Romeo and Juliet
Nurse Angelica
Juliet's nurse
Juliet's talkative, affectionate nurse, who loves her like a daughter but gives way when the pressure gets too great.
The Nurse has raised Juliet since she was a baby and is closer to her than Lady Capulet is. She is warm, funny and bawdy, always calling Juliet "lamb" and "ladybird," and she cannot give a short answer to any question. She travels the streets with her servant Peter, who carries her fan, and she takes a lot of teasing from Mercutio.
Her loyalty is real, but it is practical. The Nurse believes in comfort and safe choices. She helps Juliet by carrying messages to Romeo and bringing a rope ladder, yet she is more at home with ordinary life than with grand gestures. When the circumstances get dangerous, her advice is the one that a sensible, frightened servant would give.
“Jesu, what haste! Can you not stay awhile? Do you not see that I am out of breath?”
In the story
Contains spoilers.
The Nurse slips into the secret: she meets Romeo in the street, carries Juliet's answer, teases Juliet by making her wait for the news, and delivers the ladder for the wedding night. After Tybalt's death she comes weeping to Juliet with wild talk that leaves her unsure who is dead. She brings Romeo a ring from Juliet at the Friar's cell.
When Capulet insists Juliet marry Paris, the Nurse tells her to forget banished Romeo and take the count, a "lovely gentleman." Juliet calls it wicked and goes to the Friar alone. The Nurse is the one who finds Juliet apparently dead on the wedding morning and raises the alarm.
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