“A pair of star-crossed lovers”, shows that if the stars were in a different alignment thing may have happened differently.
Another way Shakespeare’s plays are still popular today is because or the amount of deaths he has in his plays. These also help to keep the audience interested. He does use death to lead to good in the end, when the two families stop their quarrelling. Dramatic irony is used when Romeo fights Tybalt before Mercutio’s death, because Romeo doesn’t want to fight Tybalt because they are family, it says
“which name I tender
As dearly as mine own”. This is said because he has married to Juliet and only he and the audience know this. Tybalt and Mercutio don’t know about the wedding. Many of the deaths are ‘foreshadowed’ they are seen in a dream or vision before the person dies, sometimes well before they die like when Romeo and Juliet first meet in private. Juliet foresees his death he descends from the balcony.
In this play the importance of your name is considered. This can denote class and the feud going on is because the names Montague and Capulet hate each other; this is why when Romeo and his friends go to Capulet’s party they wear masks because these two families are sworn enemies. Both of the families are upper class. We know this because they don’t just have servants their servants have servants. The importance of the name makes the whole play work. It is because of this Romeo and Juliet has to get married in secret and why friar Laurence makes a plan to get them back together. Juliet has to tell her parents she is going to the church for them to let her out, while Romeo is aloud out on the streets of Verona alone. This shows that men were freer than women. Juliet goes against her parents and wants to be free and choose whom she marries, in the end this happens but only death can bring them together. Another reason they get married in secret is because in the late 15th and early 16th century’s most upper classes had arranged marriages, their parents chose who they married and Romeo and Juliet’s parents would never have agreed to there marriage because of the long standing feud between the families.
The nurse help’s a great deal with planning the wedding. She is like a mother to Juliet. She brought her up even breast-feeding her, she was a mother but her died so she breast feed Juliet. This has made Juliet and the nurse unbelievably close together.
One of the best ways Shakespeare has kept his plays popular for over four hundred years is the different ways he shows love in his plays. There is infatuation where Romeo can not stop thinking of Rosaline at the start of the play, also there is sexual love between Romeo and Juliet this shows just how close they really are and how much they do love each other.
There is more than just love because of gender there is Romeo’s love for Mercutio as friends. When Mercutio is murdered Romeo cries then goes as far as taking Tybalts life as revenge for the death of his friend.
There is parental love in this play; we know Juliet and her parents and Romeo and his parent’s love for their next of kin because the parents of the two lovers are distraught at the end because of the loss of the children. Two lesser loves used in the play are Price Escalus’ love for his people and wants the fighting to stop, and friar Laurence’s love for the church and God.
Shakespeare’s use of language is unique, he uses things like rhyming couplets or puns on words to liven up the plays, besides the love and fight scenes. Shakespeare’s plays are mostly written in iambic pentameter, because he believed the best way to make it sound like ‘real speech’ was to have ten syllables a line. Every other syllable is the one with the most emphasis (on 2nd, 4th, 6th, 8th and 10th syllable of each line). Iambic pentameter makes it sound like a poem but it is in fact a play. Some ‘common’ people such, as the nurse does not talk in iambic pentameter, she talks in prose,
“I will tell her, sir that you do protest. Which, as I take it, is a gentleman like offer.” Another way Shakespeare uses language is puns. He plays on words like “maid” and “head” in the very first scene to make maidenhead and to cut off the Capulet’s maid’s heads or to take their maidenheads.
Also he uses soliloquies. He used these to inform the audience what the actor (or player as they used to be called) is thinking or feeling. He also used rhyming couplets, these work well at the end of scenes to finish them or with a rhyme to close the scene.
One of the best scenes in the play that is worthy of closer study is Act 1 Scene 5; in this scene there is some of Shakespeare finest use of language. An excellent piece of language is where Romeo first sees Juliet and describes her beauty,
“As a rich jewel in an Ethiop’s ear”. This is a simile saying her beauty stands out as a jewel would stand out against the dark skin of an Ethiopian. He also says she stands out like a “snowy dove” in a flock of crows. This means all the crows are black so the dove being white stands out in the same way Juliet’s beauty stands out. Romeo is obviously in love with Juliet as he goes on to say to himself,
“Did my heart love till now?” This also shows he has forgotten about Rosaline. A little later in the scene he goes to talk to Juliet and they have a long discussion about their hands touching. At this point there is lots of religious imagery about the pilgrims touching statues of saints and this is like a kiss to them, so touching hands should be like a kiss between Romeo and Juliet, also saint and pilgrims are used to show religion because in the days when the play was written religion was very strong and important to almost everyone, and there as the connection that the love of the church is pure and Romeo and Juliet’s love is also pure. After they have touched hands and talked about pilgrims palm-to-palm is like a kiss Romeo says
“To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss”, this is saying his unworthy hand was rough but he will smooth the roughness with a tender kiss. This is one of Shakespeare’s greatest scenes in the play from my point of view and is one of the main reasons that make me appreciate Shakespeare’s genius with language.
Shakespeare must still be popular today because the books of his plays are still selling. There have been two films made of “Romeo and Juliet”, one by Franco Zeffirelli in 1968 set in Italy and a more modern film by Baz Luhrman in 1997. Baz Luhrmann’s film is set in America, although the language is the same, the scenes are different. In parts it doesn’t make sense where they tell someone to draw their sword and they reach for a gun. Also the modern film is a lot faster. They talk faster and the film flows faster. The old film by Franco Zeffirelli is slower and easier to follow. Also the language fits with their costumes and the scene around them. The film changes some senses like the scene where Romeo and Juliet die/ in the book Romeo is dead and later Juliet awakes beside his limp body. In the Baz Luhrmann’s film just as Romeo drinks the poison Juliet wakes and for a short moment they see each other ‘alive’. This is how Baz Luhrmann has kept the audience interested late in the film. I believe the main reason Shakespeare remains popular is because of the way he plays with people’s emotions and the great story lines he wrote.
