..............O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
..............It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night 
..............Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope's¹ ear; 
..............Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear! (1. 5. 41-44)

.......Tybalt, Lord Capulet's nephew, recognizes Romeo's voice and threatens violence, asking a boy to bring him his rapier. But Lord Capulet, not wishing to ruin the party, steps in to keep the peace, noting that Romeo is behaving in a gentlemanly manner. 
Juliet, meanwhile, has noticed Romeo–and fallen deeply in love. She and Romeo exchange beautiful words that seal their love. 

..............ROMEO   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. 
..............JULIET  Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,
..............Which mannerly devotion shows in this;
..............For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,
..............And palm to palm is holy palmers'² kiss. (1. 5. 93-100) 

.......Later that night, Romeo climbs the wall behind the Capulet house and enters an orchard on the Capulet property. Benvolio and Mercutio, following behind, call out for him, but Romeo does not respond. Mercutio, sensing that Romeo's sudden obsession with Juliet will go amiss, says: "If love be blind, love cannot hit the mark" (2. 1. 38). His words foreshadow the tragic events that follow. When Juliet appears alone at a window overlooking the Capulet orchard, Romeo, observing her from below, says: 

..............But, soft³! what light through yonder window breaks? 
..............It is the east, and Juliet is the sun. 
..............Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, 
..............Who is already sick and pale with grief, 
..............That thou her maid art far more fair than she. (2. 2. 4-8)

Juliet then unburdens the weight of her thoughts: 

..............O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore⁴ art thou Romeo?
..............Deny thy father and refuse thy name; 
..............Or, if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love, 
..............And I'll no longer be a Capulet. (2. 2. 37-40)

.......After Romeo announces himself to her, they vow undying love. Romeo visits a priest, Friar Laurence, the next day to tell him of his love for Juliet, and the good Franciscan approves of the relationship, believing it will be the key to ending the Montague-Capulet feud. Later, Juliet sends her nurse to Romeo to sound him out on his intentions, and he tells her that Juliet should come to Friar Laurence's cell to confess her sins, then marry Romeo. After the nurse reports back to Juliet, all goes according to plan, and Romeo and Juliet become husband and wife, although they make no public announcement of their marriage.
.......On his way back from the wedding, Romeo encounters his friend Mercutio quarreling with Tybalt. Romeo tries to pacify them, to no avail, and Tybalt mortally wounds Mercutio. Mercutio–who understands the stupidity and folly of the Montague-Capulet feud–curses the two families, saying, "A plague o' [on] both your houses!" (3. 1. 61). He repeats these words three times before dying. Romeo, in turn, kills Tybalt. The fighting has attracted citizens of Verona, including the prince; he banishes Romeo. 
.......When Juliet asks her nurse for news of Romeo, the nurse says, "Ah, well-a-day! he's dead, he's dead, he's dead!" (3. 2. 41). She is referring to Tybalt, her good friend; Juliet thinks she is speaking of Romeo and wonders whether he has killed himself. The nurse then recounts the events of the violent encounter: Romeo killed Tybalt, Juliet's kin. At first, Juliet criticizes Romeo for committing such a deed but moments later scolds herself for speaking harsh words about her beloved husband. 
.......Before leaving the city, Romeo returns to Juliet and spends the night with her. At dawn, as the lovers gaze out the window, Romeo tells Juliet to 

..............           look, love, what envious streaks
..............Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east: 
..............Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day 
..............Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops. 
..............I must be gone and live, or stay and die.(3. 5. 9-13)

Juliet replies, 

..............Yon light is not daylight, I know it, 
..............It is some meteor that the sun exhales, 
..............To be to thee this night a torch-bearer,
..............And light thee on thy way to Mantua: 
..............Therefore stay yet; thou need’st not to be gone. (3. 5. 14-18)

..............                         O my love! my wife! 
..............Death, that hath suck’d the honey of thy breath, 
..............Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty: 
..............Thou art not conquer’d; beauty’s ensign⁵ yet 
..............Is crimson in thy lips and in thy cheeks, 
..............And death’s pale flag is not advanced there. (5. 3. 94-99)

.......Romeo then swallows the poison and dies. After Juliet awakens and discovers the bodies, grief overwhelms her and she kills herself, using Romeo's dagger. When the page returns with three watchmen, they discover the bloody scene and one of the watchmen fetches the Montague and Capulet families and the Prince of Verona. Others come running to the scene. Lord Montague arrives alone, telling the prince that his wife died during the night of grief brought on by Romeo’s exile. When everyone sees the bodies, the prince calls for quiet and calm while he inquires about the cause of the deaths. Friar Laurence comes forth and explains in detail the plot he conceived to feign Juliet’s death. Next, Romeo’s servant, Balthasar, says he conveyed news of Juliet’s apparent demise to Romeo, who then returned from Mantua. Finally, the page of Paris recounts what he saw at the tomb. The prince reproaches the Montagues and the Capulets, saying, "See what a scourge is laid upon your hate, / That heaven finds means to kill your joys with love" (5. 3. 313-314). The feuding families then reconcile, and the prince observes: 

..............A glooming peace this morning with it brings; 
..............The sun, for sorrow, will not show his head: 
..............Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things: 
..............Some shall be pardon’d, and some punished: 
..............For never was a story of more woe 
..............Than this of Juliet and her Romeo. (5. 3. 327-332)

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Romantic love can be beautiful and ennobling. The love between Romeo and Juliet is sublimely beautiful. Not only do they feel deeply for each other, but they also respect each other. Neither attempts to impose his or her will on the other; neither places his or her welfare above the other. Realizing that love and lust are not the same, they prize each other spiritually as well as physically. Therefore, meeting in secret from time to time to gratify their powerful sexual desires without the permanent commitment of marriage is out of the question. Such an arrangement would cheapen their relationship; it would reduce their love to a mere bestial craving. Consequently, at great risk, they decide to sanctify their relationship with a marriage ceremony binding them to eternal love. Theirs is no Hollywood marriage for three months or three years, based on selfish sexual gratification; theirs is a marriage meant for eternity, based on unselfish commitment to the spouse.
Passion Can Overtake Reason and Common Sense. So powerful is the love between Romeo and Juliet that it subjugates reason and common sense as guiding forces. True, their love has helped them achieve a level of maturity beyond their years, but it has also caused them to take dangerous risks. Their behavior, as well as events over which they have no control, vernalize their relationship, giving it little time to reach full growth. In the end, their overpowering feelings cause them to take their own lives. Likewise, so powerful is the hatred between the Montagues and Capulets that it promotes constant tension and violence, resulting in the deaths of Tybalt and Mercutio–and, of course, the deaths of their own children, Romeo and Juliet.
Immaturity and inexperience can lead to tragic endings. This theme, related to Theme 2, reaches its full development when callow Romeo and Juliet, believing all is lost, act out of the passion of the moment and commit suicide. If they had had the wisdom to consider that their whole lives lay before them, that other paths lay open to them, they surely would have embraced a fabian tactic to whittle away the opposition.
Judge people by their character and personal qualities, not by their name or social standing. As Juliet observes: “What’s in a name? that which we call a rose / By any other name would smell as sweet” (2. 2. 47-48). 
Innocent children sometimes pay for the sins of their parents. Romeo and Juliet forfeit their lives partly as a result of their parents' hatred and prejudice. 
 Fate acts through human folly. As in Macbeth, King Lear, Julius Caesar, and other plays of Shakespeare, the force of Fate seems all-powerful and ineluctable. It is as if human beings are puppets who have no control over their actions. From the very beginning, Romeo and Juliet are "star-cross'd" as children of "fatal loins" just as Macbeth is doomed by the prediction of the witches, Julius Caesar by the ominous words of a soothsayer, and King Lear, Cordelia, and others around them by "the gods," who, as Gloucester says, "kill us for their sport." But Shakespeare knows that the events leading to tragedy cannot be explained away so simply. Human beings have free will; they have the power to create their futures. Unfortunately, too often they lack the wisdom or moral strength to make the right decisions and, instead, pursue a course of action which seems "fated" for disaster.
 

Date Written: Between 1593 and 1596. 
First Printing: Corrupt, pirated, unauthorized text, 1597; authorized text (corrected by publisher Thomas Creede), 1588-1599; authoritative text, 1623 as part of the First Folio.
Probable Main Source: Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet (1562), by Arthur Brooke. Brooke's work, a long narrative poem,  was based on a French version (1559) of the tragedy by Pierre Boiastuau, who based his story on a 1554 Italian work by Matteo Bandello (1485-1561), a monk and author of 214 tales. Sources for certain plot devices or plot content probably included Il Novellino (1476), by Masuccio of Salerno; Hystoria Nouellamente Ritrouata di Due Nobili Amanti (1530), by Luigi da Porto; and the ancient mythological tale of Pyramis and Thisbe..
Type of Play: Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy in which teenagers from feuding families fall in love and marry against the wishes of their parents. 
Number of Words in Complete Public-Domain Text: 25,948
Individual Copies for Schools: Folger Shakespeare Library Edition (Low Cost)

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The climax of a play or another narrative work, such as a short story or a novel, can be defined as (1) the turning point at which the conflict begins to resolve itself for better or worse, or as (2) the final and most exciting event in a series of events. The climax of Romeo and Juliet, according to the first definition, occurs when Romeo kills Tybalt, causing a turning point that begins with Romeo's banishment. According to the second definition, the climax occurs in the final act, when Romeo, Juliet, and Paris die. 

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Language

Romeo and Juliet explodes with verbal fireworks. As one of Shakespeare’s early dramas, the play was a vehicle through which he attempted to startle audiences with his ability to manipulate language, creating puns, rhyming poetry, and striking similes, metaphors, and other figures of speech. The play opens with the chorus reciting a poem in sonnet form, a device also used to open the second act. In the opening dialogue in Act I, Shakespeare spices his writing with puns and double-entendres, as when the servants Sampson and Gregory make veiled sexual references:

GREGORY   The quarrel is between our masters and us their men.
SAMPSON   ’Tis all one, I will show myself a tyrant: when I have fought with the men, I will be cruel with the maids, and cut off their heads.
GREGORY   The heads of the maids?
SAMPSON   Ay, the heads of the maids, or their maidenheads; take it in what sense thou wilt. (1. 1. 14-17)

Now is he [Romeo] for the numbers⁶ that Petrarch flowed in: Laura⁷ to his [Romeo’s] lady was but a kitchen-wench; marry⁸, she had a better love to be-rhyme her; Dido a dowdy; Cleopatra a gipsy; Helen and Hero hildings⁹ and harlots; Thisbe a grey eye or so, but not to the purpose. Signior Romeo, bon jour! there’s a French salutation to your French slop. (2. 4. 21)

Perhaps the most memorable imagery in the play centers on figures of speech involving light and darkness. Following are examples of such imagery. 
One fire burns out another’s burning, 
One pain is lessen’d by another’s anguish. (1. 2. 42-43)
Paradox and repetition make memorable these lines spoken by Benvolio. There are two paradoxes: fire acting as a fire extinguisher and pain acting as a comforter. Likewise, there are two examples of repetition: One and another’s in the second line repeat one and another’s in the first.

It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night 
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope’s ear; 
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear! (1. 5. 42-44)
In a simile, Romeo compares Juliet to the earring of an Ethiopian. In a metaphor, he compares the darkness of night to a cheek.

But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks? 
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun. 
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, 
Who is already sick and pale with grief, 
That thou her maid art far more fair than she. (2. 2. 4-8)
 In a metaphor, Romeo compares Juliet to the light of the morning sun. An apostrophe addresses the sun (Arise, fair sun). These same words contain a metaphor and a personification comparing the sun to a person (Juliet). In another metaphor-personification, the moon also becomes a person.

The grey-eyed morn smiles on the frowning night,
Chequering the eastern clouds with streaks of light,
And flecked darkness like a drunkard reels
From forth day’s path and Titan’s fiery wheels (2. 3. 3-6)
After rising in his cell at dawn, Friar Laurence observes a sunrise overtaking the darkness. He personifies morning and night, with the former chasing the latter away.

Come, night; come, Romeo; come, thou day in night;
For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night,
Whiter than new snow on a raven’s back. (3. 2. 19-21)
In a metaphor, Juliet compares Romeo to “day in night.”

The play also abounds in nature imagery, as in the following passages:

This bud of love, by summer’s ripening breath,
May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet. (2. 2. 129-130)
Juliet speaks metaphors comparing love to a budding flower and the growing season to the ripening breath of summer.

My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep; the more I give to thee,
The more I have, for both are infinite. (2. 2. 141-143) 
Here, hyperbole and paradox help Juliet express the depth of her love.

The earth that’s nature’s mother is her tomb;
What is her burying grave that is her womb, (2. 3. 11-12)
Using personification and paradox, Friar Laurence observes that the earth is the mother of nature and that her life-giving womb is also a tomb.

What’s in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet. (2. 2. 47-48)
In a metaphor, Juliet compares hers and Romeo’s surnames to a flower. What she is saying is that what counts in life is what a person is, not who a person is. In modern terms, she is saying it does not matter whether a person is rich or poor, black or white, Catholic or Jew, American or Chinese. What matters is what he thinks and what he feels. A rose would still smell sweet if it were called a turnip or a dandelion. 

A plague o’ both your houses! 
They have made worms’ meat of me. (3. 1. 70-71)
Mortally wounded by Tybalt, Romeo’s friend Mercutio curses the Houses of Montague and Capulet. Worms' meat, a metaphor referring to his body, means that Mercutio knows he is about to die and that worms will feed on his flesh after he is buried.

Paradoxes and oxymorons appear frequently in Romeo and Juliet. Perhaps the most famous oxymoron in the play is the one occurring in the last two words of this line: “Good-night, good-night! parting is such sweet sorrow (2. 2. 201). An oxymoron consists of two contradictory words occurring one after the other. A paradox consists contradictory words separated by intervening words. In Act III, Scene II, when Juliet criticizes Romeo for killing Tybalt while praising him as her beloved, she manages to squeeze in six oxymorons and four paradoxes: 

Beautiful tyrant (oxymoron) Line 80
Fiend angelical (oxymoron)  Line 80
Dove-feather'd raven (oxymoron) Line 81
Wolvish-ravening lamb (oxymoron) Line 81
Damned saint (oxymoron)  Line 84
Honourable villain (oxymoron) Line 84
Despised substance of divinest show (paradox) Line 83
Spirit of a fiend in moral paradise of such sweet flesh (paradox) Lines 87-88
Book containing such vile matter so fairly bound (paradox) Lines 88-89
Deceit should dwell in such a gorgeous palace (paradox) Lines 89-90

Foreshadowings

In the prologue to Act I, an actor playing the chorus recites a sonnet in which he describes the bitter hatred separating the Montagues and Capulets and identifies Romeo and Juliet as lovers who had the misfortune to be born into warring families: “From forth the fatal loins of these two foes [the Montagues and the Capulets] / A pair of star-cross’d lovers take their life” (Lines 5-6). Take their life appears to have a double-meaning: first, that they come into existence; second, in a foreshadowing of events to come, that they go out of existence by taking their own lives. In another foreshadowing, Romeo recites the following lines in referring to Juliet as the sun at daybreak, envied by the moon:

Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, 
Who is already sick and pale with grief, 
That thou her maid art far more fair than she. (2. 2. 6-8)

The Role of the Apothecary

Mantua law forbids the sale of lethal poison under penalty of death. Nevertheless, the apothecary agrees to sell Romeo a dram of it. The brief scene in which they conclude the transaction supports an important motif: Money can ruin lives. Lady Capulet introduces this theme when she pressures Juliet to marry Paris for his wealth, saying, “So shall you share all that he doth possess” (1. 3. 100). Romeo and the apothecary continue the motif when Romeo seeks to purchase the means to kill himself and the apothecary accepts the money to provide this means. Romeo, distraught and desperate, entices the poverty-stricken apothecary with an offer of 40 ducats: 

Art thou so bare and full of wretchedness,
And fear'st to die? famine is in thy cheeks,
Need and oppression starveth in thine eyes,
Contempt and beggary hangs upon thy back;
The world is not thy friend nor the world's law;
The world affords no law to make thee rich;
Then be not poor, but break it, and take this. (5. 1. 75-81)

There is thy gold, worse poison to men's souls,
Doing more murders in this loathsome world,
Than these poor compounds that thou mayst not sell.
I sell thee poison; thou hast sold me none. (5. 1. 87-90).

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One 
One fire burns out another's burning, 
One pain is lessen'd by another's anguish. (1. 2. 42-43) 
Speaker: Benvolio. Meaning: one person's suffering makes another's suffering more bearable.

Two

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SAMPSON I will show myself a tyrant: when I
have fought with the men, I will be cruel with the
maids, and cut off their heads.
GREGORY The heads of the maids?
SAMPSON Ay, the heads of the maids, or their maidenheads;
take it in what sense thou wilt. (1. 1. 15-17)

.......In Shakespeare's play, the warring Montagues and Capulets do not mention the cause of the feud. It may well be that they are unaware of it–or forgot it–for it began so long before their time. One thing is certain, though: both families despise each other. Ancient grudges are like that–in politics and religion, in ethnic and national rivalries, in family relationships. It is all stupid, senseless. And that is a key point that Shakespeare is making in the play. 

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Parents Arrange Marriages For Wealth and Social Status
By Michael J. Cummings...© 2006

Think of marriage now; younger than you,
Here in Verona, ladies of esteem,
Are made already mothers. (1. 3. 76-78)

1. The Capulets have ordered Juliet to marry Paris, a young nobleman. In an expository (informative) essay, explain the marriage customs ....in Europe in the Sixteenth Century, paying particular attention to arranged marriages. Discuss the customs of the lower classes as ....well as the upper classes. Include a section on wedding ceremonies and the activities surrounding them. 
2. Imagine that Romeo and Juliet had run off after their marriage–perhaps to France, Greece or Spain–and lived the life of an ordinary ....married couple. Write an essay that describes them in their late forties, when their hair grays, their waists expand, and their own ....children fall in love. 
3. Friar Laurence, who sympathizes with Romeo and Juliet and marries them, is a Franciscan priest of the Roman Catholic Church. Write ....an expository essay about the Franciscans, beginning with their founding by Francis of Assisi (1181-1226), who renounced his ....comfortable life to wear rags, beg for food, and help the poor.
4. Romeo and Juliet fall in love at first sight. Do you believe in love at first sight?
5. How would you react if your parents opposed your marriage to someone they did not like?
6. Why didn’t Romeo and Juliet simply run away?
7. What is the most important lesson you learned from Romeo and Juliet?
8. In Act I, Scene V, the partygoers at the Capulet residence engage in a dance called the measure. It is a slow dance with dignified ....movements. Is this dance in any way symbolic of what happens in the play? If you were presenting a modern version of Romeo and ....Juliet, what dance would you choose for the Capulet party? Why did Puritans so vigorously oppose dancing in Shakespeare’s time?

1. Ethiope: Black African in Ethiopia. 
2. Palmer: Pilgrim visiting the Holy Land.
3. Soft: Hush; stop what you are doing; pay attention.
4. Wherefore: Why; for what reason.
5. Ensign: Sign, symbol.
6. Numbers: Verses; lines of poetry.
7. Laura: Young woman to whom Petrarch wrote love poems.
8. Marry: Archaic sentence introduction equivalent to well, as in “Well, he’s a fine fellow”; interjection expressing surprise, as in “No ....kidding!” or “Good grief!” 
9. Hildings: Low, base, contemptible persons.