Romeo is then drawn back to the house after he has left, ‘Can I go forward when my heart is here?’, by his new love for the Capulet and is completely motivated by this love at this point. He is almost defying the hate for the feud between the families completely when he does this and once again love and hate are drawn together simultaneously. As Romeo calls for Juliet he uses words of love to extend the image of Juliet’s beauty, ‘Juliet is the sun…(she is) the fairest stars’. He uses this metaphor to show that she is already the centre of his universe (the sun) and that he is drawn to her by ‘(his) love’. But then we see the hate for the feud once again as he exclaims ‘birds would sing and think it were not night’, he has acknowledged that their relationship with each other will not be tolerated by others, he describes it as being chaotic. The audience has also seen this before during the sharing of the first sonnet, as he describes their kiss as, ironically, a ‘sin’. Romeo and Juliet both indicate their hate for their names and believe that they are not anything else but names, ‘T is but thy name that is my enemy. Thou art thyself, though not a Montague’. Juliet shows her love for Romeo himself and hate for his name, once again both emotions together. Almost too dramatically at this point, Romeo is motivated by his new love once again as he tells Juliet ‘Call me ‘love’, and I’ll be baptised; Henceforth I will never be Romeo’, tragically the audience knows that this won’t solve the problem but the lovers are ignoring, perhaps even dazed by their love, the situation.
Certainly one of the most tragic scenes is when Mercutio dies. The audience can get a clear picture of what Romeo is truly motivated by at this point. When Tybalt confronts Romeo, Romeo backs off claiming that he loves Tybalt, ‘Till thou shalt know the reason of my love’. The ‘ancient grudge’ has been completely displaced by Romeo through his love for Juliet even if it costs him his life. But then we see a different motivated love, one for Mercutio. ‘Hold Tybalt! Good Mercutio!’, Romeo comes between the fighting due to him wanting it to stop, and maybe on a larger scale, the whole feud to stop. Out of sudden revenge, strong hate (for Tybalt and Mercutio’s death) and love for his best friend, Romeo kills Tybalt without any thought of consequence. This instant kill performed by Romeo shows his exquisite hate for Tybalt at that point as his love for Mercutio gets the better of him and therefore shows that he’s motivated by both these emotions at the same time.
Juliet, knowing that Romeo has been banished feels that her last hope is the friar, knowing that he will help as he loves Romeo. She will stop at nothing to her to ‘her Romeo’ and is completely helpless to her love to him; so much so that she threatens to kill herself if he doesn’t devise a solution. This shows us her extreme love for Romeo but at the same time her hate for marrying Paris, ‘O bid me leap, rather than marry Paris’. In what seems to be a motive of love for his wife, Romeo returns to Verona in search, for what he thinks, his dead Juliet. He then shows, once again, his hate for fate, ‘I defy you stars’, and resolves to go to her. So motivated by their love for each other and hate from ‘others’, Romeo and Juliet both die.
These ‘others’ are the other characters, also motivated by both love and hate, causing consequences that eventually built to the death of the lovers. Tybalt could be described as Romeo’s opposite, motivated much more by hate rather than love. There is definitely sufficient evidence to back this theory up but we must also look at it from his point of view. We see Tybalt’s hate for the Montagues at the Capulet party we he spots Romeo entering. This is a stark contrast to Romeo’s immediate love for Juliet. ‘Now by the stock and honour of my kin, to strike him dead, I hold it not a sin’, this quote from Tybalt tells us that he is motivated by love for his family and pride for their reputation. He will go to such lengths as killing to protect himself and his family, it’s almost as if he loves to hate and hates to love anything but his pride. ‘Uncle this is a Montague, our foe’, Tybalt is also motivated not only by love or hate but by the feud as well. But at this point we must ask ourselves if this kind of love is morally upright? In most peoples opinion, and most probably the audiences opinion at the time, the answer would of course be no. But if we look at the situation from Tybalt’s point of view I’m sure we would say the complete opposite. Tybalt could be simply standing up for himself and his family for their own good, which in turn would defiantly be morally correct. But when Tybalt shouts at Romeo saying ‘Peace, I hate the word’, we can clearly tell that Tybalts actions are clearly motivated by strongly hate for people rather than love for his family.
This idea of a stronger motivation of love or hate brings us onto Mercutio, Romeo’s best friend. Although we find out that Mercutio shows great love for Romeo, he also shows that he hates certain aspects of Romeo’s personality. We discover this during the ‘Queen Nab’ speech, he mocks Romeo’s ideas of love and fate by describing a ‘fairies midwife’. But this can also be interpreted as an act of love for Romeo as he tries to make Romeo forget about Rosaline and it may also be an act of jealously. Mercutio might even miss having his best friend around so much, instead Romeos ‘weeping’ over a women who doesn’t love him back. But Mercutio’s real motivation becomes clear when we see him fighting with Tybalt. Mercutio seems to be the only person in the play who won'’ accept the feud, we see this when he forces Romeo to go to the party in the first act, he appears to be very nihilistic. The audience sees this side of him again when he provokes Tybalt into fighting, ‘And but one word with one of us? Couple it with something: make it a word and a blow’. This shows strong hate towards the feud and Tybalt, much like his relative the prince. We then see the opposite emotion to this as Romeo enters the scene, ‘But I’ll be hanged, sir, if (Romeo) wear(s) your livery’, Mercutio is extremely loyal to Romeo and even fights Tybalt to help his friend. ‘A plague o’ both your houses!’, Mercutio is obviously motivated by hate for the feud when he announces this and clearly thinks it’s this that has killed him (the hate between the families, hate has caused the first death).
The friar and the nurse and both motivated by the love of their friends, Romeo and Juliet. Whenever Romeo seems to have some kind of problem, he will always go and consult the friar; the friar acts as a father figure towards Romeo and is therefore already showing great love for the teenager. When Romeo asks the friar to marry him and Juliet the friar is motivated by hate for the feud, ‘To turn your households into pure love’, he believes that if they do marry it may stop the feud. He also uses vocabulary of war to describe the marriage, ‘For this alliance may so happy prove’, this also tells the audience that he believes that Verona is filled by hate. This nurse also shows a parental love but for Juliet. She acts as a kind of messenger for Juliet to speak to Romeo. ‘If you should deal double with her, truly it were an ill thing to be offered to any gentlewomen, and very weak dealing’, the nurse is always acting in Juliet’s best interest just like a mother would, therefore motivated by love but perhaps also motivated by hate of seeing Juliet hurt. The audience sees her acting in Juliet’s best interest again during act 3 scene 5, ‘I think it best you married with the county’, she doesn’t want to see her friend that she loves get hurt. But she may also be motivated by fear at this point, as she could easily loose her best friend to a man if Juliet leaves the house. The nurse certainly acts more like a mother than Lady Capulet after Juliets death as she reacts ‘woefully’, here we see very clearly her strong love for Juliet.
The Capulets motivations can once again be interpreted in different ways, both though contain some elements of hate and love, just different versions. The Capulets are largely motivated by their love for their reputation and to uphold it, ‘Be quiet, or (addresses servants) to shame’. From this quote the audience can tell that Lord Capulet is ver protective of his reputation as he doesn’t want any of his guests to see Tybalts actions. During this small talk with Tybalt we see Capulets anger at Tybalt revealed in the exclamation and jagged phrasing. Later on in the play we see what seemed like an act of love towards Juliet quickly turn into one of hate as she rejects the marriage proposal put forward by the Capulets. ‘Hang thee, young baggage! Disobedient wretch!’, Lord Capulet is motivated by hate when he gives his daughter the ultimatum of either marring Paris or leaving. The use of many exclamations in the text clearly shows this motive of hate, but could also be seen as an emotion of love towards Juliet as he’s doing it in her best interest. But then he threatens to hurt Juliet, ‘My fingers itch’, this phrase tells the audience that he’s feeling angry either due to her disobedience or the worry of his falling reputation. This isolates Juliet from her parents and creates a barrier of hate between them.
‘A gloomy peace this morning with it brings; The sun for sorrow
will not show his head. Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things. Shall
some be pardoned, and some punished; For never was a story of more woe
Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.’
This speech taken from the Prince truly tells us what his motives were, love for peace. He urges Verona that they learn from the tragedy describing the situation by using paradoxes, ‘gloomy peace’, and ironically prints a memorial inscription on Romeo and Juliet’s tomb. Romeo has previously called Juliet a ‘snowy dove’, this is where that statement is proved true, peace has been brought to Verona, like a snowy dove would symbolise. The Prince believes that the families are ‘punished’ and therefore is motivated by hate for the feud.
So this play by William Shakespeare is both about love and hate entwined within each other but it is the clash between adolescence and adulthood that creates these emotions. It’s almost like the world has been turned upside down in this play as, ironically, the young are teaching the old. When Romeo and Juliet both eventually die because of the strong love for one-another somewhat grows, and also the hate between the characters is largely reduced. This is tragically ironic as it’s taken the death of four young children (young teachers) to finally kill this ‘hate’ which seems to be following the two families.
