Thursday, June 19, 2014

How does Juliet respond to her mother's request, "can you like of Paris's love?"

This line is from scene 3 of Romeo and Juliet. In this scene, the Nurse and Lady Capulet are asking if Juliet will look kindly upon marriage to Paris, who has approached Lord Capulet to request her hand. When Lady Capulet asks if her daughter can "like of Paris's love" Juliet responds, rather diplomatically, that she will "look to like," and observes that "looking" might lead to love. But, as she hastens to add, she will go no further than her parents allow. She is not overly enthusiastic about Paris's proposal, but is not dismissing it either, recognizing that she really cannot do so. It may be that Shakespeare intended this line to foreshadow her meeting with Romeo at the Capulet family masquerade later in the first act. In that case, looking certainly led her to love at first sight. Her reaction to this initial approach is also far more circumspect than her flat rejection of marriage later in the play (when, unbeknownst to her parents, she has married Romeo).

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