Romeo & Juliet: Check Your Understanding

Transcription

1 Act I, scene iii 1. Why do you think the Nurse is so close to Juliet? (Hint: Who has she lost?) 2. How old will Juliet be by Lammastide? 3. Why does Shakespeare have the Nurse tell a lengthy story about when Juliet was a baby? (What does it tell us about the Nurse's personality?) 4. When Lady Capulet asks Juliet how she feels about marriage, Juliet responds, It is an honor that I dream not of. How does Juliet feel about marriage? 5. How does Juliet's mother feel about her getting married? 6. Who wants to marry Juliet, according to her mother?

2 Act I, scene iv Suggestion: Write down where you find the answer to each question this will make it easier to re-find specific quotes and portions of the text, and will also give you practice in citations (i.e.: II, iii, 9-10, 987). 1. What does Romeo mean when he says, Give me a torch. I am not for this ambling / But being heavy, I will bear the light? (Two things - consider both the figurative and literal meanings.) 2. Romeo and Mercutio banter a lot in this scene and toss metaphors back and forth. What does Mercutio suggest to Romeo about Cupid? How does Romeo counter/refute him? 3. Does Romeo feel that love is gentle or rough? 4. How does Mercutio respond to Romeo, in regards to his thoughts in question 3? 5. What is the point of Mercutio's story about Queen Mab? 6. What does Mercutio mean when he says that dreams are the children of an idle brain / Begot of nothing but vain fantasy? 7. Mercutio compares dreams to the wind ( [Dreams are] as thin of substance as the air / And more inconstant than the wind ). What does he mean when he says, the frozen bosom of the north /And being angered, puffs away from thence / Turning his face to the dew-dropping south? 8. To whom could the quote in question 7 ( the frozen bosom ) be referring? 9. Romeo tells Benvolio and Mercutio that, My mind misgives / Some consequence yet hanging in the stars / Shall bitterly begin his fearful date. What is he worried about? 10. How does Shakespeare foreshadow that Romeo will die? 11. Has Romeo met Juliet yet?

3 Act I, scene v 1. What is the main purpose of the lines between Peter and the serving men? 2. What kind of mood is Capulet in at the beginning of the scene? 3. Who is Romeo describing when he says, Oh, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!? What is he saying about her? 4. What does Tybalt wish to do when he sees Romeo at the Capulet party? Who stops him? 5. What is significant about the form of the first conversation between Romeo and Juliet? (Hint: 14 lines) 6. Why are Romeo and Juliet discussing saints and palmers? 7. What does Juliet mean when she tells Romeo, You kiss by th' book? 8. What does Romeo mean when he exclaims, Is she a Capulet? / O dear account! My life is my foe's debt? (Hint: It is similar to Juliet saying, My only love sprung from my only hate! ) 9. What is Shakespeare foreshadowing when Juliet says, If he be married, / My grave is like to be my wedding bed?

4 Act II, prologue 1. What is significant about the form of the prologue? (Hint: 14 lines) 2. The prologue summarizes the plight of Romeo and Juliet in the story thus far: But to his foe supposed [Romeo] must complain, / And [Juliet] steal love's sweet bait from fearful hooks. What does this say about Romeo and Juliet? 3. What do lines in the prologue mean ( But passion lends them power, time means, to meet, / Tempering extremities with extreme sweet )? Act II, scene I 1. What does Romeo mean when he asks, Can I go forward when my heart is here? / Turn back, dull earth, and find thy center out? To whom is he speaking? 2. Where does Benvolio say he saw Romeo last? 3. What is the main purpose of Mercutio's calling after Romeo ( Humours, madman, passion, lover! )? Why does he talk about Cupid and Venus? 4. What does Benvolio mean when he says, Blind is [Romeo's] love and best befits the dark? 5. Benvolio's final line in the scene is, Go, then, for 'tis in vain / To seek him here that means not to be found. What does he mean?

5 Act II, scene ii 1. What does Romeo mean when he remarks, He jests at scars that never felt a wound? 2. What is Juliet saying when she asks, Wherefore art thou Romeo? 3. What is Juliet saying when she remarks that Montague... is nor hand, nor foot / nor arm, nor face, nor any other part / Belonging to a man. O, be some other name! / What's in a name? That which we call a rose / By any other word would smell as sweet? 4. Why does Romeo call Juliet dear saint (2 reasons)? 5. What does Romeo mean when he says, My life were better ended by their hate / Than death prorogu d, wanting of thy love? 6. What is Juliet confessing to Romeo when she says, Thou know'st the mask of night is on my face / Else would a maiden blush bepaint my cheek / For that which thou hast heard me speak tonight? 7. Why doesn't Juliet want Romeo to compare their love to the moon? 8. What reason does Juliet give Romeo for not wanting to discuss their love anymore that night? 9. What does Juliet want Romeo to do instead of staying with her any longer that night? 10. What does Romeo mean when he says, Love goes toward love as schoolboys from their books / But love from love, toward school with heavy looks? 11. When will Juliet send for Romeo the next day? 12. Who does Romeo say he will go see at the end of scene ii?

6 Act II, scene iii Suggestion: Write down where you find the answer to each question this will make it easier to re-find specific quotes and portions of the text, and will also give you practice in citations (i.e.: II, iii, 9-10, 987). 1. What does Friar Laurence mean when he says the following: The earth, that's nature's mother, is her tomb. / What is her burying grave, that is her womb. 2. Friar Laurence observes that, Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied / And vice sometime by action dignified. What is he saying? 3. Friar Laurence also says that, Two such oppose d kings encamp them still / In man as well as herbs grace and rude will. What does he mean here? 4. Friar Laurence correctly guesses that Romeo has not been to bed, and that that's the reason he has come to visit so early in the morning. What does Friar Laurence assume is the reason that Romeo is still awake? 5. Romeo confesses that he has been feasting with mine enemy. To whom does he refer? 6. Friar Laurence tells Romeo to be plain, good son, and homely in thy drift / Riddling confession finds but riddling shrift. What is he advising Romeo to do? 7. Romeo tells Friar Laurence that he no longer pines for Rosaline. Friar Laurence remarks, Young men's love then lies / Not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes. What is he saying? 8. To whom is Friar Laurence referring when he tells Romeo, Oh, she knew well / Thy love did read by rote, that could not spell. What is he saying? 9. What reason does Friar Laurence give for agreeing to help Romeo? 10. Friar Laurence's final line in the scene is, Wisely and slow. They stumble that run fast. What does he mean?

7 Act II, scene iv 1. What does the audience find out that Tybalt has done at the beginning of the scene? 2. What are three things Mercutio compares Tybalt to? 3. Of Romeo, Mercutio remarks, Without his roe like a dried herring. O flesh, flesh, how art / Thou fishified! What is Mercutio saying about Romeo? 4. What does Mercutio mean when he says, You gave us the counterfeit fairly last night? 5. What is Mercutio saying about Romeo when he remarks, Why, is not this better now than groaning for love? Now art / Thou sociable. Now art thou Romeo? 6. Why is Benvolio yelling, A sail, a sail!? 7. Why is the Nurse angry at Peter? 8. What does Romeo instruct the Nurse to do when he says, Bid her devise / Some means to come to shrift this afternoon. / And there she shall at Friar Laurence's cell / Be shrived and married? 9. How does Romeo plan to meet with Juliet in the abbey? 10. What does the Nurse confess to Romeo about Paris?

8 Act II, scene v 1. What is Juliet lamenting when she says, Love's heralds should be thoughts / Which ten times faster glide than the sun's beams? 2. What is Peter's job? 3. What is Juliet asking the Nurse to do when she says, Though news be sad, yet tell them merrily. / If good, thou shamest the music of sweet news / By playing it to me with so sour a face? 4. How does the Nurse feel about Romeo (... his face be better than any man's, yet his leg excels all men's, and for a hand and a foot and a body, though they be not to be talked on, yet they are past compare. He is not the flower of courtesy, but, I'll warrant him, as gentle as a lamb )? 5. Why is Juliet so impatient in this scene? 6. Who is the Nurse referring to when she tells Juliet, Then hie you hence to Friar Laurence's cell. / There stays a husband to make you a wife? Act II, scene vi 1. What is Shakespeare foreshadowing when Friar Laurence says, So smile the heavens upon this holy act / That after-hours with sorrow chide us not? 2. What does Romeo mean when he says, Do thou but close our hands with holy words, / Then love-devouring death do what he dare; / It is enough I may but call her mine? 3. Upon seeing Juliet, Friar Laurence observes, A lover may bestride the gossamers / That idles in the wanton summer air, / And yet not fall; so light is vanity. What is he saying? 4. Juliet notes that, Conceit, more rich in matter than in words, / Brags of his substance, not of ornament. / They are but beggars that can count their worth. What does she mean? 5. Does Shakespeare describe Romeo and Juliet's wedding ceremony in this scene?