Juliet Capulet

“ In the same scene Capulet urges the marriage between Juliet and Paris, and on her refusal, forgetting his former declaration that his consent would lie “within her scope of choice”—alive only to the rebellion against his authority—displays a degree of rudeness and violence which the pride and the habit of dominion alone can account for. ”

“ Romeo. And trust me, love, in my eye so do you;
Dry sorrow drinks our blood. Adieu, adieu! [Exit.
Juliet. O Fortune, Fortune! all men call thee fickle; 60
If thou art fickle, what dost thou with him
That is renown'd for faith? Be fickle, Fortune;
For then, I hope, thou wilt not keep him long,
But send him back.
Lady Capulet. [Within] Ho, daughter! are you up?
Juliet. Who is 't that calls? is it my lady mother?
Is she not down so late, or up so early?
What unaccustom'd cause procures her hither?
Enter Lady Capulet
Lady Capulet. ”

“ Pat Campbell's Juliet takes the poison, but not the cake. Her Juliet has over her the shadow of Paula Tanqueray. From the commencement, except in the Balcony scene, she is a Juliet "with a past." The balcony and the moonlight suit this Juliet. Good, too, is she when, abjectly miserable, she crumples herself up all in a heap, like the victim in a picture of Japanese torture, so that at any moment, without surprising the spectator, she might turn heels over head and straighten herself out at the feet of the irascible old Capulet. ”

“ And now Juliet saw in an instant that Mercutio's life was in greater danger from her father's anger than it had ever been from Tybalt's sword. Tybalt had always been a great favorite with old Capulet—indeed there was something similar in their characters. To find that Tybalt's murderer still lived would be maddening to the man, but to find him sheltered in his house, tended by his own daughter, might well rouse him to such a gust of fury as would lead him to plunge his dagger into the wounded man's heart. Certainly he would turn him out into the streets to die. ”

“ Sitting there, the revelation of the early morning enfolding them, he told her the undying story of those tragic loves and deaths that the great Anglo-Saxon gave to all ages.
“There were two noble families in Verona,” he began, “who for generations had been at enmity—the Capulets and the Montagues. Juliet was the daughter of Lord Capulet. She was so beautiful her fame went throughout the country. Romeo, scion of the house of Montague, heard of her beauty, and to see it, went masked to a fête given by her father. ”

“ The enmity of the rival houses of Montague and Capulet, to which Romeo and Juliet belong, is but a concrete form of this danger that ever waits when nature prompts. Romeo's fancied love for another disappears like a drop of water on a stone in the sun, when his glance meets Juliet's at the Capulet's ball. Love takes equally sudden hold of her. Worldly and religious caution seek to stem the flood of passion, or at least to direct it. The lovers are married at Friar Laurence's cell ”

“ Both Capulet and Montague, as they join hands in amity over the dead bodies of their children, acknowledge the debt they owe to the "star-cross'd" love of those "poor sacrifices of their enmity." They vie with each other in doing honour to the guiltless victims of their "pernicious rage." Montague will raise the golden statue to Juliet, and Capulet promises as rich a monument to Romeo.
Da Porto and Paynter and Brooke, in like manner, refer to the reconciliation of the rival families as the fortunate result of the tragic history. ”

“ The patient must not be moved until the next day.
The girls looked at each other. Was it possible to ask old Capulet to shelter an adherent of the hated Montague? Juliet was of the opinion that it was; Rosaline seemed less convinced.
Doubt was soon put an end to by the entrance of Juliet's nurse—babbling though breathless. The girls had seen nothing of the events in the square since the wounding of Mercutio. The nurse brought them word of a series of tragedies. Romeo, moved by the supposed death of his friend, had drawn his sword and rushed into the fight with an almost maniacal fury. ”

“ Her only response to all that the Lady and the Nurse have urged in praise of Paris is coldly acquiescent:—
"I'll look to like, if looking liking move;
But no more deep will I endart mine eye
Than your consent gives strength to make it fly."
[Pg 282]
The playful manner in which Juliet receives the advances of Romeo (i. 5. 95-109) is thoroughly girlish, though we must note that his first speech, as given in the play ("If I profane," etc.) , is not the beginning of their conversation, which has been going on while Capulet and Tybalt were talking. ”

“ They struggle with Romeo. Juliet throws flower-pots at watchmen. Exeunt Watchmen, with broken heads. Here the lovers might speak; but perhaps words will only delay the action. Capulet enters with Retainers. Romeo is bound to a tree. During struggle Juliet descends from balcony by aid of vine, and fills Retainers’ muskets with water from a patent garden tube. Capulet and Retainers retire. They point their muskets at Romeo, Capulet gives the word, but the muskets are harmless. Juliet picks up pruning knife and releases Romeo. They are discovered. ”

“ While the masks amuse themselves with dancing, Octavio makes love to Juliet. Juliet is the daughter of Antonio; and Octavio, the son of Theobald. These two old gentlemen, who are the heads of the Capulet faction, come forward, and declare, they should both be charmed to see their children smitten with each other, because they propose to make a match between them. Things don't succeed quite to their mind. Octavio falls in love with Juliet, but Juliet does not like Octavio, and contents herself with returning him a polite answer. ”

“ Lady Capulet, whose extreme grief for the loss of her kinsman Tybalt made her keep no bounds in her revenge, exhorted the prince to do strict justice upon his murderer, and to pay no attention to Benvolio's representation, who, being Romeo's friend and a Montague, spoke partially. Thus she pleaded against her new son-in-law, but she knew not yet that he was her son-in-law and Juliet's husband. ”

“ The visit to the Friar is evidently on the same day; and the next scene (iv. 2) is in the evening of that day. Juliet comes home and tells her father that she has been to the Friar's, and is ready to marry Paris. The old man at once decides to have the wedding "to-morrow morning" (that is, Wednesday) instead of Thursday. Lady Capulet objects, but finally yields to her husband's persistency; and so Juliet goes to her chamber, and drinks the potion on Tuesday evening, or twenty-four hours earlier than the Friar had directed. ”

“ Dry sorrow drinks our blood. Adieu! Adieu!"
After the banishment of Romeo, old Capulet and his wife insisted that Juliet marry young Paris, a kinsman of Prince Escalus, and sorrows unnumbered crowded on the new-made secret bride.
To escape marriage with Paris, Juliet consulted Friar Laurence, who gives her a drug to be taken the night before the prearranged marriage, that will dull all life and the body remain as dead for forty-two hours. ”

“ It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!
seem to echo Marlowe's lines in The Jew of Malta, II. i. 41, 42:
But stay, what star shines yonder in the east?
The loadstar of my life, if Abigail.
Juliet's age is reduced by Shakespeare from the sixteen years of his original (the Romeus and Juliet of Brooke) to fourteen. "Death lies on her," exclaims Capulet (IV. v.) ”

“ They reply literally to all Romeo's speeches about saints and palmers. But it should be noticed that though this is the first interview of the lovers, we do not hear them speak until the close of their dialogue, in which they have arrived at a pretty thorough understanding of their mutual feeling. Juliet makes a feint of parrying Romeo's advances, but does it archly, and knows that he is to have the kiss he sues for. He asks, 'Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?' The stage Juliet answers with literal solemnity. But it was not a conventicle at old Capulet's. ”

“ But when he got to the tomb he found the County Paris, who was nominally engaged to Juliet, and of course extremely angry to find a Montague in such a place. They fought, and Paris killed Romeo, thus putting an end to all Lady Capulet’s intrigues. But she was not to be defeated thus. She had already bribed an old144 Franciscan monk, called Friar Laurence, to say that he had secretly married Juliet and Romeo, and her nurse (a horrible old woman) corroborated the friar’s evidence. ”

“ Would it have cost Heaven more to have made me a Capulet?"
The confusion which reigns in the assembly, insensibly permits Romeo to join Juliet. Romeo makes a declaration of his love: Juliet hears him without anger; Octavio comes and interrupts their conversation. This does not prevent Juliet from artfully slipping a ring into Romeo's hand, and at the same time appointing an interview in the garden the following night.
As the day begins to close the company separates: the actors retire; and Juliet, with Celia her maid, only remain.
SCENE IV.
Juliet and Celia. ”

“ The extent to which falconry and its language had taken hold of the society of Elizabeth’s time is well illustrated in the scene in Capulet’s garden where Romeo and Juliet make their declaration of mutual attachment. She has twice retired, but again returns to the window for one last word. He has slowly and reluctantly crept back into the darkness, but a voice from above recalls him:
Hist! ”

“ S. uses it only here; but Tusser (Husbandry, 1573) has both chink and chinks in this sense, and the word is found also in Florio, Cotgrave, Holinshed, Stanihurst, and other old writers.
120. My life, etc. "He means that, as bereft of Juliet he should die, his existence is at the mercy of his enemy, Capulet" (Staunton) . Cf. Brooke: [Pg 195] —
"So hath he learnd her name, and knowth she is no geast.
Her father was a Capilet, and master of the feast.
Thus hath his foe in choyse to geue him lyfe or death:
That scarsely can his wofull brest keepe in the liuely breath." ”

“ Before three months pass, Christmas games begin, and Capel gives a banquet:
No Lady, no knight in Verona
⁠But Capilet himselfe hath byd unto his feast:
⁠Or by his name in paper sent, appoynted as a geast. (151–164.)
Romeus goes masked with other five; when they unmask, he retires to a nook, but is recognised by the torches' light. (165–182.)
The Capilets restrain their ire. (183–190.)
He views the ladies; sees one more beautiful than the rest; and quite forgets his former love. Juliet's eyes anchor on him. Love shoots her with his bow. Their eyes inform them of mutual love. ”

“ Juliet raised her eyes that had been downcast and fixed on her lover, and looked upward as if to gaze upon the fair orb of which she spoke.
In that moment her dark-blue eyes, shining like stars of the night, encountered the fixed and passionate gaze of the handsome man in the box above her. She started—it was not his dreaming fancy—it was too palpable to all—recovered herself with an effort, and went on in a voice that trembled in spite of her brave endeavor:
"'That monthly changes in her circled orb,
Lest that thy love prove likewise variable.'"
"Great God! ”

“ It is here that the real character of Juliet is first developed;—it is here that, abandoned by the whole world, and left to struggle alone with her [70] fearful destiny, the high-souled and devoted woman takes place of the tender, trembling girl. The confiding, helpless anguish with which she at first throws herself upon her nurse— ("Some comfort, nurse!") —the gradual relaxing of her embrace, as the old woman counsels her to forget Romeo and marry Paris—the tone in which she utters the question—
"Speakest thou from thy heart? ”

“ However, every thing has an end; and we had carried Juliet to the tomb of all the Capulets, the chant was done, and the mourners were gathered in the green-room. I was standing, book in hand, preparing for the last agonies of a love very imperfectly committed to memory, when I heard a slight confusion in the court-yard, and shortly after the rattle of a post-chaise. The sound subsided, and I was summoned to my post at the entrance to the place where the lovely Juliet lay entranced. ”

“ The first drawing is taken from the scene in which Juliet first appears. The actress has little to do, but to look the character;—that is, to convey the impression of a gentle, graceful girl, whose passions and energies lie folded up within her, like gathered lightning in the summer cloud; all her affections "soft as dews on roses," which must ere long turn to the fire-shower, and blast her to the earth. The moment chosen is immediately after Juliet's expostulation to her garrulous old nurse—"I pr'ythee, peace!" ”

“ Roger Barnes wouldn’t look at her twice.”
“Louis might pretend to admire her, to please Juliet,” admitted Marie. “He has a way of making every girl think he is in love with her—and he is, to a certain extent. But it’s never serious.”
Whether it were serious in this instance Miss Dresser soon had opportunity to judge.
After dinner that first night Anthony proposed taking all his guests out upon the river in a big flat-boat he had rented. But when he made up the party Rachel was not to be found.
“I’m afraid she’s gone home,” said Juliet. ”

“ It appears to me also an admirable touch of nature, considering the master-passion which, at this moment, rules in Juliet's soul, that she is as much shocked by the nurse's dispraise of her lover, as by her wicked, time-serving advice.
This scene is the crisis in the character; and henceforth we see Juliet assume a new aspect. The fond, impatient, timid girl, puts on the wife and the woman: she has learned heroism from suffering, and subtlety from oppression. It is idle to criticize her dissembling submission to her father and mother ”