Love Through The Ages: Drama

Love Through The Ages: Drama

• Romeo & Juliet
• Othello
• Ghosts
• Uncle Vanya
• A View From the Bridge
• A Streetcar Named Desire

Romeo & Juliet (Drama)

Author: William Shakespeare

Date: 1597 (Elizabeathan)

Summary: Romeo Montague and Juliet Capulet are 'star-cross'd' lovers that are destined to die (as predicted by the prologue). When Romeo meets Juliet they are both immediatly smitten however come from fueding families that would never accept their relationships. The Capulets want to marry Paris however her and Romeo decided to marry in secret with the help of the Friar. After consumating their marriage Romeo gets in a street fight where Tybalt kills Mercutio, Romeo's friend therefore Romeo murders Tybalt. Banished from Verona all seems lost however Juliet convinces the Friar to help her by providing her with a sleeping draught that would mean she could fake her own death and send Romeo a message with the plan it.

However trajedy strikes when the Friar's message fails to reach him and instead believes that Juliet is dead. Distrought, Romeo hoes to the apothecary and gets a poson so he can go to the Capulet tomb and die next to his love. On his way he murders Paris and after discovering Juliet's body drinks the poison. Almost immediatly after Juliet wakes up and discovers Romeo's corpse. She stabs herself and after the their families find them there where they decide to finally end the fued.

Themes:

Romantic love:

• Romeo uses the langauage of classical poetry, fanciful imagery and wordplay.
• Both take sonnet form when talking together - 'palm to palm is holu palmer's kiss'
• Romeo describes Juliet with religeous imagery - her lips are a 'shrine'
• They are both prepared to die for each other.

Familial Love

• Initially Juliet's father is seen as loving and wanting whats best for his daughter - 'Earth have swallowed all my hopes but she'
• However her parents are presented as unloving, uncaring and lacking understanding in Act 3 Scene 5 - 'I would the fool were married to her grave' - which is using dramatic irony as Lady Capulet feels guilty and regrets this at the end of the play when Juliet is died.

Marriage

• Highering a person's social status - 'so worthy a gentleman to be her bride' - The Capulets want Juliet to marry Paris to raise their social standing.
• Many of the existing marriages lack romance and are not related to love - Lady Capulet is trapped in a loveless marriage to a man much older.

Destiny

• Shows how love can be ruined.
• Romeo & Juliet destined for death.

Links to Other Texts:

• Othello - Desdemona and Othello also get married in secret - forbidden love.
• Wuthering Heights - Tragic nature - deaths of Cathy and Heathcliff.
• Ghosts - The death of Mrs Alving's laast love - although its familial.

Quotations:

• 'CHORUS: Form forth fatal loins of these two foes/ A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life' - Their fate is controlled by destiny.
• 'JULIET: Wherefore art thou Romeo?' -…