Context, Genre and the Prologue
Shakespeare & the Elizabethan Stage
William Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet around 1594–1596, during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. He was already a popular playwright working with the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, performing at the Theatre in Shoreditch and later the Globe on the south bank of the Thames. His plays were performed in open-air theatres to audiences of all social classes — from wealthy nobles in the galleries to rowdy groundlings standing in the yard.
Elizabethan theatre had no elaborate sets, no electric lighting, and very few props. This meant Shakespeare relied on language to create atmosphere, location, and emotion. When Romeo describes Juliet as the sun, or when the Friar talks about the dawn, the audience must imagine the setting entirely through the words. This is why the play’s soliloquies and poetic imagery are so important — they did the job that lighting, scenery, and special effects do in modern productions.
Female roles were played by boy actors in Elizabethan theatre. Juliet, Lady Capulet, and the Nurse would all have been performed by teenage boys. This adds an extra layer to the play’s exploration of gender and obedience.
Elizabethan Attitudes: Love, Marriage & Family
For Elizabethan audiences, marriage was rarely about love. Among wealthy families, marriages were arranged to secure alliances, property, and social status. A daughter was expected to obey her father’s choice of husband without question. Capulet’s anger when Juliet refuses to marry Paris would have seemed entirely justified to many in Shakespeare’s audience — a daughter’s disobedience was a serious social transgression.
The idea of marrying for love was considered reckless and even dangerous. Romeo and Juliet’s secret marriage is not just romantic — it is an act of rebellion against their families, their society, and the patriarchal system that controlled women’s lives. Shakespeare uses their love story to question whether passion or duty should govern human behaviour.
Elizabethans believed strongly in fate and fortune. The stars were thought to influence human destiny — astrology was taken seriously, and the idea that your life was mapped out before birth was widely accepted. Shakespeare taps directly into this belief: Romeo and Juliet are described as “star-cross’d lovers” whose destiny is written in the heavens. Throughout the play, references to stars, fortune, and destiny reinforce the idea that the lovers are doomed from the very beginning.
However, Shakespeare also shows characters making choices that contribute to the tragedy — Romeo’s impulsiveness, Friar Lawrence’s risky plan, Tybalt’s aggression. The play asks whether the tragedy is caused by fate, by human error, or by the toxic feud between the families. This tension between fate and free will is one of its central questions.
The Genre: Tragedy
Romeo and Juliet is a tragedy. In classical and Elizabethan drama, a tragedy follows a noble or admirable character whose downfall is caused by a combination of fate and a personal flaw (known as hamartia). Romeo’s hamartia is arguably his impulsiveness — he acts on emotion rather than reason at almost every turning point.
What makes this play unusual among Shakespeare’s tragedies is that the protagonists are young, innocent, and sympathetic. Unlike Macbeth or King Lear, Romeo and Juliet do not bring about their own destruction through ambition or cruelty. Their tragedy stems from the hatred that surrounds them. This makes the play feel especially poignant — two young people are destroyed by a conflict they did not create.
The play mixes genres: it begins like a comedy (witty servants, love at first sight, a secret wedding) before shifting into tragedy after Mercutio’s death in Act 3. This tonal shift is deliberate — Shakespeare lures the audience into hope before snatching it away.
The Prologue: Revealing the Ending
The play opens with a Prologue spoken by the Chorus. In just fourteen lines — a sonnet — Shakespeare tells the audience everything: where the play is set (“fair Verona”), what the central conflict is (“Two households, both alike in dignity … From ancient grudge break to new mutiny”), and how it ends (“A pair of star-cross’d lovers take their life”).
Revealing the ending at the start creates dramatic irony. Every time Romeo and Juliet speak of hope, the audience already knows they will die. This transforms the play from a simple love story into something far more powerful — the audience watches, helpless, as two young people rush towards a fate they cannot escape. The tension comes not from wondering what will happen, but from watching how it unfolds.
“Two households, both alike in dignity” — The families are equals in status, making the feud a pointless contest of pride rather than a genuine dispute over power.
“From ancient grudge break to new mutiny” — The conflict is old and inherited. No one remembers how it started, yet it continues to cause violence. “New mutiny” shows it is escalating, not fading.
“A pair of star-cross’d lovers take their life” — “Star-cross’d” means their fate is controlled by the stars (doomed by destiny). “Take their life” has a double meaning: they live their lives, but they also end them.
“Doth with their death bury their parents’ strife” — Only the children’s deaths can end the parents’ hatred. This line condemns the older generation — their feud costs them everything.
The Prologue is a sonnet — the poetic form most associated with love. Shakespeare uses the form of love poetry to describe death and destruction, fusing love and violence from the very first line. This duality runs through the entire play.