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   ms-charleston-yawp Teacher
   High School - 11th Grade

   eNotes Editor

   Being a true romantic lover, Romeo uses fine figurative language to compare Juliet to a jewel, a dove, and even a shrine.  First, Romeo uses simile when he says, "It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night / Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear."  Juliet, then, is therefore beautiful as well as high-class.  Second, Romeo uses simile again when he says, "So shows a snowy dove tropping with crows / As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows."  I suppose that Paris is the main crow here, which makes me laugh.  Juliet, of course, is the dove:  beautiful, pure, white, and heavenly.  Finally, it isn't until Romeo actually speaks to Juliet that he approaches metaphor:  "If I profane with my unworthiest hand  / This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this: / My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand / To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss."  Now Romeo approaches the spiritual using metaphor in calling Juliet an actual "shrine."  Juliet, then, is more than just heavenly, now she is holy.  It is this last comparison that approaches the answer to your second question in that Romeo's actual first conversation with Juliet is largely a metaphor of religious pilgrims going to a holy shrine to pay homage:  so does Romeo pay homage to Juliet.  Romeo reveals, then, that his feelings are not merely physical, but spiritual as well.

   Sources:

   http://www.enotes.com/romeo/act-scenes-3-5-summary-analysis

   http://www.enotes.com/romeo/romeo-character-analysis

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   Posted by ms-charleston-yawp on Saturday March 7, 2009 at 9:28 PM