“All are Punished” - Punishment in Romeo and Juliet

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Coursework 4 : Essay on a Shakespeare Play

Andrew Fernando

“All are Punished” Act V Scene 3 Line294

        “All are punished” is a line said by the ruler of Verona, Prince Esculus and probably bests sums up the well-known tragedy by William Shakespeare.

        William Shakespeare the author of the play wrote the play during the time of Queen Elizabeth.  It was set in Italy to suck up to the Queen by saying that Italy was in a bad condition because of its bad monarchs whereas England was in a great condition because of its brilliant ruler.

        After the chorus has left we quickly see the third battle that has taken place in Verona involving the Montagues and the Capulets because of an argument that took place so long ago that no-one knows how it happened in the first place. Here the battle is started by servants and this because to servants were part of the family and if there was a fight they to be involved.  The servants are joking about raping the other families female servants.  However the joking soon turn to horror when the fighting and killing begins.

        In the paragraph we also see how the families are not all “2.4 families”.  Lady Capulet mocks her spouse when asks for a sword to join the fight by saying he should have a crutch.  This is probably because she is resentful that she was forced to marry Capulet.

        At this time women were considered to be the property of their men, be it their husband or father, and so if you were told to marry someone by your father you married them.  These arranged marriages were for peace, money land, etc..  In the play, Juliet is forced into agreeing to marry Paris.

        As you can see it is this family dispute that is responsible for causing many of the fights and the deaths.  The first person to die is Mercutio.  He is killed in a fight because he is ashamed that Romeo, a Montague, will not fight Tybalt, a Capulet, and so rather than letting the family name be disgraced he takes Romeo’s place.  Fighting like this was common in the time the play was set.  Just like in West Side Story, an adaptation of the play, and in many cities today rival gangs would fight each other however they would not want to kill each other but hurt each other and so as shown in Franco Zeffirelli’s Film in 1968 Tybalt was probably repentant that he had killed Mercutio.  Romeo is blamed by Mercutio for stepping in and thus allowing Tybalt to hit him.  At first everyone thinks that Mercutio is joking about the extent of his injury, he is known for his sarcasm and foolishness as we are shown in his Queen Mab speech.  

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        When he sees that Mercutio is dead then Romeo is overcome with anger.  He has

lost someone who is like a brother to him and whom he loves very much.  He is so overcome with hate that anger takes control of his mind and he only wants to kill Tybalt.  Romeo, who is now married to Juliet, goes after Tybalt and kills him.  Romeo is then told by Benvolio to leave for he knows that he will be killed for the price of murder is death.  

The Prince now enters.  He himself is partially responsible for the deaths in ...

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