Recurring motifs and images in Romeo and Juliet.

As in all of Shakespeare's plays, Romeo and Juliet is full of recurring motifs and images. In addition to the more obvious themes of love, war, and death apparent in the Bard's tragic tale, there are other concepts that Shakespeare refers to again and again, all of which work to enrich the already engaging plot and characters. To supplement your reading and understanding of Romeo and Juliet, we have explained some of these themes below.

Light and Dark

Throughout Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare utilizes light or the absence of light as a motif that enhances and/or contributes to the mood of a particular scene. As we watch Romeo and Juliet fall in love, and we watch as more and more obstacles get in the way of their burgeoning love, Shakespeare has alternately included light and dark images in the text of his play. When Romeo first encounters Juliet in the Capulet house, he exclaims "O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!" and when he sees Juliet later in the famous balcony scene, the smitten Romeo says, "But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks? / It is the east, and Juliet is the sun."

But this optimistic light fades when situations start to go awry. In Act III, scene 5, Romeo and Juliet have met secretly in the Capulet orchard during the night. In this case, the light is not a friend to the young lovers, because as soon as day breaks, they must part. Indeed, when Juliet persuades Romeo to leave, she states, "O, now be gone; more light and light it grows" and Romeo replies, "More light and light; more dark and dark our woes!" At the end of Romeo and Juliet's lives, and the play itself, darkness has completely taken over. The Prince exclaims, "A glooming peace this morning with it brings; / The sun, for sorrow, will not show his head . . . For never was a story of more woe / Than this of Juliet and her Romeo."

These are just a few examples of references to light and darkness in Shakespeare's play. See if you can find more.

Time

A Consequence More Powerful than Fate Most people think that Romeo and Juliet are doomed because of Fate. In the Prologue the lovers are referred to as” star-crossed.” Immediately it is assumed that their fate is tragic. Even when Romeo is sent off to Mantua, Juliet speaks to Fate to make sure her Romeo is safe. Everything in this play could be made into the argument that Fate is most powerful. It could have been Fate that made Romeo kill Tybalt. Fate is a powerful force. Fate is a predetermined course of events considered to be beyond human control. Juliet’s deciding to take the poison may have been Fate, and Romeo and Juliet meeting may have been fate. Fate may seem to be the idea that destroys the lovers, but in reality Time dooms the lovers. Time regulates every little detail that happens in this play. If only there were more time there would be a different outcome.

Because time is not an object one cannot grasp it. Time, like fate, is more powerful than the lovers. “We mark it, save it, waste it, bide it, race against it. We measure it incessantly, with a passion for precision that borders on the obsessive. Time is so vitally enmeshed with the fabric of our existence, in fact, that it’s hard even to conceive of it as an independent entity- and when we try, the result is less enlightening.” (Time Magazine) Time is a strong force and it is impossible to beat. Time can never be changed Time is a ...

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Because time is not an object one cannot grasp it. Time, like fate, is more powerful than the lovers. “We mark it, save it, waste it, bide it, race against it. We measure it incessantly, with a passion for precision that borders on the obsessive. Time is so vitally enmeshed with the fabric of our existence, in fact, that it’s hard even to conceive of it as an independent entity- and when we try, the result is less enlightening.” (Time Magazine) Time is a strong force and it is impossible to beat. Time can never be changed Time is a non-spatial continuum in which events occur in apparently irreversible succession. Time not fate pushes Romeo and Juliet to make choices; the lovers are defeated.

Time cannot be changed and this essentially slowly kills the lovers. Time is immutable. Since it cannot be altered, time slowly leads to the lovers’ death. Time is the force that takes over the characters in this play. Romeo makes the mistake of letting his rage get to him after Mercutio’s death. Romeo cannot go back to change his emotional outrage and capricious murder of his new relative Tybalt. If Romeo had not walked in on Mercutio and Tybalt’s quarrel, Romeo would not have had to go off in the rage. “…This day begins the woe others must end.”(III.I.126) In Harold Goddard’s critical essay there are aspects of this scene that are thoroughly analyzed. Romeo is banished from Verona and it’s because he is unable to change what he did to Tybalt. In the essay Harold Goddard discusses what Shakespeare says about this scene, “Love’s not Time’s fool ” (43). Goddard believes that Shakespeare’s meaning in this is that Romeo’s love is not fooling time, but time is beating Romeo at his own game. Fate makes Romeo kill Tybalt but time will not let him turn back.

Time cannot be controlled but Lord Capulet tries to control it and plans too fast. Lord Capulet is ready for his daughter to marry. Time is unable to be controlled. On the other hand Lord Capulet is trying to manipulate time so Juliet will be married sooner than expected. Juliet has no time to get out of the marriage with Paris, she pleads with her mother, “Is there no pity sitting in the clouds o sweet my mother, cast me not away. Delay this marriage for a month, a week, or, if you do not, make the bridal bed in that dim monument where Tybalt lies.”(III: V: 206) Even with Juliet’s threats her parents do not care what she wants time pushes on in their minds. Juliet tries to find drastic measures to defeat time.

Time is precise and because there is no way to add or take away time Romeo is already doomed. Romeo’s destiny was being based on his letter from the Friar. Romeo spent time in Mantua waiting for the Friar’s letter. Friar does not get the letter to Romeo because of time. The Friar’s instincts are to send a letter to Mantua through a messenger but, the timing was not good because of the diseases and his frailty. Friar John says,“ I could not send it (here it is again) now get a messenger to bring it thee, so fearful were they of infection.”(V:II: 25). Likewise in Harold Goddard’s critical essay he discusses The Friar and Romeo’s meetings about Juliet. His idea is Romeo and Juliet were too quick with their decisions. Goddard states, “A moment too late. That fear is with him Shakespeare shows by another echo.” Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast,” the Friar had warned Romeo on dismissing him after his first confession of his love for Juliet.” (48) Timing is everything. If one thing is not on que then everything thereafter has the same problem. Romeo finally begins to see that time is taking the two lovers away from each other.

Time is a force more powerful than the characters and that is why the characters are doomed before they last see each other. The end of the play comes and Romeo’s instant reaction to the news of Juliet makes him move too quickly. Romeo’s mind is set on killing himself without haste so that he can be with Juliet. Romeo arrives at the tomb too soon but he does not know it. Romeo has no desire to fight with time any longer and he has no more time left with Juliet. Romeo rushes to the apothecary and receives poison in which he drinks to kill himself. Romeo speaks to the poison, “…Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die.” (V:III: 115) The poison takes Romeo’s life within an instant and his life with Juliet is over.

Because Time is more powerful than the characters they are also unable to rely on Fate bringing them back together. In the movie of Romeo and Juliet time lets the two lovers see each other for a split second and it adds a dramatic irony. It is assumed that Juliet’s poison works too long and Romeo’s works too quickly. Time determines the lover’s fate. Juliet sees her love dead and she speaks to him, “…Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end, …” (V:III: 165) The lovers have not been able to escape the acts of time. In an article entitled Time Out written by, Randolph Hobler discusses the affects of time. “Time is a kind of sort of vast, invisible, ethereal river coursing constantly through the universe. Why, it’s so real, we can practically feel it ebbing around us.” The lovers felt time creeping upon and destroying their lives together. Time defeats the lovers not their love.

The force of Time weakens the lovers and at the end there is none left to let the lovers succeed. In Harold Bloom’s critical essay he discusses what time does to the characters and he says, “Time’s ironies govern love in Chaucer, as they will in Romeo and Juliet.” (88) Time cannot be erased and it may not be predicted. Since time is unable to be predicted, the lovers are unable to know what is about to happen to them

Before Romeo and Juliet begins the readers all know that there are two hours until the lovers are killed. The play begins on a note of time. The Epilogue states that two statues will be made of the lovers together. So time between the lovers is stopped it’s permanent. The only thing that is not controlled by time is the art, which Shakespeare creates. The art makes love permanent even though the lovers themselves are dead.

Also ubiquitous in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet is the motif of time. In the very first scene after the Prologue, Romeo proclaims, "Ay me! sad hours seem long." In this early scene, Romeo mourns his unrequited love of Rosaline, and the feeling is so intense that time is affected. But these long hours do not last for much longer.

When the action picks up in the play—when Romeo and Juliet meet and soon realize their relationship cannot develop without a reconciliation between their families—the characters note that time passes more quickly. The love of Romeo and Juliet has developed at an accelerated pace: As Juliet says in Act II, scene 2, "It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden; / Too like the lightning." As their love has developed quickly, so does the approach of the day Juliet will be married to Paris. Time has become an enemy of Romeo and Juliet's love, as Old Capulet has decided to hasten the marriage of Juliet and Paris in order to help her overcome what he believes is her grief for Tybalt's death. Paris tells the Friar: "Now, sir, her father counts it dangerous / That she do give her sorrow so much sway, / And in his wisdom hastes our marriage / To stop the inundation of her tears." The timing of the marriage is off, as was Tybalt's death. Time is passing at such a fast pace that it must also take the lives of young Romeo and Juliet. In Act IV, scene 5, Old Capulet observes, "Death lies on her like an untimely frost."

Fate

Another theme Shakespeare incorporates in Romeo and Juliet is that of fate. In his play, Shakespeare toys with the idea that fate or destiny is a supernatural power predetermining the path of one's life. As the Chorus states immediately in the Prologue of Romeo and Juliet, "A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life." In other words, the young Romeo and Juliet are doomed from the very beginning: their "stars" are misaligned. No matter what they do to attempt to repair their tragic situation, something always inhibits them from prevailing: Although they fall in love, their families prevent this love; although they get married, Tybalt is slain by Romeo, and Juliet must marry Paris; although Juliet escapes marriage by pretending to die, Romeo does not get the Friar's note and believes she is dead.

Near the beginning of the play, in Act I, scene 4, Romeo aptly predicts his own fate:

I fear, too early: for my mind misgives

Some consequence yet hanging in the stars

Shall bitterly begin his fearful date

With this night's revels and expire the term

Of a despised life closed in my breast

By some vile forfeit of untimely death.

Indeed, even though Romeo attempts to challenge fate, stating "I defy you, stars!" in Act V, scene 1, later in the play (Act III, scene 1), Mercutio is killed by Tybalt, and Romeo attributes his death to "this day's black fate." Shortly afterward in the scene, when Romeo kills Tybalt, the exasperated Romeo exclaims, "O, I am fortune's fool!"