What's in a Name? Naming and Denaming in Romeo and Juliet's Balcony Scene

How now reader?

With my Masters course entering that busy time of year, I have been inundated with work and the blog has been somewhat neglected (and will probably continue to be so). Having said that, I thought I would take a few minutes to share some thoughts on Romeo and Juliet's infamous balcony scene and the importance of naming and denaming.

In Romeo and Juliet names are an integral part of the character’s lives - particularly their family name. Whether they are Montague or Capulet will determine who they can associate with and where they can go in Verona. Shakespeare knew the importance of titles in early modern England first hand. In the same year he wrote this play, his father, John Shakespeare, was refused the right to a coat of arms, and the use of the title “gentleman” that came with it. In 1596, Shakespeare himself was successful in renewing the petition on the family's behalf. Shakespeare had also already written about perhaps the most famous stripping of a title in English history some years earlier - the de-crowning of Richard II. It is interesting then that Shakespeare begins the balcony scene playing with the idea of erasing names.

The importance of names and titles in Romeo and Juliet  is made clear from the very beginning of the play and characters regularly identify each other by the family their affiliated with. “By my head, here comes the Capulets”. (3.1.34) Their names therefore also mark the physical boundaries of Verona In which one can or cannot frequent. (The feast of Capulet, the streets of Verona or an enemies garden for example.) A character's class or social status is also defined by their name. Shakespeare makes clear the superior wealth of the Capulets in his descriptions of the luxury items in the Capulet home and the number of staff that serve them. It is interesting how the balcony scene reinforces this division by placing Juliet looking down to Romeo. Equally interesting is that the garden which Juliet's balcony overlooks is fenced in and we are told: “The orchard walls are high and hard to climb”. This physical boundary is a mirror of the social boundaries between the two lovers. The garden is a no go area for Montagues like Romeo, but Romeo is just the outsider to attempt to overcome these barriers.

The power of names is so strong that it dictates to characters who they are and what their place is in the world. We are given a stark reminder of this when Juliet cries: ‘wherefore art thou Romeo?’. Why are you Romeo? The fact that he is Romeo forbids them from being in love. It dictates their future. She goes on to plead that he “Deny thy father and refuse thy name.”(2.2.33-4). This line highlights the hereditary link to both Romeo’s name and his social position. Romeo’s response is rather child like and oversimplified, he proclaims, “Call me but love and I'll be new baptized” (2.2.50) implying that the issue could be resolved simply by stripping himself of his name, but the following lines show that severing the ties between person and name is far from easy.

Juliet.

What man art thou that, thus bescreened in night,

So stumblest on my counsel?

Romeo.

By a name

I know not how to tell thee who I am:

                (2.2.52-4)

Having rejected his name, Romeo no longer knows how to respond to the question, ‘Who are you?’. His response not only highlights the universal complexity of the question from a philosophical point of view, but also shows how, until this point, Romeo’s identity is so closely bound to that of his family that when that label is removed he has nothing left.

The problem of their clashing identities is resolved by Juliet who takes the first steps in freeing the couple from the identity associated to their names and family loyalties. She creates a new identity in an act of self fashioning, not in their names, but instead in the identity of the internal self. She makes her philosophy clear when Romeo runs out of things to swear his love by and she points out that he need only: “swear by thy gracious self”. (2.2.114) In asserting that the internal self is more powerful than an identity based on the giving and taking of names Romeo and Juliet fashion a path that will supersede the social boundaries that obstruct them. The power of this internal knowledge is best shown when Juliet describes her devotion to Romeo:

My Bounty is as boundless as the sea,

My love as deep; the more I give to thee,

The more I have, for both are infinite.

                (2.2.133-5)

However, we know that this union will not last and their doom is foreshadowed towards the end of this scene. Hearing the call of her nurse Juliet cries “Anon, good nurse! Sweet Montague, be true.” (2.2.137). After all their efforts to redefine themselves outside of their names, Juliet utters the very name they have worked so hard to dispel. This is the first of multiple uses of proper names that carry through to the end of the scene. She calls him “dear Romeo” (2.2.142) and even wants to make herself hoarse “With repetition of my Romeo's”. (2.2.164) Perhaps the pair are attempting to appropriate their former selves with their new identity, but as we discover through the course of the play their renaming is called into question by the mounting obstacles that obstruct them. In act three scene five Romeo can not be Juliet’s husband in the public square where the two families repeatedly meet in conflict. Likewise, Juliet’s new identity as Romeo’s wife can not be sustained without contradicting her father's wish that she marry Paris. They are still bound to their names and their familial allegiances.

Ultimately Romeo and Juliet’s attempt at re-identifying themselves falls short. They find that their names cannot be separated from their original social context and they are still restricted by the boundaries of their family identities. Shakespeare may have been happy to let Juliet dream that “a rose/ By any other name would smell as sweet”(2.2.44) but the harsh reality he imposes on her is far more unyielding.