Act 1 Scene 1 begins with two servants of the Capulet household talking about how they would like to beat up the Montague men and rape the Montague women and take their virginity. Toward the end of the scene there is a dramatic and exciting fight scene, which shows to the audience that the love which Romeo and Juliet have is in a world where violence rules and most problems are resolved by fights. This is very much about the hate and honor of both the Montague’s and the Capulet’s.
The section of the play at the beginning of the scene shows the servants use sexual innuendo to lure in the Montague maids so that they can have sex. The Elizabethan audience is usually extremely rowdy therefore Shakespeare gets the audience extremely excited and this creates a sense of comedy. This also makes the audience more involved as they listen more to what is going on after that point.
After the beginning of the scene there is a large fight which breaks out between the Montague’s and the Capulet’s, this fight is triggered after one of the Capulet servants decides to provoke one of the Montague servants as he walks past. The Capulet servant bites his thumb at the Montague servants. This is highly offensive in Elizabethan times; it is the equivalent to sticking your middle finger up in modern times. This angers the Montague servant and a fight quickly occurs. Benvolio, a kinsman to Montague enters and draws his sword to stop the violence and Tybalt, a kinsman to the Capulet’s sees Benvolio’s sword drawn and therefore draws his own. Benvolio tries to explain to Tybalt that he only drew his sword for peace but Tybalt says “What, drawn and talk of peace? I hate the word, as I hate hell, all Montague’s, and thee. Have at thee coward!” this suggests that Tybalt hates peace as much as he hates hell and the Montague’s. It also suggests that Tybalt is not a peaceful character and will resort to violence over the smallest of disagreements.
Due to the full attention from the audience Shakespeare decides to create strong opposition between the two families at the immediate start. This will help the audience understand the tension between the two families early on, which also creates a sense of opposition. Putting both ideas of sexual love and comedy at the beginning contrasted with hatred and violence at the end creates juxtaposition to create more opposition. The structure of Act 1 scene 1 is a basic version of the whole play to come, as this scene also begins as a comedy and ends as a tragedy.
There are lots of oppositions in Romeo’s language right at the end of Act 1 Scene 1, for example, “loving hate”, “sick health”, “heavy lightness”, “still-waking sleep”, “cold fire” and “bright smoke”. The reason for this is that Shakespeare uses this contradicting language (oxymorons) is because he is expressing his first encounters of love within the character of Romeo. This is due to the unlikeliness of the character of Romeo that the way in which Shakespeare would write about Romeo in this sort of way is as if he were trying toe express his first encounters of love through Romeo, his first feelings.
Another scene in the play that creates opposition as a dramatic device is Act 1 Scene 5. The act starts with a jolly mood with four servants of the Capulet household are getting ready and then soon after Capulet himself says a jolly speech to start the grand party. Romeo then sees Juliet and asks a serving man what her name is but he does not know her name. Romeo then expresses his love and says “I never saw true beauty till this night” this shows that Romeo is extremely in love. Tybalt, however, overhears Romeo and asks for his sword to be brought to him, this shows hatred and anger in contrast to Romeo’s love for Juliet. Shakespeare places these two events next to each other because he is trying to show that these two things may contradict each other but in ‘Romeo and Juliet’ these two things are so close together and alike, Romeo’s love for Juliet is surrounded by hatred and anger. This once again shows the opposition and juxtaposition between the feelings.
Romeo then expresses his feelings for Juliet by going up to her and speaking to her, but, he speaks to her very religiously, “this holy shrine”, “holy palmers’ kiss” and saints do not move” this all shows another opposition as they are committing a sin by doing this but all whilst they continue to talk religiously. By talking religiously to Juliet Romeo tries to indicate that Juliet is like a saint and he is like a pilgrim, thus using a strong simile. Shakespeare uses this religious language to suggest that their relationship should be religious, but in fact it is everything but religious.
After this encounter there is yet further opposition as Romeo finds out that Juliet is a Montague and says “my life is my foe’s debt” and when Juliet finds out she says “my grave is like to be my wedding bed” this shows contrast between the religious love and then the complete shock and disbelief. But also it is extremely ironic that Shakespeare chooses to say “my grave is like to be my wedding bed” as this actually occurs at the end of the play when both Romeo and Juliet die. The audience are therefore prepared for what is to come, therefore if the audience already know what will happen there would be no point in watching it but they cannot leave as they would have become so dramatically attached to Shakespeare’s techniques in keeping the audience entertained. Shakespeare has them find out the truth so early on so it will give a greater affect as, even though Romeo and Juliet’s families are bitter rivals they still love each other without a care in the world about their families, this suggests that their love is immature.
The final Scene where Shakespeare uses opposition as a dramatic device is Act 3 Scene 1. In this Act Shakespeare uses juxtaposition and oxymoron’s to create opposition. In most Shakespeare play there is usually an odd scene known as the pivotal scene in which Shakespeare changes the tension and emotions between the characters. Act 3 Scene 1 is this scene. This particular point usually decides whether the play will end as a comedy or a tragedy. So due to the scenes aggressive tone, the audience learns that the play will end tragically.
Romeo and Juliet’s love seems more precious and delicate due to Shakespeare creating the play’s environment a dramatic device. This is once again where Shakespeare uses opposition and juxtaposition, but on a larger scale, throughout the whole play.
The scene begins with Benvolio and Mercutio wandering around the streets of Verona, but Benvolio feels unsafe and tries to tell Mercutio to go inside but Mercutio refuses. Tybalt soon arrives with his group and soon after Romeo too. The arrival of Tybalt is extremely ironic as just moments before his arrival Benvolio was expressing the dangers of walking out in the open, the dangers of being attacked by Capulet servants, which occurs almost immediately afterwards. Tybalt asks to speak to one of them, but Mercutio was annoyed so being a comical character he begins to taunt him. Tybalt is quickly angered and asks Romeo to draw his sword but Romeo refuses and says that he would rather love Tybalt “I never injured thee, but love thee better than thou canst devise” this once again shows opposition and antithesis by putting the idea that Romeo tries to love Tybalt but Tybalt acts violent towards him, so love and hate are the oppositions here. Mercutio is slain by Tybalt due to Mercutio’s strong temper but as he dies, which the others are unaware of his wound they think he is joking “Ask for me tomorrow” and “you shall find me a grave man” this contrast with the angry character that just fought Tybalt and the comic character that, even as he dies, lives to make his friends laugh. Also as he dies he is making jokes, but once he dies there are no more jokes because when he dies, his jokes go with him therefore initiating that the comedy of the play has ended and the tragedy had started. But after his death anger is once again built up by Romeo who goes to slay Tybalt, this put in contrast with the Romeo that tried to love Tybalt shows opposition and juxtaposition as these two contradicting ideas are placed next to each other.
Romeo slays Tybalt but feels bad as he has just killed his new wife’s cousin “O, I am a fortune’s fool” as he also gets banished for doing so. In Elizabethan times it was believed that a man who was completely and utterly in love, as Romeo was, has lost his manliness. But Romeo proves that he may be in love but that doesn’t stop him fighting for pride and honour. Shakespeare contradicts the beliefs of the Elizabethan society by making a character so unrealistic that loves and fights at the same time, which also shows that Romeo is immature and naive.
In conclusion, Shakespeare uses opposition as a dramatic device by contradicting his ideas to create opposition, for example, saying that Romeo loved Tybalt but within half an hour he wants to fight Tybalt, this creates strong opposition and juxtaposition. He also uses opposition by showing progression in Romeo’s love for Juliet. The effects of these oppositions are that the audience get more into the play as there is more opposition therefore more anger, violence and in some cases there is more emotion expressed. The emotion which is often sexual emotion really helps Shakespeare to get the readers attention as in Elizabethan periods the audience is really rowdy and sexually motivated.
