Shakespeare Romeo And Juliet Tragedy Elements
1- Contrast
Foil Character: Romeo / Mercutio I I Impulsive / Mocks Romeo In terms of his vision of love.
Tragic Hero: (Underscored throughout the play) (Must have a tragic flaw)
Romeo is a tragic hero because his tragic flaw is that he is impulsive.
C) FATE
Darkness / Lightness
Rosaline: Moon
Juliet: Sun
Willpower is important. Fate is different from Shakespearean tragedy. Fate is important but willpower of human beings is underestimated. Willpower of the characters is important because they decide what to do.
Star-crossed lovers: they are cursed by the fate. They know each other by coincidence.
Example:
“Major Role: Fate” Tybalt dies, Juliet is in pain. Lord Capulet wants Juliet to be happy instead of sad. He takes the wedding date to an earlier date. If Tybalt hadn’t died, probably this wouldn’t have happened.
Before crashing the party, Romeo speaks of feeling an unknown danger ahead.
Friar Laurence warns Romeo that “Impulsive people have negative consequences”. “Pre-determined fate”.
Romeo kills himself because he didn’t get the news (Plague) about Juliet’s fake death, and thinks she is really dead.
Romeo finds a poor man who sells him poison only because of poverty. If the apothecary wasn’t in desperate need of money, he would not have sold him the poison.
At the feast, the servant who is gathering the invited people, is illiterate, therefore Romeo and Benvolio.
D) Conflict: Between Montegue and Capulet (the warring families)
Between the hero and the society.
Emotional love is popular in the era. Courtly love is what father desires.
Romeo conflicts with conventions of the society.
There is also a conflict within the hero. Romeo is a slippery man. (Rosaline or Juliet which one should he choose?) Crashing the party. There is a conflict!
Between values and notions / traditions.
E) Nemesis (Poetic Justice)
“Fair Verona” => No crime will remain unpunished. No good will remain
Foil Character: Romeo / Mercutio I I Impulsive / Mocks Romeo In terms of his vision of love.
Tragic Hero: (Underscored throughout the play) (Must have a tragic flaw)
Romeo is a tragic hero because his tragic flaw is that he is impulsive.
C) FATE
Darkness / Lightness
Rosaline: Moon
Juliet: Sun
Willpower is important. Fate is different from Shakespearean tragedy. Fate is important but willpower of human beings is underestimated. Willpower of the characters is important because they decide what to do.
Star-crossed lovers: they are cursed by the fate. They know each other by coincidence.
Example:
“Major Role: Fate” Tybalt dies, Juliet is in pain. Lord Capulet wants Juliet to be happy instead of sad. He takes the wedding date to an earlier date. If Tybalt hadn’t died, probably this wouldn’t have happened.
Before crashing the party, Romeo speaks of feeling an unknown danger ahead.
Friar Laurence warns Romeo that “Impulsive people have negative consequences”. “Pre-determined fate”.
Romeo kills himself because he didn’t get the news (Plague) about Juliet’s fake death, and thinks she is really dead.
Romeo finds a poor man who sells him poison only because of poverty. If the apothecary wasn’t in desperate need of money, he would not have sold him the poison.
At the feast, the servant who is gathering the invited people, is illiterate, therefore Romeo and Benvolio.
D) Conflict: Between Montegue and Capulet (the warring families)
Between the hero and the society.
Emotional love is popular in the era. Courtly love is what father desires.
Romeo conflicts with conventions of the society.
There is also a conflict within the hero. Romeo is a slippery man. (Rosaline or Juliet which one should he choose?) Crashing the party. There is a conflict!
Between values and notions / traditions.
E) Nemesis (Poetic Justice)
“Fair Verona” => No crime will remain unpunished. No good will remain