Examining Juliet's relationship with the Nurse and her two parents, and how they change over time and what causes these changes.

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In this essay I will examine Juliet’s relationship with the Nurse and her two parents, and how they change over time and what causes these changes.

Juliet’s main relationship is with the nurse, the nurse appears all the way through the play.  At the beginning of the play the relationship is clear, they are very good friends, they trust and love each other.

The nurse is Juliet’s ‘mother’ figure, more so than her natural mother, Lady Capulet.  The nurse has looked after Juliet since she was born, giving her the ‘maternal instinct’ that a mother ‘receives’ on giving birth to a child.  Although the Nurse did not give birth to Juliet, she fed her and looked after her from a very young age, so the bond between them is strong, just as a mother giving birth to a baby should be.  The nurse is always looking out for Juliet, even though she is Juliet’s servant and is paid for looking after her.  Because the relationship is so strong the fact that the nurse is the servant isn’t shown by either character.

We first meet the nurse when Lady Juliet, her natural mother enters the room and comes to talk to her.

Lady Capulet asks the nurse to leave:

“Nurse, give us leave a while. We must talk in secret”

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Lady Capulet quickly changes her mind and asks the nurse to come back in even though they want to talk in secret, this shows that Juliet’s own mother is uncomfortable and nervous speaking to her own daughter and that the nurse is part of the family and that she is trusted with the families secrets.  This also includes the nurse in the conversation.  The conversation ends up being about Juliet’s father wanting her to marry Paris.

In Shakespearian times, it was usually the father that decided who to ‘give’ his daughter to; this was usually done at a ...

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