Romeo and Juliet passages - Identify Literary Devices

oxymoron

"O brawling love, O loving hate."

Allusion

Romeo says that Rosaline "hath Dian's wit."

Pun

"You have dancing shoes / With nimble soles. I have a soul of lead / so stakes me to the ground I cannot move."

Imagery

representation in words of a vivid sensory experience

•Example: In Act 1, Scene 5, lines 55 and 56, Romeo uses imagery to describe Juliet's beauty when he says, "So shows a dove trooping with crows / As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows."

Point-of-view

Tybalt says, "I'll not endure him"

Paradox

A statement that might seem to contradict itself but is nevertheless true; for example,

"My only love sprung from my only hate."

Rhyme

Now old desire doth in his deathbed lie,

And young affection gapes to be his heir.

That fair for which love groaned for and would die,

With tender Juliet matched, is now not fair.

Soliloquy

A speech an actor gives as though talking to himself or herself. Romeo starts his famous "But soft, what light through yonder window breaks" (II.ii.2). He is speaking to himself about Juliet.

Aside

words spoken by an actor supposedly heard only by the audience

•Example: Romeo "She speaks." He is not talking to Juliet, the only other person on stage.

Only the audience is intended to hear this line.

Hyperbole

Juliet says that her "bounty is as boundless as the sea." In other words, she says what she has to offer Romeo is wider than the ocean.

Simile

These violent delights have violent ends

And in their triumph die, like fire and powder,

Which, as they kiss, consume.

Protagonists

Romeo and Juliet

Antagonist

Tybalt

Tragedy

a story with an unhappy ending

•Example: Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy, because the main characters, along with four other people, die.

Conflict

the struggle between opposing forces or characters -

Tybalt's hatred of Montagues, and especially Romeo, which ends with a fight.

Chorus

The Prologue - A characteristic device in ancient Greek drama, wherein a group of actors speaking or chanting about the play, particularly an emotion about the action or characters

Monologue

O, then I see Queen Mab hath been with you. She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes In shape no bigger than an agate stone. Mercurtio

Motif

devices that continually reoccur in a work. Ex. fate throughout Romeo and Juliet.

Dramatic Irony

It occurs when the audience is aware of something that the characters in the story are not aware of. Act V

The audience knew Juliet was not dead but Romeo did not.

Foreshadowing

A narrative device that hints at coming events; often builds suspense or anxiety in the reader.

Act III, scene 5 Juliet says

"O God, I have an ill-divining soul! Methinks I see thee, now thou art so low, As one dead in the bottom of a tomb."

Personification

"Now old desire in his death-bed lie"

personification

"Arise fair sun, and kill the envious moon"

simile

"The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars, as daylight doth a lamp"

metaphor

"Juliet is the sun"

personification

"The grey eyed morn smiles on the frowning night"