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"concealed" and "cancelled"
Wordplay
Act 3,
Scene 3
Lines 91a-97

An explanation of the wordplay on “concealed” and “cancelled” in Act 3, Scene 3 of myShakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.

Romeo

Nurse!

Nurse

              Ah sir! Ah sir! Death's the end of all.

Romeo

Spakest thou of Juliet? How is it with her?
Doth she not think me an old murderer,
Now I have stained the childhood of our joy
With blood removed but little from her own?
Where is she, and how doth she, and what says
My concealed lady to our cancelled love?

These two similar sounding words also evoke two senses of the line:

  • Their marriage is concealed, secret.
  • Their love has been interrupted, cancelled, by Romeo's banishment.