Juliet

• who is Juliet?


  member of the Capulet family, only daughter in the Capulet family,13 years old
• what is her role in the story?

  She is a protagonist

  Her relationship with Romeo drives the play forward

  She matures over the course of the play
• What does she represent?

  The tension between societal expectations and personal desire
• "My child is yet a stranger in the world, She hath not seen the change of 14 years" -Capulet on lines 8-9

  • treated as her fathers property ( an attitude typical in Elizabethan England)
  • She is presented as Naive because she has no worldly knowledge
• "Then have my lips the sin that they have took" - Juliet line 119

  • Her innocence and obedience begin to decrease
  • She orders him to kiss her again, using an imperative sentence
  • This may have shocked Shakespeare's audience
• "What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other word would smell as sweet" - Juliet

  • Presented as insightful as she knows the family feud is pointless
  • This knowledge is shown because she asserts that names don't really matter
  • She also uses hypophora
• "O, swear not by the moon, th' inconstant moon" -Juliet

  • Presented as pragmatic
  • Juliet is frustrated by Romeo's poetic language
  • This suggests that Juliet is more used to love in 'courly' terms
  • Could also suggest that she is the more dominant in the relationship
• "Beautiful tyrant, fiend angelical! Dove-feathered raven, wolvish-ravening lamb!" - Juliet
• " Beautiful tyrant, fiend angelical! Dove-feathered raven , wolvish-ravening lamb!" - Juliet

  • Shows that she is conflicted
  • Does not know who to chose : Family or Husband
  • She uses oxymorons to create this impression
• "I will not marry yet" - Juliet

  • She rejects her family
  • The modal verb "will" and negation "not" makes this clear
  • This may have shocked Shakespeare's audience
• "O, happy dagger, This is my sheath. There rust, and let me die." - Juliet

  • She is fully committed to Romeo which has driven her to desperation
  • These lines also imply that Juliet has matured, given the sexual connotations