“Dry sorrow drinks our blood.” This means Romeo and Juliet feel a great sadness, as they do not know when they will next see each other. Again fate is mentioned by Juliet and what happens in the stars. “O Fortune, Fortune…” and again fortune is mentioned a few lines down “Be Fickle, Fortune;” Notice that whenever Juliet says fortune, whether it is at the start of a sentence or half way through one, it has a capital letter. This indicates that fortune, and what is in the stars are very important not only to Juliet, but to the whole play too. The importance of fortune is emphasized when Juliet has a premonition of Romeo’s death. The 16th Century audience will know the importance of fortune form the prologue. The audience will realize what Juliet has said “As one dead in the bottom of a tomb.” Will be to do with fate, and will possibly believe the next time Juliet does see Romeo, he will be dead at the bottom of a tomb!
Lady Capulet shouts to her daughter, and Juliet replies with the obedience and politeness she has done throughout the whole play. Juliet calls her Mother “Madam” for example, “Ay Madam”, “Madam I am not well.” And “Madam in happy time too.” The audience knows that Lady Capulet and Juliet do not have much of a good relationship. They know this for close to the beginning of the play; Lady Capulet wants to talk to Juliet so she asks the nurse to leave. However Lady Capulet changes her mind after panicking, and calls the nurse back into the room. When Lady Capulet finally enters Juliet’s room, Juliet is crying because Romeo her “love” has left and she does not know when she will see him again. The nurse knows why Juliet is sobbing, but Lady Capulet mistakes the tears for Romeo for the tears of Tybalt’s death. The audience knows that Juliet is not crying for Tybalt, but hysterical for the departure of Romeo instead, Lady Capulet is very cold towards Juliet, and is not very sympathetic. She tells her daughter to now stop crying. Lady Capulet calls Romeo a “villain”, and Juliet responds to this by saying “Villain and he be many miles asunder. [Aloud] God pardon him; I do, with all my heart: And yet no man like he doth grieve my heart.” This is where Juliet starts saying things with double meanings. When she says “Villain and he be many miles asunder,” she means he is many miles away from being a villain, and not many miles away from Verona, because she knows that Romeo has just left her bedroom window. The audience would know this and would realize that Juliet means Romeo is many miles from being a villain. Juliet says aloud, “God pardon him; I do…” here, she is saying she forgives Romeo for killing her cousin Tybalt. Lady Capulet thinks that Juliet is saying she forgives Romeo because he is alive, so she threatens to kill Romeo with poison, by sending someone to Mantua “shall give him such an unaccustomed dram That he shall soon keep Tybalt company; And then I hope thou wilt be satisfied.” Lady Capulet thinks this will please Juliet, but the audience knows differently. Juliet responds by saying “I shall never be satisfied.” This is interpreted by Lady Capulet that Juliet will never be satisfied because Tybalt is already dead, killed by Romeo. But the audience will know that Juliet means that she will never be satisfied because she will not ever get to see Romeo properly for a long time, which will seem longer because she loves him. This again is a double meaning. Lady Capulet not picking up on this proceeds to tell Juliet about her arranged marriage to County Paris on Thursday. Juliet does not know what her Mother is talking about and shows interest in what Lady Capulet is saying to her. When Juliet finally understands that her father has arranged her marriage to Paris, Juliet rebels. This will shock the audience and her parents greatly, because she has always done what her parents have asked of her, she has always been polite, and never disobeyed them, so when Juliet does stand up for herself no one can believe it.
Juliet says Paris can not love her that much because he has not even been to see her. Juliet uses irony, when she says “I will not marry yet; and when I do, I swear it shall be Romeo, whom you know I hate, Rather than Paris.” The audience knows that she does not hate Romeo, and the nurse knows that she does not too, Juliet loves Romeo. This is when tension really starts to build up, because Lady Capulet tells Juliet to tell her Father that she will not marry Paris. When Capulet sees Juliet she is still in tears, he is sympathetic and uses several metaphors. Lord Capulet says Juliet is a “tempest-tossed body” which symbolizes a storm, which is about to happen when he realizes Juliet will not marry Paris. He also calls her a boat implying she is very small compared to the world as a boat is very small compared to the sea. Capulet is compassionate for a minute.
The moment Lord Capulet enters is a dramatic device; he does not know what his wife and daughter are talking about and has to ask. Even after he asked, he still does not realize, at first, what Juliet is trying to explain to him. Then he catches on after lady Capulet says “Ay, Sir; but she will have none, she gives you thanks. I would the fool be married to her grave!” Here again we have the link
between death and marriage. The audience knows that death is coming to claim Juliet Capulet still does not fully understand that Juliet does not want to marry Paris as he says “Soft, take me with you, take me with you wife,” and then he starts to work it all out. Just before Capulet realizes that Juliet will not marry Paris and just when he has worked it all out is probably the point at which the tension of the scene is at its highest point. This will make the audience think and feel for Juliet, because Capulet goes on to ask questions about his daughter such as: “Is she not grateful?” He asks if his daughter is not proud to be able to marry Paris. “Is she not proud? Doth she not count her blest, Unworthy as she is, that we have bought so worthy a gentleman to be her bride?” So Capulet starts to think that Juliet is ungrateful; this will again be a very tense part of the scene. The mood will be angry and confused; there will be a great deal of sadness too. Capulet starts to doubt the way he bought up his daughter, and believes Juliet is a very ungrateful child after everything he has done for her. The 16th Century audience knows that Capulet can be a violent man, because at the beginning of the play, when there was a fight between the Capulets and the Mountagues, Capulet said bring me my sword when he did not even know why they were fighting with each other. This would also make the audience think about what he might do to Juliet because he sees her as “ungrateful.” The audience would feel nervous for Juliet and they would want to give her sympathy. As Juliet tries to calm the situation down by trying to be nice, Capulet becomes more and more outraged by the fact Juliet will not marry Paris. And as Lord Capulet gets angrier he starts to call Juliet awful names. He says he will never look at her again after calling her “green-sickness carrion! Out you baggage! You tallow-face!” Capulet also says to Juliet “hang thee young-baggage! Disobedient wretch!” Here Juliet must look terrible. For her own father to say that she looks like a “green-sickness carrion” meaning she looks like dead flesh and she is a “tallow-face” or the colour of a wax crayon, she must look extremely pale, the colour of alabaster, and is obviously very upset. The audience knows how frustrated Capulet can get. They know that Capulet is a fairly violent man too, so when Capulet shouts “My fingers itch.” The audience will respond with a shock of horror. They will think what is Capulet going to do? Will he hit his only daughter?
We know that Juliet is very important to Lord Capulet “that God had only lent us but this only child;” And this does indicate how important Juliet is to him. In Elizabethan times, when Romeo and Juliet is set, children often died at birth, or at a very young age, and this is why Juliet is so important to her Father. Capulet emphasizes how cross he is with Juliet when he says “Out on her, hilding!” In Elizabethan times hilding would have been a different word for a slut, so Juliet will be distraught her Father has said this to her. Capulet leaves on a very strict note, saying “I’ll not be foresworn,” meaning he will not change his mind. This will make the audience ask questions about what Juliet will do now. Will she marry Paris? Will she tell her Mother and Father she is married to Romeo? Will she keep sticking up for herself? The tension is at an extremely high point here, and the scene starts to become exciting when the nurse stands up for Juliet. The audience will be immediately shocked, and again will ask themselves questions. What will Capulet do? Will he use his fists to get his own way? However Capulet does not use his fists and leaves.
Lady Capulet then proceeds to exclaim “Talk not to me, for I’ll speak a word ; Do as thou wilt for I have done with thee.” Here Lady Capulet is rejecting Juliet and when she says “Do as thou wilt, for I have done with thee.” She is saying Look, do what you want because I have had enough of you! Juliet becomes desperate after her Mother leaves and turns to the nurse for advice. The nurse is then very disloyal to Romeo saying “I think it best you married the County. O he’s a lovely gentleman! Romeo’s a dishclout to him.” Here the nurse is being disloyal because earlier in the play the nurse had said Romeo was a wonderful man and now she is calling him a “dishclout.” This is seen by the 16th century audience as practical but unacceptable advice. What the nurse has said will make the audience feel as though everyone has deserted Juliet, they will start to imagine how Juliet feels.
Death again is mentioned, and the audience will start to link Romeo, Juliet, marriage and death together, especially when Juliet says “If all else fail, myself have power to die.” Juliet means she has the power to kill herself! Just before she says this, the nurse leaves after Juliet was sarcastic to the nurse saying “Amen!” to the nurses suggestion of marrying County Paris. This is a dramatic device, because Juliet is all on her own, and the audience will start to remember what Lord Capulet called Juliet before he found out she would not marry Paris. “Thou counterfeits a bark, a sea, a wind:” The bark symbolizes a boat or vessel, and when Capulet says this he means how small a boat is compared to the sea, or how small Juliet is compared to the world. This is emphasizes at the very end of the scene when everyone has left the stage, she is by herself, and everyone has left her. The tension and mood in this scene does give hints as to what is to come later on in the play, but so does the prologue. At the end of the scene the mood is very low, and sad, as Juliet is distraught. However the tension is left high with the thought of Juliet saying “If all else fail, myself have power to die.”
Overall Shakespeare builds the mood and tension very effectively in act three scene five of Romeo and Juliet. He does this so well he keeps the audience on the edge of their seats. To build up the mood and tension and keep it at an all time high, he uses the consummation of Romeo and Juliet’s marriage, the arranged marriage of Juliet and County Paris, the way Juliet disobeys her parents for the first time in play, the way the nurse talks out of place, and the fact that Lord Capulet’s “fingers itch” from the anger. This keeps the audience excited and thinking of what is yet to come in the play.
