Romeo and Juliet Light and Darkness Quotes

But all so soon as the all-cheering sun
Should in the furthest east begin to draw
The shady curtains from Aurora’s bed,
Away from the light steals home my heavy son,
And private in his chamber pens himself,
Shuts up his windows, locks far daylight out
And makes himself an artificial night.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 1, Scene 1. A worried Montague reveals the extent of his son Romeo’s depression. When the sun rises Romeo doesn’t just hide himself away in a room, but he shuts up the windows and locks the daylight out. Montague’s speech includes the use of personification in "all-cheering sun," while "draw the shady curtains" is a metaphor for sunrise.

O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope’s ear;
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!
So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows,
As yonder lady o’er her fellows shows.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 1, Scene 5. These lines tell us how Romeo is smitten by Juliet when he first lays eyes on her at the Capulets’ ball. In the first line Romeo uses a metaphor to compare Juliet to a torch lighting up the room. Then in a simile he compares her shining beauty against the night to an jeweled earring sparkling on the ear of an Ethiopian. Another metaphor likens Juliet to a magnificent "snowy dove" in a room full of "crows." Romeo uses the imagery of light against the dark to describe the radiance of Juliet’s loveliness. His speech indicates a love-at-first-sight moment for the young man. But Romeo’s ominous statement that Juliet has "beauty too rich to use, for earth too dear" is foreshadowing of how she will be laid out in the tomb too early and of the tragic events that follow. We also see here an example of Romeo’s impetuous and impulsive behavior. From being depressed before this over his unrequited love for Rosaline, he instantly falls for Juliet the moment he sets eyes on her. This is a case of situational irony, since Romeo came to the Capulet party hoping to see Rosaline, so one wouldn’t expect him to instantly fall in love with another girl.

But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 2. In the famous balcony scene, Romeo is hiding in the Capulet orchard beneath Juliet’s bedroom when she makes an appearance on the balcony. In a metaphor, the lovestruck Romeo compares Juliet’s beauty to the shining light of the sun at sunrise. Juliet is portrayed as if she were the center of the universe and Romeo’s love for her something beyond this earth.

Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief,
That thou her maid art far more fair than she:
Be not her maid, since she is envious;
Her vestal livery is but sick and green
And none but fools do wear it; cast it off.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 2. Romeo speaks these lines in the passionate balcony scene, one of the most famous in all English literature. Juliet is leaning out of her bedroom balcony and a smitten Romeo is hiding in the garden below. With teenage hormones raging, his adoring words mark the beginning of the finest passages of poetry in the play. The sun represents a metaphor for Juliet who is transforming the darkness of the night into the light of day. The moon is personified as being "envious" and "sick and pale with grief." In mythology the moon represented virginity. Moon goddess Diana was patron of virgins in ancient Roman religion (for the Greeks she was Artemis). This passage tells us that virgin Diana is "envious" of Juliet’s radiance. Juliet is urged not to be Diana’s "maid" but to take her "vestel livery" and "cast it off," as only fools wear it. In this risqué metaphor, Romeo is wishing for Juliet to give up her virginity and be with him in the most intimate and physical way. The passage is also a good example of the light and dark motifs found throughout the play, with many scenes occurring in darkness and the motifs used to show contrast and conflict.

The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars,
As daylight doth a lamp; her eyes in heaven
Would through the airy region stream so bright
That birds would sing and think it were not night.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 2. Romeo uses light imagery to tell us how glorious Juliet is to him in the play’s most famous scene, commonly known as the balcony scene. Hiding in Capulet’s orchard after the ball, he sees Juliet leaning out of her balcony window overhead. Using a simile, he says that the radiance of her cheeks overpowers the stars, just as daylight does a lamp. The brightness of her eyes would make the birds sing, thinking it was day and not night.

I have no joy of this contract to-night:
It is too rash, too unadvised, too sudden;
Too like the lightning, which doth cease to be
Ere one can say "It lightens."

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 2. Juliet appears skeptical to Romeo’s first declaration of love for her in the balcony scene. In a simile she compares its rashness and suddenness to lightning, which flashes one moment and disappears the next. This image paints love as something unpredictable and even dangerous. Foreshadowed here is the play’s tragic ending for the two lovers. In this fledgling relationship Juliet appears to be the more cautious and mature one. She asserts her free will in this passage, wanting Romeo to slow down and not rush things. Romeo on the other hand wants to dive right in. Moments later he tells Juliet that he cannot be satisfied without an "exchange of thy love’s faithful vow for mine." Juliet’s words and her wanting to take a step back because everything is happening too fast also highlights the theme of appearance vs reality.

O blessed, blessed night! I am afeard.
Being in night, all this is but a dream,
Too flattering-sweet to be substantial.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 2. After Romeo and Juliet declare their love for one another, Romeo thinks this is too good to be true. He is afraid that he will wake up and discover it was only a dream because it is nighttime. The description "blessed, blessed night" emphasizes how night is the couple’s friend and daylight their enemy, because they have to conduct their love in secret.

Good night, good night! parting is such sweet sorrow,
That I shall say good night till it be morrow.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 2. At the end of the balcony scene Juliet bids goodnight to Romeo, because she doesn’t want to say goodbye. She uses an oxymoron when she describes the parting as "sweet sorrow." This indicates the bittersweet feeling of spending time with Romeo and then having to part with him. The play’s light and dark symbolism appears here, as Juliet acknowledges the division between day and night.

The grey-eyed morn smiles on the frowning night,
Chequering the eastern clouds with streaks of light,
And flecked darkness like a drunkard reels
From forth day’s path and Titan’s fiery wheels.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 3. Friar Laurence uses striking imagery to paint a vivid picture of the dawn’s mixture of light and darkness, while reminding us also of the uncertainty and danger of the lovers’ situation. In the passage morn is personified as smiling and night as frowning. The departing darkness is compared in a simile to a staggering drunkard trying to get out of the sun’s path. "Titan’s fiery wheels" is an allusion to the Greek sun god who drove a chariot of fire.

Alas poor Romeo! he is already dead; stabbed with a white wench’s black eye; shot through the ear with a love-song.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 4. Mercutio says this about the lovesick Romeo, thinking that he is pining away for the "wench" Rosaline. What he doesn’t know, but the audience does, is that Romeo affections have switched from Rosaline to Juliet, whom he has fallen head over heels in love with. This is an example of dramatic irony, a literary and theatrical device much loved by Shakespeare and used throughout the play. Mercutio’s joke about Romeo being dead for love is tragically foreshadowing of how Romeo will die from his love of a woman – Juliet! We see also the juxtaposition of light and dark in this passage – "a white wench’s black eye." These two contrasting motifs are used throughout the play and represent the conflicting powers of good and evil.

Spread thy close curtain, love-performing night,
That runaway’s eyes may wink and Romeo
Leap to these arms, untalk’d of and unseen.
Lovers can see to do their amorous rites
By their own beauties; or, if love be blind,
It best agrees with night.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 2. In this sexually charged passage by Juliet, she yearns for the pleasure of her wedding night. Using erotically charged imagery and language, she looks forward to the "amorous rites" of lovers. Night is personified and curtain is used as a metaphor for darkness. Though only approaching her 14th birthday, Juliet is presented as a woman and a sexual one at that. This shows the very physical nature of Romeo and Juliet’s relationship. When it comes to strong physical desire and her longing to be "love performing," Juliet is Romeo’s equal. In the final two lines the motifs of light and dark are used – lovers can see by the light of their own beauty or, if love is blind, then it is best in the night.

Come, civil night,
Thou sober-suited matron, all in black,
And learn me how to lose a winning match,
Play’d for a pair of stainless maidenhoods.
Hood my unmann’d blood, bating in my cheeks,
With thy black mantle; till strange love, grown bold,
Think true love acted simple modesty.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 2. Juliet calls on the night to help her win her love Romeo so that they can both lose their virginities, "a pair of stainless maidenhoods." The night is personified by being presented as a "sober-suited matron," who will help Juliet achieve her sexual fulfillment. A falconry metaphor is used, "hood my unman’d blood, bating in my cheeks," when Juliet asks the night to hide her nervousness and the blood rushing to her cheeks. In falconry an untamed hawk is controlled by hooding it so that it won’t beat its wings wildly and harm itself.

Come, night; come, Romeo; come, thou day in night;
For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night
Whiter than new snow on a raven’s back.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 2. Juliet uses a metaphor to compare Romeo to "day in night," as she impatiently waits for him to arrive so that they can consummate their marriage. Romeo’s shining whiteness of "new snow" is contrasted with the darkness of the night. The night is personified as having "wings" that will carry Romeo to her.

Come, gentle night, come, loving, black-brow’d night,
Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night
And pay no worship to the garish sun.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 2. In a soliloquy full of passion Juliet addresses the night, personifying it as "gentle" and "loving." She urges it to "come" so that she can be with Romeo under cloak of darkness. Their love is forbidden because of the feud between their families, so the night offers protection. Juliet’s strong desire and longing for her wedding night with Romeo is expressed here in explicitly sexual and violent terms. In the play love and sex are intertwined with violence and death and are never far apart. Juliet’s repetition of "come" makes clear the physical union she yearns for with Romeo. Using a metaphor, she imagines Romeo dying and being cut into little stars to light up the heavens in an ecstasy of love. This image describes the sexual fulfillment she longs for with the young husband she secretly married. In Shakespeare’s time, "die" was Elizabethan slang for sexual climax. The passage’s opposing symbolism of light and dark reminds us that the light of the couple’s love glows most brightly in the dark.

Wilt thou be gone? it is not yet near day:
It was the nightingale, and not the lark,
That pierced the fearful hollow of thine ear.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 5. After their night of love, Romeo prepares to leave Juliet’s room just before dawn. In the scene’s opening words Juliet tries to convince Romeo that he didn’t hear the lark but the nightingale. She doesn’t want him to leave and is trying to persuade him to stay a little longer. The lark is the herald of the morning, signaling Romeo must go, while the nightingale is the bird of night. Romeo has been banished from Verona over killing Tybalt and is fearful of being caught in the city. Their love is only safe under the cloak of darkness and the couple are fearful of the coming day. In the passage Juliet gives human qualities to the hollow of an ear, a good example of personification.

Look, love, what envious streaks
Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east:
Night’s candles are burnt out, and jocund day
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain-tops.
I must be gone and live, or stay and die.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 5. A beautiful dream mood is created here, but also an ominous and foreboding one. The banished Romeo is preparing to leave his young wife Juliet after a night of passion. A dream mood is created in lines two and three, as day is personified as "jocund" with the ability to stand "tiptoe," while "night’s candles" is a metaphorical representation for the stars and moon. But the happy mood is shattered by the first and last lines, which speak of envy and dying, foreshadowing the death of Romeo later in the play.

Yon light is not day-light, I know it, I:
It is some meteor that the sun exhales,
To be to thee this night a torch-bearer,
And light thee on thy way to Mantua.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 5. After Romeo cautions that daylight is coming and he must be on his way, Juliet’s response is full of powerful light and dark imagery. The lovers are bidding goodbye to one another after their wedding night. Juliet comes up with the fanciful idea that the light is not daylight, but the sun exhaling a meteor to light Romeo’s way to Mantua, where he must go into exile. She personifies the word meteor as the bearer of a torch to guide him through the dark night. Her deep love and longing for Romeo shines through, as she find it hard to part with her new husband.

JULIET: O God, I have an ill-divining soul!
Methinks I see thee, now thou art below,
As one dead in the bottom of a tomb.
Either my eyesight fails, or thou look’st pale.
ROMEO: And trust me, love, in my eye so do you:
Dry sorrow drinks our blood.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 3, Scene 5. In their final scene together alive, Juliet foresees a tragic fate for Romeo, as she has a vision of him lying dead in a tomb. She reveals her sense of foreboding as Romeo departs and descends the ladder from her balcony. This is foreshadowing of how Romeo will visit Juliet’s tomb after she takes a potion that makes her appear dead and poisons himself. The heavy foreshadowing and dramatic tension are further heightened when they comment on how pale they both look, with Romeo personifying sorrow as having the human ability to drink their blood. The young lovers are both trapped by their tragic fates.
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