The Representation of Love and Marriage in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet

The Representation of Love and Marriage in William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet

In this essay I am going to examine love and marriage and the way it

is presented in the play 'Romeo and Juliet'. William Shakespeare is

one of the most famous writers in British history. During

Shakespeare's time, attitudes to love and marriage were very different

to the ways we are used to today. Love is presented as an intense and

overwhelming force in the story and different forms of love are

presented. There is 'courtly love' and also romantic love.

Romeo and Juliet were both children from 'aristocratic' families.

During the 15th and 16th centuries, Italy was divided into different

areas of land owned by different groups of people. All of these areas

were ruled by the 'Romeo and Juliet' families, the Montagues and the

Capulets. This was the recipe for intense rivalry and ill feelings

between the families.

All of this now meant that marriage was very important. It was less to

with actual love than pretty much anything else. It was mostly to do

with securing social advancement and protecting power. In order not to

make a lot of enemies, families would try to get their children to

marry other families' children. They would already be friends with

that family. This would strengthen the friendship between the two

families and secure their position in society. This means that there

is little room for romantic love and this play shows that Romeo and

Juliet's relationship is doomed to fail in a society such as this.

This is because the Montagues and the Capulets are sworn enemies.

The key scenes which show great relevance to love and marriage in

R...

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...himself.

Shakespeare also uses the Nurse as a dramatic device. Nurse never

seems to give Juliet a straight answer and always talks nonsense. Her

nonsense raises anxiety for Juliet and the reader/audience. For

example the nurse says to Juliet that Romeo is dead although he is

not. "Alack the day, he's gone, he's kill'd, he's dead!" although

later Nurse says "Tybalt is gone and Romeo banished." which proves

that Romeo is not dead.

Each of these techniques encourages the audience to share Romeo and

Juliet's experience of love as if at the same time as Romeo and Juliet

experience it. Because of all of the errors of judgement, the delays

and failures in communication, the Nurse's nonsense, the speed of play

etc. the audience is made to experience the same obstacles, the same

stops and starts as the tragic lovers do.