Different Types of Love Explored in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet

Different Types of Love Explored in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet

In this essay, I will illustrate the ways in which Shakespeare

incorporates a cleverly blended mixture of love and death into Romeo

and Juliet. I will also consider the various forms of love, alongside

other emotions that make Romeo and Juliet so emotive, and the language

used to present these themes.

I will now illustrate the inextricable link between love and death.

Even before the drama unfolds, Shakespeare links love and death in the

prologue, where he suggests that the death of the two lovers was

pre-ordained in the stars:

“From forth the fatal loins of these two foes

A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life;” (Prologue, lines

5-6)

The phrase “star-crossed” means against fate – fate was thought to be

controlled by the stars, and “star-crossed lovers” means they aren’t

supposed to be together. They probably died because they went against

fate.

After Romeo and Juliet’s marriage, Tybalt challenges Romeo to a duel,

but Romeo declines: Tybalt is family now. The fact that Romeo refuses

to fight angers Mercutio, who ends up getting mortally wounded at the

hands of Tybalt. Before Mercutio dies, he puts “a curse on both your

houses.” In the Shakespearian era, a dying man’s curse was thought to

be a powerful force. A conversation between Romeo and Benvolio ends:

Benvolio: “O Romeo, Romeo, brave Mercutio is dead.

That galliant spirit hath aspired the clouds,

Which too untimely here did scorn the earth.”

Romeo: “This day’s black fate on moe days doth depend,

This but begins the woe others must end.”

Romeo is saying here that because of Mercutio’s curse, and his

inevitable death, Romeo and Juliet’s fate is sealed.

These themes are consolidated at the end of the play when the death of

the two lovers is necessary for the two families to unite:

“O brother Montague, give me thy hand.

This is my daughter’s jointure, for no more

Can I demand.