With close reference to the text explore Shakespeare’s presentation of Romeo through reference to at least three key scenes.
William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is an Elizabethan tragedy play, written in the sixteenth century. This is an important aspect to the play because terms like ‘courtly lover’ would have been initially understood by an audience of that time, whereas, at present, it is virtually unknown. The phrase ‘courtly lover’ was a way to describe Romeo in the beginning of the play. If a person was a courtly lover, they were usually in a false love with an older woman. In Romeo’s case, Rosaline, an unobtainable Capulet woman. A courtly lover was a person who felt that they were in love, but was simply infatuated with a person who was beyond their reach. This immature description could be contrasted as Romeo develops throughout the play.
From the beginning of the play Shakespeare shows Romeo to be rather immature and adolescent. His short-lived infatuation with Rosaline could be contrasted with a more genuine love for Juliet. Shakespeare makes it clear to his audience that the character of Romeo is shallow and disingenuous. He does this by depicting Romeo to be reveling in his own misery and despair. Shakespeare uses dramatic devices in the form of riddles and contrived rhyme to show Romeo’s confusion. An example of this is in a conversation between Romeo and his cousin Benvolio in Act 1, Scene 1. Romeo uses a series of oxymora like ‘loving hate’ and ‘heavy lightness’. Shakespeare shows through the forced poetic language that Romeo is seeking attention and enjoying the company of his misery. Shakespeare also makes it clear to his audience that a person truly in love would not speak in this manner.
Although Shakespeare spends a lot of time in the beginning showing Romeo’s lack of maturity and false poetic language, after meeting Juliet for the first time, Romeo’s language is no longer false, and is more sincere. Although his words are still poetic, they are not false, but rather more natural. At the party at the Capulet household in Act 1, Scene 5, Romeo first meets Juliet. Although Shakespeare creates the idea that Romeo has fallen in love with Juliet, and that this love is also felt by Juliet, it is also questionable that Romeo’s new ‘love’ is merely another adolescent infatuation, except this time, it is reciprocated by Juliet. Shakespeare uses a sonnet between Romeo and Juliet, indicating that their love is unforced and spontaneous. The sonnet indicates that Romeo and Juliet‘s conversation is natural and flowing, as opposed to forced and contrived. Also, contrary to Elizabethan customs, the sonnet between Romeo and Juliet is shared, as opposed to the usual ‘courtly lover’ manner of the man speaking the verse, not the woman. The language that Romeo and Juliet use is a total contrast to the noise of the party, and to the language of hate throughout the play, for example, ‘Then move not, while my prayers effect I take’ could be contrasted with ‘Patience perforce with willful choler meeting…’. It is also a contrast with the entire violent background of the story, being about hatred between two families, with a pair of ‘star-cross’d lovers’ between it.
