Theme Of Dramatic Irony In Romeo And Juliet

Shakespeare has many instances of dramatic irony in Romeo and Juliet. He uses it for different purposes, one purpose is to show how, despite the Friar trying to help the situation he worsened it unintentionally. A second purpose is to show how secret Romeo and Juliet were.
One example of dramatic irony is the Friar gives Juliet a potion and creates a plan to help Juliet be with Romeo again. While Juliet debates to take the potion she decides,”Romeo, Romeo, Romeo! Here’s drink. I drink to thee.” (IV.III.58)This is when Juliet decides to take the sleeping potion despite wondering if it will be poison and she sees it as the only way to see Romeo again. Juliet is then put in the family tomb and Romeo finds out she is “dead”. Friar John returns and Friar Lawrence says this of him not delivering the letter,”Unhappy fortune! By my brotherhood, The letter was not nice but full of charge, Of

Benvolio says,”He heareth not, he stirreth not, he moveth not. The ape is dead, and I must conjure him.— I conjure thee by Rosaline’s bright eyes, By her high forehead and her scarlet lip, By her fine foot, straight leg, and quivering thigh,And the demesnes that there adjacent lie, That in thy likeness thou appear to us.” (II.I.15-21) In this part of the play Benvolio has no idea what Romeo is doing and that he has forgotten completely about Rosaline. While Benvolio says this Romeo is in the gardens of his new lover Juliet, which nobody knows he loves other than the readers. Shakespeare does this because he makes it lead into a story where they have to hide their marriage and they are just bound for something to happen because you can’t hide a marriage forever. Also, if Shakespeare would make it to where Romeo told them, then he would have been killed by Lord Capulet or he would have forbidden Juliet from seeing Romeo and they would no longer see each other and it wouldn’t be a play someone would want to go