Count Paris - Role in The Play

Role in The Play

Paris makes his first appearance in Act I, Scene II, wherein he offers to make Juliet his wife and the mother of his children. Juliet's father, Lord Capulet, demurs, telling him to wait until she is older. Capulet invites Paris to attend a family ball being held that evening with permission to woo Juliet. Later in the play, however, Juliet refuses to become Paris' "joyful bride" after her cousin, Tybalt, dies by her new husband Romeo's hand, proclaiming for the first time that she now despises Paris and wants nothing to do with him. Capulet violently threatens for her to be hanged and then to make Juliet a lowly street urchin if she does not marry Paris, hitting his daughter, shoving her to the ground and screaming in her face. Juliet's mother, too, turns her back on Juliet shortly after her father storms out of the scene ("Talk not to me, for I'll not speak a word; do as thou wilt, for I have done with thee"), as does the Nurse. Then, while at Friar Lawrence's cell at the church, Paris tries to woo her by repeatedly saying that she is his wife and that they are to be married on Thursday. He kisses her and then leaves the cell, prompting Juliet to threaten to kill herself.

His final appearance in the play is in the cemetery where Juliet, who is feigning death, is "laid to rest" in the Capulet family tomb. Believing her to be dead, Paris has come to mourn her death in solitude and privacy, sending his manservant away. He professes his love to Juliet, saying he will nightly weep for her. Shortly thereafter, Romeo, deranged by grief himself, also goes to the Capulet's tomb and is confronted by Count Paris who believes Romeo came to desecrate Juliet's tomb. They both duel until Romeo wins and kills Paris. Romeo drags Paris' body inside the Capulet tomb and lays him out on the floor beside Juliet's body: Paris' final, dying wish.