ACT II. SCENE II. Capulet’s orchard – textual analysis

Reading the title the reader immediately understands the scene might take place in the Capulets’ garden near an orchard, the area where fruit trees grow. He doesn’t know yet who the main characters are, but by considering the structure he can infer the scene coincides with a dialogue between Romeo and Juliet; indeed the first two expressions which the poet wants to draw the attention on are “Enter Romeo” and “Juliet appears”: the chiasmus also highlights the writer want the reader to focus on the two characters, who become the center of investigation of the scene. Furthermore the verb “appears” gives the idea of a sudden entrance of Juliet in the scene, while Romeo was pronouncing his first words as he thought he was alone: so the reader might first think the scene is a monologue, but after he realizes he is going to read a dialogue.

The first problem the reader has to tackle is Romeo’s first consideration: he refers to “scars that never felt”; the reader can’t forget in the previous scene Romeo climbs the wall which divided the Montagues and the Capulets’ gardens and leaps down within it to reach the beloved Juliet: someone could have thought Romeo was mad, because in Verona everyone knew the two families hated each other. But Romeo fell in love with Juliet and that love coincides with the scars he refers to.

The first 25 lines are dedicated to Romeo’s monologue: he thought he was alone, so his voice is loud enough to be heard by Juliet, who is standing above at a window lost in thought. Romeo’s begins with “but” which catches the reader attention: at the beginning Romeo was speaking alone, but after he notices a light trough the window and realizes Juliet is there and can hear him, so his voice becomes louder. The semantic field of nature Romeo uses in his speech helps the reader in understanding the emotions he feels to Juliet: he compares her to the sun, inciting to fight against the moon showing her beauty and brightness, defining the moon as something to kill, jealous, upset and pale. Romeo had always compared Rosaline to the moon, and now, his love for Juliet has outshone the moon. Now Romeo steps from the moonlight darkness into the light from Juliet's balcony, he has left behind his melodramatic woes and moved toward a more genuine, mature understanding of love.

Indeed after he says he is “too bold” showing his humility: he could never imagine Juliet’s words were referred to him. He’s willing to listen and to answer her question making clear his idea of love to Juliet: it’s not ephemeral like Rosaline’s one, he immediately noticed Juliet at the party as a woman of great and pure moral values.

Again semantic field of astronomy (stars, sun) is related to her qualities or physical appearance: in simile at line 20 Shakespeare compares her cheek to a daylight’s brightness highlighting once more the parallelism between Juliet and nature. Also semantic field of nature (daylight, heaven, bird, night) continues the poet’s rhetorical choices in Romeo’s speech defining her eyes able to make birds singing thinking about the end of night. The last three lines coincide with Romeo’s wish to become a glove to feel an to touch passionately Juliet’s candid cheek.

Juliet’s first words are an exclamation: she hears some strange noises and pronounces it because she’s curious to find out what are the next words of the mysterious man. So Romeo kept on speaking but lower so that Juliet can’t understand clearly what he’s saying, speaking again with natural references to Juliet, defining her as a bright angel.

Now Juliet pronounces her famous words “O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo?”. With the expression she lets the reader understand she knew the mysterious man was Romeo and now she tackles the problem of the two families’ rivalry. She tells Romeo she’s willing to forget about the Capulets and escaping with him to get married, as long as he pronounces his oath of love.

Romeo is now confused: he doesn’t know what to do, to answers or not to. Besides Juliet’s following words convince him: she doesn’t care about their families rivalry, she only wants his love. She doesn’t know the importance of the Montagues, that’s only a name, not enough to forbid their love. Then she asks him to forget his name. He does.

Romeo begins to display signs of increasing maturity in this scene. Romeo is no longer the melancholy lover of the first acts. Up to this point, Romeo has expressed his emotions in a traditional, colloquial style. His behavior has been notably antisocial: he preferred to submit to the misery of his own amorous failures. Although Romeo has matured in the brief time since the beginning of the play, he remains somewhat immature when compared with Juliet — a pattern that recurs throughout their relationship.

Although Juliet is only 13, she considers the world with striking maturity. As later acts reveal, her parents do not provide an emotionally rich and stable environment, possibly forcing Juliet to mature beyond her years. Juliet shows the beginnings of increasing self-possession and confidence that ultimately lead her to seek her own fate rather than a destiny imposed upon her by her parents. She stops him from using traditional, colloquial poetic forms in expressing his affection. She encourages him to be genuine and to invest himself in a less traditional, more spiritual concept of love.