Romeo and Juliet

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Shakespeare Essay

In this essay I intend to examine how Shakespeare makes the prologue and Act 1 of ‘Rome and Juliet’ exciting, dramatic and memorable for the audience and how he prepares us for the tragedy to come.

Romeo and Juliet, set in Verona, tells the story of how two star cross’d lovers life comes to an end after nothing but their deaths would put a stop to a long existing feud between their families.

The play ‘Rome and Juliet’ was written in 1595, inspired by a poem by Arthur Brook called ‘The tragical story of Romeus and Juliet’. This was written in 1562, one of the early origins of the play.

‘Rome and Juliet’ is based around a mixture of love, hate, tragedy and disguise. Shakespeare added a few changes to the play such; Act 1 scene 1 was added, he invented the character of Mercutio who acts as a balance to Tybalt as they are on opposing sides of the two families. He also made the Nurse and Benvolio more important and shortened the time scale from 9 months to 5 days, faster pace is more exciting as it is more interesting for the audience. I think he made these changes to get people more interested and improve it for what he thought was best. Tragedy occurs as various points of the play, the most memorable bit being when both ‘Rome and Juliet’ die, I thing this fits in well with the traditional idea of death in the play. Love also features in the play and links in with the tragedy as ‘Rome and Juliet’s’ love for eachother ultimately leads to their deaths. Four main types of love are included in the play, courtly, true, sexual and dutiful. ‘Rome and Juliet’s’ love for eachother is an example of true, where as Paris’ love for Juliet is courtly, ‘rules’ that they were supposed to follow in marriage. Dutiful love is that where the marriage of two people is set up. True love is usually passionate and fast moving.

Marriage was different then from how it is today, in their time girls married around the age or 13 or 14 and in most cases the lady’s husband was picked by her parents. In play Capulets’ were reluctant to see this happen so quickly. ‘She hath not seen the change of fourteen years’. This is slightly true in our play and Juliet is reluctant to marry Paris but more than happy to marry Romeo, this is dramatic irony as the two were married the next day.

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The prologue is an introduction to the play which is meant to draw people in and make them find out more, similar to a blurb on a book. Shakespeare set it out as a sonnet, this is appropriate as sonnets nearly always include love and so does the play. The lines in the prologue all have 10 syllables. It is also set out chronologically to match the sequence of events in the play. Phrases included in the prologue which prepare us for the tragedy are; ‘Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean’ which indicates that blood is shed which ...

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