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The portrayal of women in Shakespeare's plays
Who is the nurse in romeo and juliet
Depiction and treatment of women in Shakespeare plays
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Recommended: The portrayal of women in Shakespeare's plays
Juliet’s character is a collection of innocence, youth and naïveness. Her portrayal, however, did not fit well with the stereotypical view of how an Elizabethan women should have been. Women back then had to obey their fathers and husbands. They weren’t granted free will and so Juliet initial portrayal is girl who is an obeying daughter but when she discovers love she becomes a disobedient daughter to be faithful to her husband (Romeo).
Act 1 Scene 3, is the scene where we are introduced to Juliet when her Nurse and mother, Lady Capulet are introducing the idea of marriage and love. Juliet is portrayed as youthful, innocent and obedient, this is further emphasised when the Nurse makes constant references to Juliet’s childhood. When her mother bring up the idea of marriage, Juliet replies “It is an honour that I dream not of” when she states that she has given no thought to the idea of marriage, means even though she does not love Paris, if told to fall in love with Paris she would because she obeying her parents and only should care about their opinion on matter. This would have related to the Elizabethan audience because she was being loyal to her parents and at that time loyalty to your family was the most important agenda. Shakespeare uses the predictable behaviour at
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Juliet is completely fallen in love with Romeo, as he is with her, and this causes a change is her portrayal since she acts unfaithful to her words. “Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much.” She teases Romeo, Romeo suggests a kiss “O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do. They pray; grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.” Juliet accepts the proposition “Saint do not move, though grant for prayers’ sake.” This is the first appearance of Juliet’s behavioural change as she shows signs of disobedience when she kisses Romeo, when she is supposed to fall in love with man her parents suggested
Romeo and Juliet, written by William Shakespeare, is a story of two young lovers. These two hearts, Romeo Montague and Juliet Capulet belong to feuding families. The family feud causes them to keep their love a secret and therefore only Romeo, Juliet, Benvolio, the Nurse and Friar Lawrence know of their love. Romeo and Juliet are able to look past the feud and let themselves fall in mad love with the other. They let themselves do almost anything for the other and at times it seems like too much to do, even for the one they love. Although fate and character traits play a key role in the play, ultimately Rome and Juliet’s personal choices lead to their downfall.Fate originates all of the conflicts in Romeo and Juliet, from when they met until they die.
Juliet rejects all previous standards for women. She will not be confined to a relationship with Romeo that adheres to the courtly love tradition.
In Act one Scene two, Juliet is first introduced to the audience, where Paris is asking Capulet for his daughter’s hand in marriage. Capulet describes Juliet as “yet a stranger in the world” who “hath not seen the change of fourteen years”. Capulet sees his daughter as young and innocent. To Capulet, Juliet “is the hopeful lady of my earth” because “earth hath swallow’d all my hopes but she”. These quotes indicate that Capulet cares about Juliet’s well being because he cannot bear losing another one of his children.
When studying a play like Romeo and Juliet, it is easy to assume that it factually portrays the era in which it was made. A plethora of characters in the play such as Capulet, do in fact represent people of this era. However, when researching deeper into the context of the Elizabethan times, Romeo and Juliet, to little/no extent represents Juliet as an ordinary girl living in this period. Shakespeare has crafted Juliet through characterisation (speech and action) as a character that culturally and socially defies Gender roles, marries younger than the social normality and is not looked down upon after taking her life. These all rebel against how young women were seen and represented in the Elizabethan times.
Juliet started off being a young girl who did what her parents asked of her, but as the story went on it started changing, so did she. She showed a lot of positive changes throughout the story. One big positive change that is illustrated in the story is how she can make her own decisions without caring about what other people think. Juliet changed him into a better person by stopping him from progressing from girl to girl to stick with her.
The societal roles and expectations forced upon Juliet regarding her identity impact her actions and decisions. Juliet’s expected contributions to society were based on her gender,her social class and family name, and her age.
“Romeo and Juliet” by William Shakespeare is a play about two lovers from different families that have an internal feud between them. It ends in both lovers, Romeo and Juliet, committing suicide as they could not openly live with each other. An important idea in this play is that of the impetuosity of youth and the rash decisions that young people may make. This idea is continuously brought up throughout the play and is explored through the concepts of overreacting and being blinded by anger, desperation in forbidden love and taking your life for love.
Juliet`s beauty instantaneously mesmerizes Romeo, which ultimately diminishes his previous affection for Rosaline. In this scene, impulsive behavior and decision- making are greatly portrayed. During Romeo and Juliet`s first encounter, he asks for a kiss “[my] lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready to stand, / To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss” (I.v.95-96). On his initial reaction to seeing her, Romeo boldly approaches Juliet with the sudden desire to kiss her. Romeo`s coaxing portrays his persistent personality and the strong emotion he feels towards her to which is far beyond his control. Consequently, the overpowering feeling that has taken over Romeo, which causes him to ask for a kiss from someone he met moments ago. Ultimately, Romeo`s decision to ask for a kiss
Juliet’s weakness to be controlled by love leads her to make unadvised and irresponsible decisions that contribute to her choice of ending her life. Characterized as a young and rash teenager, with no interest in love and marriage at first, Juliet wants to be independent. However, after she first lays eyes on Romeo, Juliet’s perception of love is quick to change. Their strong love easily manipulates and clouds her judgment. Even if she is cautious and realizes their love is too fast, the rush of feelings from having a first love overcomes her.
In the beginning of the play Romeo and Juliet make many rash decisions that change the course of the play. Such as, when Romeo decides to sneak into the Capulet’s garden to have a conversation with Juliet. If Romeo was spotted by any of the guards or a resident of the Capulet household, he would have been captured and killed. When Juliet asks how Romeo snuck into the garden he replies to her, “With love’s light wings did I o’erperch these walls, For stony limits cannot hold love out…” (2.2.66-67). Romeo states that he snuck in with love’s wings and that nothing can stand in the way of love. Romeo shows that his love for Juliet can lead him to make rash decisions and not to think his actions through. An example of Juliet making a rash decision
Have you ever noticed how people change after they fall in love? In the story Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, Juliet is proven to be a dynamic character because of how she changes throughout the story and why. In the story, Juliet changes from understanding and reasonable to disobedient and unreasonable because she is in love.
Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet in the 16th century, at a time where the role of the woman was to be subservient to men and act as a wife to their husband and a mother to their children. Women were expected to conform to the expectations of society, and were seen as possessions by their fathers and husbands. Fathers arranged their daughters’ marriages, usually for financial or social gain for the family. In Romeo and Juliet, the unfair treatment of women is conveyed through characters such as Juliet, a young girl who is growing into the expectations of society, and Lady Capulet, who represents a traditional side of love and values social position rather than men themselves.
From “the fatal loins” (Prologue.5) of Lord and Lady Capulet, protagonist Juliet is born in Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet. Early on in the play Juliet is portrayed as a very dutiful daughter to her family. After her encounter with Romeo however, she begins a rapid transformation from a naive young girl into a woman. By the end of the play Juliet’s transformation evolves her from a dutiful daughter, into a faithful wife that is willing to desert her family in the name of love.
Predetermined destiny writes out our stories before we experience them and is essential to Romeo and Juliet. The star-cross’d lovers gig basically fueled the whole love-filled dramatic play. Although, Romeo and Juliet both learn this, the hard way, costing their lives, as their love was fated to end in death, unfortunately. In the prologue, lines 6-11 state, “A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life; Whose misadventures piteous overthrows, Do with their death bury their parents’ strife. The fearful passage of their parents’ rage, Which but their children’s end naught could remove” (Beers 807). Due to these lines 6-11, it proves that Romeo and Juliet’s destiny was already written previously in the stars above, and the pair of lovers could do nothing but face it, together, hand in hand, with all that they had left.
A Psychological Analysis of Romeo and Juliet Romeo and Juliet was obviously not written to fit the psychoanalytic model, as the theories of Freud were not developed for centuries after Shakespeare. Shakespeare wrote about Renaissance England, a culture so heavily steeped in Christianity, that it would have blushed at the instinctual and sexual thrust of Freud’s theory. However, in order to keep literature alive and relevant, a culture must continually reinterpret the themes and ideas of past works. While contextual readings assure cultural precision, often these readings guarantee the death of a particular work. Homer’s Iliad, a monument among classical works, is currently not as renowned as Romeo and Juliet because it is so heavily dependent on its cultural context.