Gregory: “No, for then we should be colliers.”
Sampson: “I mean, an we be in choler, we’ll draw.”
Gregory: “Ay, while you live, draw your neck out o’ the collar.”
This exchange would have been topical and regarded as clever at the time. Also, certain customs, such as arranged marriages, would have been recognised and understood: “Having provided a gentleman of noble parentage.” The word provided, shows that Capulet think it’s his job to find Juliet a man and not for her to fall in love with a man. An arranged marriage would shock the audience today, as they aren’t as common as they used to be. I don’t think that arranged marriages are right and that people should be able to have a choice over who they marry. Other elements touch on some of the fashions and tastes at the time. Mercutio is good at providing some sort of social commentary. He mocks the way that Tybalt fights and Mercutio is used to put lightness into the play. He and the Nurse are there to make us laugh. Mercutio’s main role is to poke fun at the contemporary customs. He is particularly harsh about Romeo’s supposed love for Rosaline: “If love be rough with you, be rough with love.” When Mercutio says this to Romeo, he means if Romeo is so sick and tired of love being rough, unkind and playing games with him, then why doesn’t he try to be rough with love and play love’s cruel game to get what he wants?
This is where Mercutio’s purpose may be more than comic relief. Shakespeare is not only detailing the customs of the time but is also commenting on them, through Mercutio’s character. Shakespeare does this because if he said it himself, then he could get into trouble for offending or upsetting people, but if a character says it then it’s only what the character says and is just their personality shining through, and the character dies anyway. Mercutio is particularly spiteful about courtly love. Courtly love was a fashion at the time that young men in love used to try to adopt in Shakespearean times. This posed included over-the-top language that men use in poems, expressing their feelings and is devastated if the woman frowns on them. For example Romeo is: “Out of her favour where I am in love.” Shakespeare comments on this through the sarcasm of Mercutio but also through his early characterisation of Romeo.
Shakespeare made courtly love seem ridiculous through early characterisation. Even though Romeo sticks to the rules of the time, he still annoys the audience: “I have lost myself, I am not here, this is not Romeo, he’s some other where.”
When Romeo and Juliet first meet they share a sonnet together. A sonnet is a poetic form of fourteen lines that was in fashion, and was used to express love. So when Romeo and Juliet share a sonnet it shows their true love for each other. The sonnet is significant to their love because their families won’t allow them to be together and when they share the sonnet together, it shows that they are meant to be together and that their love for each other is pure. Romeo is lost in Juliet’s beauty: “ O she doth teach the torches to burn bright! It seems she hangs upon the cheek of the night…”
I think that Romeo and Juliet’s love would still affect an audience today and we could understand the purity of their love. Also, we can still be moved by their terrible fate. However, love and death aren’t the only timeless themes dealt with in the play. The play is also about parental and teenage disputes: “ Talk not to me, for I’ll not speak a word. Do as thou wilt, for I have done with thee”, this quote would not shock an Elizabethan audience. Parents and teenagers will always be involved in some kind of degree of conflict at some point, no matter the time or ways in which people live. Conflict is also a timeless issue in the play. Similar to these two young lovers, separated from one another because of an unknown feud. Some lovers today are separated because of race, religion or parental disapproval. Just as conflict and hatred are timeless emotions, so is friendship that is another issue dealt with. True friendships take us back to the Bible, which states that everybody will always have someone in their life, which they can call a friend. This is shown through Romeo and Mercutio, as they mock and fall out with each other, but are still willing to fight for one another. I think all the reasons above are just exactly why this play is so enduring and why it has never been neglected since it was written in the 16th century. In the first two hundred lines of the play we see violence, comedy and intrigue, which all contribute to the plot. Shakespeare cleverly adapts different characteristics and personalities to each character making them all individual and unique. Although we may not like Tybalt, we can still understand his views and him as a person. Also, we can understand Capulet when he tries to get Juliet to marry Paris, because he feels it’s his duty and wants her to marry someone of her own status and so that he can leave her all of his belongings in his will: “ Unworthy as she is, that we have wrought, so worthy a gentleman to be her bride.”
My favourite character is Mercutio, because he’s funny and he speaks his mind and doesn’t really care about the consequences. I also think Mercutio helps the audience understand the play more because he mocks and asks questions that an audience today would ask.
In conclusion to the question for my essay, I think that to fully understand the play you do need to have a general understanding of the language and customs, but I don’t think that it’s essential. It would make it easier to understand and I think when you understand something you can appreciate it and maybe even enjoy it more.