The theme of light and dark imagery recurs in the play. The important scenes, including the balcony scene or the fight in Act III, Scene 1, take place either late at night or in the morning. Shakespeare uses the contrast in light and dark, night and day, to show opposing alternatives in the play.
In the beginning Shakespeare use this imagery to suggest Romeo's despair over his unrequited love for Rosaline. His father describes how...
The theme of light and dark imagery recurs in the play. The important scenes, including the balcony scene or the fight in Act III, Scene 1, take place either late at night or in the morning. Shakespeare uses the contrast in light and dark, night and day, to show opposing alternatives in the play.
In the beginning Shakespeare use this imagery to suggest Romeo's despair over his unrequited love for Rosaline. His father describes how Romeo locks himself in his room and shuts out the light of day. Lord Montague says in Act I, Scene 1,
Away from light steals home my heavy son
And private in his chamber pens himself,
Shuts up his windows, locks fair daylight out,
And makes himself an artificial night.
Later in Act I, instead of darkness, Romeo uses the light to further reinforce his depression as he tells Mercutio and Benvolio he would rather just hold the torch at Capulet's party, rather than dance and have a good time. He says in Act I, Scene 4,
Give me a torch. I am not for this ambling.
Being but heavy I will bear the light.
When he sees Juliet at the party he uses light imagery to describe her. She is literally the light that brings him out of his depression over Rosaline. In Act I, Scene 5 he says,
O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
As a rich jewel in an Ethiop’s ear—
Beauty too rich for use, for Earth too dear.
During the balcony scene, which takes place at night, Romeo compares Juliet to the sun: "It is the east and Juliet is the sun." He urges the sun to kill the "envious" moon. Juliet makes him forget his sadness over Rosaline. She is now the brightest thing in his life and capable of transforming darkness to light.
Juliet too uses light and dark imagery in her soliloquy in Act III, Scene 2. As she impatiently awaits their honeymoon night she demands the gods to drag the sun across the sky, hastening night. She says that Romeo is so bright he will actually outshine the sun,
Give me my Romeo, and when I shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night
And pay no worship to the garish sun.
Light and dark imagery suggests opposing alternatives as it pervades Act III, Scene 5 in Juliet's bedroom after the couple's honeymoon. Juliet is reluctant to see Romeo leave. He has been banished from Verona. She declares that it is the nightingale, the symbol of the night, singing outside her bedroom window. She urges Romeo to stay but he knows it is actually the lark, "herald of the morn" outside the window. The night is Romeo and Juliet's ally and the light of day their enemy as Romeo is exiled to Mantua. Romeo suggests this when he says,
More light and light, more dark and dark our woes.
Also see the link below for another discussion of light and dark imagery in Romeo and Juliet.
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