The dramatic effect of Romeos speech when he first sees Juliet is to set the scene for the trouble that is to come and tells us something of Romeos character.
Firstly Romeo doesn’t even know who she is because the quotes “What lady’s that which doth enrich the hand? Of yonder knight?” The effect on the audience is quiet strong because they know that Juliet is the daughter of the rival Capulet family, Romeo is talking to a servant and is quiet obviously entranced by her looks even thought he knows nothing about her. “It seems she hangs upon a cheek of night, As a rich jewel in an Ethiop’s ear-” Romeo then goes on to compare her with the other women and presumably with Rosaline. I know this because he says “As yonder lady o’er fellows shows” After this Romeo decides to watch her for a while “The measure done, I’ll watch her place of stand” we can now see the trouble already starting because Romeo is overheard talking about Juliet by Tybalt.
The dramatic effect of Tybalt speech is to make the play more exciting and to how us firstly that Romeo has been recognised as a Montague “ Fetch me my rapier, boy.” Tybalt clearly thinks that Romeo is making fun of all of them “What dares the slave, Come hither covered with an antic face, To fleer and scorn at our solemnity.” He sends his pager to collect his rapier for him so that he is able to kill Romeo “Now by my stock and honour of my kin, To strike him dead I hold not a sin.” Capulet doesn’t know initially why Tybalt has gone off on one and when he is told that Romeo is a Montague by Tybalt he try to calm Tybalt down. This reaction from Tybalt shows us that the bad feelings shown are mainly held upon the younger generations rather than the older generations. Capulet tries to calm Tybalt down by telling Tybalt that Romeo isn’t such a bad person “And to say truth, Verona brags of him, to be a virtuous and well-governed youth.”, and tells Tybalt that a party is not the place to cause trouble “It is my will, the which if thou respect, Show a fair presence, and put off these frowns”. This just makes Tybalt more aggressive and he says “He shall be endured”. Capulet uses 2 rhetorical questions “Am I the master here, or you? Go to!, You’ll not endure him? God shall mend my soul” . After this Tybalt backs down but threatens that there is going to be trouble in the near future “I will withdraw, but this intrusion shall, Now seeming sweet, convert to bitterest gall” . This is in total contrast with Romeo’s speech which is about love where as Tybalt is about Hatred in the family honour. The audiences reaction to the speech is that they will feel sorry for Capulet because his party mood has been disrupted by Tybalt. Dramatically it is important to feel sorry for Romeo as well because this will effect our feelings when this play comes to a drastic end. The audience will not feel sorry for Tybalt when he is killed because of how he has reacted in this part of the play.
One of the was Shakespeare makes this scene dramatically effective is by the meeting of Romeo and Juliet. First of all to show how naive they are. They play with each other verbally but Romeo takes the first strike by taking hold of Juliet’s hand but makes a little joke about it in case she were to get upset “If I profane with my unworthiest hand, This holy shrine, the gentle sin in this” . Romeo then continues to take the lead by saying “My lips two blushing pilgrims, ready stand, To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss” . Romeo wont give up “Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?” Juliet at this point is still shy but starts to tease Romeo “Ay, pilgrims, lips that they must use in prayer” . Romeo notices that Juliet is reacting favourably to his advances and decides to go one step further “Then move not while my prayer’s effect I take. Thus from my lips, by thine, my sin is purged” , which results to Romeo kissing Juliet. Romeo then notices that Juliet is not pretending to be shy anymore so he then kisses her once again. Juliet then comments about his kiss “You kiss by th’book” . The whole of this speech which is written in a shared sonnet is a dramatic device to quickly let us know what they feel for each other.
In deciding whether this is infatuation of real love a number f things have to be taken into consideration. Firstly, that until Romeo saw Juliet he was professing his love for Rosaline so his affection has changed very quickly and based only really on what he sees. They have only just meet and Juliet has lead a very sheltered life and is still very young. It is difficult to deicide whether it is real love or infatuation as everyone’s definition of love will differ slightly. My view is that Romeo and Juliet can not possibly be in love at this moment in time because they know so little about the each other. This changes as the play goes on but in Act 1 Scene 5 it is just infatuation . The dramatic effect of this is to make us want to know how their relationship develops. Especially as we know that there is going to be problems waiting ahead.
The dramatic effect of the ending is that it breaks up the love scene between Romeo and Juliet in a big way . When Romeo discovers that Juliet is a Capulet he realises what problems this relationship will cause “O dear account! My life is my foe’s debt.” . Benvolio advices Romeo to leave. Juliet soon discovers by talking to the nurse after some confusion that the man she has been talking to is a Montague and is devastated “That I must love a loathed enemy” . This leaves us wanting to know more about what happens. Shakespeare has made Act 1 Scene 5 dramatically effective because he has shown us the blossoming love between Romeo and Juliet the fact that they are warring families and the depth of hatred this causes in Tybalt. The universal themes of love and hate are still relevant to audiences today, many books and films are still about these themes (love and hate) and the story of Romeo and Juliet continues to be told in different ways such as the film “ West Side Story”. My personal opinion about the scene is that it tells us a lot about the two households but I feel as if this scene is not the most interesting scene in the play.