Summary Exploring and analysing Juliet's soliloquy in Act 4 of Romeo and Juliet
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Course
English
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GCSE
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Romeo and Juliet
An in-depth analysis of Juliet's soliloquy in Act 4 of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Part of a bundle of my best work that I have compiled particularly to help GCSE students looking to achieve A/A* grades.
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In Act 4 of Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’, Juliet’s extended soliloquy discusses
her fears and doubts about drinking the potion that the Friar Laurence has given to
her. She repeats many “if” phrases, questioning hypotheticals that emphasise her
troubled state of mind. She constantly questions the actions she is supposed to do
and fears the consequences it could bring. A particularly heart-wrenching quote is
that Juliet fears that the Friar has given her a poison but thinks better of it, calling the
Friar a “holy man.” We learn from this that Juliet is troubled about who she can and
cannot trust, particularly following the Nurse’s ‘betrayal’ of her. The use of the verb
“fear” highlights Juliet’s youth and the audience feels pity that in her time of need, a
girl who is not yet fourteen, a “stranger to the world,” does not feel that she can trust
anyone.
Furthermore, Juliet’s feelings are presented as tumultuous as she switches from one
fear to another very quickly and her use of rhetorical questions emphasise this. She
also uses an exclamatory sentence – “what a fearful point!” with regards to her fear
of waking “before the time” Romeo comes to find and rescue her. The repetition of
the words “fear” and “fearful” shows how Juliet feels backed into a corner; she
cannot remove herself from her relationship with Romeo and cannot disobey her
father's order to marry Paris. Thus, she is presented as very insightful by
Shakespeare, demonstrating a heightened awareness of the many possible endings
to her tense situation.
Additionally, Juliet’s thoughts are presented as morbid when she talks about “bloody
Tybalt… festering in his shroud” and considers the “loathsome smells” of dead
bodies in the Capulet tomb. The words “bloody” and “festering” draw attention to
Juliet’s troubled state of mind and create vivid imagery. She also ends this extract by
voicing her fear about becoming “distraught” in her isolation and killing herself in the
tomb by using “a kinsman's bone” to “dash out [her] desperate brains.” This graphic
imagery shakes the audience, and we again feel pity for her because of the internal
conflict and anxiety that she is feeling, and having to face all alone.
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