On question keeps coming up in my mind, is this play really about love? We see Romeo apparently madly in love with two different girls in a very short space of time.
In the first act Montague says that Romeo is always sad
“Many a miring hath he there been seen,
with tears augmenting the fresh morning dew”
and as soon as day comes he shuts him self away
“but all soon as the all-cheering sun
should in the furthest east being to draw
the shad curtains from Aurora’s bed,
away from light steals home my heavy son,
and private in the chamber pens himself,
shuts up his window , locks fair daylight out”
he talks about Rosaline in a immense hate and disagreement
“O brawling love, O loving hate,
O any thing, of nothing first creates.
O heavy lightness, serious vanity….
Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health”
But Rosaline is distant and Romeo becomes frustrated
“she’ll not be hit
With cupid’s arrow; she hath Dian’s wit;
And, in strong proof of chastity, well-arm’d
From love’s weak childish bow she lives unarm’d”
But when Juliet see Romeo for the first time see has a different reaction to Romeo then Rosaline, she accepts her feelings
“My only love sprang from my only hate”
and she is anxious to fulfilling them as soon as possible
“I that thy bent of love be honourable ,
thy purpose marriage, sent me word tomorrow….
And all my fortunes at thy foot I’ll lay.”
The first contact Romeo has with Juliet is when he kisses her at the Capulet’s ball
“thus from my lips, by thine, my sin is purg’d”
and he takes immediate action to see her again in spite of the feud,
“with love’s light wings did I o’er-perch these walls;
for stony limits cannot hold love out,
and what love can do, that can love attempt;
therefore thy kinsmen as no stop me”
and by the end of the scene wit the help of Juliet Romeo is getting organised.
“hence will I to my ghostly fathers cell,
his help to carve, and my dear hap to tell”
Romeo is no longer shutting himself away from life, and his friends begin to notice the difference in his attitude
“why, is not this better than groaning for love?
now art thou sociable, now art thou Romeo”
and when Romeo finds out that Juliet is dead he is he is equally, and fatally, deived and he buys the poison from the apothecary to kill him self.
“well Juliet, I will lie with thee tonight.
Let’s see for means”
Romeo And Juliet - 27/04/2007 -