Even before Romeo finds out that Juliet had supposedly died, he has an uneasy feeling and foreshadows, “I dreamt my lady came and found me dead.” (V, I, 6) But then, Romeo finds out from his servant who has just arrived that Juliet has died (supposedly). As at the beginning of the play, when the Chorus referred to the “star-crossed lovers,” Romeo now rebels against Fate, “Is it e'en so? Then I defy you, stars!” He decides that he can’t live without her, blaming mischief (personification) “O mischief, thou art swift/ To enter in the thoughts of desperate men!” (V, I, 37-38) which gives him the idea to buy some poison and goes to her tomb.

Friar Laurence finds out that his letter never got through to Romeo because the messenger was delayed. (He was visiting a family thought to have the plague and the house was quarantined so he couldn’t get out to deliver the message to Romeo.) Friar Laurence has to go get Juliet from the tomb himself.

In the meantime, Paris goes to Juliet’s tomb to put flowers on her grave when he sees Romeo. Romeo fights Paris and kills him. As he is dying, Paris asks Romeo to lay him beside Juliet and Romeo complies. Romeo then drinks the poison and dies. Juliet awakens and sees that Romeo is dead so she grabs his dagger and kills herself.

Both families, the Prince and the townspeople go to the tomb. Friar Laurence tells of the marriage of Romeo and Juliet and the plan to get them together. The Montagues and Capulets decide that the feud has gone on long enough and it is time to end it. As a monument to their children and a reminder of the end of the feud, they also plan to build golden statues of Romeo and Juliet.

In the end, the Prince wraps up the Light to Dark theme by stating: “A glooming peace this morning with it brings/ The sun for sorrow will not show his head.” (V, iii, 321-322) He also has the last word on Fate, telling the two feuding families:

“See what a scourge is laid upon your hate,

That heaven finds means to kill your joys with love!” (V, iii, 309-310)

So Juliet goes to Friar Laurence’s cell to get advice. She comes with a knife, prepared to take her own life if the Friar can’t come up with a solution. She foreshadows her own death when she states: “Or bid me go into a new-made grave/ And hide me with a dead man in his shroud.” (IV, 1, 86-87) Because Juliet can’t really marry Paris (as she is already married to Romeo), Friar Laurence gives her a potion which will make her seem dead for forty-two hours. Friar Laurence tells her that he will send a messenger to Romeo to let him know what the plan is so he can come get her and take her to Mantua.

Juliet goes home and tells Lord Capulet that she will be happy to marry Count Paris because she doesn’t want him to get suspicious and so that her plan may succeed. Juliet tells her nurse and mother that she wants to be alone for the night, telling them that she has “need of many orisons/ To move the heavens to smile upon my state” (IV, iii, 3-4) referring to her Fate. She has second thoughts about drinking the potion (“Or, if I live, is it not very like/ The horrible conceit of death and night” referring to the Darkness, IV, iii, 37-38) but only out of love for Romeo decides to drink it after all.

Everyone is preparing for the wedding of Juliet and Paris. But in the morning, when the nurse finds Juliet seemingly dead, she states “Never was seen so black a day as this” (IV, v, 54) referring to the Dark theme. When Lord Capulet is told, he weeps, “Death, that hath ta'en her hence to make me wail,/ Ties up my tongue and will not let me speak..” (IV, v, 32-33) Death is personified as having taken Juliet and tying up Lord Capulet’s tongue not letting him speak. Thus, everyone believes that Juliet is dead. Instead of a wedding, there will be a funeral.

Again Shakespeare chooses to inject a little humour here with some word play amongst the musicians, Nurse and Peter. The joke is with the words and actions around dagger and wit in this example (IV, v, 115-117):

“Pray you, put up your dagger and put out your wit.” – Second Musician

“Then have at you with my wit. I will dry-beat you with an iron wit and put up my iron dagger.” – Peter

More feuding out on the streets of Verona: Tybalt kills Mercutio who, as he is dying, says, “Ask for me tomorrow and you shall find me a grave man.” Shakespeare uses the pun to inject some humour into a scene of death. It keeps the audience from getting too bored with all the tragedy and dying that happens in this play.

So now Romeo kills Tybalt, kind of accidentally, but to avenge Mercutio’s slaying. But Romeo feels really bad about it because as Tybalt is Juliet’s cousin, he is now also Romeo’s relative. He calls himself, “Fortunes Fool,” (III, i, 98) referring to his destiny (Fate). But instead of having him put to death, the Prince banishes Romeo from Verona, because he killed Tybalt for slaying Mercutio, which the law would have done anyway.

While waiting for Romeo’s return, Juliet discusses her love for Romeo. Here Shakespeare again uses personification in the lines: “if love be blind,/ It best agrees with night. Come, civil night,/ Thou sober-suited matron, all in black.” (III, ii, 9-11) where love is blind and night is civil and a sober-suited matron dressed in black. But then, Juliet finds out from her nurse that Romeo killed Tybalt and that he is banished from Verona. Romeo goes to Friar Laurence’s cell to hide out. The Friar tells him to go say goodbye to Juliet under darkness of night and then to go to Mantua. Meanwhile, Lord Capulet tells Count Paris that Juliet will marry him on Thursday.

Romeo visits Juliet to say goodbye, but has to leave with the morning light. The theme changes from Light to Dark here: “More light and light, more dark and dark our woes.” (III, v, 36) As he is leaving, Juliet foreshadows his bad end when she says,” Methinks I see thee, now thou art below,/As one dead in the bottom of a tomb.” (III, v, 55-56) Juliet also refers to Fate here stating, “O God, I have an ill-divining soul.” (III, v, 53) After Romeo leaves, Juliet’s parents tell her that she will marry Paris on Thursday, but when she refuses, Lord Capulet gets angry and says he’ll disown her.

Romeo is hiding from Benvolio and Mercutio in the Capulet’s garden. When he sees her coming out onto her balcony, he again uses metaphors to discuss her beauty, comparing her to the sun. “But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?/ It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.” (II, ii, 2-3) Romeo and Juliet express their love for each other in the famous balcony scene.  There is also much imagery used here in the Light theme. Romeo compares Juliet to different kinds of light: “It is the east and Juliet is the sun!” (II, ii, 3), sunlight; “The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars/ As daylight doth a lamp,” (II, ii, 20-21), daylight; and “O speak again bright angel,” (II, ii, 26), the bright light that surrounds an angel. Romeo also hints at their Fate again here: “My life were better ended by their hate/ Than death proroguèd, wanting of thy love.” (II, ii, 77-78) They decide to get married the next day.

Shakespeare uses personification in the opening of scene three when Friar Laurence states “The grey-eyed morn smiles on the frowning night.” (II, iii, 1) Romeo comes to tell Friar Laurence of his love for Juliet and that he wants the Friar to marry them tomorrow. The Friar agrees because it might end the feud between the two families.

Mercutio and Benvolio discuss Romeo’s whereabouts of the previous night and Tybalt’s challenge to the house of Montague. Romeo comes in and the three exchange jokes with each other. Shakespeare often used base humour to keep the lower class of the audience entertained as well. Then Juliet’s nurse comes to speak to Romeo about Juliet. Romeo sends Juliet a message through the nurse to get her to meet him at Friar Laurence’s cell tomorrow. The nurse delivers Romeo’s message to Juliet, and the next day they meet there and are married. But just before Juliet arrives at the Friar’s cell, he foreshadows the end of the story again by stating, “These violent delights have violent ends.” (II, vi, 9)

As the saying goes, “Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.” In this play, one lie leads to another, and to another, and to another. But it seems to all work out in the end (even though it’s a tragedy) because the family feud between the Montagues and Campulets comes to an end. But right at the beginning, the Chorus tells us that Fate plays a huge role in this drama:

“A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life,

Whose misadventured piteous overthrows

Doth with their death bury their parents' strife.” (Prologue, 6-8)

Another theme highlighted in this play is the theme of Light turning to Dark. The beginning of the play contains a lot of Light imagery which changes to Dark after the middle of the action passes.

This family feud is what the sad story of Romeo and Juliet revolves around. Act one begins in the streets of Verona where a fight is begun by servants of the Montagues and Capulets and is broken up by Prince Escalus who says that the next person, who kills someone because of this feud, would be put to death. Enter the “hero” of the story, Romeo telling his friend Benvolio the reason for his sorrow: He is in love with a woman who doesn’t love him, Rosaline. He thinks she is the most beautiful creature in the world, using personification to describe her: “One fairer than my love! The all-seeing sun/ Ne’er saw her match since first the world begun.” (I, ii, 97-98)

Back at the Capulet manor, Lord Capulet explains to Count Paris that his daughter, Juliet, is too young to marry, but invites him to the party he is throwing that evening to see if he might like some other young beauty. Meanwhile Lady Capulet and Nurse talk to Juliet about marriage and the proposition of marrying Paris.

Then, Benvolio convinces Romeo to attend the Capulet party in order to see other beautiful women to get his mind off Rosaline. Romeo, Benvolio and Mercutio amongst others, head for the Capulet ball, on the way discussing dreams and love. Shakespeare uses foreshadowing throughout the whole play, but in Act one, Romeo kind of sums up his own demise talks of Fate in the stars and which directs his path when he says,

                        “For my mind misgives

            Some consequence, yet hanging in the stars,

            Shall bitterly begin his fearful date

            With this night’s revels, and expire the term

            Of a despised life closed in my breast

            By some vile forfeit of untimely death.

But he that hath the steerage of my course,

Direct my sail.” (I, iv, 82-89)

Tybalt notices Romeo crashing the party. Romeo and Juliet notice each other and they instantly fall in love. Romeo thinks Juliet is the most beautiful woman he’s ever seen, “She doth teach the torches to burn bright” (I, v, 42) comparing her to Light. Once Juliet notices Romeo, their first dialogue uses metaphoric language comparing their hands and lips to devoted palmers on a holy pilgrimage:

“If I profane with my unworthiest hand

This holy shrine, the gentle sin is this:

My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand

To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.” (Romeo, I, v, 95-98)

“Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,

Which mannerly devotion shows in this,

For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,

And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.” (Juliet, I, v, 99-102)