Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare Act 4 Scene 5 PDF

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Summary

Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare line by line analysis of Act 4 Scene 5. Summary of the entire chapter broken down into sectors to ensure greater understanding. An analysis of the summary is provided to ensure complete depth of understanding of the scene as a whole...

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Romeo and Juliet Act 4 Scene 5

Line by line

Nurse “Mistress! What, mistress! Juliet – fast (asleep), I warrant (guarantee) her … He’ll fright you up, I’ faith. Will it not be?” -

Direct translation: Mistress! Hello, mistress! I bet she’s fast asleep. Juliet! Hello my lamb! My lady! Darn it, you sleepyhead! Love! Madam! Sweetheart! Why don’t you answer, bride! Not even one word? Well get your rest now, sleep for a week. I bet you that the next night you won’t get much sleep with Count Paris. God forgive me, she’s sound asleep! I have to wake her up. Madam, madam, madam! Oh, let the count take you in your bed, I’m sure he’ll wake you up. Will you not wake up?

Nurse “What, dressed and in your clothes … Some aqua vitae (smelling spirits), ho! My lord! My lord!” -

Direct translation: What, you got dressed and all your clothes are ready and you fell back to sleep again! I’ve got to wake you up. Lady! Lady! Lady! Oh no! Help, help! My lady’s dead! Oh curse the day that I was born! Someone get me a strong drink! My Lord! My Lady!

Lady Capulet “O me, O me! My child, my only life… Call help!” -

Direct translation: Oh me, oh no! My child, my only child! Please revive, look up, or I’ll die with you! Help, help! Call for help.

Capulet “Ha! Let me see her. Out, alas! She’s cold…Upon the sweetest flower of all the field.” -

Direct translation: What? Let me see her. Oh, alas! She’s cold, her blood has settled, and her joints are stiff. I can tell from her face she’s been dead for hours. This death is like an unexpected frost on the sweetest flower in all of the field.

Capulet “Ready to go, but never to return… And leave him all. Life, living, all is death’s”

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Direct translation: Ready to go to the church, but she will never return. Oh my son! The night before your wedding day Death has slept in your wife’s bed. There she lies, a beautiful flower deflowered by death. It is only death that I can have for a son-in-law, death will be my heir. It’s as though my daughter is married to death, and now when I die only death will inherit everything I have. All I have belongs to Death.

Lady Capulet “Accursed, unhappy, wretched, hateful day! … And cruel death hath catched (snatched) it from my sight!” -

Direct translation: Accursed, sorrowful, wretched, hateful day! This is the most miserable hour time himself has ever seen in his eternal journey! I had only one, poor one! One poor, loving child, only one thing to rejoice in and find solace in, and cruel death has taken her from my sight!

Nurse “In lasting (everlasting) labor of his pilgrimage!” -

Time is personified here.

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Time's job, or time's labor, is to march relentlessly to pilgrimage.

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Upon learning of Juliet's death, lady Capulet believes that this is the worst moment time has ever seen in all its marching.

Nurse “O woe! O woeful, woeful, woeful day!... O woeful day, O woeful day!” -

Direct translation: Oh woe! Oh terrible, terrible, terrible day! This is the saddest, most terrible day that I’ve ever seen! Oh day! What a day, what a day! What a hateful day! There was never another day as dark as this one! Oh, woeful day, oh woeful day!

Paris “Behuiled, divorced, wronged, spited, slain!... O love! O life! Not life, but love in death!” -

Direct translation: I’ve been deceived, divorced against my wish, hurt, insulted, and nearly killed by this death! Death, you detestable cruel thing, I’ve been tricked by you, almost completely defeated! Oh my love! Oh my life! Not life, my love is dead!

Capulet “Despised, distressed, hated, martyred, killed!... And with my child my joys are buried.”

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I’ve been spited, distressed, nearly martyred and killed by this death! Terrible time, why did you have to come now and ruin this solemn ceremony? Oh child, oh child! You were my soul, more than my child! You’re dead! Alas! My child is dead, and with her all my happiness is buried.

Capulet “My soul, and not my child” -

Wordplay

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Juliet was everything to Capulet; she was his soul.

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She was also his only—sole—child. She is no longer his child, as she is no longer.

Friar Laurence “Peace, ho, for shame! Confusion (calamity’s) cure lives not… That you run mad seeing that she is well (in heaven)” -

Direct translation: Quiet, everyone, for shame! The best course of action in this devastation won’t be found in this kind of uproar. You shared this lovely girl with Heaven, and now Heaven has her entirely, which is all the better for the girl. You could not keep Juliet’s body from death, but Heaven will keep her soul alive forever. You always sought to give her a better life, for your own heaven was the idea of her moving up in life. Are you going to weep now that she has moved up all the way to the clouds in Heaven? Showing the kind of love you are, it seems like you love your child poorly, going mad when she is in the best state possible.

Friar Laurence “She’s not well married that lives married long … Yte natures tears are reason’s merriment (ridicule)” -

Direct translation: It’s best not to be married for too long, so it’s better to be married and die young. Dry your tears and give some rosemary to this lovely corpse. Dress her in her finest clothes and carry her to the church according to custom. It’s in our nature to mourn, but our reason laughs at us for our excessive lamenting.

Friar Laurence “She’s not well married that lives married long; but she’s best married that dies married young” -

These two lines sound like a proverb which the friar has come up with to appease the feelings of the Capulets, but they contain a hidden truth. Juliet is best married, and it’s best that she would appear to die young.

Friar Laurence “… stick your rosemary on this fair corpse” -

The rosemary plant was a symbol of remembrance, often placed with the body in a funeral and distributed to the mourners in attendance.

Capulet “All things that we ordained festival (ordered for the wedding)… And all things, change them to the contrary” -

Direct translation: All the festive things we prepared must now be repurposed for a solemn funeral. The wedding band must now sound like a funeral bell, the food is converted into a burial feast, and the wedding marches must be changed to heavy dirges. Juliet’s wedding bouquet will lie with her buried corpse, and everything seems to be turned into the opposite of what it was for.

Friar Laurence “Sir, go you in, and madam, go with him … Move them no more by crossing (contradicting) their high will” -

Direct translation: Sir, you should go inside, and madam, you go with him. And you too, Sir Paris. Let everyone prepare to bury this lovely young lady. The heavens have frowned upon you for some kind of sin. Take care that you don’t bring down more misfortune by disobeying God’s will.

Peter “I will then give it you soundly.” -

Peter's words have a double meaning:

A) "I will attack you thoroughly" B) "I will insult you musically."

Peter “I will carry (tolerate) no crotchets (idiocy); I’ll re (ruin) you, I’ll fa (fix) you. Do you note (hear) me?” -

Direct translation: Here, Peter uses musical puns to tell the musicians that he won't put up with their mischief.

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A crochet is a musical note.

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He then uses the names of notes ("re" and "fa") to tell them he'll ruin them if they try anything else. By "Do you note me?" he means, "Do you get me?" The First Musician carries the puns over into his next line.

Peter “…my iron dagger. Answer me like men.” -

Peter is threatening to thrash the musicians with his strong wit. But an iron wit is a dull and senseless one, so really, he is threatening to fight them with his own stupidity.

Peter “… musicians have no gold for sounding” -

Peter’s explanation has two interpretations:

A) musicians receive no gold which jingles in their coin purses B) musicians have no gold bells for playing music

Summary and Notes

✓ The nurse enters Juliet’s bedroom to find her sleeping soundly. ✓ She reproaches the girl for being lazy and tries to wake her by announcing that Paris has arrived but is surprised when Juliet doesn’t even stir. ✓ As she notices that Juliet is still dressed in her clothes from the day before, she begins to chide her further—but then sees that Juliet is, apparently, dead. ✓ The nurse calls out for help, and Lady Capulet hurries into the bedroom. ✓ Seeing that her daughter is dead, she laments the loss of her “only life” and says she herself may as well die, too. ✓ Capulet runs in, asking what is taking so long—when the nurse and Lady Capulet tell him that Juliet is dead, he, too laments his daughter’s “untimely” death. ✓ The three of them loudly mourn Juliet, screaming and crying out until Friar Laurence and Paris come to the door.

Notes -

The Capulets’ melodramatic mourning of Juliet is overdramatic to the point of mockery.

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Shakespeare contrasts her parents’ overdramatic reactions to her death, suggesting their falsity, against the melodrama that Romeo and Juliet themselves have exhibited throughout the play.

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While young love and the difficulty in expressing it can justify outsized and even violent responses, the Capulets’ duplicate these genuinely overwhelming emotions is false and offensive.

✓ As the friar, Paris, and a group of musicians enter Juliet’s chambers asking if Juliet is ready to head to church, Capulet tells them that “death [has] lain” with Juliet, deflowering her on her wedding day. ✓ Death, now, is his son-in-law. ✓ Paris is shattered, and joins Capulet, Lady Capulet, and the nurse in loudly and dramatically lamenting Juliet’s horrible death. ✓ Friar Laurence tries to mitigate their mourning by telling them that Juliet is in a better place. ✓ All her parents wanted for her after all, he points out, was her "promotion”—now, she has climbed to the highest heights of all. ✓ He urges them to dress her in finery, adorn her with herbs, and bring her to church. Notes -

As Capulet, Lady Capulet, and Paris dramatically mourn Juliet’s “death,” Friar Laurence points out their melodrama and hypocrisy.

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When Juliet was alive, her parents plotted to use her for their own social advancement.

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Now that she is dead, he suggests, what they’re really mourning is the death of their ability to use her for their own gains, as they never really knew—or cared about knowing—the person their daughter truly was in life.

✓ Capulet laments that all of the marriage preparations were in vain—the wedding feast will become a funerary one, and Juliet’s bridal flowers will now cover her corpse. ✓ Friar Laurence again urges the family to focus now on preparing for the funeral and trusting in the fact that Juliet is in a better place. ✓ They all exit, leaving the musicians alone to lament that they’re out of a job. ✓ Peter, however, enters the chamber and urges the musicians to play something comforting. ✓ They insist now is not the time for music, and comically exchange verbal barbs with Peter as he tries to get them to play a elegy instead. ✓ Eventually, Peter gives up his cause and leaves. ✓ The musicians remark upon how annoying he is, then decide to stay and eat their fill at the funeral feast.

Notes

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As occurs often in the play, this scene shows a moment of great tragedy being punctuated by comic relief offered by the servant characters.

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While the Capulets ridiculously—and, the friar suggests, falsely—mourn their daughter’s loss, the action shifts over to the servants—whom Shakespeare often renders as the only sane and relatable characters in the play, presenting them as real people struggling with everyday problems, like where to get their next meal when their planned gig falls through....