Context

• Gender-

  • Women seen lesser than men
  • Women were deformed men
  • Women seen as property
  • Seen as sexual objects
• Shakespeare set his play in a foreign land in Verona permitted him to critique society and monarchy without being accused of treason
• • Friar Lawrence in the play would have been viewed as suspicious or a untrustworthy character
  • As people in Elizabethan society were mainly protestant and they viewed Catholicism for its apparent corruption and excess of passion
  • You would even be sent to prison if you were catholic
• • Religion was central in Elizabethan life
  • The play however contained a lot of sins
  • Suicides
  • Juliet's refusal to obey her father (contravention of 10 commandments)
  • Young couple seen to embody pride, lust and perhaps greed
• Superstition was central around Elizabethan society, most believed that some greater force would or already has controlled their destiny
• Violence the fights in the play would have been unthinkable as the state employed violence

  Hangings and burnings all form of central part of entertainment in Elizabethan society