Bennett Ganshorn Mrs.Calhoun English 9B 11 April 2023 Romeo and Juliet Analysis Thesis: In the play Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare uses figurative language to show Friar Lawerence’s traits. Through metaphors and personification during Friar Lawerence’s herb-picking scene, Shakespeare characterizes the Friar as a sensible and aware character. While the Friar is picking herbs, the Friar gives the herbs human-like characteristics, he also describes how the earth is where nature lives and where it dies, this metaphor, and personification reveals the Friar's character traits.
Danielle Matamba Matamba 1 Marryat NC English 1 8 February 2023 Analysis of Shakespeare’s Iconic Romeo and Juliet Balcony Scene The classic author, William Shakespeare, is well known for his usage of figurative language in his most famous tragedy, Romeo and Juliet. Many scholars consider Shakespeare the master of figurative language. In Romeo and Juliet, he uses different forms of figurative language to help create tension and add to the tragedy.
Playwright William Shakespeare is renowned for his plays in both modern and old times. Most famously, The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet follows a feud between families that leads to the death of star-crossed lovers. The advancement of the play is displayed through different motifs and patterns. Specifically, the motif of dreams versus reality is developed by symbolism and word choice to convey that the desires of people are often disrupted by the harsh reality of their situation. To that end, the development of the motif through the characters' choice of words and symbolism also allows the progression of the theme.
“Never affirm, always allude: allusions are made to test the spirit and probe the heart.” Here, Umberto Eco speaks of the power of allusions. One simple reference can stimulate hundreds of ideas, relations, and images in a reader’s head. Allusions guide the reader on the journey to understanding a work as a whole. Shakespeare, inventor of over 1700 commonly used words, and one of the most quoted authors of all time, used allusions to enhance his works.
Throughout the play Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare uses figurative language to express character and emotional traits. Shakespeare expresses Romeo as a character looking for love. Romeo is shown as a lover whose feelings of love are not the same true love that Juliet has for him. Romeo uses the poetic figurative language of metaphors and hyperbole to express his emotions and characteristics. Romeo is standing outside of Juliet’s home and looks up at her window with the sun shining on Juliet.
Friar uses personification along with other literary devices that helps the reader understand the theme. In Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare uses elements of language in Friar Laurence’s speech to convey the idea that everything is both good and evil. In the first half of the soliloquy, Friar talks about the sky in a way that demonstrates how it is good and evil, like the light of the sun and the darkness of the moon. Friar starts his Soliloquy by saying, “The grey-ey’d morn smiles on the frowning night, Check’ring the Eastern clouds with streaks of light” (2.3.1-2).
Shakespeare creates a strong connection between the audience and the characters in the play through his usage of literary elements that creates the young teenage love story of Romeo and Juliet. “With love’s light wings did I o’erperch these walls, for stony limits cannot hold love out, and what love can do, that dares love attempt. Therefore thy kinsmen are no stop to me.” (Shakespeare 2.2.71-74) This is Romeo’s speech to Juliet when he says that he has trespassed onto her property without being seen by anyone because of his love for her.
Romeo and Juliet Quote Analysis In Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare uses literary devices and diction to make connections within the play. As Romeo enters the monument, he walks to and opens Juliet’s casket to see her lifeless body. His grief and sadness cause him to say, “Thou detestable maw, thou womb of death, gathered with the dearest morsel of the earth, Thus I enforce thy rotten jaws to open, and in spite I’ll cram thee with more food,” (5:3:54-57). Romeo describes his beloved as the “dearest morsel of the earth”.
In Act 1 Scene 4 of Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare uses allusions to help support the theme of fate in the play. In the quote, “She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes In shape no bigger than an agate-stone On the fore-finger of an alderman…” Shakespeare alludes to common English folklore with the use of Queen Mab. In old English folklore, there were many beliefs of fairies influencing dreams.
Throughout literature and novels we can find authors who will reference history, other authors works and most often the Bible. One may ask themselves the reasoning behind allusions and how it can affect our perspective and the authors meaning when reading the novel. In the late sixties, Julia Kristeve, who studied the elements of literature and other communication systems, introduced the word “Intertextuality”. In Kristave’s essay “Word, Dialogue, and Novel” she went into deep analysis of an authors work and its text, “A literary work, then, is not simply the product of a single author, but of its relationship to other texts and to the strucutures of language itself. Any text," she argues, "is constructed of a mosaic of quotations; any text
Meitong Liu Gaffney English 1, Period 4 20 May, 2024 Romeo & Juliet Quote Analysis If love is one sided, it will only be unrequited. In the play, Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare uses allusion to enhance the theme of love using Cupid, the Roman god of desire and love, while the one being loved is arming herself so that she’s shielded from Cupid’s arrows. In the morning, Romeo was walking down the street with his cousin Benvolio, and complaining to Benvolio about his unrequited love for his crush, Rosaline, and how weak, childish love failed to impress her as she was well shielded by the armor of chastity.
Once in fair Verona, a bloody feud took the lives of two attractive young lovers and some of their family and friends. The Montague/Capulet feud will forever go down in literary history as an ingenious vehicle to embody fate and fortune. In Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare uses literary devices, such as foreshadowing, repetition, and symbolism, to show how the Montague/Capulet feud is a means by which the inevitability of fate functions and causes the bad fortune of the lovers. To start with, Shakespeare uses the prologue to foretell future events as a direct result of the feud.
Exploring the Motif of Love in Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” In Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” the main motif is Love. While many motifs are apparent in this play, love is the main motif shown. Many characters show the motif of love, but, the central figures in this play, Romeo and Juliet, best embody this motif. Shakespeare uses many tools and techniques to emphasize the motif of love in this fantastic story.
Even though Juliet is portrayed as quiet and obedient; however, she holds a womanly figure that prepares her to have maturity beyond her years. When her mother suggests that she marries Paris because he is rich and good looking, Juliet responds “I'll look to like, if looking liking move: But no more deep will I endart mine eye than your consent gives strength to make it fly.” (1.3.482) In this text Lady Capulet tells Juliet all about how phenomenal Paris is.
At last but not least, the author employs negative diction, such as: “vexed” (1.1.199), “madness” (1.1.200), and “gall” (1.1.201). “Vexed” denotes annoyed, and “madness” denotes insanity. Since Romeo is referring to love in such a negative way, this shows that Romeo is pessimistic about love. In this passage, the metaphors demonstrate that love is short-lasting, depressing, and conflicting. Due to the metaphor and negative diction in this passage, the author characterizes Romeo as a person who is conflicted and frustrated by love.
