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“love conquers all” is a phrase that many of us have heard in our lifetime. however, the comedy, midsummer night’s dream, challenges this notion
How does Shakespeare explore the theme of love
Shakespeare's influence on modern day culture
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John Steinbeck once said “It's so much darker when a light goes out than it would have been if it had never shone”. In order to appreciate something for all that it truly is, one must learn to compare it to its opposite. These opposites both complement each other and bring out the worst in one another. Moreover, they also produce energy through the tension they create. This is true of opposition everywhere, literature included. Authors often make use of it, thus making their works more interesting and relatable. In the play Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare uses light and dark imagery to create a tension that mirrors the energy we encounter in our everyday lives. In particular, this energy is found in setting, characterization, and the theme of love.
All of the scenes in the play take place in either the light of day or the darkness of night. Although this may seem obvious, the opposition between these settings plays an important role in conveying the mood of both characters and events. Traditionally, the brightness of sunlight is used to represent hope and joy. Nevertheless, Shakespeare often uses the light of day to create irony by setting a dark ambience. In the opening scene of Act 1, Lady Montague is looking for her son. When Benvolio says that he saw him walking towards the woods, Montague responds with,“Many a morning hath he there been seen. / With tears augmenting the fresh morning’s dew” (1.1.128-129). Montague is stating that Romeo is crying in the forest, as he does most mornings. This relates his sadness to daybreak, and establishes that the brightness of day often carries a solemn feeling. Similarly, it creates irony in the fact that although the setting is bright and joyful, Romeo’s mood is somber. The signifi...
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...they hadn’t appeared he could have stayed along Juliet’s side. This is important to the play as a whole for envy is a dangerous thing; it is the resentfulness brought on by something owned by another. When faced with this feeling, one can sometimes be pushed to do complete cruel actions, and even take that which they do not own. Here, Romeo and Juliet’s ability to be together is being taken away, for their love is one that most would not understand. The other Capulets and Montagues, who have never looked passed their name barriers, have never been able to experience love without boundaries the way Romeo and Juliet have learned to.
In the play Romeo and Juliet, an energy that duplicates that of our everyday lives is created through William Shakespeare’s use of light and darkness. This imagery is distinctly found in setting, characterization, and the theme of love.
During Shakespeare’s time, feasts and balls were very popular amongst the members of upper class. The masks worn to these festivities were often extremely detailed, fabulous, and expensive. The main component to make those masks catch people’s attentions is the colour. The background colour of the mask is purple, the symbol of power and wealth. In the play, Juliet is the daughter of a big family – the House of Capulet. The Capulet family is one of the Patriarch families of Italy, the other one is the House of Montagues. Recall that purple represents power and wealth, in Act I Scene V it shows how powerful and wealthy Juliet (and her family) is, because masquerades would only be held if nobility (the House of Capulet) could demonstrate their own wealth, status, and power. However, the mask is not painted all purple, because those wealth, titles are not all belongs to Juliet, it’s partly just because she’s born in this family, and she doesn’t contribute as much. Therefore, there is a space that is painted purplish-white.
Before Romeo and Juliet meet, the audience know that Romeo is a Montague and Juliet is a Capulet. The audience is also aware that Romeo is deeply in love with a Rosaline, who does not return his feelings. Because of this, Romeo is somewhat depressed. He walks around at night crying and during the day he “makes himself an artificial night” in his bedroom, meaning that he shuts himself in his room all day with the curtains drawn, as Lord Montague says in Act 1 Scene 1. In Act 1 Scene 2, Lord Capulet informs the audience that Juliet is fourteen by saying, “ she hath not seen the change of fourteen years,” when Paris, a wealthy kinsma...
On first seeing Juliet, Romeo exclaims, "O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright! / It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night / Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope's ear; … So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows" (Act 1 Scene 5 Lines 44-48) Romeo describes Juliet's beauty in terms of light and dark. "She doth teach the torches to burn bright" means both that her beauty is brighter than the light of any torch and that she makes the whole room light up. The brightness of Juliet's beauty is made even brighter by the contrasts with the blackness of the "Ethiope" and the blackness of crows. The use of antithesis with the "snowy doves" and the "crows" creates a powerful opposing force showing how she stands out from the others. Another interpretation of the dove is that it is a symbol of peace and sets in place an image of Romeo and Juliet's love creating peace between the two rival families. Another moment is when Juliet is waiting for Romeo to come to her bed. In her imagination, the night will bring her love. She goes on to say, "Spread thy close curtain, love-performing night, / That runaways' eyes may wink and Romeo" (Act 3 Scene 2 Lines 5-6). Juliet is seeing things as though she is in bed, the curtains are closed, creating a dark atmosphere where they act their love. In the dark, the pair will create their own light, because "Lovers can see to do their amorous rites / By their own beauties" The use of courtly love is very common in theatres at the time of Romeo and Juliet because in those days people would dream and fantasize about courtly love and was an entertaining
An example of this is “Spread thy close curtain, love-performing night, That runaways’ eyes may wink and Romeo leap to these arms, untalk’d of an unseen”. Juliet is longing for Romeo to come and consummate their marriage at night, which is when they can be together, as their relationship is too unnatural for them to meet at day, due to the hatred of their families. It is further proven that the dark imagery represents passion. Juliet is passionate about Romeo, as she has made up her mind to give her maidenhood to him, which is something she can never undo. An additional quote is “Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops. I must be gone and live, or stay and die… Let me be ta’en, let me be put to death; I am content, so thou wilt have it so“. Romeo has just consummated his marriage with Juliet. He says that the stars are gone, and that daylight is coming. Romeo must leave, as Verona is waking up, and he will be killed if he is seen with Juliet. Even with this risk, he considers staying with Juliet, as he enjoys being with her. Dark imagery is used to show how passionate Romeo is about Juliet. He made their marriage legal, and is even considering risking death to stay with her longer. He has permanently committed to her, and cannot go back. As the evidence presented shows, the dark imagery in Romeo and Juliet reflects the theme of passion.
When we look at the text closely Juliet uses the word black a lot, with thy black mantel and black-brown night. When the word black is used when we think of death, which evidently occurs a few times in the play. Juliet also uses words like 'hooded' which again. makes us think of death. In her speech she uses pathetic fallacy when she says 'cloudy night', which also suggests negative feelings.
Imagine living a tragic existence, not even two entire decades long. Imagine being controlled by an invisible, yet limitless puppet string conducted by “the stars”. When fate is your enemy and time reveals each unraveling tragedy to your dismay, you understand how it feels to be the protagonist’s of Shakespeare’s most famous love story, The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet. Tradition, heredity, and ancestry symbolize the celestial psychology that is the stars. Controlling every miniscule detail of the play from human behavior to action sequences, to the ultimate climax of the tale. The power that fate has is surprisingly destructible yet inevitable to audiences as they come to realize the given characteristics that cannot be changed, even to avoid death. The moment Romeo and Juliet initially saw one another, they were sure their love was meant to be. This feeling was brought on because their love was the solution of the stars, or forefathers, to cure the rivaling families’ animosity. Fate contributes to the development of The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by relating to astrological terms, human behavior, and fate as an agent of destruction.
Shakespeare emphasizes the optimism of the scene by using language that creates positive connotations of the dark - to contrast the depressive connotations of act one, scene two. Romeo is grateful for 'night's cloak' which allows him to visit Juliet in secret without being captured and killed by the guards. This notion is developed later in the play - Romeo and Juliet meet primarily in the night-time whilst the main acts of violence occur during the day. this manipulation of stereotypical imagery, combined with the sense of contrasting and conflicting emotions.
He does not think he will ever be happy again, he doesn’t want to be out during the day and creates an artificial night, but this changes the moment he sees Juliet. Juliet, instantly becomes the new love of Romeo, bringing him out of the darkness and becoming the light to Romeo’s darkness. Montague, concerned about his son’s behavior says, “But all so soon as the all-cheering sun should in the farthest East being to draw the shady curtains from Aurora’s bed, away from light steals home my heavy son and private in his chamber pens himself, shuts up his windows, locks fair daylight out, and makes himself an artificial night.” (I.i. 142-148) Montague saying this explains how Romeo has been acting extremely upset and depressed, shutting out all light and enveloping himself in darkness. However, when he meets Juliet, everything changes and he begins to embrace the light. Romeo muses, “But soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is East, and Juliet is the sun!”(II.ii. 2-3) Here, Romeo refers to Juliet as the sun, for she has brought light into his life, bringing him out of the darkness. Due to Juliet, Romeo goes from being depressed all the time to learning to embrace the light and finding
“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/ Be not her maid since she is envious/ Her vestal livery is but sick and green/ And none but fools do wear it. Cast it off!/ It is my lady. Oh, it is my love/ Oh, that she knew she were!” (Shakespeare II ii 2-11).
In the tremendous play of ‘Romeo & Juliet’, Shakespeare’s ways engages the audience straight away. The astounding methods he uses hooks the audience into the play and allows them to read on, wondering what will happen. The tragic love story of Romeo & Juliet, as mentioned in the prologue, sets a variety of themes throughout Act 1 Scene 5. Many of the recognisable themes are: youth and age, revenge, forbidden love, fate, action and hate. The main idea of the play is a feud that had been going on between two families, The ‘Montagues and Capulets’, the son of the Montagues and the daughter of the Capulets fall in love and the story tells us how tragic, death, happiness and revenge find them throughout the play.
Being one of the most debated texts in history, Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’, has the power and ability to divide audiences. Throughout the play, it is seen that Shakespeare has left the audience to contemplate the underlying cause of the Romeo and Juliet tragedy. Shakespeare begins by showing the reckless actions and choices of the lovers, illustrating one of the main contributing factors to their deaths. Friar Lawrence plays a large role in the deaths of the lovers as he is the main instigator, greatly contributing to the deaths. Also, demonstrated through the play is that the lover’s destiny is written in the stars. Without
Literary devices play a crucial and essential role in almost all works of literature. Literary devices are techniques used by the writer in order to conjure moods and ideas within the reader. Writers use different literary devices for different purposes. One very important literary device is imagery. In imagery, words are used to invoke an image in the reader's mind. One writer that utilizes a great deal of imagery is William Shakespeare. In William Shakespeare's tragedy Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare uses images of poison and death to create moods of death and sorrow.
First of all, the themes of Romeo and Juliet such as love and hate are essentially the same in all its facets and colours whether it is in the 1500’s or the present time. The play is still accepted universally because people can closely relate to themes such as love and hate, and life and death, and these themes are the basis of the play. For example, there is the i...
Techniques and Devices Shakespeare Uses to Show the Power and Beauty of the Love Between Romeo and Juliet
In the play “Romeo and Juliet”, Shakespeare shows that love has power to control one’s actions, feelings, and the relationship itself through the bond between a destined couple. The passion between the pair grew strong enough to have the capability to do these mighty things. The predestined newlyweds are brought down a rocky road of obstacles learning love’s strength and the meaning of love. The power of love controlled Romeo and Juliet's actions.