Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet cover

Resources

  1. 01Quick overview2 min read
  2. 02Summary26 scenes
    • Prologue
    • Act 1
    • Act 2
    • Act 3
    • Act 4
    • Act 5
    • Structure
  3. 03Themes444 min read
    • Love
    • Gender and honour
    • Youth and impulsiveness
    • Fate
    • Conflict
    • Family and authority
    • Death and time
  4. 04Characters55 min read
    • Juliet
    • Romeo
    • Capulet
    • Friar Lawrence
    • Nurse
    • Mercutio
    • Lady Capulet
    • Tybalt
    • Prince
    • Chorus
    • Montague and Lady Montague
    • Paris
    • Benvolio
    • Sampson and Gregory
  5. 05Key quotes41 quotes
  6. 06Key extracts17 min read
    • Extract 1: Act 1, Scene 1: Romeo tells Benvolio what love feels like
    • Extract 2: Act 1, Scene 5: Romeo sees Juliet, and Tybalt knows his voice
    • Extract 3: Act 3, Scene 5: The Nurse tells Juliet to marry Paris
    • Extract 4: Act 5, Scene 3: Juliet wakes in the tomb
  7. 07Stylistic features14 methods
    • From naming to analysing
    • Turn methods into marks
    • Start from your extract
    • Who hears a line decides what it means
    • Opposites meet and trade places
    • Commands, questions and names show who holds power
    • Sonnets frame the love story, and the lovers share the form
    • The play turns at its middle, then races
    • Rhyme and prose show whose world a speaker is in
    • Subject terminology

Key quotes

A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life

Chorus

Prologue · Fate · Death and time

Dramatic irony

My only love sprung from my only hate!

Juliet

Act 1, Scene 5 · Love · Conflict

Paradox

It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden, / Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be

Juliet

Act 2, Scene 2 · Youth and impulsiveness · Love

An you be mine, I'll give you to my friend. / An you be not, hang, beg, starve, die in the streets

Capulet

Act 3, Scene 5 · Family and authority · Gender and honour

Beautiful tyrant, fiend angelical!

Juliet

Act 3, Scene 2 · Love · Gender and honour

Echo

These violent delights have violent ends

Friar Lawrence

Act 2, Scene 6 · Youth and impulsiveness · Love

Sententia
All 41 quotes