Romeo And Juliet Essay Sample

📌Category: Plays, Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare, Writers
📌Words: 596
📌Pages: 3
📌Published: 11 February 2022

Shakespear has shown Juliet’s attempt to secure independence and control. Romeo and Juliet meet at a party and become infatuated with each other, soon falling in love. Afterwards, Juliet realises that she can’t be with Romeo, as he is a Montague, and she is a Capulet. Forbidden to love each other due to a long-standing family feud. Juliet struggles to decide whether to fight to be with Romeo. This uncertainty is expressed in the quote"My only love sprung from my only hate! Too early seen unknown, and known too late! Prodigious birth of love it is to me, That I must love a loathed enemy." This shows Juliet cursing her love for Romeo, a man she should hate. It also depicts the pressure she feels to uphold her families expectations. She knows that if she chooses to love Romeo, she will be disobeying and rejecting her family's wishes. Despite this conflict, Juliet does not abandon her feelings. She announces to Romeo "If that thy bent of love be honourable, / Thy purpose marriage, send me word tomorrow." This line is asking Romeo to marry her and prove his love, showing how enraptured she is by him. The next afternoon they marry, and Juliet's act of disobedience and her own will is final. A couple of hours after the wedding Romeo kills a capulet and is punished with exile. He has to leave Juliet and Verona behind, or risk execution. Lady Capulet then tells Juliet that she will be getting married to a different man (Paris) on Thursday. She declares “I will not marry yet; and when I do, I swear / It shall be Romeo—whom you know I hate— / Rather than Paris”. This is a major act of disobedience and shows her desire to make her own choice and have free will. Her father hears of this act of insubordination and threatens to disown her if she doesn't comply. Juliet, unsure what to do, asks the nurse for guidance and she advises ‘​​Romeo’s a dishclout to him. An eagle, madam,/ Hath not so green, so quick, so fair an eye/ As Paris hath. Beshrew my very heart,/ I think you are happy in this second match,/ For it excels your first’,. This shows Nurse urging Juliet to remarry and forget about Romeo, as he is nowhere near as good a man as Paris. Nurse cared for and loved Juliet for many years, and Juliet had trusted her for a long time. Yet she ignores the Nurses advice, seeing her opinion as a betrayal. This highlights her devotion to Romeo, and her attempt to make her own decision, choosing to be with him. Juliet then fakes her death to avoid a forced marriage to Paris. By doing this she can go be with Romeo without any suspicions and start a new life with her beloved husband. She drinks a sleeping potion, and soon all of Verona is discussing her death. Romeo hears of this and believes that she is no longer alive. He visits her in her family vault and upon witnessing that the rumours are seemingly true, he ends his life. Juliet wakes up to find his corpse in the room with her. Despite everything she had done to be with her love, he had died. Her attempt to assert her own will had failed. Her plan to start a new life full of freedom and love was destroyed by her family's vicious feud and their expectations. The external forces in her life had snuffed her chances of independence and happiness. Full of grief and realising that her family would never allow her to have the control she craved, she ended her life. Shakespear has clearly shown that Juliet ventured to assert her own will and have the life she dreamed of, but remained subject to what her family wanted.

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