Friday, July 15, 2016

How would you write an analysis essay on Romeo and Juliet using this thesis: "Shakespeare uses a lot of foreshadowing in Romeo and Juliet that...

I believe the statement: "Shakespeare uses foreshadowing in Romeo and Juliet that is conveyed in the dialogue" (I would eliminate the ubiquitous and redundant term "a lot" from this statement) is a good start. 

In Act I, Scene 1, Benvolio foreshadows Romeo's meeting with Juliet when he tells Romeo to look at other women. Romeo is sad and depressed over his unreciprocated love for Rosaline so Benvolio suggests Romeo "examine other beauties." And in Act I, Scene 2, after meeting the servingman and discovering Rosaline will be at Capulet's party, Benvolio tells Romeo,



At this same ancient feast of Capulet’s Sups the fair Rosaline whom thou so loves, With all the admirèd beauties of Verona. Go thither, and with unattainted eye Compare her face with some that I shall show, And I will make thee think thy swan a crow. 



Benvolio, of course, is right. Romeo falls madly in love with Juliet on first sight. He even echoes Benvolio's use of the word crow when comparing Juliet to the other women at the party. He says in Act I, Scene 5,



So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows



In Act I, Scene 4, Romeo foreshadows his own death as believes attending Capulet's party will lead to some fateful events which will change his life forever. He says,



I fear too early, for my mind misgives
Some consequence yet hanging in the stars
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night’s revels, and expire the term
Of a despisèd life closed in my breast
By some vile forfeit of untimely death.



Again in Act II, Scene 6, Romeo talks of his death before he marries Juliet in Friar Lawrence's cell. He claims he would just as soon die happy after marrying the girl. His words are prescient as he only has a few more days to live after the wedding. He says,




Do thou but close our hands with holy words,
Then love-devouring death do what he dare,
It is enough I may but call her mine.





Romeo foreshadows his suicide in Act III, Scene 3 when talking to the Friar. He even mentions poison as he writhes on the ground in Lawrence's cell after learning of his banishment. He says,




Hadst thou no poison mixed, no sharp-ground
knife,
No sudden mean of death, though ne’er so mean,
But “banishèd” to kill me?





Juliet too presages her own suicide as she carries a knife with her when she seeks counsel from Friar Lawrence after her father demands that she marry Count Paris. She threatens to kill herself if the Friar has no solution. She says in Act IV, Scene 1,




If in thy wisdom thou canst give no help,
Do thou but call my resolution wise,
And with this knife I’ll help it presently.





Juliet even foreshadows the Friar's solution when she tells him what lengths she will go to in order to avoid marrying Paris. She says she would go into a tomb or sleep with dead bodies, which is precisely what happens. She says,




Or hide me nightly in a charnel house,
O’ercovered quite with dead men’s rattling bones,
With reeky shanks and yellow chapless skulls.
Or bid me go into a new-made grave
And hide me with a dead man in his shroud





She repeats this imagery again when she is alone just before drinking the Friar's potion which will render her lifeless for nearly two days. She fears she will wake up alone in the tomb, and this is what happens as she wakes just after Romeo has poisoned himself and the Friar has yet to arrive. She says in Act IV, Scene 3,




O, if I wake, shall I not be distraught,
Environèd with all these hideous fears,
And madly play with my forefathers’ joints,
And pluck the mangled Tybalt from his shroud,
And, in this rage, with some great kinsman’s bone,
As with a club, dash out my desp’rate brains?



 








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