Romeo and Juliet: Act II Close Reading

Romeo and Juliet: Act II Close Reading of one of Juliet's speeches from "The Balcony Scene," Act II, Scene II -- the theme of 'star crossed' (i.e. doomed) love

JULIET

Well, do not swear: although I joy in thee,

I have no joy of this contract to night:

It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;

Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be

Ere one can say 'It lightens.' Sweet, good night!

This bud of love, by summer's ripening breath,

May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet.

Good night, good night! As sweet repose and rest

Come to thy heart as that within my breast!

The balcony scene of "Romeo and Juliet" has provided modern romantic tragedy with one of its most long-standing images of young love and beauty. The play's most familiar image is that of young and beautiful Juliet standing above her beloved Romeo on a balcony while professing her affection for the honest and open young man. However, a close reading of the text suggests that the actual language of these adolescents is filled with dramatic foreshadowing of their eventual fate -- the language of death that runs through the play, regarding the romance of the protagonists. Even when Juliet is declaring her love for Romeo, there is a sense that between the two of them, light is dark and dark is light -- in other words, that their romance has created a kind of world upside down of values, where love is going too fast in a way that can only, ultimately end with the mutual demise of love and the two young lovers. The theme of the star-crossed lovers that begins the play thus is ever-present, even when the two of them are most innocently and happily in love.

As is seen in the above-quoted passage, although the relationship between Romeo and Juliet may be destroyed by other plot and psychological factors, such as the unnecessary difficulties posed by the rivalries between the young people's families, Juliet's language suggests that there are potential problems are inherent to the romance, outside of such factors. She says that their love is "too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;/Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be/Ere one can say 'It lightens.'" (II.2) In other words, it is a lightening-quick romance, formed at first sight, without the two individuals getting to know one another first, or of being introduced by their parents.

Rather than formed in the day, the implication is of Juliet's metaphor is that the romance came in the darkness, illuminated by the dangerous light of lightening, rather than the more stable light of the sun. One cannot really see clearly in a night lit by lightening. Juliet notes that as soon as one says that the lightening has provided a bit of light by which to see clearly, the light is gone. Thus, we are told, will be the light giving love of the two lovers -- it will be nothing like the love of the day, of sunlight. Again, this underlines the theme that is a love of quick light, like the stars, and love of the night, like the stars or a lightening storm, not of a nourishing, life-generating light.

Juliet's sense of foreboding is so strong, she admits she does not even delight in the verbal contract or betrothal of the two lovers that night, although she delights in Romeo's nearby presence. Because their love is forbidden, even the contract must be formed by night, in secret. The stress upon "good night" expresses gratefulness for night's ability to give her love, and of how the night alters the appearance of Romeo, giving him cover in her family's orchard. Still, it also suggests that night is, unlike the love of the day, the star-crossed romance of Juliet and Romeo exists outside of the day-by-day social institutions that can provide a stable framework for a permanent romantic alliance.

Juliet briefly compares their love to a flower as well, first budding then in bloom. It will become fully open when the two of them next meet. The sexual implications are clear -- these two young buds will be ripened and mature and ready for marriage and physical enjoyment, when they meet next. But the quick, verbal bud to flower progression also suggests the theme of a star-crossed, hasty speed once again, a kind of speeded-up film of romance, to use an anachronistic metaphor borrowed from time-stop film frequently employed in documentaries about flowers coming to maturity.