Put up your swords-you know not what you do”. From this first line he shows the audience his pacifist nature and shows that his pacifist nature may help others later on. This is immediately contrasted with the entrance of fiery Tybalt who upon Benvolio’s attempt’s stop the fighting says “what drawn, and talk of peace! I hate the word, as I hate hell, all Montague’s and thee. Have at thee coward”. This clearly exhibits Tybalt unmasked aggression and eagerness to fight Benvolio showing the audience his malevolence.
This like most of the dialogue and actions in scene 1 help to establish the play, this one notably because it shows that the first acts of violence are committed Tybalt. The fight is quickly broken up by some armed citizens which is when Capulet and lady Capulet arrive quickly succeeded by Montague and lady Montague. Capulet is eager to fight and clearly shows this, “what noise is this? Give me my long sword, ho!”. With both men eager to fight it’s their wives that prevent them from doing so, for example in reply to Capulet asking for his long sword lady Capulet replies with “A crutch, a crutch! Why call you for a sword?”. The fact that the heads of the households want to fight shows the violence is deep rooted.
The ruler of Verona prince Escalas arrives promptly to deal with the escalating violence. He immediately goes into a speech about the two family’s history of violence showing his authority, also like Benvolio his name is an adjective for his character because Escalas is Latin for scales meaning he acts as a balance between the two families. In his speech he issues an ultimatum “if you disturb our streets again, you’re lives shall pay the forfeit of the piece”. This line is foreshadowing events to come by hinting at the fore coming acts of Romeo killing Tybalt and being subsequently banished.
The characters all exit apart from Montague, lady Montague and Benvolio who begin to discuss Romeo’s ‘heavy’ mood and after reasoning Benvolio agrees to find out what is wrong with Romeo, shown in line 149 “I’ll know his grievance, or be much denied”. With this section of dialogue the scene changes from violence to a more melancholy atmosphere mainly due to discussing Romeo’s melancholy deposition. When Benvolio meets with Romeo he is sullen and his speech contains numerous oxymorons such as “there’s much to do with hate but more to do with love” and “o brawling love, o loving hate”. These oxymoron’s mirror the plays main themes of love and hate and show that there is something amiss. It is likely that these lines mean that Romeo is contested in his emotions and experiences difficulty in distinguish love and hate from one another. A second device is used again, foreshadowing. When Romeo says “ love is a choking gall” meaning love is like a choking poison this is an example of foreshadowing as well as dramatic irony for he kills himself by ingesting poison later in the play when he thinks Juliet is dead. In hope of raising Romeo’s spirits Benvolio tells him he should find a new love and the old one will die “one fires burns out another’s burning”. This is further use of dramatic irony because the new love will lead to his death.
The second scene opens with Capulet and Count Paris discussing Juliet and his intention to marry her. Paris broaches the subject with “but now my Lord. What say you to my suit?” With his response of “my child is yet a stranger in the world” he shows his reluctance for her to marry at an early age and tells Paris “let two more summers whither in her pride. ‘Ere we may think her right to be a bride”. This conversation highlights the fact that marriage was considered at an early age, although in this scene Capulet is considerate to Juliet and wants to make sure Paris is a good match for her despite him forcing her to marry in Act 3 Scene 5. It is also interesting due to the fact that the advice Capulet gives to Paris “At my poor house look to behold this night
Earth-treading stars that make dark heaven light” and “Among fresh female buds shall you this night” is similar to that of Benvolio’s where he instructs Romeo to go and find a new love.
The scene moves back to a street where Benvolio and Romeo are talking. Benvolio is trying to advise Romeo about his love for Rosaline, but Romeo is unconvinced; “your plaintain leaf is excellent for that” meaning that Benvolio’s advice is too simple to benefit, what he considers to be, the complexity of his love. After more arguing, a messenger arrives and delivers the invitation to Romeo and Benvolio. The chance that the messenger would meet Romeo and Benvolio is very small, meaning that this meeting was fated. Benvolio says to Romeo that they should attend the party in order to find a more attractive girl than Rosaline, “compare her face with some that show, and you will see your swan a crow”. Romeo agrees to attend but only to prove Benvolio wrong. He describes other women as “transparent heretics, be burnt for lies! One fairer for my love” compared to Rosaline. This is also ironic as in the next scene Romeo falls in love with Juliet, forgetting Rosaline completely.
Scene 3 is entirely made up of dialogue which shows the weak relationship between Juliet and her mother and the stronger, more maternal relationship between the nurse and Juliet. It also explores their characters, showing Juliet’s naivety, the nurse’s laid-back and bawdy attitude and Lady Capulet’s self-absorption and lack of interest and concern for her daughter.
The fourth scene opens with Romeo, Benvolio and Mercutio as well several other masked friends. Romeo is still in a slightly depressed state and shows this by saying “is love a tender a tender thing? it’s too rough, too rude, too boisterous, and it pricks like a thorn”. This use of personification like in earlier scenes shows Romeo’s view on love and its importance. He had a premonition of his own death which he tells Benvolio and Mercutio after Mercutio’s lengthy speech to Romeo, “by some vile forfeit of untimely death”, showing that he thinks that attending the Capulet party may be unwise “but t’is no will to go”. Nevertheless, he decides to abandon his fear and go “but he, that hath the steerage of my course, direct my sail! Oh,lusty gentlemen.” This premonition is very important to the course of the play because it is blatant foreshadow, as attending the party does ultimately lead to Romeo’s death. This is also made exciting by the fact that it is Romeo who, in a sense, decides his own fate by ignoring his vision. Just like the chance meeting with the servant, this is fate.
Scene 5 starts in a light-hearted way, showing the contrasting way in which the play is structured, with the Capulet servants providing the comic relief in order to balance out the dourness and austerity of Romeo’s demeanour in the previous scene, which helps the audience to relax. As the servants exit, the hosts Capulet and Lady Capulet, as well as Tybalt, Juliet, the nurse and their party guests enter. Capulet starts the party with a short speech welcoming the guests and encouraging them to dance. When the dancing begins, he reminisces with his cousin about their youth. It’s now that Romeo first see’s Juliet and is at once smitten with her beauty, this shows that she is the embodiment of pure beauty. He professes over this saying “so shows a snowy dove trooping with crows, as yonder lady o’er her fellows shows”. This being ironic as he earlier stated to Benvolio that all other girls compared to Rosaline are crows which proves to be untrue. Romeo’s voice is overheard by tybalt who reacts viciously demanding his sword “this, by his voice, should be a Montague, fetch me my rapier boy”. This signals the return to violence and bloodshed is only stopped when tybalt storms past lord Capulet who enquires to where he is going leading tybalt to explain Romeo’s presence. Capulet forbids tybalt from confronting Romeo, arguing that Romeo is conducting himself in an orderly manner “He bears him like a portly gentleman”. Capulet’s reaction shows that he may not be a especially violent person and may welcome peace. Tybalt obeys his uncle but is still aggressive and promises revenge saying “I will withdraw , but this intrusion shall, now seemingly sweet convert to bitterest gall”. This threat is foreshadowing the latter violence in which Tybalt kills Mercutio and also the fact that it refers to gall again pointing to Romeo’s death. Romeo and Juliet now meet for the first time
Shakespeare’s use of characters is what makes Romeo and Juliet one of the most well none stories of all time. Each one is memorable and adds to the play in there own way. They range from violent characters (e.g. Tybalt), pacifist characters (e.g. Benvolio) and characters that provide comic relief (e.g. the nurse)
Benvolio is the first significant character introduced in the play. Shakespeare has named him in accordance to his temperament, benne being Italian for good and volio for voice. This role as the voice of reason beside Romeo gives him his significance. He is more careful and sensible in his advice to Romeo than Mercutio and is opposed to violence. He has a close relationship with Romeo and is responsible for getting Romeo to attend the Capulet party and meet Juliet. His well natured manner and laid back attitude as well as his pacifism “I do but keep the peace” mean it is likely he would be described as phlegmatic out of the ‘four humours’ or ‘temperaments’ which was popular in Shakespearean times. He is the only member of his generation to survive the play with Romeo, Juliet, Mercutio, Paris and Tybalt all dying.
The next important character to come into the play is Tybalt, nephew to Lord Capulet, who enters shortly after Benvolio. He is an example of a choleric person out of the four humours, who contains energy and passion but suffers from a short temper and aggression. This is shown in the play as he is often the forbearer of violence and says himself “peace! I hate the word as I hate hell, all Montague’s and thee.” He is Romeo’s adversary and wishes to kill him throughout the play although he ends up killing Mercutio instead and then later being killed by Romeo. He is referred to as ‘the fiery tybalt’ for his aggression and is also known as ‘the prince of cats’ because he kills any mouse he see’s with his sword but it is more likely Shakespeare simply wanted to include this to parody the character of Tibert/Tybalt out the Reynard fables who was also known as the ‘prince of cats’.
Lord Capulet and Montague are the heads of each of the households which fight in the play. Despite being older with a younger generation under them they still behave immorally by attempting to fight each other in act1, scene 1. this aggression and eagerness for violence with Capulet saying “what noise it this, pass me my long sword, ho!” and Montague displaying equal bloodlust with “hold me not, let me go” it is likely that they are responsible for much of the hatred between the younger characters such as Tybalt and Mercutio. All though this evidence points them being poor role models Capulet’s behaviour in scene 5 points to him being less violent then previously believed when he forbids Tybalt from fighting Romeo.
Romeo the melancholies main character of the play is an impulsive and passionate person who led by his emotions and impulsive nature often leads to him to make poor decisions leading to unmediated acts which lead to grave consequences. At the start of the play he is in love with Rosaline, this love being petrachan which attributed to his depressive nature. In scene 5 of act 1 he displays his decisive and impulsive side when he falls in love with Juliet at first sight, after previously stating to Benvolio that he could never fall for anyone but Rosaline. Another attribute which would explain Romeo’s behaviour is his love, which often obscures his character which is more complex than it appears. Even though his love for Juliet is supposed to be pure, it takes time for him to develop this, as when he is in love with Rosaline it is suggested he may be trying to emulate the love he has read about in poetry and romantic literature, whereas his love for Juliet is more unique and authentic. Overall, I believe it is Romeo’s inability to moderate all of these emotions that leads to his death. Love compels him to sneak into the Capulet garden, risking death just to meet her. Anger compels him to kill Tybalt in cold blood to avenge Mercutio and despair compels him to commit suicide when he thinks Juliet has died. If he could control these emotions, he might have lived but similarly would have never have been able to share the love that he had with Juliet.
Lady Capulet, the mother of Juliet, is a poor guardian who is dismissive of Juliet and does not seem to value what her child says, often relying on the nurse for support. She intended Juliet to marry Paris and broaches the subject with her in scene 3; she sends the nurse away but summons her back almost instantly when she realises her relationship with her daughter is too poor for her to be able to properly communicate with her.
The nurse is the woman who has been responsible for caring for Juliet her entire life. She offers a much more maternal figure than Juliet’s biological mother having breastfed, raised and befriended her. She is often vulgar and bawdy as well as sentimental and frequently launches into long rambling speeches and fragments of nostalgia. An excellent example of this is in scene 3 when she tells a story of when Juliet was a child and how she had a bump on her head “as big as a young cockerel’s stone”. Her bawdiness is important as it provides comic relief to the play so it isn’t comparatively bleak while her sentimental side is important to form the band with Juliet as she appears to be the only person in which Juliet can confide and trust her love for Romeo even though the nurse’s views on love differ from Juliet’s.
Juliet the love and main protagonist of the play is on the eve of her fourteenth birthday. She is a naïve, obedient and sheltered child at the beginning of the play but as the play progresses she changes rapidly. Even though many girls marry at her age she admits to not having given the notion of matrimony much thought “it is an honour I dream not of”. she shows her obedience to her parents by saying she will try to love Paris even though she has no feelings for him. Later in the play she distances herself from her social background by leaving her parents and the nurse to pursue Romeo where she makes her own decisions showing her ascension into maturity.
Mercutio is one of the most memorable of all characters in the play with his lightning quick wit and clever mind. He like Benvolio has a charactonym as his name (mercurial), a mercurial person is lively, eloquent and changeable with the same reckless nature that dominates Romeo’s melancholies disposition. He is Romeo’s best friend best friend and guide despite the fact he occasionally mocks him. His free spirited jokester intellect means that he delivers some of the plays best lines and even upon his death he makes on last pun as he tells the other characters “ask for me tomorrow, and you shall find me a grave man”. On his death he shows his belief that the events of the play were not fated at all and are the product of the hatred between the Montague’s and Capulet’s and the actions of each of the characters. This leads him to curse the families shortly before dying by saying “a plague on both your households”. I believe Shakespeare used Mercutio to give internal insight to the play as Mercutio seems to understand the events almost as if he was an audience member. This allows him to advise Romeo and criticise all other characters such as, when in Act 1 Scene 4, he delivers the famous Queen Mab speech in which he uses the fictional fairy queen as a greatly elaborate and lengthy way to explain that Romeo’s doubt for attending the party is just nonsense. His advice is often of this nature when he pressures Romeo into decisions in different ways than Romeo’s other friend, guide and confidant, the sterner Benvolio.
There are many themes present in ‘Romeo and Juliet’, with love and hate being the most obvious, but also passion which forces these themes and others. It is passion that provides a forcefulness of love in the play, unlike the bad poetry Romeo writes for Rosaline. It is a brutal, powerful emotion that captures Romeo and Juliet and destroys the world around them and ultimately themselves.
The themes of death and violence permeate ‘Romeo and Juliet’ and they are always connected to passion, whether the passion is displayed in love or hate. The connection between hate, violence and death is obvious but the connection between love and violence is more deep-seated and subtle. After first meeting each other and falling in love, both characters are consumed with such passionate love that it consumed them in the same way that hate would. Both characters show this self-directed violence by their suicidal urges. Both characters produce knives in front of Friar Lawrence, threatening to take their own lives in different scenes, then when Capulet forces Juliet into an arranged marriage with Paris, she says “if all else fail, I have the power to die.” Then when Romeo lies sleeping in her bed, she likens him to “one dead at the bottom of a tomb.” It is this overwhelming passion and profoundness that they end their lives for, as the only means of preserving their love.
In the prologue Romeo and Juliet are referred to as “star-cross’d”, meaning fate controls them. This can be seen throughout the play and something that the characters are aware of, for example, when Romeo believes Juliet is dead he cries “then I defy you stars”, highlighting the idea that love between Romeo and Juliet is against fate.
A visual theme through out the play is duality between light and dark where Shakespeare uses them metaphorically with light not always being good and dark not always being evil. They are used in contrast and alternatives many times many times for example when Romeo is on Juliet’s balcony he described Juliet as the sun who banishes the “envious moon” meaning Rosaline to transform night into day. Another example occurs when after having spent the night together Romeo has to leave into exile, Juliet pretends that it is still night and that love is darkness “more light and light, more dark and dark our woes”.
Shakespeare uses a series of dramatic devices throughout the first act and the prologue in order to prepare us for the tragedy to come. For example dramatic irony is used when Romeo talks about his love for Rosaline and how he is unable to love any other girl while the audience knows that he will fall in love with Juliet shortly after. Foreshadowing is used extensively during the first act to hint at the events to come. For example when Romeo describes love as a “choking gall” it is describing his own death by poison which he does not realise making this also dramatic irony. Gall is referred to twice more in the first act reinforcing this point and showing how the deaths are perhaps fated. Dramatic contrast is used not only in act 1 but throughout the entire play with love intumescing the bleak hatred and violence and comic relief from the dourness of both love and haste when the two integrate.
The use of language throughout the play is vastly significant from the obviousness of the servant’s blank verse dialect in contrast with the elocution of the main characters prose “Did my heart love till now? Forswear it, sight! For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night” to the more specific features like oxymorons “O brawling love, o loving hate”. Oxymorons are used to show the contradiction of some of the themes such as the aforementioned example spoken by Romeo showing that love and hate and not to far apart. The queen Mab
Overall, Shakespeare makes the first act exciting and dramatic by setting the scene excellently while introducing more and more of the story preparing with his use of foreshadowing. He makes each character necessary providing them with play shaping roles and in the case of some such as Mercutio gives them memorable lines and traits. The prologue is very effective for opening the play while the first scene is extensive in content of dialogue, action, characters and the opposing themes.