Also we begin to understand what the young males think of love at first because they do not fully understand truly passionate emotional love and talk a lot about sexual love ‘well in that hit you’ll miss: she’ll not be hit. With cupid’s arrow: she hath Dian’s wit.’ Here Romeo is saying how he is heartbroken because the woman he loves wont have sex with him. He comes in and we know he isn’t happy because the other males have been talking about it previously. He talks about how upset he is that his current girlfriend isn’t having sex with him and has taken a vow of chastity. He talks a lot about how he feels no love but wants to love her. Basically he wants to have sex with her but can’t and he feels like he’ll never get over her if they split up.
‘ He that is stricken blind cannot forget the precious treasure of his eyesight lost.’
In act two scene two Romeo’s perception of love has changed because he is experiencing true, emotional passionate love. This scene is important because it is this love that escalates the hatred between the families. Romeo falls in love with Juliet, and Juliet falls in love with Romeo. For the first time they both experience a love that is more passionate and stronger then anything they have ever felt before. We realise this straight away as Romeo is talking about Juliet, he does briefly mention sex once but after that he does not mention it again. This is very different to the way he was talking about Roseline. (Roseline) : ‘nor ope her lap to saint – seducing gold’
(Juliet) : o speak again, bright angel, for thou art as glorious to this night, being o’er my head.’
He seems to have forgotten about her. Then Juliet starts talking about Romeo, she talks about how it is only their names that are keeping them from their love and she says that she would give up her name and her family for Romeo, this shows how powerful their love was. ‘What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other word would still smell as sweet;’
Romeo then say’s that he would give up his name for her. ‘Call me but love and I’ll be baptised; henceforth I will no longer be Romeo.’ At this point Juliet discovers that Romeo is listening to her. Then they start talking and declare their love for each other. This shows that this is proper love that neither of them can understand or control. Then Juliet goes to bed and Romeo goes off to arrange their marriage. The entire scene just show’s how strong their love is and how obsessed they are with each other it also has an underlying threat of death throughout, if Romeo is discovered he will be killed. This is important because it say’s that they would both disobey their families and disown them for each other which provokes violence and eventually leads to their deaths. This is shown even more by Romeo’s soliloquies throughout this scene talking about how much in love he is.
Now I will look at the sound and language and how these reflect on the love and hate themes. In act one scene one the language is generally poetic towards the end when Benvolio and Romeo talk of love. However Sampson and Gregory talk bawdier, in pro’s not poetic, as they are talking about sex and fighting. The play starts talking about love but in a sexual way in act one. Then in act two the love they discuss has progressed into a deeper and more meaningful emotional, passionate love. In act one scene one love and hate are linked through a double entendre, when Sampson refers to his ‘naked weapon’. This links love and hate through sex and violence, it’s a more toned down version of it in act one as both the love and the hate get a lot stronger and more powerful throughout the play. Love and hate are both strongly connected throughout the play so at this point I would say that the play is about both theme’s equally. Love and hate are opposite things that are closely interlinked. Shakespeare interprets this into his play through Romeo’s confusion about love. In act one scene one during when Romeo is explaining how he feel’s about Roseline and what it is that upsetting her he uses a lot of oxymoron’s. This is to emphasise the fact that Romeo is very confused about how he feels. He says ‘heavy lightness’, ‘cold fire’ etc. This is when he is very confused about his feelings for Roseline, here we also here one of the most important lines of the play when looking at the theme’s love and hate. ‘oh brawling love, oh loving hate’. This is when we see the confusion of love and hate. At this point Romeo is very confused between love and hate. He loves a woman but can’t have her because of hate. He first begins to look at the reasons for the hatred and doesn’t understand. He is getting confused and the basis on which he was taught to hate makes no sense to him any more because of love. Whereas in act 2 scene 2 he doesn’t use very many oxymorons. This is because the Romeo is sure about his feelings; he knows what he wants to say because he knows how he feels. In act one scene one hate is confusing his feeling and love is clarifying them yet confusing his feelings of hatred. This is because there is hatred. We see how love and hate get confused and confuse each other. In act 1 scene 1 the sentences are short, the conversation between Sampson and Gregory moves at a quick pace, whereas in act 2 scene 2 the conversation flow nicely with rhythm and a metre of poetry, its slow but not to slow. The sentences are long and precise with what each character wants to be said. Act one scene one represents hate more then it does love and the sentences are short and quick and spoken in standard English pro’s whereas act 2 scene 2 is all about love and is spoken in iambic pentameter.
Next I am going to look at imagery. Metaphors are used to describe a passionate love like Romeo and Juliet’s to an audience who may have never experienced anything like it; ‘with loves light wings did I o’erperch these walls for stony limits cannot hold love out’ also it’s used to describe a lifelong pointless and deep-set hatred to people who have never experienced it. There is a lot of imagery used in hate ‘as I hate hell all Montague’s and thee’ but not so much used in love, ‘o gentle Romeo, if thou dost love, pronounce it faithfully’. In hate imagery is used is used in quite a violent way. When Sampson say’s that his ‘naked weapon is out’ he is referring to his sword but it is also a sexual pun as they were just talking about sex. The most violent hatred fuelled simile is when Tybalt compares his hatred towards peace and Montague’s as ‘ as I hate hell’ in act one scene one. The kind of imagery that reflects hatred uses a lot of negative words and a negative thing because hatred is seen as a negative thing. Hatred fuels violence and is a bad emotion to have, you’re never happy when you are angry about hate. Hate reflects love though in very deep ways as they are opposite emotions yet so closely interlinked which is what Shakespeare was trying to show through the writing of this play. Whereas the imagery in act two scene two reflects love and uses more positive words, because love is a positive emotion and therefore an opposite of hate. Love is something bright and beautiful and as most people in the theatre had probably never experienced it Shakespeare wrote of it through imagery, comparing it to things. Like when Romeo refers to Juliet as a ‘bright angel’.
Now I am going to look at themes. The basic themes used in Romeo and Juliet are love and hate. But these are reflected in many different ways. Such as honour and pride. It is honour for their families that makes them hate all members of the other family, and it is pride that refuses to allow them to back down from any fight which fuels the hatred and the violence. Themes that reflect love are themes like loyalty and family. Although these also spiral into hatred. The love for the characters families fuel hatred as I said before and the loyalty for the families fuel hatred. But it also works the other way round, all of the themes that eventually fuel hatred are based on love for families, and friends. There are different types of love and hate used in Romeo and Juliet. These change throughout the progression of the play. At first there is the approach to love that is purely sexual and there is the approach to hate that is purely violent. Then it progresses into an infatuation type of love and hatred with more of a reason (pride, honour, revenge). Then at the end the characters have matured a lot more emotionally and the love has turned into true obsessive passionate love and the hatred is pure deep-set loathing.
I have throughout this essay shown how love and hate have been presented throughout the play and compared them. I think that love and hate are equal themes in the play as love fuels hate and hate fuelled love. Love and hate are completely cyclical but are broken by love at the end.