Discussion Topic
Dramatic irony in Juliet's meeting with Paris in Friar Laurence's cell
Summary:
The dramatic irony in Juliet's meeting with Paris in Friar Laurence's cell lies in the fact that Paris is unaware of Juliet's secret marriage to Romeo. While Paris speaks of their impending wedding and future together, Juliet's responses are double-edged and filled with hidden meaning, understood only by the audience and herself, highlighting her true feelings and situation.
What elements of dramatic irony are in Friar Lawrence and Paris' conversation in Romeo and Juliet, Act 4, Scene 1?
Dramatic irony refers to a kind of irony by which the audience possesses knowledge of which the characters are unaware. You can definitely see dramatic irony in this conversation that opens act 4, scene 1.
Remember, Romeo and Juliet follows a romance between its two main characters, whose families are feuding with each other. The two are married by Friar Laurence, though their marriage is kept a secret. The situation quickly deteriorates, however, when Romeo kills Tybalt, Juliet's cousin, and is banished from Verona. Meanwhile, Juliet finds herself under pressure to marry Paris.
As act 4, scene 1 begins, we observe Paris speaking with the Friar about his marriage with Juliet. Indeed, when Juliet later enters the scene, he greets her as his "wife." When he speaks on the subject of Juliet's grief, he assumes (like the rest of her family) that her grief is on account...
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of Tybalt's death. This is actually why such a quick marriage is being pushed on Juliet: as Paris himself says, her father believes that marrying Paris will "stop the inundation of her tears."
What neither Paris nor Juliet's family is aware of, though Juliet and Friar Laurence understand it quite well, is that Juliet is already married to Romeo. With this in mind, she does not want to marry to Paris (in fact, her grief is actually on account of her forced separation from Romeo), and furthermore, when viewed from a religious perspective, she cannot marry Paris. Remember, marriage is treated within the Church as a holy sacrament, and that commitment remains in force, regardless of Romeo's banishment. It is in this that we can see the dramatic irony of the scene: the audience knows the truth of Juliet's grief and of her secret marriage with Romeo, even as Paris remains unaware, and is acting out of a very different set of assumptions.
After Paris departs, we observe Juliet threatening to commit suicide rather than marry Paris. It is here that Friar Laurence tells Juliet his plan to fake her death, and reunite her with her husband.
How does Juliet's meeting with Paris in Friar Lawrence's cell illustrate dramatic irony?
When Juliet runs into her intended husband, Count Paris, in Friar Lawrence's cell, Paris believes that she has come to "make confession" and be absolved before she marries him. Little does he know that she has actually come to the Friar's cell out of desperation, uncertain what to do now that she is secretly married to Romeo Montague, a fact unknown to any but the Friar, and is being forced to marry Paris. She is ready to kill herself, committing what would be, for them, another sin, not to be absolved of any she has already committed so that she can be a pure bride. Paris has no idea. He even tells her, "Do not deny to him that you love me." He believes, then, that Juliet does love him, not knowing that she does not love him at all but, rather, that she loves Romeo, her true husband. When Paris remarks on her face which is "much abused with tears," he believes they are for her slain cousin, Tybalt, but they are actually for her banished husband. Moreover, he tells her that her "face is [his]" because he will soon be her husband, and she agrees that her face is "not [her] own." However, she means that it belongs to Romeo, not Paris. All of these constitute examples of dramatic irony because Paris is unaware of so much!