In the Prologue of ‘Romeo and Juliet’ Shakespeare demonstrates how the trouble starts of with the lowest social ranking of both families members in ‘fair Verona’. Shakespeare describes Verona as a beautiful Renaissance City. Why? Perhaps because he wants to shatter this image of dignity, harmony, beauty and respectability, this is ironic because why would you destroy everything that is beautiful around you? The reason being for this is because of an ‘ancient grudge’.
“From ancient grudge break to new mutiny”. The two families, Montagues and Capulets had many problems. The whole conflict started a long time ago with small little things, and then grew into big fights involving many people. No leader of either household even thought about making peace, they were too busy spoiling everything for each other. The Capulets and the Montagues have been fighting for so long that the reason of the main purpose has become lost in time. The conflict is futile. There was hate between the two families so much that even the servants hated each other. This feud would have caused many problems to Romeo and Juliet.
“Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean”
This line is ironic because it mentioned the two families being civilised when they are not. Instead of talking things over they fight. The society itself is disgusted and resentful at them when they should be setting an example. Repetition is used with the word ‘civil’. ‘Civil’ mean civilians, not soldiers. ‘Unclean’ Act against God. They are sinned.
“From forth the fatal loins of these two foes”
The alliterative ‘f’ sounds in the words ‘forth’, ‘fatal’, and ‘foes’ has a sharp stopping effect to it. Shakespeare used the word ‘fatal’ to tell us that as soon as Romeo and Juliet are born, they are doomed. As an audience we are given a god-like perspective. Before the play even starts we know that Romeo and Juliet are going to die young. This is done to reinforce the inevitability of the pathos. Dramatic irony- is that we know the two young innocent lovers will die young. When Romeo and Juliet first meet each other at a party at the Capulet’s house, their love was destined to die. It illustrates the theme of fate in the play that Romeo and Juliet are destined to meet and fall in love. If Juliet had known who Romeo was would she still fall in love with him? She might not because he is the son of the Montagues, who is her family’s rival.
The fact that they had no choice, it almost feels like as if higher powers (God) are controlling their destiny. It makes us feel sympathy for them. Alliterated ‘d’ sounds in the words ‘doth’ and ‘death’ sounds sombre and serious, why? It’s because the language is portraying death.
Benvolio (a friend of Romeo) is the most responsible figure. ‘Put down your swords, you know not what you do’. This shows Benvolio is a peacemaker. He is trying to be reasonable by pointing out that both sides are out of control. Is Benvolio account biased? No, he gives a fair and balanced account. His name is also means Bene that is translated to good/well in Latin.
His language is polite and ordered: the language of Courtly society. The language has become iambic pentameter again to show that social order had temporarily been restored (Dramatic irony). The audience knows that the peace will not last, whereas the characters do not know their fate.
Tybalt, the cousin of Juliet is the opposite of Benvolio. He is impulsive, angry, aggressive and a troublemaker. His only goal is was to destroy all the Montagues. Benvolio calls him as ‘Fiery Tybalt’, because his always aggressive and always up for a fight.
Shakespeare breaks down the iambic pentameter gradually to show how this people are beginning to lose control of their calmer emotions:
“Do you quarrel, sir?”
“Quarrel, sir! No sir!’”
The replies have become shorted and therefore sound more tense, snappy and angry. There’s also a set of repetition with the word ‘sir’.
Sampson the servant of the Capulet wants to provoke the Montagues into responding first so that the Capulets will not be blamed for starting the fight. This show that by splitting the pentameter, Shakespeare is symbolically splitting Montagues and Capulets, they are divided by hate.
Shakespeare used Prince Escalus to describe the scene of utter chaos and mayhem. Prince Escalus officially represents social order and upholding the law. But is he powerful? ‘Will they not hear?’ This tells us that Prince Escalus is not a strong leader and because of that the fighting mob does not listen to the Prince to being with. He threatens the families with death penalty but does not follow through with his threat. Is he scared to the two powerful families? The reasons being that the two families have ‘thrice’ disturbed the peace. ‘Three civil brawls bred of an airy wood’. Three times the two families have been fighting. Does the Prince Escalus use his power effectively?
“Canker’d hate”
The Capulets and the Montagues learned about their children’s love when they have already died. Is it the Capulets and the Montagues fault for the death of their children or was it just their fate to die?
In the beginning of Act 1 Scene 3, it starts off with the characters Mercutio and Benvolio on set. Once Benvolio spot Tybalt, Benvolio tells Mercutio absently that they should leave and go elsewhere knowing that trouble will be stirred as a fight has been bound to come for days.
“I pray thee, good Mercutio, let’s retire: the day is hot, the Capels are abroad, And if we meet we shall scape not a brawl, for now, these hot days, is the mad blood stirring.”
Mercutio then starts teasing Benvolio for what he said whilst all Benvolio wanted was peace and no fight or trouble between the two houses. He does this by using wordplay
“Thou art like one of these fellows that, when he enters the confines of a tavern, claps me his sword upon the table and says ‘God send me no need of thee!’ and by the operation of the second cup draws him on the draw when indeed there is no need.”
This in other, in other words is that Mercutio is trying to say that Benvolio is one of those people who say they don’t want a fight but then goes and start one. When Mercuito says this, he is teasingly accusing Benvolio of trying to stop the fight but ends up making one. Benvolio is trying to keep peace between the two but does not realize that his actions are making it worse.
Mercutio did not leave, but he acted tough to Juliet’s cousin Tybalt who was not looking for a fight with Mercuito… only Romeo. Mercutio is a person who is proud of who he is and will stand up for himself no matter what rules he breaks and likes to act tough even though he isn’t, he is playful, fun, hyper and likes joke about women and act dirty-mindedly, he is a person who’d like to get into fights for fun. That day, Mercutio was in a ‘quarrelsome’ mood and was ready to fight and argue with someone (especially Tybalt).
Tybalt was looking for Romeo after Romeo was seen in a Capulet’s Party, he did not know that Romeo had just married his Cousin Juliet. This is an example of dramatic irony.
Mercutio then teases Tybalt’s name and tries to pick a fight. ‘Tybalt’ is also a cat’s name so Tybalt insults him by calling him “rat catcher”, he also twists Tybalt’s words to annoy him.
“Mercutio, thou consortest with Romeo.”
“Consort? What, dost thou make us minstrels? And thou make minstrels of us, look hear nothing but discords. Here’s my fiddlestick, here that shall make you dance. ‘Zounds, consort!”
When Mercutio is saying this, he is playing on the words of Tybalt. There are two meaning of consort, consort meaning to hang about with someone and Consort as a group of musicians, fiddlesticks meaning sword.
In Act 3 Scene 1, Mercutio started the argument this therefore meant that whatever happened would have been Mercutio’s fault. When Romeo arrives and disagrees to fight, Mercutio feels anger and rage over the change of heart Romeo had for Tybalt. Neither Tybalt nor Mercutio knew that Tybalt is now Romeo’s cousin-in-law.
“Tybalt, the reason I have to love thee doth much excuse the apparent rage to such a greeting. Villain am I none; therefore farewell, I see thou knowest me not.”
Here, Romeo tells Tybalt that he has a reason to love him enough to excuse him for saying that… this makes Mercutio mad and say “O vile submission”. When he says that, he means that if Romeo would not fight Tybalt then he would. Romeo and Benvolio try and stop them but fail. Mercutio is hurt. Whilst he is injured, he uses punning and wordplay to lighten the mood. Mercutio uses the term “grave man” which could mean one of two things. It could mean grave man as in serious or grave man as in dead person in the ground.
When Romeo sees that Tybalt had killed Mercutio, all the reason to feel ‘love’ for Tybalt was slow disintegrating. He is mad angry and upset at Tybalt and chases after him. Romeo and Tybalt end up fighting and Tybalt is killed. After Tybalt is killed, Romeo runs off and cries out of guilt.
Throughout the Story, Shakespeare uses a lot of dramatic irony. Dramatic irony is when the audience knows what the characters do not or when some of the characters know what some do not. Shakespeare uses this by Romeo and Juliet getting married and the Capulets and Montagues left in the dark, as the families are rivals. This gives the play an added tension.
At the end of the play, the tragedy is set upon us when Romeo and Juliet die for each other. The death of Mercutio and Tybalt changed the paths and feelings of Romeo and Juliet’s love for each other.
