With this, Juliet then goes to the Nurse to seek advise which is then hurtled back into her face with force, the Nurse surprisingly had gone onto Capulet’s and Lady Capulet’s way of thinking about Romeo and in my opinion she betrays Juliet. Nurse believes that now Romeo has been banished that she would wed Paris, and she states that the second marriage is always the best, she says this to try and influence and convince Juliet into marrying Paris. Juliet feels extremely let down by Nurse so leaves for Mantua to speak to Friar Lawrence to seek some badly needed advice.
At the start of the scene Juliet comes across as being very emotional and is often showing this emotion by sobbing with pain, which is believed to be partly about Tybalt’s death, but mainly about Romeo being banished for Mantua and her anger towards this decision.
In the meantime Capulet arranges a marital ceremony for his daughter Juliet and Paris behind her back, Capulet thinks that this is a favour, but he doesn’t realise how much his daughter will resent him for doing this; Juliet wants Romeo, not Paris. When Juliet founds about this she is upset but doesn’t realise the importance of it and a quote from the play of what she said to Capulet is ‘I will not marry yet. And when I do, I swear It shall be Romeo, whom you know I hate,Rather than Paris’
Lady Capulet is feeling really upset and miserable about what Juliet said when she said that she would rather marry Romeo than Paris, Lady Capulet feels that Romeo is no good for her daughter and especially after what in her eyes he did to Tybalt. Capulet enters the scene seeing Juliet upset, he says‘Thou counterfeits 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’
He is comparing Juliet’s emotion to that of a ship rocking through the ocean. This is a really effective part of Capulet’s language, it tells the audience of how caring he can really be towards his daughter.
He carries onto ask questions to Lady Capulet, saying ‘Have you delivered to her our decree?’ A question which is relating to the marital ceremony. Lady Capulet says in return, ‘Ay sir, but she will none’. This is where Capulet changes in the play, he changes from being caring and loving to brutal and offensive. A quote from the play that shows this is ‘But fettle you fine joints ‘gainst Thursday next To go with Paris to Saint Peter’s Church, Or I will drag thee on a hurdle thither. Out, you green-sickness carrion! Out, you baggage! You tallow-face!’
This speech by Capulet changes his character; he slates and embarrasses Juliet, this is not the right way to speak to your daughter. The audience would have been astonished and frightened of what might happen next, but also intrigued. The surroundings in theatres would have been different too, clothing would have been different also, the play was wrote in old English and the people there then would have been able to understand it, whereas now nobody would understand it.
The part of the play where Lady Capulet and Capulet arrange the marriage of Juliet and Paris behind Juliet’s back is really evil. I think that Juliet was right to have a go at her parents because when anything is done behind your back it gets you very annoyed and you feel very betrayed.
These examples that I have given are the main themes and issues that happen in this scene.
Conclusion
I think that Act 3, Scene 5 is a very good scene in the play and one of the most important scenes out of the whole lot of them. It shows ever so much detail and emotion between the families and shows how some people really are and who they really care about. It also gives us further evidence of how strong Juliet feels for Romeo and how much she misses him now that he as gone.
It is also very interesting in the way how it shows the changes in attitude and character of characters such as Capulet and Nurse. Before this scene they were seen as nice and caring people who worshipped Juliet but in this scene they turn into more selfish and self intrigued characters.
