Figurative Language Response Shakespeare demonstrates the theme that being impulsive will affect your life negatively throughout the book Romeo and Juliet. There are many instances included in this novel that Romeo & Juliet’s youth takes hold of their thinking, and their quick decisions leads to a chain reaction; their death being the final event that shows the result of their impulsivity. This recurring theme is manifest in the following passage (1.5.152-155): My only love sprung from my only hate! Too early seen unknown, and known too late! Prodigious birth of love it is to me That I must love a loathed enemy. (Shakespeare)
With the use of irony, writing style, and literary devices like: oxymoron, hyperbole, diction, and metaphor, Shakespeare is able to present this motif excellently to leave the reader thinking. Initially, Shakespeare opens with a hyperbole: “My ONLY love...my ONLY hate!”. In
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This displays her impulsive nature because it is unlikely that she would even know Romeo, let alone love him--only hours after they meet. Therefore, she is exaggerating the fact that she truly loves Romeo, and he is the only one she loves. Secondly, situational irony is shown in the two words “love” and “hate”. It contrasts the reader’s expectations in the way that an only love could allegedly never be the same person as a former mortal enemy. It exemplifies Juliet’s lack of thought before her actions she would have taken her time to think about attempting to hold a romantic relationship with her supposed mortal enemy if she was wiser. Third, Shakespeare uses an oxymoron to uncover this theme with the altercation “unknown” and “known” contradicting each other but used for the same purpose.