Juliet’s Character is Dynamic
Abstract
This is an essay about the play, Romeo and Juliet; the essay will prove using examples from the play that the character of Juliet is a dynamic character.
In the play, “Romeo and Juliet,” Juliet’s Character is Dynamic
There is only one other Shakespeare’s play, “Hamlet,” that matches “Romeo and Juliet” in filming and popularity. In the first two acts of the play, “Romeo and Juliet,” it seems as if the play is a comedy; but the play changes momentum in act three, it begins to exhibit characteristics of a romantic tragedy. Whether or not this is deliberately done is left to speculation, as is typical of Shakespeare, his audience can only guess his intentions. The play is about two feuding families whose son and daughter fall in love. These children defy all social norms to perpetuate their love; eventually they commit suicide and what they could not accomplish alive they achieve in death; they ended the family feud between their families. Juliet, one half of the couple, is a character to reckon with; the play begins with her on the threshold of womanhood and ends with her as a fully matured woman who is willing to die for the sake of love.
Some practices that children in the western, developed world would laugh at as being uncivilized is the way of life for other ethnic groups. One such practice is parents arranging their children’s marriages, and it is expected that the children will agree, any form of defiance by either party could be detrimental, it might even result in death. In Shakespeare’s time traditions were held dear; this is the predicament that faces Juliet, her mother could not even decide her age, her mother thinks she is fourteen and her nurse thinks she is twelve, yet, she knows it is time for her to get married. Telling Juliet about Paris is only a formality because her mother expects her to abide by her wishes and marry Paris. Juliet is introduced in the play as an innocent young girl whose thoughts are not about marriage. “It is an honour [sic] that I dream not of” (Act I, Scene III). At her mother’s urging, Juliet promises that she will look at Paris but she will not promise to like him. “I'll look to like, if looking liking move:/
But no more deep will I endart mine eye” (Act I Scene III). The next time Juliet is seen she has matured beyond her years and not only is she thinking of marriage, she is smitten with Romeo, so much so that she is brave enough to tell her nurse to find out if he is married. Judging by the way the play progresses, it is safe to say that Juliet would have behaved no differently if she knew who Romeo is from the onset. Juliet’s first encounter with love is violent as much as it is tragic.
Juliet’s maturity is sudden and one asks the question, did falling in love mature Juliet or did she mature before falling in love? This is not an easy question to answer, nonetheless it is clear that she has become intelligent beyond her years; finding out that Romeo is a Montague has made her bold and she reasons like an old sage.
'Tis but thy name that is my enemy;/ Thou art thyself, though not a Montague./ What's Montague? it is nor hand, nor foot,/ Nor arm, nor face, nor any other part/ Belonging to a man. O, be some other name!/ What's in a name? that which we call a rose/ By any other name would smell as sweet;
As Juliet maturity continues we see her do the unthinkable, in an age when a woman’s survival depends on either her husband or father, and threaten with expulsion from the only home she has ever known, she marries Romeo. When Romeo kills Tybalt she is expected to put her family before her husband; but then she reasons; “My husband lives, that Tybalt would have slain;/ And Tybalt's dead, that would have slain my husband:/ All this is comfort; wherefore weep I then?” (Act 3. Scene 2.109-11). Juliet does what most modern woman would do, stand by the side of her husband. The fight between Tybalt and Romeo is a feud and her husband could have been the looser.
“Romeo and Juliet” is one of Shakespeare’s greatest romantic tragedies and even though it may have started as a comedy, it bears the traits of Shakespeare’s writing. When the play comes to an end there is a lesson to be learned; the Couplets and the Montagues hold on to a tradition whose beginning they cannot account for, yet, it cost them their children.
