Analyse the significance of passion Essay

In the tragedy Romeo and Juliet there are many forms to passion; these references are made in a variety of ways, ranging from parental passion to the classic loving passion shared between two people. But there is an underlying hint right from the very start that there is an inevitable notion that this love will never happen because of the family feud. At the very start of the book, the chorus introduces the heated feud between the Montague and Capulet households. This feud has spanned a long time and is an ‘ancient grudge’ that has continued throughout the family, from the parents to the children and even into the servants of the households. The word ‘two’ is used, frequently, not just to refer to Romeo and Juliet but to show the obstacles they face to show the opposites as rivals and not just families. We see rivalry induced by the feud where servants from the two houses meet in the town of Verona. When Sampson and Gregory, servants of the Capulet household meet and clash with Abram and Balthasar, of the Montague household, the rivalry is shown from the outset, ‘ My naked weapon is out. Quarrel, I will back thee’. This is in the first meeting of the servants, where Sampson explains he will back Gregory if he happens to get into a fight, and surely enough, they do get into a fight, household against household which is then broken up by Benvolio, ‘Put up your swords, you know what to do’. When he says this, it brings the realisation that they are in public, but the hot headed Tybalt does not agree and wants to fight. He says, ‘Peace? I hate the word’ and they fight again. This is only then broken up by the officers, and Prince, even though the heads of the families arrive and actually want to fight each other themselves! ‘Give me my long sword, ho! ‘ this is Capulet speaking to his wife, asking for his sword, but this is then stopped by Prince Escales. This starts the notions of the tragic end; it brings them together but also leads them to their deaths. We first meet Romeo, ‘moping’ around feeling sorry for himself, and isolating himself. He is a typical petrachan lover solipsistic, which means feeling sorry for himself and being self absorbed speaking in complex language, using oxy morons , like ‘feather of lead. ‘ obviously an opposite as feathers are very light and not heavy. ‘Cold fire’ and of course fire is not cold! These are used to emphasise Romeo’s feelings at this present time, he is feeling quite confused and discarded because his love is not reciprocated by Rosaline, but he is making sure he feels it and everyone else knows about it. Shakespeare uses a play on words, a translingual pun, when Benvolio uses Romeo walking underneath the sycamore grove. ‘ At first glance this doesn’t look very significant at all but if we read between the lines we find it is a very clever pun, which is used to emphasise Romeo’s feelings. â€Å"Syc†, or ‘sick’ is used to describe his ill state of emotional health, while ‘amour’ is the French word for love, so sycamore, literally means sick of love, and as he feels physically sick as a result of his un-returned love. This is quite ironic as the love is not returned, as he is never going to get her but he thinks that he is and hopes and prays that she will love him back but unfortunately this is never going to happen. On Romeo and Julie’s first meeting there is a lot of passion felt and shown, When Romeo sees Juliet for the first time, he is astounded and taken aback by her beauty, he sees Juliet ‘as a rich jewel in an Ethiop’s ear’ and he is stunned by her. Their first exchange is filled with religious imagery, Romeo initiates it and Juliet immediately responds to Romeo positively, ‘That I must love a loathed enemy’ this is further on in the passage, after Juliet finds out Romeo is from a different family, but she still shows how she likes him and still wants to see him even though the family feud could, and does get them in a lot of trouble. Juliet is reminding herself that she needs to be a lady but still stays very coy and subtly flirtatious, ‘Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer’. This is when Romeo tries to kiss her and she says this as an attempt to warn him off, and he, as expected, does not take to this and carries on trying to kiss her, and she, quite taken aback by this obliges, and once again remembers she has to be a lady, but as expected succumbs to another kiss from him and has really let her guard down. But she is reminded again to be a lady, by the nurse, as Juliet has to go and meet her mother and speak with her. Romeo realises this love is real later on when they meet again in the evening and he hears her speaking and the famous balcony scene on which he listens to her waiting for him to arrive. The parents of Romeo and Juliet show a lot of passionate emotions and feelings for their children and in the Capulet’s case, for their nephew , Tybalt, the passion is clearly when Tybalt is slain by Romeo. The love and passion that lady Capulet shows for him, by calling for ‘Romeo’s blood’, ‘Romeo must not live’ and is very passionate about the killing of their nephew. The Montague household shows a lot of care for Romeo in one of the only instances we see the Montague’s, when Romeo is in exile, he talks about ‘writing as letter to his father’ which shows a lot of care for them, Juliet’s parents, however are only there to make her marry Paris so they can gain most of the benefit out of it. Instead of making their daughter happy. In contrast, it seems that the Montague parents love their son as the father son bond is strong, whereas the father – daughter or mother – daughter bond in the Capulet household is very weak as the parents do not seem like they want what’s best for their daughter. ‘How, will she none? Doth she not give us thanks? Is she not proud? Doth she not count her blest’ this is the point at which Juliet spells out that she does not want to marry Paris and her parents are very upset, even offended by this and cannot understand why she would not like to make them happy. But there is clearly love shown by both of the sets of parents at the deaths of Romeo and Juliet, ‘and it is mis-sheathed in my daughter’s bosom’ this is when they first see her in the tomb of the Capulet’s and they are distraught at the sight of seeing their own flesh and blood lying dead by her own sword. The prologue and the ‘chorus’ play a huge part in helping the audience understand and foreshadow the tragic events in the play, ‘star cross’d lovers’ it is set out from the start that something is going to go wrong, there are many mentions of fate in the chorus, that the play is always going to end in death for our two heroines and that the marriage could never have worked because something, fate, was always working against them because of this terrible feud that has lasted throughout the family histories. The nurse and the friar play huge parts in the lives of the two children, they make the whole marriage happen by organising everything and help Juliet to get away from her parents, when the friar suggests drinking the vial of fluid that has the potion to make it look as if Juliet is dead and so she would be buried, but unfortunately fate was working against them once again as the letter the friar wrote to Romeo never made it to him so Romeo ended up killing himself because he saw his bride lying ‘dead’ before him. The nurse has been a ‘wet nurse’ to Juliet for as long as Juliet has been alive and she is much closer to Juliet, we know this because Juliet is much less formal when she is around the nurse but very formal around her mother by using ‘thou’ and ‘you’ to indicate formality. Unfortunately in this Tragedy Romeo and Juliet even though they had much help getting together, it is underlined by the curse at the start that because of the family feud it will never last and was always going to end in tragedy.