Scene 1

• introduction of conflict between Montague and Capulet family: Capulet servants brag about how they will conquer Montague men physically and Montague women sexually
  
  • Montague servants enter - Capulet servants makes a highly insulting gesture towards them
  • verbal confrontation turns into fight
• Benvolio (Montague) wants to stop the fight by drawing his sword (not by actually using it)
• Tybalt (Capulet) also draws his sword and attacks Benvolio out of his hatred for peace and for the Montagues
• heads of families Montague and Capulet enter and are barely prevented from attacking each other by their wives
• Prince Escalus intervenes and demands the fight to stop - otherwise a penalty of torture must be conveyed
  
  • fights have gone on for too long
  • proclamation of death sentence if furter fights emerge, destroying the civil peace
• description of how the fight started by Benvolio
• Lady Montague wonders about the whereabouts of her son Romeo
  
  • Benvolio saw Romeo pacing through a grove but did not speak to him since he looked troubled
  • Montagues explain that Romeo has been in a state of melancholy for a while now
  • they don‘t know what troubles him although they had tried to find out
  • Benvolio promises to find out what troubles the Montague‘s son
• Romeo approaches, displaying an aura of sadness
  
  • Romeo confesses to Benvolio that he is in love with Rosaline who does not share his feelings for her (swore to live a life of chastity)
  • Benvolio is more pragmatic about love: he advises that there are other beauties to gaze at
  • Romeo insists that the woman he adores is the most beautiful, being unable to forget about her and leaves

Function

• provision of background information, including the long-standing hatred between the Capulets and the Montagues
• portrayal of members of all social classes of Verona (servants, Capulets/Montagues, Prince Escalus)
• introduction of different characters
  
  • Benvolio: thoughtful, respectful of the law
  • Tybalt: hothead, always lusting for fights
  • Romeo: moonstruck, melancholy
• themes:
  
  • masculine honor (honor must be defended whenever it is transgressed against, no matter the social class the person is in)
  • servants‘ function (comment on the actions of their masters/society)
  • display of the stupidity of the Montagues/Capulets: willing to die just to defend honor
  • passion vs. law
  • Rosaline (does not appear on stage for the whole play)

Scene 2

• Capulet talks with Paris, a kinsman of the Prince, about Paris‘ wish to marry Capulet‘s daughter Juliet
• Capulet is satisfied with the thought of having such a noble suitor for his daughter, yet thinks she is too young to marry
• Capulet invites Paris to the annual masquerade ball that he hosts the very night in order begin courting Juliet
• the servant Peter is asked to invite some guests according to a list that was handed to him by Capulet
• illiterate Peter asks Romeo who happens to strolly by with Benvolio to read the list for him
  
  • Romeo reads the list, sees the name of his beloved Rosaline
  • Peter invites Romeo and Benvolio (assuming they are not Montagues) as a thanks for helping him
  • Benvolio convinces Romeo to go there in order to forget about Rosaline and to see the other beautiful women Verona has to offer
  • Romeo agrees but thinks about meeting Rosaline there

Function

• introduction of Paris as Juliet‘s potential husband and consequently, Juliet‘s subordination to her father‘s intentions
• hints at a possible meeting between Romeo and Juliet at the masquerade ball
• shows the restrictions of women in comparison to the freedom of men in Verona
  
  • Juliet has to marry whomever her father sees fit for her
  • Romeo even risks going to a feast of his father‘s enemy, indifferent regarding the possible fights and consequences
  • women regarded as powerless and choiceless
  • although Capulet seems to let his daughter decide who she will pick as a husband ("My will to her consent is but a part" (Act I, Scene 2, l. 17)), he can still force her into a marriage she does not agree with
• parental influence as a tool of fate:
  
  • arranged marriage between Paris and Juliet
  • feud between Capulets and Montagues that forbids a relationship between Juliet and Romeo
  • a social structure that prevents the star-crossed lovers to live a life together
• element of humor: the illiterate servant Peter who accidentally invites Montagues to the feast of the Capulets
  
  • Peter also a victim of social structures
  • has no power because he is of lower class offspring and therefore, he is not able to read

Scene 3

• a few hours before the feast Lady Capulet talks to her daughter Juliet
• at first, she sends Juliet‘s Nurse away but then decides differently because she feels that she needs the Nurse‘s advice
• the Nurse recounts a story about Juliet who got accidentally involved in a sexual joke as a child
• Lady Capulet unsuccessfully tries to stop the Nurse, Juliet has to intervene and silences the Nurse
• Juliet‘S mother uses the occasion to ask Juliet about whether she has given any thought to marriage which Juliet denies
• Lady Capulet explains that she was almost the same age as Juliet is now when she gave birth to her and mentions the brave Paris as a possible suitor
• in order to soothe her mother, Juliet - not having any interest in love or marriage at all - claims that she will look if she might be able to love Paris later at the feast

Function

• further development of parental influence:
  
  • Lady Capulet agrees with her husband‘s opinion that Juliet should get married
  • Juliet basically has no other choice but to follow her mother‘s advice in looking at Paris
• element of humour - the story the Nurse tells
  
  • when Juliet was a baby, the Nurse‘s husband made a comment about her falling on her back when she would come of age, meaning that one day she would engage in sexual intercourse
  • from her birth on, Juliet has been an object of sexuality and potential marriage
• provision of insights on three major characters
  
  • Lady Capulet as incapable mother (sends Nurse away, then retrieves her for her advice)
  • the Nurse as a maternal reference person to Juliet (in comparison to Lady Capulet) and as comical, vulgar element
  • Juliet as naive and young, as obedient to her mother and the Nurse, but also as more powerful than her mother (stops the Nurse, will not put a lot of effort into making herself loving Paris)

Scene 4

• Romeo, Benvolio and Mercutio are wearing masks, about to enter the Capulet‘s feast
• Romeo is still melancholy about Rosaline and Mercutio tries to mock him by turning Romeo‘s declarations of love into sexual metaphors
• Romeo does not react on that, stating that a dream showed him that going to the masquerade ball was a bad idea
• Mercutio uses the mentioning of the dream to plunge into a speech about Queen Mab who visits people in their dreams
• completely entranced by this, Mercutio can‘t stop and his speech reaches a bitter underlying tone which is why Romeo intervenes and calms Mercutio
• Mercutio seems different now, saying that dreams are just the children of an idle brain
• they return their attention on getting to the feast, Romeo still voices concerns about their potential untimely death but realizes that whatever will happen lies in the hands of God

Function

• sense of faith
  
  • Romeo believes that the night will bring their death
  • audience already assumes that he will find an untimely death
  • fate is already predestined through Romeo relying on God to make the right decisions for him
• introduction of Mercutio
  
  • quick-witted, entrancing, direct, excessive
  • able to mock Romeo
  • does not believe in the ideals of either love or the importance of honor in comparison to Romeo or Tybalt
  • does not care to accept the ideals that society has imposed upon all of the other characters in the play, actually sees through their blindness
  • master punner in the play and thus ridiculing Romeo‘s dictums of the rhetoric of love or Tybalt‘s sense for the latest fashion
  • has realized that the ideals come from less high-minded desires
• the Queen Mab speech:
  
  • Queen Mab based on mythological Celtic creatures
  • words "quean" and "mab" were references to whores in Elizabethan England
  • Mercutio indirectly links the story about the fairies to whores and hence shows the dichotomy
  • the queen only brings dreams suited to the person dreaming (lover will dream of love, soldier of cutting throats)
  • the queen would even go as far as to introduce young girls to sexuality
  • fairy tale has turned into a dark picture of society
  • figures in the play represent the persons in the speech in some manner (Romeo‘s vision of love is but a dream, Friar Lawrence wants to bring peace to Verona)
  • all of those wishes are delusions

Scene 5

• at the feast Romeo sees Juliet across the room and instantly forgets about Rosaline and falls in love with Juliet
• Tybalt notices Romeo‘s presence and almost breaks into a fight, yet is retained by Capulet who knows of the reputation of Romeo (still swears to himself that this will not go unpunished)
• Romeo talks to Juliet and makes her believe that she represents a saint to which Romeo has pilgrimed and whose sins can only be absolved through a kiss
• Juliet gives Romeo permission to kiss her and thus taking away his sin, kiss a second time
• the Nurse arrives and tells Juliet that her mother wants to see her
• Romeo finds out that Juliet is a Capulet and is devastated
• Juliet has deep feelings about the kiss and hopes that the man she just kissed is not married
• sends of her Nurse to identify the man and then learns that it is Romeo and is just as devastated as Romeo for their love for each other is doomed

Function

• Romeo and Juliet are finally meeting and both fall in love with each other (it almost took one complete act for them to finally find each other)
• Christian metaphor
  
  • love is so divine that it can only be described with religious vocabulary
  • love as pure and divine
  • close to blasphemy (Juliet as a saint - Anglican Church presumed this as some kind of idol worship)
• the moment Romeo sees Juliet for the first time, Tybalt recognizes him as an enemy in the Capulet‘s house
  
  • Tybalt‘s rage already provides the audience with the fate that Romeo and Juliet will both suffer
• set-up of the roles within the relationship of Romeo and Juliet
  
  • Romeo as agrgressor and Juliet as shy, remaining still when Romeo kisses her
  • yet, it is her who forces the second kiss, claiming that Romeo must take back the sin from her lips
  • Juliet thus as quick-witted and as determined in what she desires
• "You kiss by th‘ book" (Act I, Scene 5, l. 112)- two ways of meaning
  
  • Juliet in wonder of how good a kisser Romeo actually is (presents her as inexperienced)
  • ironic observation that Romeo kisses as if he had learned how to kiss from a manual (proficient but fanciless)
  • Juliet possesses a more real level of love whereas Romeo is captured by the mere forms of love