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How Does Shakespeare Present Conflict In Romeo And Juliet

Decent Essays

Romeo and Juliet is a play with an extravagant twist written by William Shakespeare who was a play write in the 16th century. The play is about 2 star crossed lovers whose families hold an ancient grudge against each other. Throughout the play the theme of conflict is constantly conveyed. I am going to explore the method Shakespeare uses to present conflict in act 1 scene 1 and act 3 scene 1 of Romeo and Juliet. In act 1 scene 1 Shakespeare uses language to create one-sided conflict on the side of Tybalt. He says “Turn thee Benvolio and look upon thy death” this clearly shows how he is saying I will be the one to kill you once you face me. This is in the form of a metaphor, as death is usually portrayed as an actual being that visits you before you die, so Tybalt is saying he is death. “I hate… all Montague’s and thee” the word “hate” was repeated constantly throughout Tybalt’s dialog this could be interpreted that each hate is each generation that has hated one other from the Montague and Capulet family. The name Benvolio is derived from the Latin meaning “peacemaker”. This is a great contrast to Tybalt seeing as he has entered the scene with intentions to kill a Montague. …show more content…

Then Benvolio enters and tries to stop the fight later on Tybalt enters and tries to kill him. The families enter the fight to defend their honour and then lastly the prince. Shakespeare may have structured act 1 scene 1 like this with the lowest status of people and then the prince (with the highest status) as a controversy to how tension is mounting in the scene. By doing this the audience would have thought at the beginning that even the servants had the courage to draw their swords so how would the actual family members

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