Further more in act 1 scene 5 (the Capulet’s party) Romeo stands to the side and removes his mask during the dancing to have a better look at Juliet as soon as he does this he immediately falls in love with her and forgets completely about Rosaline. Tybalt recognises Romeo and immediately sets his gaze on him like a predator after his prey but before Tybalt can create a scene old Capulet tells him to leave Romeo alone as he does not want the party turned into a battlefield. In the party there is mainly love, hate tries rise but is pruned in the bud.
Whilst at the party Romeo finds Juliet and touches her hand a symbol for friendship. They speak in sonnet form to one another, and Romeo eventually persuades Juliet to kiss him, this is interrupted when Juliet is forced to go see her biological mother meanwhile the nurse warns Romeo that Juliet is a Capulet, at which he is startled. Juliet finds the Nurse at the end of the party and begs her to find out who Romeo is. The informs her that he is Romeo the only son of the Montague family, this shows his importance as in those days boys had more privileged than girls as they were the heir and also could perform manual jobs more efficiently like farming. Juliet is heart broken because she loves a loathed enemy.
In addition, later on in the scene we see that Romeo compares Juliet to “a rich jewel in an Ethiop’s ear” when he first sees her, This is significant in the overall importance of the play as love scenes take place in the dark, away from the disorder of the day. Romeo loves Juliet at night, but kills Tybalt during the day. It especially shows up in the first act in the way Romeo shuts out the daylight while he is thinking of Rosaline. Here the dark represents hate and light symbolises love.
In addition, the lover’s share a sonnet which uses imagery of saints and pilgrims. The use of poetry and descriptive language creates the sense of love in the play. This relates to the fact that Romeo means pilgrim in Italian however it is also a disrespectful sonnet, for Juliet becomes a saint to be kissed and Romeo a holy traveller. The foreshadowing comes from Juliet towards the end of the first act, Juliet states, “If he be married my grave is like to be my wedding bed”. One of the remarkable aspects of the play is the transformation of both Romeo and Juliet after they fall in love, Juliet first comes across as a young, innocent girl who is obedient and loyal towards her parents and family. However, by the last scene she is devious this is proven I the manner by which she asks her Nurse about three separate men at the party, saving Romeo for last so as not to arouse suspicion. This also shows us how love can change people including their personalities.
Juliet is on a tight rope, on one side is her love and loyalty for her family and on the other her passionate love for Romeo. The side she falls on is dependant on which is stronger. Shakespeare tries to show the audience that love is mixed with hate because of her love for her family she is forced to hate their enemy, on the other hand she is in love with the enemy therefore the two can never go together.
Furthermore the play emphasizes character’s eyes and the act of looking accords with Romeo’s role as a blind lover who doesn’t believe that there could be another lady fairer than Rosaline. Romeo denies that he could be deluded by love, the “religion” of his eye, Romeo also rejects Benvolio’s advice to find another love to replace Rosaline as she dose not want anything to do with him, this further highlights Romeo’s immaturity as a lover and as a logical thinker.
In act 3 scene 1 (the fight) the play opens with Benvolio and Mercutio anticipating the arrival of Romeo on a street in Verona, the mentioning of the street is vital as it indicates to the audience the characters are in a public place. Tybalt is expressly looking to find Romeo whom he wants to punish for sneaking into the masked party the previous day also his hatred for Romeo had increased as he got scolded by Lord Capulet, head of the household over something which deemed right. Romeo arrives and tries to be submissive to Tybalt trying to convince him he harbours no hatred towards the Capulet house as he married Tybalt’s cousin Juliet, that morning. Tybalt is unsure how to react towards Romeo whether to forgive him or to punish him, but since Mercutio was provoking him to a duel, in anger Tybalt stabbed Mercutio whilst Romeo intervened and stood before them.
Benvolio then exits the stage with battle scared Mercutio, who soon returns to tell Romeo that Mercutio has died. Romeo vows revenge on Tybalt for his friends death forgetting all about Juliet and the law soon returning to fight Tybalt and kills him. Benvolio tells Romeo to run away before the prince arrives. The prince followed by the Montague and Capulet families, shows up at the scene. Benvolio tells the prince the entire story, but the prince refuses to accept that Romeo was guiltless. He banishes Romeo from Verona, threatening to kill him should he return.
More over Mercutio leads the action in this most dramatic of the five acts this maybe due to his realization how hate is so consuming like a disease, just before he dies whilst wounded he cries out “A plague o’ both your houses”, saying it three times (three being a magical number which appears a number of times in Shakespeare’s play) Indeed it is this curse which brings about the demise of both Romeo and Juliet. In my opinion this scene is mostly hate as we see Romeo’s best friend Mercutio turn against him.
Act 1 scene 5 has more love than hate whereas Act 3 scene 1 has more hate than love this is one of the major differences between the two scenes. The audience observes Romeo and Juliet in act 1 scene 5 beginning to fall in love with each other, the hate in Tybalt tries to erupt but is efficiently suppressed by the head of his household. In Act 3 scene 1 see a glimmer of love when Romeo does not want to fight Tybalt and tries to hint their new relation by saying “I do protest I never injured thee, but love thee better than thou canst devise, till thou shalt know the reason of my love; and so good Capulet, which name I tender as dearly as my own, be satisfied”. The hate eventually breaks loose when Mercutio is stabbed by Tybalt and places a curse on both the families. Similarities between these scenes also include how Friar Lawrence and Juliet’s Nurse play a parental role, one to Romeo and the other to Juliet.
In my opinion the love between Romeo and Juliet is a violent, overpowering force that supersedes all other values, loyalties, and emotions. In the course of the play, the young lovers are driven to defy their entire social world, families friends and ruler Love is the overriding theme of the play, not in the form of a prettied-up, pure version of the emotion, like the kind of un-sieved flour. Love in Romeo and Juliet is a brutal, powerful emotion that captures individuals and catapults them against their world, and, at times, against themselves.
Love, in Romeo and Juliet, is a grand passion, and as such it is blinding; it can overwhelm a person as powerfully and completely as hate can. The passionate love between Romeo and Juliet is linked from the moment of its mention with death, notices that Romeo has crashed the feast and determines to kill him just as Romeo catches sight of Juliet and falls instantly in love with her. From that point on, love seems to push the lover’s closer to love and violence, not further from it. Romeo and Juliet are plagued with thoughts of suicide, and a willingness to experience it.
This theme continues until its inevitable conclusion: double suicide. This tragic choice is the highest, most potent expression of love that Romeo and Juliet can make. It is only through death that they can preserve their love, and their love is so profound that they are willing to end their lives in its defence. In the play, love emerges as unprincipled, leading as much to destruction as to happiness. But in its extreme passion, the love that Romeo and Juliet experience also appears so exquisitely beautiful that few would want, or be able, to resist its power.