Romeo and Juliet Group

Question:

john17
john17
Student
High School - 11th Grade

What effect has Shakespeare created by referring so often to the notion of time in "Romeo and Juliet" ActIII Sc.4 ?

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Posted by john17 on Saturday June 20, 2009 at 5:56 AM and tagged with haste, lord capulet, paris, time, urgency.

Answers:

  1. lit24
    lit24 Teacher
    Doctorate

    eNotes Editor

    In Act III Sc.1, Romeo kills Tybalt and consequently he is banished. In Act III Sc.4 Lord Capulet on an impulse informs Paris that Juliet will be married to him on the following Thursday:

    "O' Thursday let it be: o' Thursday, tell her,
    She shall be married to this noble earl."

    This scene is taking place late in the night and Paris and Lord and Lady Capulet are tired and would like to go to bed soon: "I (Capulet) would have been a-bed an hour ago." The various references to time by Shakespeare in this scene create an air of urgency and haste: Lord Capulet realises that things have gone out of control and that it is better that Juliet gets married to Paris without any further delay. This same urgency is echoed in Paris' eagerness to be united with Romeo at the earliest: "I would that Thursday were to-morrow."

    Lord Capulet ends the conversation and the scene in the same impulsive manner and haste with which he had decided that Juliet must get married to Paris:

    "Well get you gone: o' Thursday be it, then.
    Go you to Juliet ere you go to bed,
    Prepare her, wife, against this wedding-day.
    Farewell, my lord. Light to my chamber, ho!
    Afore me! it is so very very late,
    That we may call it early by and by.
    Good night."

    Sources:
    http://www.enotes.com/romeo-and-juliet/character-analysis
    http://www.enotes.com/romeo-and-juliet/criticism
    http://www.enotes.com/romeo-and-juliet/essays

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    Posted by lit24 on Sunday June 21, 2009 at 6:27 AM