In an attempt to push away from medieval love conventions and her father's authority, Shakespeare's Juliet asserts sovereignty over her sexuality. She removes it from her father's domain and uses it to capture Romeo's love. Critic Mary Bly argues that sexual puns color Juliet's language. These innuendoes were common in Renaissance literature and would have been recognized by an Elizabethan audience. Arguably, Juliet uses sexual terms when speaking to Romeo in order to make him aware of her sexuality. When he comes to her balcony, she asks him, "What satisfaction canst thou have tonight?" (2.1.167). Bly asserts that "satisfaction in her hands, becomes a demure play on the sating of desire" (108). Following this pun, Juliet proposes marriage. She teases Romeo with sexual thoughts and then stipulates that marriage must precede the consummation of their love. Juliet uses "death" in a similar sense. She asks night to "Give me my Romeo, and when I shall die / Take him and cut him out in little stars" (3.2.21-22). Death holds a double meaning in these lines. It connotes both "ceasing to be and erotic ecstasy" (Bly 98). Based upon this double meaning, one can infer that "she sweetly asks 'civil night' to teach her how to lose the game of love she is about to play for her virginity" (Wells 921). She tells her nurse, "I'll to my wedding bed, / And death, not Romeo, take my maidenhead!" (3.2.136-137). Placing death opposite Romeo highlights the irony of the situation; both death and Romeo should claim her maidenhead together. These sexual puns reveal Juliet's awareness of her sexuality. She entices Romeo, forcing her sexuality to act as emotional currency.
After her marriage to Romeo, Juliet speaks about her virginity in objective terms: "O, I have bought the mansion of a love / But not possessed it, and though I am sold, / Not yet enjoyed" (3.2.26-28). In line 26, love is an object to be bought and sold. In the next line, she recognizes that she sold herself. Juliet understands that she sold her virginity for Romeo's love.
Juliet rejects all previous standards for women. She will not be confined to a relationship with Romeo that adheres to the courtly love tradition.
Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare explores the lives of ‘a pair of star crossed lovers’ from feuding families in the city of Verona. Their love and passion for one another is so great, that even an act of revenge doesn’t prevent them from being with each other. Act 3 Scene 2 is set in Capulets house and entails a conversation between Juliet and her Nurse regarding her cousin, Tybalt’s death and her lover, Romeo’s banishment. Juliet expresses her grief for Tybalt’s death and her abhorrence at Romeo’s deed. Although the Nurse blames Romeo for the death of Tybalt, Juliet’s loyalty and love towards her husband, enables her to overcome the shock.
Juliet strategizes her disastrous plan and worries, “How if, when I am laid into the tomb, I wake before the time that Romeo come to redeem me?” (Lines 30-32 of Act Four, Scene Three). Juliet is desperate to see Romeo, ergo she plans to fake her death. Her thoughts of Romeo finding her lifeless foreshadows their future. Romeo is deprived of the news of Juliet’s real state of health, therefore he says, “Well, Juliet, I will lie with thee tonight. O mischief, thou art swift to enter the thoughts of desperate men!” (Lines 34-36 of Act Five, Scene One). Once again, Romeo’s perception is only focused on Juliet. His mental instability leads him to think Paris is in the way obtaining true happiness, thus he slays him. Romeo acquires poison, stands beside Juliet, and states, “Here’s to my love! (Drinks.) O true apothecary! Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die.” (Lines 119-120 of Act Five, Scene Three). Romeo observes Juliet’s body and determines that he should die beside her. Juliet wakes to his lifeless body, and determines she should commit suicide, as well. Romeo’s foolish decisions lead to the death of himself and
Manifest destiny is the idea that Americans had, and have, the inherent right to expand the United States from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. As we know, this eventually happened, but it took a lot of time, money, blood, and effort in order to achieve this divine goal. We take for granted the size and span of our country, when for a good part of the 19th century, we shared the land mass with Spanish Mexico. It’s important to understand what drove us to pursue this goal, and the struggles that we encountered in obtaining, exploring, and settling the land.
The first person to coin and use the term manifest destiny was a journalist by the name of John O’Sullivan. O’Sullivan wanted the United States to annex Texas and the Oregon territory. “That claim is by the right of our manifest destiny, to overspread and to possess the wh...
In the late 1700's, John Adams was President. Adams was a member of the Federalist Party. The Federalists were in control of the Congress. Adams and other Federalists were Pro-British and the Republican Party was Pro-French. Thomas Jefferson led the Republicans. Federalists were worried that the influx of French into the country could become a powerful voting block. The Alien and Sedition Acts were passed by the Federalist controlled Congress to deal with this problem. The first of the laws was the Naturalization Act. This act required that aliens be residents for 14 years instead of 5 years before they became eligible for U.S. citizenship. Congress then passed the Alien Act, authorizing the President to deport aliens "dangerous to the peace and safety of the United States" during peacetime. The third law, the Alien Enemies Act, allowed the wartime arrest, imprisonment and deportation of any alien subject to an enemy power.
Manifest destiny became very popular and was created by John O’ Sullivan. Manifest destiny was an important event in this time period. This was an “imperialist phrase first used in 1845 to urge annexation of Texas; used thereafter to encourage American settlement of European colonial and Indian lands in the Great Plains and Far West” (Tindall, A31). “By 1840, nearly 7million Americans; 40 percent of the nation’s population lived in the trans- Appalachian West” (History.com). Most of the population in the west people who left their homes in the east for a better economic opportunity. When these settlers thought of western migration, land ownership, farming and freedom crossed their minds. Manifest destiny brought opportunity and hope to these
Manifest Destiny was a concept developed by Polk; it was a plan for the Anglo-Saxon Americans to expand westward to the Pacific Ocean. In 1845, John L. O'Sullivan, described the annexation of Texas by extension, and the right to occupy the rest of the territory as a right of the American people. Manifest Destiny was a term used to justify the Oregon, New Mexico, and California Annexation. Manifest Destiny would become responsible for the annexation of Texas, but also responsible for the war with Mexico (1846-1848). Few Americans opposed, mostly abolitionists, but nothing was done about it. The end result would be liberty and economic freedom.
The audience’s first impression of Juliet however, is through her interaction with her mother (Lady Capulet) and the Nurse. From the Nurse’s remarks, the audience learns that Juliet is thirteen and “Come Lammas-eve at night shall [Juliet turn] fourteen” (Act I.3.18-9). As Juliet enters the presence of her mother and the Nurse, Shakespeare portrays Juliet as a very faithful daughter. When summoned by the Nurse, Juliet comes promptly then responds politely to her mother “Madam, I am here, what is your will?” (Act I.3.7). When Juliet refers to her mother as ‘madam” (Act I.3.7), the audience also gets the impression of Juliet being compliant to her elder’s wishes. This can be observed when her mothe...
Manifest Destiny was the commonly held American attitude during the 1800s that there was a god given obligation for Americans to expand throughout the natural borders of the continent. Manifest Destiny is generally perceived by Americans to be a benevolent movement due to the positive economic conditions it had created. However, ever since the inception of the concept of Manifest Destiny, many have viewed it not as a movement of benevolence, but rather as a movement of aggressive imperialism. This is because Manifest Destiny resulted in the mass destruction and forced migrations of Native American tribes as well as the Mexican-American War, a long standing statement of American Imperialism. It is clear that through the negative consequences
Ever since America has gained independence from Britain, America has been able to expand and claim territories mainly in the West. In the 1840s, it has become evident that many people supported the concept of Manifest Destiny. Manifest Destiny combines a belief in expansionism along with other common ideas of the era including “American exceptionalism and Romantic nationalism” (New World Encylopedia, 1). It has commonly held a belief in White supremacy; others might see it in a broader expression as a belief in Americans’ mission in the world. This term meant different things to different people, ultimately conveying messages of freedom, culture, and democracy to others. Journalist John L. O’Sullivan stated, “We must
Juliet’s attitude toward love and marriage changes throughout Romeo and Juliet; because she first has no desire to marry, then she falls in love with Romeo, and finally, gets married. In the first scene, Juliet has no desire to marry anyone, when Lady Capulet asks Juliet about marriage, she replied, “it is an honor I dream not of.” However, throughout the next scene, Juliet becomes infatuated with Romeo; she mentions to Romeo, that she is “too fond,” referring to her love, for him. Later, Juliet gets married to Romeo; their marriage is clarified, when Juliet says, “I am sold.” Juliet was not interested in love or marriage, but her ruminations later change; upon meeting Romeo.
The belief was that the United States’ expansion was a divine happening and the rights of all other races were disregarded. Manifest destiny was the expansion of the white Anglo-Saxon race influencing events such as wars and resulting in white supremacy. The white population believed they had the “God given” right to take land from what they deem as inferior races, namely the Mexicans and Native Americans. Furthermore, white people believed they could make better use of the territories they conquered and boost their own economy. There was even a minority group who believed expansion was inevitable because of the rapid growth of the white population. Manifest destiny encouraged racism, segregation, and the persecution of innocent
Just as writers have the liberty to reinterpret works to make them more relevant to their particular time, so should commentators be allowed to criticize a work with modern ideas? For all the blatant and covert sexual content of Shakespeare’s plays, they are in no way subscribing to a psychoanalytic construct. With that said, a psychoanalytic construction makes this play more relevant to modern readers, as psychoanalytic ideas are so pervasive they are either thoughtlessly accepted or flippantly rejected. Either way, Freudian ideas are a filter through which modern readers can understand the actions of Romeo and Juliet. The ideas used to interpret this play are not classically Freudian, but rather a more contemporary understanding of psychodynamics as influenced by modern existential theory.
Many Americans in the early 1800s believed that it was the destiny of America to control all of the North American continent. This belief was called "Manifest Destiny." The term originated from a New York newspaper editorial of December 27, 1845, which declared that the nation's manifest destiny was "to over spread and to possess" the whole continent, to develop liberty and self-government to all. In the eyes of the Americans, it meant that it was God's will that Americans expand their territory from coast to coast.
During this act, there are clashing emotions that Juliet feels when Nurse reports Tybalt’s death and Romeo’s punishment. There were both similar and different reactions by both Romeo and Juliet due to Romeos punishment. Juliet was extremely sad and confused due to many reasons and both were very upset about Romeos punishment due to the fact they would not be able to see each other anymore.