Old vs Young - Tragedy
Uploaded by houiej on Dec 06, 2000
The older generation of people in the play can be contrasted with the two young lovers. The lovers portray themselves as rash and impulsive who are filled deeply with emotions. Their elders, on the other hand, have experienced more in life and are probably wiser, thus they see things from a different angle. This leads to the elders not understanding the feelings of Romeo and Juliet, hence causing conflicts, misunderstandings and pain to arise. The older generation in this play refer to Romeo and Juliet's parents, the Nurse and Friar Lawrence.
I do agree that the older generation did play a major role in their children's destiny through their foolishness and good intentions, but not all blame is credited to them because Romeo and Juliet did contribute to their own tragedy. Fate also 'thwarted our intents'.
Montague and his wife show themselves to be caring and loving parents. After the fight on the streets of Verona, Benvolio is conversing with Montague and his wife about Romeo. Lady Montague knows her son has been troubled lately so she is glad 'he was not at this fray'. Montague has observed his son's distress, 'deep sighs', 'heavy son' and wants to relieve his despair, 'as willingly give cure as know'. From here, we can detect the good intentions of Romeo's parents, thus we know that whatever choice Romeo makes, they would have rendered their utmost support to him.
Older people are often thought to be wiser. Capulet admits that it is easy for 'men so old as we to keep the peace' which shows that the feud between their families can be resolved. However, it is clear that no effort has been put into ending their quarrel. This highlights the idiocy of the two men which leads to the tragedy because the young lovers could be happily married when the feud ended.
Capulet has good intentions when he finds a suitable match for his daughter. Paris is a handsome and gracious gentleman. It can be said though, that Capulet is acting out of pure selfishness because he knows Paris is a relative of the Prince which is why he, later in the play, insists that Juliet marry Paris. Lady Capulet is absurd in her description of Paris, 'a flower', 'to beautify him only lacks a cover'. Her attitude towards marriage and love is so artificial and she seems more interested in the wealth and nobility...