The Nurse in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet

The Nurse is Capulets servant, and she is a very good servant as she tries her hardest to please the Capulets and Juliet at the same time. She is also a very important character in the play and in the Capulets lives. Through out the play The Nurse is Juliet’s confidant. The Nurse is a crucial character who strongly influences Juliet’s thoughts and actions. The main reason why the Capulet employed her was to breast feed Juliet. The Nurse was perfect for the job because she had just lost her little baby Susan, and The Nurse will now have unwanted breast milk that is ideal for Juliet as Lady Capulet does not want the role of breast feeding. The relationship between The Nurse and Juliet is like a mother daughter relationship, she is like Juliet surrogate mother towards Juliet.

The Nurse possesses many qualities. For example, she is very hearty towards Juliet, kind, protective, compassionate and a loving lady. In some parts of the play The Nurse can be long-winded, insensitive, arrogant, insecure and stupid at times but she loves Juliet very much, partially as she imagines that Juliet is a substitute for her own daughter Susan. She has a bawdy sense of humor, which brings out the naturalness of sex and childbearing. This is seen when she tells Juliet to look for love, - “Go girl, seek happy nights to happy days';. This displays a realistic attitude to love. Such bawdy realism is, like the ribaldry of Mercutio and company, a contrast with the tender, romantic and passionate feelings of Romeo and Juliet. The Nurse is a practical but rather stupid woman at times. She loves Juliet like her own child. Throughout the play The Nurse is very talkative. She will usually do what she believes is right or what Juliet wants, like secretly meeting with Romeo and arranging the wedding of Romeo and Juliet.

Throughout the play the relationship between Juliet and The Nurse always shows. The Nurse has a playful as well as a caring relationship with Juliet. Even though The Nurse maybe a servant in the Capulet household, The Nurse has a far more superior role to an ordinary servant. This is seen in Act 1 Scene 3 when Lady Capulet sent The Nurse out and them immediately calls her back in as The Nurse knows Juliet so well. “Nurse come back again'; The relationship between The Nurse and Juliet is so strong that The Nurse knows Juliet better than her own mother; this is shown in Act 1 scene 3 when Lady Capulet does not know the age of her daughter.