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Analysis of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet
By NASRULLAH MAMBROL on July 25, 2020 • ( 6 )
Shakespeare, more than any other author, has instructed the West in the catastrophes of sexuality, and has invented the formula that the sexual becomes the erotic when crossed by the shadow of death. There had to be one high song of the erotic by Shakespeare, one lyrical and tragi-comical paean celebrating an unmixed love and lamenting its inevitable destruction. Romeo and Juliet is unmatched, in Shakespeare and in the world’s literature, as a vision of an uncompromising mutual love that perishes of its own idealism and intensity.
—Harold Bloom, Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human
Romeo and Juliet, regarded by many as William Shakespeare’s first great play, is generally thought to have been written around 1595. Shakespeare was then 31 years old, married for 12 years and the father of three children. He had been acting and writing in London for five years. His stage credits included mainly histories—the three parts of Henry VI and Richard III —and comedies— The Two Gentlemen of Verona, The Taming of the Shrew, The Comedy of Errors, and Love’s Labour’s Lost. Shakespeare’s first tragedy, modeled on Seneca, Titus Andronicus , was written around 1592. From that year through 1595 Shakespeare had also composed 154 sonnets and two long narrative poems in the erotic tradition— Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece. Both his dramatic and nondramatic writing show Shakespeare mastering Elizabethan literary conventions. Then, around 1595, Shakespeare composed three extraordinary plays—R ichard II, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and Romeo and Juliet —in three different genres—history, comedy, and tragedy—signalling a new mastery, originality, and excellence. With these three plays Shakespeare emerged from the shadows of his influences and initiated a period of unexcelled accomplishment. The two parts of Henry IV and Julius Caesar would follow, along with the romantic comedies The Merchant of Venice, As You Like It, and Twelfth Night and the great tragedies Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth, and Antony and Cleopatra . The three plays of 1595, therefore, serve as an important bridge between Shakespeare’s apprenticeship and his mature achievements. Romeo and Juliet, in particular, is a crucial play in the evolution of Shakespeare’s tragic vision, in his integration of poetry and drama, and in his initial exploration of the connection between love and tragedy that he would continue in Troilus and Cressida, Othello, and Antony and Cleopatra. Romeo and Juliet is not only one of the greatest love stories in all literature, considering its stage history and the musicals, opera, music, ballet, literary works, and films that it has inspired; it is quite possibly the most popular play of all time. There is simply no more famous pair of lovers than Romeo and Juliet, and their story has become an inescapable central myth in our understanding of romantic love.
Despite the play’s persistence, cultural saturation, and popular appeal, Romeo and Juliet has fared less well with scholars and critics, who have generally judged it inferior to the great tragedies that followed. Instead of the later tragedies of character Romeo and Juliet has been downgraded as a tragedy of chance, and, in the words of critic James Calderwood, the star-crossed lovers are “insufficiently endowed with complexity” to become tragic heroes. Instead “they become a study of victimage and sacrifice, not tragedy.” What is too often missing in a consideration of the shortcomings of Romeo and Juliet by contrast with the later tragedies is the radical departure the play represented when compared to what preceded it. Having relied on Senecan horror for his first tragedy, Titus Andronicus, Shakespeare located his next in the world of comedy and romance. Romeo and Juliet is set not in antiquity, as Elizabethan convention dictated for a tragic subject, but in 16th-century Verona, Italy. His tragic protagonists are neither royal nor noble, as Aristotle advised, but two teenagers caught up in the petty disputes of their families. The plight of young lovers pitted against parental or societal opposition was the expected subject, since Roman times, of comedy, not tragedy. By showing not the eventual triumph but the death of the two young lovers Shakespeare violated comic conventions, while making a case that love and its consequences could be treated with an unprecedented tragic seriousness. As critic Harry Levin has observed, Shakespeare’s contemporaries “would have been surprised, and possibly shocked at seeing lovers taken so seriously. Legend, it had been hereto-fore taken for granted, was the proper matter for serious drama; romance was the stuff of the comic stage.”
Shakespeare’s innovations are further evident in comparison to his source material. The plot was a well-known story in Italian, French, and English versions. Shakespeare’s direct source was Arthur Brooke’s poem The Tragicall Historye of Romeus and Juliet (1562). This moralistic work was intended as a warning to youth against “dishonest desire” and disobeying parental authority. Shakespeare, by contrast, purifies and ennobles the lovers’ passion, intensifies the pathos, and underscores the injustice of the lovers’ destruction. Compressing the action from Brooke’s many months into a five-day crescendo, Shakespeare also expands the roles of secondary characters such as Mercutio and Juliet’s nurse into vivid portraits that contrast the lovers’ elevated lyricism with a bawdy earthiness and worldly cynicism. Shakespeare transforms Brooke’s plodding verse into a tour de force verbal display that is supremely witty, if at times over elaborate, and, at its best, movingly expressive. If the poet and the dramatist are not yet seamlessly joined in Romeo and Juliet, the play still displays a considerable advance in Shakespeare’s orchestration of verse, image, and incident that would become the hallmark of his greatest achievements.
The play’s theme and outcome are announced in the Prologue:
Two households, both alike in dignity, In fair Verona, where we lay our scene, From ancient grudge break to new mutiny, Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean. From forth the fatal loins of these two foes A pair of star-cross’d lovers take their life; Whose misadventur’d piteous overthrows Doth with their death bury their parents’ strife.
Suspense over the lovers’ fate is eliminated at the outset as Shakespeare emphasizes the forces that will destroy them. The initial scene makes this clear as a public brawl between servants of the feuding Montagues and Capulets escalates to involve kinsmen and the patriarchs on both sides, ended only when the Prince of Verona enforces a cease-fire under penalty of death for future offenders of the peace. Romeo, Montague’s young son, does not participate in the scuffle since he is totally absorbed by a hopeless passion for a young, unresponsive beauty named Rosaline. Initially Romeo appears as a figure of mockery, the embodiment of the hypersensitive, melancholy adolescent lover, who is urged by his kinsman Benvolio to resist sinking “under love’s heavy burden” and seek another more worthy of his affection. Another kinsman, Mercutio, for whom love is more a game of easy conquest, urges Romeo to “be rough with love” and master his circumstances. When by chance it is learned that Rosaline is to attend a party at the Capulets, Benvolio suggests that they should go as well for Romeo to compare Rosaline’s charms with the other beauties at the party and thereby cure his infatuation. There Romeo sees Juliet, Capulet’s not-yet 14-year-old daughter. Her parents are encouraging her to accept a match with Count Paris for the social benefit of the family. Love as affectation and love as advantage are transformed into love as all-consuming, mutual passion at first sight. Romeo claims that he “ne’er saw true beauty till this night,” and by the force of that beauty, he casts off his former melancholic self-absorption. Juliet is no less smitten. Sending her nurse to learn the stranger’s identity, she worries, “If he be married, / My grave is like to be my wedding bed.” Both are shocked to learn that they are on either side of the family feud, and their risk is underscored when the Capulet kinsman, Tybalt, recognizes Romeo and, though prevented by Capulet from violence at the party, swears future vengeance. Tybalt’s threat underscores that this is a play as much about hate as about love, in which Romeo and Juliet’s passion is increasingly challenged by the public and family forces that deny love’s authority.
The first of the couple’s two great private moments in which love’s redemptive and transformative power works its magic follows in possibly the most famous single scene in all of drama, set in the Capulets’ orchard, over-looked by Juliet’s bedroom window. In some of the most impassioned, lyrical, and famous verses Shakespeare ever wrote, the lovers’ dialogue perfectly captures the ecstasy of love and love’s capacity to remake the world. Seeing Juliet above at her window, Romeo says:
But soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the East, and Juliet is the sun! Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, Who is already sick and pale with grief That thou her maid art far more fair than she.
He overhears Juliet’s declaration of her love for him and the rejection of what is implied if a Capulet should love a Montague:
O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo? Deny thy father and refuse thy name! Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love, And I’ll no longer be a Capulet. . . . ’Tis but thy name that is my enemy. Thou art thyself, though not a Montague. What’s Montague? it is nor hand, nor foot, Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part Belonging to a man. O, be some other name! What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet .So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call’d, Retain that dear perfection which he owes Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name; And for that name, which is no part of thee, Take all myself.
In a beautifully modulated scene the lovers freely admit their passion and exchange vows of love that become a marriage proposal. As Juliet continues to be called back to her room and all that is implied as Capulet’s daughter, time and space become the barriers to love’s transcendent power to unite.
With the assistance of Friar Lawrence, who regards the union of a Montague and a Capulet as an opportunity “To turn your households’ rancour to pure love,” Romeo and Juliet are secretly married. Before nightfall and the anticipated consummation of their union Romeo is set upon by Tybalt, who is by Romeo’s marriage, his new kinsman. Romeo accordingly refuses his challenge, but it is answered by Mercutio. Romeo tries to separate the two, but in the process Mercutio is mortally wounded. This is the tragic turn of the play as Romeo, enraged, rejects the principle of love forged with Juliet for the claims of reputation, the demand for vengeance, and an identifi cation of masculinity with violent retribution:
My very friend, hath got this mortal hurt In my behalf; my reputation stain’d With Tybalt’s slander—Tybalt, that an hour Hath been my kinsman. O sweet Juliet, Thy beauty hath made me effeminate And in my temper soft’ned valour’s steel!
After killing Tybalt, Romeo declares, “O, I am fortune’s fool!” He may blame circumstances for his predicament, but he is clearly culpable in capitulating to the values of society he had challenged in his love for Juliet.
The lovers are given one final moment of privacy before the catastrophe. Juliet, awaiting Romeo’s return, gives one of the play’s most moving speeches, balancing sublimity with an intimation of mortality that increasingly accompanies the lovers:
Come, gentle night; come, loving, black-brow’d night; Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die, Take him and cut him out in little stars, And he will make the face of heaven so fine That all the world will be in love with night And pay no worship to the garish sun.
Learning the terrible news of Tybalt’s death and Romeo’s banishment, Juliet wins her own battle between hate and love and sends word to Romeo to keep their appointed night together before they are parted.
As Romeo is away in Mantua Juliet’s parents push ahead with her wedding to Paris. The solution to Juliet’s predicament is offered by Friar Lawrence who gives her a drug that will make it appear she has died. The Friar is to summon Romeo, who will rescue her when she awakes in the Capulet family tomb. The Friar’s message to Romeo fails to reach him, and Romeo learns of Juliet’s death. Reversing his earlier claim of being “fortune’s fool,” Romeo reacts by declaring, “Then I defy you, stars,” rushing to his wife and breaking society’s rules by acquiring the poison to join her in death. Reaching the tomb Romeo is surprised to find Paris on hand, weeping for his lost bride. Outraged by the intrusion on his grief Paris confronts Romeo. They fight, and after killing Paris, Romeo fi nally recognizes him and mourns him as “Mercutio’s kinsman.” Inside the tomb Romeo sees Tybalt’s corpse and asks forgiveness before taking leave of Juliet with a kiss:
. . . O, here Will I set up my everlasting rest And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars From this world-wearied flesh.
Juliet awakes to see Romeo dead beside her. Realizing what has happened, she responds by taking his dagger and plunges it into her breast: “This is thy sheath; there rest, and let me die.”
Montagues, Capulets, and the Prince arrive, and the Friar explains what has happened and why. His account of Romeo and Juliet’s tender passion and devotion shames the two families into ending their feud. The Prince provides the final eulogy:
A glooming 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; Some shall be pardon’d, and some punished; For never was a story of more woe Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.
The sense of loss Verona and the audience feels at the lovers’ deaths is a direct result of Shakespeare’s remarkable ability to conjure love in all its transcendent power, along with its lethal risks. Set on a collision course with the values bent on denying love’s sway, Romeo and Juliet manage to create a dreamlike, alternative, private world that is so touching because it is so brief and perishable. Shakespeare’s triumph here is to make us care that adolescent romance matters—emotionally, psychologically, and socially—and that the premature and unjust death of lovers rival in profundity and significance the fall of kings.
Romeo and Juliet Oxford Lecture by Emma Smith
Analysis of William Shakespeare’s Plays
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A Summary and Analysis of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
Although it was first performed in the 1590s, the first documented performance of Romeo and Juliet is from 1662. The diarist Samuel Pepys was in the audience, and recorded that he ‘saw “Romeo and Juliet,” the first time it was ever acted; but it is a play of itself the worst that ever I heard in my life, and the worst acted that ever I saw these people do.’
Despite Pepys’ dislike, the play is one of Shakespeare’s best-loved and most famous, and the story of Romeo and Juliet is well known. However, the play has become so embedded in the popular psyche that Shakespeare’s considerably more complex play has been reduced to a few key aspects: ‘star-cross’d lovers’, a teenage love story, and the suicide of the two protagonists.
In the summary and analysis that follow, we realise that Romeo and Juliet is much more than a tragic love story.
Romeo and Juliet : brief summary
After the Prologue has set the scene – we have two feuding households, Montagues and Capulets, in the city-state of Verona; and young Romeo is a Montague while Juliet, with whom Romeo is destined to fall in love, is from the Capulet family, sworn enemies of the Montagues – the play proper begins with servants of the two feuding households taunting each other in the street.
When Benvolio, a member of house Montague, arrives and clashes with Tybalt of house Capulet, a scuffle breaks out, and it is only when Capulet himself and his wife, Lady Capulet, appear that the fighting stops. Old Montague and his wife then show up, and the Prince of Verona, Escalus, arrives and chastises the people for fighting. Everyone leaves except Old Montague, his wife, and Benvolio, Montague’s nephew. Benvolio tells them that Romeo has locked himself away, but he doesn’t know why.
Romeo appears and Benvolio asks his cousin what is wrong, and Romeo starts speaking in paradoxes, a sure sign that he’s in love. He claims he loves Rosaline, but will not return any man’s love. A servant appears with a note, and Romeo and Benvolio learn that the Capulets are holding a masked ball.
Benvolio tells Romeo he should attend, even though he is a Montague, as he will find more beautiful women than Rosaline to fall in love with. Meanwhile, Lady Capulet asks her daughter Juliet whether she has given any thought to marriage, and tells Juliet that a man named Paris would make an excellent husband for her.
Romeo attends the Capulets’ masked ball, with his friend Mercutio. Mercutio tells Romeo about a fairy named Queen Mab who enters young men’s minds as they dream, and makes them dream of love and romance. At the masked ball, Romeo spies Juliet and instantly falls in love with her; she also falls for him.
They kiss, but then Tybalt, Juliet’s kinsman, spots Romeo and recognising him as a Montague, plans to confront him. Old Capulet tells him not to do so, and Tybalt reluctantly agrees. When Juliet enquires after who Romeo is, she is distraught to learn that he is a Montague and thus a member of the family that is her family’s sworn enemies.
Romeo breaks into the gardens of Juliet’s parents’ house and speaks to her at her bedroom window. The two of them pledge their love for each other, and arrange to be secretly married the following night. Romeo goes to see a churchman, Friar Laurence, who agrees to marry Romeo and Juliet.
After the wedding, the feud between the two families becomes violent again: Tybalt kills Mercutio in a fight, and Romeo kills Tybalt in retaliation. The Prince banishes Romeo from Verona for his crime.
Juliet is told by her father that she will marry Paris, so Juliet goes to seek Friar Laurence’s help in getting out of it. He tells her to take a sleeping potion which will make her appear to be dead for two nights; she will be laid to rest in the family vault, and Romeo (who will be informed of the plan) can secretly come to her there.
However, although that part of the plan goes fine, the message to Romeo doesn’t arrive; instead, he hears that Juliet has actually died. He secretly visits her at the family vault, but his grieving is interrupted by the arrival of Paris, who is there to lay flowers. The two of them fight, and Romeo kills him.
Convinced that Juliet is really dead, Romeo drinks poison in order to join Juliet in death. Juliet wakes from her slumber induced by the sleeping draught to find Romeo dead at her side. She stabs herself.
The play ends with Friar Laurence telling the story to the two feuding families. The Prince tells them to put their rivalry behind them and live in peace.
Romeo and Juliet : analysis
How should we analyse Romeo and Juliet , one of Shakespeare’s most famous and frequently studied, performed, and adapted plays? Is Romeo and Juliet the great love story that it’s often interpreted as, and what does it say about the play – if it is a celebration of young love – that it ends with the deaths of both romantic leads?
It’s worth bearing in mind that Romeo and Juliet do not kill themselves specifically because they are forbidden to be together, but rather because a chain of events (of which their families’ ongoing feud with each other is but one) and a message that never arrives lead to a misunderstanding which results in their suicides.
Romeo and Juliet is often read as both a tragedy and a great celebration of romantic love, but it clearly throws out some difficult questions about the nature of love, questions which are rendered even more pressing when we consider the headlong nature of the play’s action and the fact that Romeo and Juliet meet, marry, and die all within the space of a few days.
Below, we offer some notes towards an analysis of this classic Shakespeare play and explore some of the play’s most salient themes.
It’s worth starting with a consideration of just what Shakespeare did with his source material. Interestingly, two families known as the Montagues and Capulets appear to have actually existed in medieval Italy: the first reference to ‘Montagues and Capulets’ is, curiously, in the poetry of Dante (1265-1321), not Shakespeare.
In Dante’s early fourteenth-century epic poem, the Divine Comedy , he makes reference to two warring Italian families: ‘Come and see, you who are negligent, / Montagues and Capulets, Monaldi and Filippeschi / One lot already grieving, the other in fear’ ( Purgatorio , canto VI). Precisely why the families are in a feud with one another is never revealed in Shakespeare’s play, so we are encouraged to take this at face value.
The play’s most famous line references the feud between the two families, which means Romeo and Juliet cannot be together. And the line, when we stop and consider it, is more than a little baffling. The line is spoken by Juliet: ‘Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?’ Of course, ‘wherefore’ doesn’t mean ‘where’ – it means ‘why’.
But that doesn’t exactly clear up the whys and the wherefores. The question still doesn’t appear to make any sense: Romeo’s problem isn’t his first name, but his family name, Montague. Surely, since she fancies him, Juliet is quite pleased with ‘Romeo’ as he is – it’s his family that are the problem. Solutions have been proposed to this conundrum , but none is completely satisfying.
There are a number of notable things Shakespeare did with his source material. The Italian story ‘Mariotto and Gianozza’, printed in 1476, contained many of the plot elements of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet . Shakespeare’s source for the play’s story was Arthur Brooke’s The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet (1562), an English verse translation of this Italian tale.
The moral of Brooke’s tale is that young love ends in disaster for their elders, and is best reined in; Shakespeare changed that. In Romeo and Juliet , the headlong passion and excitement of young love is celebrated, even though confusion leads to the deaths of the young lovers. But through their deaths, and the example their love set for their parents, the two families vow to be reconciled to each other.
Shakespeare also makes Juliet a thirteen-year-old girl in his play, which is odd for a number of reasons. We know that Romeo and Juliet is about young love – the ‘pair of star-cross’d lovers’, who belong to rival families in Verona – but what is odd about Shakespeare’s play is how young he makes Juliet.
In Brooke’s verse rendition of the story, Juliet is sixteen. But when Shakespeare dramatised the story, he made Juliet several years younger, with Romeo’s age unspecified. As Lady Capulet reveals, Juliet is ‘not [yet] fourteen’, and this point is made to us several times, as if Shakespeare wishes to draw attention to it and make sure we don’t forget it.
This makes sense in so far as Juliet represents young love, but what makes it unsettling – particularly for modern audiences – is the fact that this makes Juliet a girl of thirteen when she enjoys her night of wedded bliss with Romeo. As John Sutherland puts it in his (and Cedric Watts’) engaging Oxford World’s Classics: Henry V, War Criminal?: and Other Shakespeare Puzzles , ‘In a contemporary court of law [Romeo] would receive a longer sentence for what he does to Juliet than for what he does to Tybalt.’
There appears to be no satisfactory answer to this question, but one possible explanation lies in one of the play’s recurring themes: bawdiness and sexual familiarity. Perhaps surprisingly given the youthfulness of its tragic heroine, Romeo and Juliet is shot through with bawdy jokes, double entendres, and allusions to sex, made by a number of the characters.
These references to physical love serve to make Juliet’s innocence, and subsequent passionate romance with Romeo, even more noticeable: the journey both Romeo and Juliet undertake is one from innocence (Romeo pointlessly and naively pursuing Rosaline; Juliet unversed in the ways of love) to experience.
In the last analysis, Romeo and Juliet is a classic depiction of forbidden love, but it is also far more sexually aware, more ‘adult’, than many people realise.
4 thoughts on “A Summary and Analysis of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet”
Modern reading of the play’s opening dialogue among the brawlers fails to parse the ribaldry. Sex scares the bejeepers out of us. Why? Confer “R&J.”
It’s all that damn padre’s fault!
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Themes and Analysis
Romeo and juliet, by william shakespeare.
Despite being hundreds of years old, Romeo and Juliet still packs a punch and is able to include several key themes throughout the play...
About the Book
Article written by Lee-James Bovey
P.G.C.E degree.
Despite being hundreds of years old, Romeo and Juliet still packs a punch and is able to include several key themes throughout the play.
The Nature of Fate
Right from the beginning of the play, we are introduced to the idea of fate as Romeo and Juliet are described as star-crossed lovers . Throughout they are somehow able to divine their futures but neither of them seems to have the power to avoid them. When you consider everything that has to transpire to lead to their demise it really is a series of unfortunate events.
The Effects of Love
In Elizabethan, England love was associated with feminity . We see this reoccurring throughout the play as Romeo is unable to fight Tybalt because he believes his love for Juliet has made him effeminate.
Self Versus the State
The laws of the state suggest that fighting between the two houses are prohibited and yet we see those laws flouted by Mercutio and Tybalt in the name of their own honor and then Romeo in the name of revenge. We also see Juliet going against her father’s wishes to marry the man she loves. All of these decisions seem to have dire consequences.
Romeo and Juliet: Key Moments
There are several vital moments that make up the play. These are key because they move the plot towards its ending.
- Prince Escalus announces that any further civil unrest will lead to the death sentence. This sets up early in the play a situation that is probably going to come to the fore.
- Romeo and Juliet meet. Obviously, if this does not occur then they would not fall in love. However, this is destined to happen as we found out from the prologue. You also have to wonder if they didn’t meet would the ancient grudge ever have truly ended. Does the deaths of Romeo and Juliet serve a greater purpose?
- Romeo and Juliet declare their love for one another. The balcony scene is one of the most iconic in the play and has some of the play’s best-known lines including the iconic, “wherefore art thou Romeo?”.
- Romeo and Juliet marry – obviously, this is significant as marriage was far more sacred in Elizabethan England than it is in modern society.
- Tybalt kills Mercutio which leads to himself being killed by Romeo which results in Romeo being banished. This is the chain of events that leads Juliet to come up with her plan to fake her own death which tragically backfires.
- Capulet promises Juliet to Paris. This forces Juliet to take action that eventually leads to her demise.
- Juliet plans to fake her death so she can be with Romeo. On the face of it, this is a good plan unfortunately it is badly executed.
- Balthazar tells Romeo that Juliet is dead. This leads Romeo on a mission to be with her and end his own life.
- Romeo and Juliet die. Tragically if Juliet had woken a few minutes earlier or if Romeo’s fight with Paris had lasted longer then this end might not have played out. This really shows the nature of fate in this play.
About Lee-James Bovey
Lee-James, a.k.a. LJ, has been a Book Analysis team member since it was first created. During the day, he's an English Teacher. During the night, he provides in-depth analysis and summary of books.
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Romeo and Juliet
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Student Prompt: Write a short (1-3 paragraph) response using one of the below bulleted outlines. Cite details from the play over the course of your response that serve as examples and support.
1. Mercutio has many clever and joking lines. He often wants to cheer up Romeo and make others laugh.
- How does the tone of the play change when Mercutio is killed? ( topic sentence )
- How do events in the rest of the play show that Mercutio’s death is an important turning point in the plot? Name at least three events and use details from the text to support your ideas.
- Finally, discuss in your concluding sentence or sentences how Mercutio’s death connects to the theme of feuds and rivalry .
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Home — Essay Samples — Literature — Romeo and Juliet — Romeo And Juliet At Fault Analysis
Romeo and Juliet at Fault Analysis
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Romeo's faults, juliet's faults.
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Analysis of the Differences between Laws and Ethics
This essay about the distinction between laws and ethics, clarifying their differences and exploring their intersection. It discusses how laws are formal regulations enforced by governing bodies, while ethics are internally driven moral principles. Despite their disparities, they influence each other, with laws often reflecting ethical values. The essay highlights potential conflicts between legal requirements and moral convictions, emphasizing the importance of understanding the relationship between legality and morality in ethical decision-making. Overall, it aims to enhance awareness of the complexities surrounding human behavior regulation and ethical considerations in society.
How it works
In our daily lives, we often encounter discussions about laws and ethics, terms that are frequently used interchangeably. However, upon closer examination, it becomes apparent that they represent distinct concepts with unique implications. While both serve as guidelines for human behavior, the disparities between them are significant and merit exploration.
Laws, in essence, are formal regulations established by governing bodies to maintain order within a society. These regulations are codified and enforced through a legal system, with violations often resulting in penalties or sanctions.
The primary purpose of laws is to provide a framework for harmonious coexistence by delineating acceptable conduct and resolving disputes through a structured process. They encompass a wide range of areas, including criminal, civil, and administrative law, and are subject to periodic amendments to reflect evolving societal norms and values.
On the other hand, ethics pertains to a system of moral principles that govern individual or collective behavior. Unlike laws, which are externally imposed and legally binding, ethics are internally driven and rooted in personal beliefs, values, and conscience. While laws dictate what one must do to comply with societal standards, ethics delve deeper into questions of right and wrong, guiding individuals in making morally sound decisions even in the absence of legal obligations. Ethics are inherently subjective and can vary across cultures, religions, and philosophical frameworks, contributing to the diversity of human perspectives on morality.
Despite their distinctions, laws and ethics are not entirely independent entities; rather, they intersect and influence each other in various ways. While laws provide a basic framework for acceptable behavior, they do not encompass all moral considerations. Conversely, ethical principles often serve as the foundation for legal norms, shaping the development and interpretation of laws. For instance, laws prohibiting discrimination are informed by ethical principles of equality and fairness, reflecting societal values regarding human dignity and justice.
Moreover, conflicts may arise between laws and ethics when legal requirements contradict moral convictions or ethical standards. In such instances, individuals may face moral dilemmas, compelled to choose between complying with the law and adhering to their ethical principles. These conflicts underscore the complexity of navigating the interface between legal obligations and moral responsibilities, prompting critical reflection on the relationship between legality and morality in ethical decision-making.
In conclusion, while laws and ethics share common objectives in regulating human behavior, they differ in their origins, scope, and enforcement mechanisms. Laws are formal regulations established by authorities to maintain social order and resolve disputes, while ethics are moral principles guiding individual conduct based on personal beliefs and values. Despite their distinctions, laws and ethics are interconnected, influencing each other and shaping societal norms. Understanding the differences between laws and ethics is essential for fostering ethical awareness and promoting responsible citizenship in an increasingly complex world.
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It's true that Romeo and Juliet have some spectacularly bad luck. Tybalt picks a fatal fight with Romeo on the latter's wedding day, causing Capulet to move up the wedding with Paris. The crucial letter from Friar Lawrence goes missing due to an ill-timed outbreak of the plague. Romeo kills himself mere moments before Juliet wakes up.
Despite the play's persistence, cultural saturation, and popular appeal, Romeo and Juliet has fared less well with scholars and critics, who have generally judged it inferior to the great tragedies that followed. Instead of the later tragedies of character Romeo and Juliet has been downgraded as a tragedy of chance, and, in the words of critic James Calderwood, the star-crossed lovers are ...
In act 1, scene 5, after seeing Juliet, Romeo and his new love compose a sonnet together, revealing their mutual love. When they begin a second sonnet, the nurse interrupts, foreshadowing how their love and their lives will be cut short. Romeo's language is derived from the sonnet, especially the Petrarchan conceits that Shakespeare parodied ...
In the summary and analysis that follow, we realise that Romeo and Juliet is much more than a tragic love story. Romeo and Juliet: brief summary. After the Prologue has set the scene - we have two feuding households, Montagues and Capulets, in the city-state of Verona; and young Romeo is a Montague while Juliet, with whom Romeo is destined to ...
Full Title: Romeo and Juliet. When Written: Likely 1591-1595. Where Written: London, England. When Published: "Bad quarto" (incomplete manuscript) printed in 1597; Second, more complete quarto printed in 1599; First folio, with clarifications and corrections, printed in 1623. Literary Period: Renaissance.
Summary of Romeo and Juliet. Romeo and Juliet is a tragic love story by Shakespeare about two lovers who are not meant to be together as they come from feuding families. To summarise it, Romeo of the Montagues and Juliet of the Capulets were born to be sworn enemies due to the life long conflict between their families.
Analysis. Last Updated September 5, 2023. Romeo and Juliet is perhaps the best-known of Shakespeare's early works, written around 1595, at about the same time as A Midsummer Night's Dream ...
Romeo notes this distinction when he continues: Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, Who is already sick and pale with grief. That thou, her maid, art fair more fair than she (ll.4-6 ...
A. Decision to give consent for Juliet to marry Paris. B. Reaction when Juliet refuses to marry Paris. C. Decision to move the date up one day. V. Impetuosity of Friar Laurence. A. Willingness to ...
The Nature of Fate. Right from the beginning of the play, we are introduced to the idea of fate as Romeo and Juliet are described as star-crossed lovers. Throughout they are somehow able to divine their futures but neither of them seems to have the power to avoid them. When you consider everything that has to transpire to lead to their demise ...
In conclusion, Romeo and Juliet remains a timeless masterpiece that continues to resonate with audiences today. Through its exploration of love, fate, and societal norms, Shakespeare's play offers profound insights into the human experience. By analyzing the themes, characters, and literary devices in Romeo and Juliet, one can gain a deeper ...
Romeo and Juliet analysis essay. Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, is a play about two young star crossed lovers, whose love was destined for doom from the beginning due to the hatred between the two families, Montagues and Capulets. The themes of love and hate are very important in the play as they drive the plot.
The essay on "The Role of Fate in Romeo & Juliet" by William Shakespeare provides a comprehensive and well-organized analysis of the role that fate plays in the story. The writer demonstrates a clear understanding of the theme and effectively employs a variety of sentence structures and grammatical constructions to articulate their ideas.
Thanks for exploring this SuperSummary Study Guide of "Romeo and Juliet" by William Shakespeare. A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student ...
Analysis. Romeo comes out of hiding just as a light in a nearby window flicks on and Juliet exits onto her balcony. "It is the east," Romeo says, regarding Juliet, "and Juliet is the sun .". He urges the sun to rise and "kill the envious moon .". He urges Juliet to take her "vestal livery" and "cast it off.".
Romeo and Juliet is one of William Shakespeare's most famous plays, and it tells the tragic story of two young lovers from feuding families. While many readers and audiences often sympathize with the star-crossed lovers, it is important to consider the role of each character in the play's tragic outcome. This essay will analyze the faults of ...
Unlike laws, which are externally imposed and legally binding, ethics are internally driven and rooted in personal beliefs, values, and conscience. While laws dictate what one must do to comply with societal standards, ethics delve deeper into questions of right and wrong, guiding individuals in making morally sound decisions even in the ...
Romeo Character Analysis. The name Romeo, in popular culture, has become nearly synonymous with "lover.". Romeo, in Romeo and Juliet, does indeed experience a love of such purity and passion that he kills himself when he believes that the object of his love, Juliet, has died. The power of Romeo's love, however, often obscures a clear vision ...
Juliet Character Analysis. Having not quite reached her fourteenth birthday, Juliet is of an age that stands on the border between immaturity and maturity. At the play's beginning, however, she seems merely an obedient, sheltered, naïve child. Though many girls her age—including her mother—get married, Juliet has not given the subject ...