O, bid me leap, rather than marry Paris, / From off the battlements of yonder tower;/ / Or walk in thievish ways; or bid me lurk / Where serpents are. Chain me with roaring bears; / Or shut me nightly in a charnel-house.
Act 4, Scene 1.
Tomorrow night look that thou lie alone; / Let not thy nurse lie with thee in thy chamber. / Take thou this vial, being then in bed, / And this distilled liquor drink thou off. / When presently through all thy veins shall run / A cold and drowsy humour, for no pulse / Shall keep his native progress, but surcease. / No warmth, no breath, shall testify thou livest.
Act 4, Scene 2.
Where I have learned me to repent the sin / Of disobedient opposition. / To you and your behests, and am enjoined / By holy Lawrence to fall prostrate here, / And beg your pardon./ Pardon, I beseech you! / Henceforward I am ever ruled buy you.
How now, my headstrong! Where have you been gaddling?
Act 4, Scene 3.
(Assume she’s holding a vial of poison and dagger.) Farewell. / God knows when we shall meet again./ I have a faint cold thrills / Through my veins, / That almost freezes up the heat of life. / Come, vial. What if this mixture do not work at all? / Shall I be married then tomorrow morning? / [Lays down dagger] No, no. This shall forbid it. Lie thou there.
In these lines, Juliet is speaking to Friar Lawrence about how she doesn’t want to get married to Lord Paris. She went far enough as to say that she would even kill herself just to escape that fate. Then, Friar Lawrence gives an idea. He said that he could give her a poison that will help fake her death, while giving her the appearance that she is dead. The poison will stop her heart from beating blood through out her body, and she will become cold to the touch. The potion is supposed to last 40 to about 42 hours (MAYBE!). The plan is when she is brought to the family vault, after about two days, Romeo and afriar Lawrence will be there waiting for her to wake up. Afterwards Romeo will take her to Mantua.
Act 4, Scene 4.
Nurse! Wife! What, ho! What, nurse, I say! / Go waken Juliet, go and trim her up; / I’ll go and chat with Paris. Hie, make haste, / Make haste; the bridegroom he is come already. / Make haste, I say..
In these lines, Juliet is just returning from her talk with Friar Lawrence. When Juliet enters her father says (MODERN ENGLISH) “ Hello, my headstrong daughter! Where have you been?” Juliet then says to him that she went to Friar Lawrence’s cell to beg for forgiveness for her ‘sins’ against her father. Juliet also says that Friar Lawrence told her to beg on her knees for Lord Capulets’s forgiveness. So, following the Friars ‘orders’, she begged for him to forgive her and that she will always follow his rules. However, Lord Capulet does not know the true extent of what had happened at his cell (LAST SCENE).
Act 4, Scene 5.
Alack the day, she’s dead, she’s dead, she’s dead!
In these lines, Juliet is laying alone on her bed, holding Friar Lawrence’s ‘non-lethal poison’. As she was holding the bottle, she was thinking about if the bottle did not work, then she would have to be married. Juliet also thinks it might be lethal poison because the Friar (Lawrence) might be ashamed of marrying the same women twice. Just in case Friar Lawrence’s poison did not work, Juliet has a dagger with her. She has a dagger with her because (she said this in a previous scene) she said that she would rather kill her self than marry Lord Paris. I think that if Friar Lawrence did not give her this vial of non-lethal poison and think of that plane to reunite the two lovers, Juliet might have actually ended her life.
Act 5, Scene 1.
This scene is about the preparation of the wedding for Juliet and Lord Paris. In these particular lines, Lord Capulet is telling the Nurse or his wife to get Juliet ready for the wedding. Juliet’s nurse ends up fulfilling Lord Capulet’s request. As I began reading this scene, I was very intrigued because nobody knows that Juliet drank the poison.
In this moment of the play, Lady Capulet, or Juliet’s mother, and Juliet’s nurse, find Juliet ‘dead’ on her bed. What they really don’t know is she is not dead (Friar Lawrence’s plan). In these lines of the play, Lady Capulet and Juliet’s nurse are shocked because Juliet is dead. The nurse and Lady Capulet are both crying and saying “curse the day! She’s dead, she’s dead, she’s dead!”. I think this is the most significant scene in the entire play because Friar Lawrence’s plan for Romeo and Juliet to reunite once again is starting to work.
She’s dead, deceased, she’s dead. Alack the day!
In these lines, Balthasar is informing Romeo of Juliet’s ‘death’. This scene isimportant in the play for two reasons: The first being the fact that Romeo just found out that Juliet has died, and he did not find out about the plan. The second thing is that he decides to ride back to Verona, where he will stay at the Capulet mausoleum, and kill himself in the building (this happens in later lines). Before he prepares to leave for Verona, he goes to an apothecary shop to by lethal medicines that will end his life. Romeo suicide plan is put to a halt because the apothecary tells him that is illegal to sell these toxic ‘remedies’, but he does have them. Romeo then convinces the man using his poverty-stricken appearance as a way to convince the apothecary to sell him the toxins. Romeo then takes the poison and begins on his journey.
News from Verona! How now, Balthasar./ Dost thou not bring me letters from the Friar? / How doth my lady? Is my father well? / How fares my Juliet? That I’ll ask again, / For nothing can be ill if she be well.
Then she is well, and nothing can be ill. / Her body sleeps in Capel’s monument, / And her immortal part with angels lives. / I saw her laid low in her kindred’s vault, /And presently took post to tell it you. / O, pardon me for bringing these ill news,/ Since you did leave it for my office, sir.