ASEBL Journal – Volume 11 Issue 1, January 2015
ly, for those of all descent names. It is through obeying ancestral instructions (usually
passed from parent to offspring) that every co-descendant by that name came to be.
So, when Romeo and Juliet communicate a willingness to abandon their descent
names, they are behaving nontraditionally, disobeying their parents (and ancestors),
and exhibiting improper kinship by destroying their means of identifying kin, forgoing
all future cooperation with all bearers of their respective names:
Juliet. O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?
Deny thy father and refuse thy name.
Or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,
And I’ll no longer be a Capulet.
Art thou not Romeo, and a Montague?
Romeo. Neither, fair maid, if either thee dislike. (2.2. 33-35, 60-61)
Indeed, their names kept, we see filial disobedience on the part of Juliet and willingness in Romeo. By contrast, Tybalt obeys his uncle Capulet. Upon spying Romeo at
the Capulet feast, Tybalt determines to confront him, though Capulet – like Montague
bound by royal decree to keep the peace – intervenes, asking, then commanding his
nephew to “be patient” and not to disturb the feast (1.5.70). Albeit begrudgingly,
Tybalt nevertheless obeys, waiting until morning to send a challenge to Romeo, thereby following the ancestral instruction to hate all Montagues.
“[They fight.]”
One of the means by which Shakespeare demonstrates the consequences the feud is
through the juxtaposition of noticeably similar characters in similar situations behaving in noticeably dissimilar ways with respect to the feud, unambiguously illustrating
for the audience which behaviors led (and lead) to which consequences and allowing
the audience to imagine alternative outcomes. Tybalt’s behavior is presented as an
alternative to that of Romeo’s; the former speaks of hate and the latter of love. The
play opens with a potential quarrel made definite upon Tybalt’s arrival, when he perpetuates the feud by attacking the Montague Benvolio (whose sword is drawn in an
attempt to part the fighting servants), asking: “What, drawn and talk of peace? I hate
the word, / As I hate hell, all Montagues, and thee” (1.1.67-68). By contrast, Romeo
startles upon sight of blood from the fight before noting its senselessness (in a foreshadowing the Prince’s ironic assessment of the feud in the final scene):
O me! What fray was here?
Yet tell me not, for I have heard it all.
Here’s much to do with hate, but more with love.
Why then, O brawling love, O loving hate,
O anything of nothing first create! (1.1.171-175)
These contrasting attitudes toward the feud (“O me!