Juliet is respectful to her mother in the first half of the play. Her mother is waiting for her to give her views on marriage to which Juliet replies ‘It is an honour that I dream not of.’ She says that the idea of marriage is an honourable concept but she has never given any thought to it. The word ‘honour’ shows respect for her mother’s suggestion which is understandable as girls in her time were expected to obey and respect their parents without question. However, although she replies in a respective way Juliet is also shrewd in the way she replies to her mother’s question of marriage. This is demonstrated when she says: ‘I look to like, if looking liking move; / But no more deep will I endart mine eye / than your consent gives strength to make it fly.’ She doesn’t give her mother a straight answer but twists it around so that she is neither giving her consent for the marriage nor refusing the proposition. Here Juliet shows that she is not merely an object of admiration but as a person who is developed enough to be able to express her views without being rude or disrespectful.
We see Juliet’s character develop drastically when she first meets Romeo. She is much more developed and in control of her life compared to when she was talking to her mother about her marriage proposals. She even brings up the suggestion of marriage herself instead of relying on Romeo, ‘If thy bent of love be honourable, / Thy purpose marriage, send me word tomorrow.’ Juliet falls in love with Romeo when she first meets him and on their second meeting proposes to him. It seems surprising, knowing the position of women in Shakespearean times, that Juliet should be so courageous as to be the one who suggests marriage to Romeo since it was normally the male who asked for the females hand in the male who asked for the females hand in marriage. However, it can be seen as a normal scene in the 21st century as both male and female initiate the talk of marriage.
Later, we see Juliet start to develop further as Romeo is exiled and her attempts to refuse the marriage to Paris seem futile. She threatens to take her own life rather than marry Paris and demands help from the friar in an insistent manner. We see this in Act 4, Scene 1 when she says: ‘Unless thou tell me how I may prevent it. / If in thy wisdom thou canst give no help, / do thou but call my resolution wise, / and with this knife I’ll help it presently.’ The manner in which Juliet behaves in this part of the play contrasts with her apparently obedient and submissive manner towards her parents at the start of the play. Juliet shows a very immature side of herself during this part of the play. She doesn’t look through the consequences that her death will bring and only thinks about how Romeo and she could be together even in death. However, some people may argue and say that she actually shows the audience a more mature image of herself. It takes a considerable amount of courage for a person to take their own life for the person they love.
Juliet is very convincing in the way that she deceives her parents and appears to apologize profoundly to them for her behaviour. ‘Where I have learnt me to repent the sin / of disobedience opposition / … / To beg your pardon.’ This is dramatic irony because the audience know that she is only acting and isn’t really sorry for what she has done and has no intention of listening to her father. It makes the audience wonder what will happen later in the play and if this turnaround will lead to something horrid happening. This makes the audience look back at her behaviour at the beginning of the play and wonder if she really was only acting when she showed her obedient daughter side at the beginning of the play. The way she is able to deceive her parents shows just how much her character has developed throughout the play. During this part of the play, Juliet has total control over her life and the audience’s attention. She is no longer the feeble girl who never spoke a word against her parent but someone who is determined to take control of her life.
Her desperation to escape her marriage to Paris forces Juliet to take a sleeping drug that she obtained from Friar Lawrence which enables her to go into a deathlike trance. ‘I have a faint cold fear thrills through my veins / That almost freezes up the heat of life.’ She speaks in an expressive way which makes the audience empathetic towards her fear and able to imagine how difficult it must be for her to take the drug. Here yet again Juliet shows that she is much more developed than Romeo and captures the audience’s hearts with her pureness and love. She confesses her fear of not knowing what the drug may contain and whether it may really kill her. This makes the scene more catching for the audience as they want to find out what happens next.
Juliet can be seen as acting considerably foolish or extremely courageous towards the end of the play. ‘Yea, noise? Then I’ll be brief. O happy dagger, / This is thy sheath; there rust, and let me die.’ When Juliet wakes up and finds Romeo beside her dead, she doesn’t hesitate in killing herself for the sake of her love and this could be seen as a demonstration of her courage. In spite of that, it could also be seen as a foolish act as she could have thought about the best thing to do and about the consequences her actions would have on others before taking her own life.
In conclusion, there is certainly some evidence that she is at first much less developed that Romeo and more of an object of admiration. However, some people say that she is not just an object of admiration at first but that her character at the beginning leads up to her development towards the end. After she meets Romeo, there is a great deal of evidence of how her behaviour changes and she becomes much more mature and refined and an important character in the play. On the other hand it is also true that Romeo also has an important role in the play because it is because of him Juliet’s character changes so much and becomes so much more developed. It helps if we understand the context of the play because then we can understand why Juliet acts in the way she does in parts of the play. Compared to heroines of other plays, Juliet is much more understood by the audience as she opens up to the audience and lets them empathize with her.