Role in The Play
Friar Laurence plays the part of an adviser to Romeo and Juliet, along with aiding in major plot developments.
Alone, he foreshadows the later, tragic events of the play with his soliloquy about plants and their similarities to humans. When Romeo requests that the Friar marry him to Juliet, he is shocked, because only days before, Romeo had been infatuated with Cara and Rosaline, a woman who did not return his love. Nevertheless, Friar Laurence decides to get Romeo and Juliet married in the attempt to end the civil feud between the Capulets and the Montagues.
When Romeo is banished for killing Tybalt and flees to Mantua, Friar Laurence tries to help the two lovers get back together using a death-emulating potion to fake Juliet's death. The friar sends a letter to Romeo explaining the situation, but it does not reach him because the people of Mantua suspect the messenger came from a house infected with the plague, and the Friar is unable to arrive at the Capulet's monument in time. Romeo kills Count Paris, whom he finds weeping near Juliet's corpse, then commits suicide, by drinking poison that he bought from an impoverished apothecary, over what he thinks is Juliet's dead body. Friar Laurence arrives just as Juliet awakes from her chemically-induced slumber. He urges Juliet not to be rash, and to join a society of nuns, but he hears a noise from outside and then flees from the tomb. Juliet then kills herself with Romeo's dagger, completing the tragedy. The Friar is forced to return to the tomb, where he recounts the entire story to Prince Escalus, and all the Montagues and Capulets. As he finishes, the prince proclaims, "We have still known thee for a holy man."
Read more about this topic: Friar Laurence
Famous quotes containing the words role and/or play:
“The role of the stepmother is the most difficult of all, because you can’t ever just be. You’re constantly being tested—by the children, the neighbors, your husband, the relatives, old friends who knew the children’s parents in their first marriage, and by yourself.”
—Anonymous Stepparent. Making It as a Stepparent, by Claire Berman, introduction (1980, repr. 1986)
“The last act is bloody, however pleasant all the rest of the play is: a little earth is thrown at last upon our head, and that is the end forever.”
—Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)