The contrast of youth and old age is important in this play. How far do you agree with this statement?

Shakespeare definitely presents a generation gap in Romeo and Juliet. Both Romeo and Juliet believe the older characters, Friar Lawrence and the Nurse, do not understand their love for each other. Juliet makes reference to the idea in Act II, scene 5 during her soliloquy to open the scene. Romeo does the same thing after the fight in Act III. He accuses the Friar of not realizing the depth of his love for Juliet.

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Shakespeare definitely presents a generation gap in Romeo and Juliet. Both Romeo and Juliet believe the older characters, Friar Lawrence and the Nurse, do not understand their love for each other. Juliet makes reference to the idea in Act II, scene 5 during her soliloquy to open the scene. Romeo does the same thing after the fight in Act III. He accuses the Friar of not realizing the depth of his love for Juliet.

At the beginning of Act II, Romeo proposes marriage to Juliet. Later in the Act, Juliet sends the Nurse to discover Romeo's plans. In scene 5, Juliet is anxiously awaiting the Nurse's return. The Nurse is late and Juliet remarks that if the woman were younger she would be quicker and would better understand Juliet's feelings. Juliet says,

Had she affections and warm youthful blood,
She would be as swift in motion as a ball;
My words would bandy her to my sweet love,
And his to me.
But old folks, many feign as they were dead,
Unwieldy, slow, heavy, and pale as lead.

The Nurse is also slow in revealing Romeo's arrangements and it drives Juliet crazy. She cajoles the Nurse but it doesn't speed up the news. The Nurse doesn't understand Juliet's haste and comments,

O God’s lady dear,
Are you so hot? Marry, come up, I trow.
Is this the poultice for my aching bones?
Henceforward do your messages yourself.

A similar conversation takes place between Romeo and the Friar in Act III, scene 3. Romeo has just killed Tybalt and taken refuge in Lawrence's cell. When the Friar gives Romeo the news that he has been banished, Romeo launches into a whining rant. He laments the fact that he won't be able to see Juliet and that he'd rather be dead. When the Friar tries to reason with him, Romeo accuses the Friar of being old and not comprehending his feelings. Romeo says,

Thou canst not speak of that thou dost not feel.
Wert thou as young as I, Juliet thy love,
An hour but married, Tybalt murderèd,
Doting like me, and like me banishèd,
Then mightst thou speak, then mightst thou tear thy hair
And fall upon the ground as I do now,
Taking the measure of an unmade grave.

The Friar eventually reprimands Romeo for his words and points out his immature behavior. He says,

Hold thy desperate hand!
Art thou a man? Thy form cries out thou art.
Thy tears are womanish; thy wild acts denote
The unreasonable fury of a beast.
Unseemly woman in a seeming man,
And ill-beseeming beast in seeming both!

In the end the Nurse and Friar Lawrence fail in their roles as older role models for Romeo and Juliet. The Nurse gives Juliet bad advice about marrying Paris, forcing the girl to seek counsel from the Friar. The Friar fails in his plan for Juliet to fake her death as his message to Romeo is never received. In this case, the generation gap winds up being deadly for the young people.