Romeo And Juliet Compare And Contrast Essay

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Romeo and Juliet Compare and contrast the characters of Romeo and Juliet. How do they develop throughout the play? What makes them fall in love with one another? Romeo and Juliet is a timeless play of love and tragedy. It is about fate that brought the two lovers together only to die a tragic death. The characters, Romeo and Juliet, contrast dramatically as they develop throughout the play. Romeo is a passionate, excitable, intelligent and moody young man, well-liked and admired throughout Verona. He is fiercely loyal to his friends, but his behaviour is somewhat unpredictable. In the beginning of the play, he is upset over his unrequited love for Rosaline. In Act 1 scene 1 Romeo talks to Benvolio his best friend about the girl who…show more content…
At the start of Act 1 Scene 5, we can see the difference in his love for his Rosaline and his dear ‘Juliet’. We can see the difference in, when instead of calling Juliet ‘beautiful’ he refers to her as a ‘holy shrine’ which is a religious object, In the 14th century this would have been a very big praise as they were very religious people. We can see that he is instantly smitten with Juliet in the way that he asks, ‘Did my heart love until now?’ when he sees Juliet at the ball, showing that he never really loved before. He then declares his undying loyalty to her when he tells Juliet that, ‘…call me but love, and I’ll be new baptised…’ which is another religious reference. In Juliet, Romeo finds a legitimate object for the extraordinary passion that he is capable of feeling, and his unyielding love for her takes control of…show more content…
We know this because Juliet says that ‘all my fortunes at thy foot I’ll lay’, we can see clearly her devotion to her love, Romeo. Another way her character is similar to Romeo is in the way that she is brave, Romeo puts his life on the line for her whereas Juliet says ‘tell me not to fear’, and is quick to commit suicide saying ‘I’ll be brief’ she wants to do this so that she doesn’t break her loyalty to Romeo. This makes the audience sympathise with Juliet and her ever increasing problems, but also they are glad as she changes to be more brave as ‘fate’ had brought Romeo and Juliet together and they want them to be together because of this. In a way Juliet’s character does somewhat have a large change, at the start of the play when her mother asks her about marriage she replies that ‘it is an honour that I dream not of.’ But when she marries Romeo , Juliet matures beyond her fourteen years and immediately assumes the responsibilities of a wife. She gives up her dependency on the nurse and risks pain and death to remain loyal to Romeo. In the last scene, Act 5, Scene 3, (the death scene) we see strong emotions coming from both Romeo and Juliet. Juliet feels courage, anxiety, resolute and scared. Whereas Romeo has strong feelings of sadness, anger, determination and
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