Juliet Flashcards
(9 cards)
- Learns Romeo is a Montague (A1S5)
“My only love sprung from my only hate! Too early seen unknown, and known too late!”
• What: Conflict between love & family hatred
• How:
• Antithesis (“love”/“hate”) = tension between emotion & loyalty
• Repetition of “only” → isolation; love is rare, tragic
• Foreshadowing → “too late” = inevitable tragic timing
• Monosyllables → finality, blunt realisation
• Why: Emphasises destructive nature of inherited conflict → love born from hate = doomed
- Balcony scene – questions his name (A2S2)
“O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo?”
• What: Regret that he is her enemy by name
• How:
• Anaphora of “Romeo” = obsessive fixation, despair
• Rhetorical question → not asking where he is, but why he is who he is
• Metonymy of “name” = identity shaped by society, not self
• Disruption of iambic pentameter → shows emotional turbulence
• Why: Love challenges societal structures → Juliet caught between desire & inherited duty
- Balcony scene – contemplates rejecting family (A2S2)
“Deny thy father and refuse thy name; … And I’ll no longer be a Capulet.”
• What: Offers to abandon identity for love
• How:
• Imperatives (“deny”, “refuse”) = bold defiance of patriarchy
• Conditional structure → control shared, mutual sacrifice
• Crescendo of rebellion → building tension in line delivery
• Why: Highlights conflict between personal desire & social identity → Juliet transcends expectations
- About to marry Romeo in secret (A2S6)
“But my true love is grown to such excess I cannot sum up half my wealth.”
• What: Describes love as overwhelming and immeasurable
• How:
• Metaphor of “wealth” = love as emotional capital
• Hyperbolic diction → romantic idealism
• Semantic field of abundance → boundless, limitless affection
• Why: Suggests that emotional excess can lead to tragedy → love as destabilising force
- Responding to Romeo’s banishment (A3S2)
“O serpent heart, hid with a flowering face!”
• What: Feels betrayed by Romeo after Tybalt’s death
• How:
• Metaphor → beauty masking cruelty = appearance vs reality
• Zoomorphism (“serpent”) = biblical allusion to temptation/deception
• Exclamative tone = emotional eruption, betrayal
• Why: Love’s purity tainted by violence → shows collapse of idealism
- Rejecting Paris and choosing death (A4S1)
“If in thy wisdom thou canst give no help, / Do thou but call my resolution wise, / And with this knife I’ll help it presently.”
• What: Threatens suicide if forced to marry Paris
• How:
• Weapon = symbol of agency → knife as tool of control
• Alliteration (“with…wisdom…wise”) = pressure on Friar’s judgement
• Balanced syntax → false calmness over explosive emotion
• Why: Shows active resistance to patriarchal coercion → reclaiming autonomy
- About to drink potion (A4S3)
“What if this mixture do not work at all? Shall I be married then tomorrow morning?”
• What: Anxiety before taking drastic action
• How:
• Series of rhetorical questions = frantic thought spiral
• Monosyllabic phrasing = blunt reality of consequences
• Disjointed metre → psychological instability
• Why: Highlights depth of fear and desperation → vulnerability before illusion of control
• Themes: fate, gender, time, individuals vs society
- Wakes to find Romeo dead (A5S3)
“O churl! Drunk all, and left no friendly drop / To help me after?”
• What: Angry that Romeo didn’t leave poison for her
• How:
• Juxtaposition of “friendly” and “poison” = death romanticised
• Exclamative tone = blends grief, anger, love
• Direct address = intimacy even in betrayal
• Irony: calls Romeo selfish, yet intends same end
• Why: Emotional complexity of grief → Juliet still sees love as shared fate
• Themes: love/relationships, death, fate, youth
- Final line before suicide (A5S3)
“O happy dagger! This is thy sheath: there rust, and let me die.”
• What: Welcomes death, sees body as vessel for weapon
• How:
• Oxymoron (“happy dagger”) = joy in death = love/fate convergence
• Metaphor (“sheath”) → erotic undertone, weapon = masculine force
• Imperatives → full control of destiny
• Sibilance → soft, almost peaceful ending
• Why: Love, sex, and death merge → Juliet’s final act is autonomous, tragic, poetic
• Themes: death, love/relationships, fate, gender
