How the Prologue in Romeo and Juliet Prepares the Audience for the Play Essay

The prologue to Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’ prepares the audience by making a short summary of the play so it gets the audience thinking about what the story is about. The prologue is a sonnet which is a 14 line poem, it is also known as an english, elizabethan sonnet which contains 3 quatrains and a rhyming couplet. A sonnet is usually a love poem and that is exactly what ‘Romeo and Juliet’ is about. The first quatrain of the sonnet is about the feud and conflict between the two families. Both of the families have the same status ‘ both alike in dignity’ but they seem to be holding a ‘grudge’ against each other, we aren’t told what causes the hate within the two houses but it is there and drags the households into fights this is particulaly shown in line 4 ‘where civil blood make civil hands unclean’ the word ‘blood’ is meaning that death and injuries occur due to the feud the families have. ‘Civil’ is meant to mean poliet or fair which is a bit ironic since there isn’t any politeness. The second quatrain is about the lovers, Romeo and Juliet, and their deaths. ‘From forth the fatal loins of these two foes’ this line is saying that the two household enemies have produced a pair of lovers, this is mainly emphasised in the phrase ‘ fatal loins’ this implies that these being in love is deadly and they are also involved with the feud of their parents. It also means that their fate has been decided and that death will be their destiny. The second line ‘A pair of star cross’d lovers take their life† this is implying that the stars which is meaning their destinies, since they believed that stars told their destiny like horoscopes, so being star cross’d lovers means that their destinies are entwined but they are also against each other due to the feud. The last line of the second quatrain ‘doth with their death bury their parents’ strife’ this shows that in order to end the feud the deaths of Romeo and Juliet seem to take affect on their parents. The next quatrain is about both love and hate. The first line ‘The fearful passage of their death-marked love’ this means that all the events that they go through will lead them them to their destinies of death. The second line says that their parents anger is something that isn’t easy to take away but in the next line ‘which but their children’s end, nought could remove’ this means that the only thing they can’t stop is their children’s death and it was caused by their hatred to one another. The last line ‘is now the two hours’ traffic of our stage’ this implies that the events that they have mentioned will now take place on the stage by the actors. The rhyming couplet is the last to lines of the sonnet. ‘The which, if you with patient ears attend, what here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.’ These two lines are now directed to the audience and that now they are going to show them the play if they are willing to stay. The phrase ‘patient ears attend’ show that because they are on a stage they don’t usually use scenery so you have to listen and use their imagination to help what is happening. In conclusion the prologue to Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’ prepare the audience for the play by mentioning the key facts to the play so they know what to expect when that particular event is being performed also it helps to explain the parts of the play which seem to be a mystery like the parents hatred, the audience would not know that the two families are meant to be sharing the same status just that there are two groups who don’t like each other. It also prepares the audience like a warning saying that death will occur in the play as well as love and hatred.