ignorant of the romance between Romeo
and Juliet, and so while his own suit for Juliet threatens the lovers' plans, he is not a "blocking" character.
Moreover, in the tomb scene, Paris acquits himself well, displaying a depth of affection for Juliet and earning
Romeo's praise. But Paris is a conventional lover. Lady Capulet compares him to a "book" in urging her
daughter to look favorably upon the "volume" of his face. Paris goes by the book: he seeks Old Capulet's
permission to marry Juliet and looks forward to the day when she will be mother to his children. His wit is not
match for Juliet's in Act IV, scene i., when the two come together at Friar Laurence's cell. Paris is a "good"
man but a standard lover; Romeo is not even a man, but he is a transcendent lover, made so by his bond with
Juliet.
FAQs
193
Why does Shakespeare insert the role of the Apothecary into the play?
In the first scene of Act V, Romeo is told by Balthasar that Juliet's corpse lies in the Capulet's family tomb.
His thoughts turn immediately to suicide, and when Balthasar departs he declares, "O mischief, thou art
swift/To enter the thoughts of desperate men!" (V, i., ll.35−36). Romeo then recalls that a apothecary's shop is
nearby, and knocks forcefully on the door to awaken the druggist. What is striking here is how badly Romeo
behaves with the Apothecary. For no reason save his distraught mood, Romeo refers to the impoverished
Apothecary as a "caitiff wretch." Knowing that the Apothecary is poor, Romeo offers him forty ducats. The
Apothecary is reluctant to fulfill Romeo's request for a sure poison, but relents by saying "my poverty, but not
my will, consents" (l.75). To this, Romeo replies in a high−handed manner, "I (pay) thy poverty, not thy will"
(l.76). The mistreatment of the Apothecary by Romeo illustrates just how dependent Romeo's identity as a
transcendent lover is upon the presence of Juliet. Whenever Romeo is apart from Juliet, he lapses into
weakness. At this juncture, believing her to be lost forever, Romeo reverts into the part of a spoiled
adolescent.
How genuine is the reconciliation of the Capulet and Montague families at the play's end?
After the Prince has found that all (including himself) are to blame for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet, Old
Capulet undergoes a remarkable change of heart, and says to his rival, "O brother Montague, give me thy
hand" (V, iii., l.296). Old Montague readily assents and the two agree to erect golden statues of the fallen
lovers. We cannot be satisfied by this reconciliation, however. The deaths of Romeo and Juliet are intended to
be such a profound tragedy that no compensatory "good" can derive from their demise.
Bibliography and Further Reading
*If available, books are linked to Amazon.com
Brown, John Russell. Discovering Shakespeare: A New Guide to the Plays. New York: Columbia University
Press, 1986.
Campell, Lily B. Shakespeare's Tragic Heroes: Slaves of Passion. Gloucester, MA: Peter Smith, 1973.
Craig, Hardin, Ed. The Complete Works of Shakespeare. Chicago: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1961.
Erickson, Peter. Patriarchal Structures in Shakespeare's Drama. Berekely, CA: University of California Press,
1985.
Evans, Bertrand. Shakespeare's Tragic Practice. Oxford: Clarendon Press,1979.
McLeish, Kenneth. Longman's Guide to Shakespeare's Characters. Harlow: Longman House, 1985.
Granville−Barker, Harley. Prefaces to Shakespeare. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1965/1978.
Kittredge, George Lyman, Ed. The Kittredge−Players Edition of the Complete Works of William Shakespeare.
New York: Grolier, 1936.
Pitt, Angela. Shakespeare's Women. London: David &Charles, 1981.
Prentice Hall Literature: Gold. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, Inc., 1989.
Bibliography and Further Reading
194
Ribner, Irving. Patterns in Shakespearian Tragedy. London: Methuen, 1960.
Seward, James H. Tragic Vision in "Romeo and Juliet". Washington, DC: Consortium Press, 1973.
Stauffer, Donald A. "The School of Love: `Romeo and Juliet'," Shakespeare the Tragedies: A Collection of
Critical Essays. Ed. Alfred Harbage. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice−Hall, 1964, pp.28−33.
Toor, David. A Life of Shakespeare. New York: Kenilworth Press, 1976.
Van Doren, Mark. Shakespeare. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1939.
Wells, Stanley. (Ed.). The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press, 1986.
Bibliography and Further Reading
195