Act One "Romeo And Juliet" by Shakespeare

The following academic paper highlights the up-to-date issues and questions of Act One Scene Two Romeo And Juliet. This sample provides just some ideas on how this topic can be analyzed and discussed.

Look closely at setting, style and characterization. You should also consider the difference between an Elizabethan and Modern audience’s interpretation of the scenesIn Act 1 Scene 5 it is the Capulet’s ball and Romeo who is from the house of Montague enters. It is on this festive night that Romeo first catches sight of Juliet and falls in love with her beauty.

Tybalt a Capulet (Juliet’s cousin), realizes that Romeo is a Montague and becomes very angry at this intrusion. Romeo flirts with Juliet and they kiss. Both Romeo and Juliet start to like each other but find out whom each other are, they find out they are from opposite families who are enemies.

In Act 2 Scene 2 Romeo visits the Capulet house in secret to see Juliet again.

He finds her on the balcony talking to herself. She is unaware that he is standing there watching her talk about her love for him and she even starts to talk about all the problems that loving him causes because of the two families conflicts. Romeo then answers to this and also declares his love for her. They then decide they should marry and Juliet would send a messenger to Romeo to find a time and pace for their marriage to take place. From the beginning when Romeo enters ‘the enemy’ Capulets banquet, Romeo’s life changes.

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In Act 1 Scene 5 as you read you can see how Tybalt’s anger builds up; it shows his bitterness towards Romeo. Capulet manages to stop him from fighting Romeo at his ball so he can have a peace and enjoyable evening.

From the way tybalt and Capulet are reacting you can tell here that old Capulet wants peace whereas the new generation wanted to carry on with the feud. When Romeo and Juliet are flirting with each other in this scene they use religious imagery such as “ay pilgrim lips that they must use in prayer”. This quote shows how Juliet uses religious imagery back to Romeo; this is a sense of premonition when Romeo realizes that Juliet is a Capulet in scene 5. Also, there is a contrast of love and hate at the end of scene 5. As well as this, there is irony in the feud that she does die tragically. This is all shown at the end of act 1 scene 5.These two scenes both consist of Romeo and Juliet showing and expressing their feelings for one another.

But both these scenes are also very different because act 1 scene 5 is in more of a public place because it is at the ball whereas act 2 scene 2 is in a more secretive place, where Juliet is on her balcony and Romeo is in the Capulet’s garden looking up at her this makes it more romantic and passionate for them. Their feelings start to become more intense whilst they are alone together.However, in contrast to this, the settings are also similar as they are both hostile towards Romeo and in both scenes Juliet is the dominant one, we know this because she is telling him what to do and leading him to what to say to her.

For example, in Act 2 Scene 2 she tells him to ask her hand in marriage. You can also tell in both scenes that they feel really comfortable with each other because they speak in sonnets and poetry to show that their love just comes naturally. There is a lot of sexual tension in both scenes and you can tell as an audience that these two people feel very passionate about each other.There is uses of light imagery throughout the two scenes where Romeo goes to the different settings, which are both very aggressive towards him because of him being a Montague. In the ball scene there is light even though Tybalt does not like that he is there.

The light is representing that they are in an open public area so they cannot do anything because they are not alone; when Romeo and Juliet do get a chance on their own it is a dark place to show that they are not allowed to be together because of the family feud.The use of light imagery is also used when Romeo is talking about Juliet and how she is better then the sun, he flatters her at every giving opportunity which shows audiences what kind of loving caring person he is. Traditionally light is considered to be “good” because it allows us to perceive the world around us and to work within it; in contrast to the dark is considered to be “evil” which is the complete opposite to light. But in Romeo and Juliet the light and dark imagery roles are reversed as in a way daytime becomes evil and nighttime becomes good as it aids Romeo and Juliet.

In Act 2 Scene 2 Romeo refers to Juliet as being better then both the sun and the moon. Romeo, seeing Juliet at her window, compares her to the sun and light that brightens his dark world. He had previously compared Rosaline to the moon. His love for Juliet has risen and killed the feelings he had for Rosaline. During act 1 scene 5 they both use religious references in the sonnet that they share together, they use it to describe each other in a sexual way. There is a lot of sexual tension in the sonnet that they share together because all they do is compliment each other and talk about how attractive and beautiful they are to each other.

It is seen that these two people are very much attracted to one another in each other’s physical appearances.To conclude it is obvious that there are both differences and similarities in both scenes. There is sexual tension between Romeo and Juliet even when they first met which carried on, we can tell it is love at first site because Romeo does not take his eyes of Juliet and vice-versa. I think that throughout the scenes Romeo and Juliet both seem to change a little, as they are being more affectionate towards one another. I think they both feel love for each other and do not care about the family names. I think fate plays a very big part in this because if Rosaline had not of left Romeo he would not have gone to the Capulets celebration and therefore would not of seen Juliet.