Why do you think the friar doesnt tell Capulet that Juliet is already married to Romeo in act 4?

Answer 1

Juliet is still living at home with her family, and no one yet knows how Old Capulet might react if he find out that his daughter has married against his will.

Romeo is hardly going to blab about his marriage in the street. He needs to be loyal to Juliet, not to a bunch of twenty-something layabouts.

Answer 2

A couple of possibilities. The Friar is a coward, and he just cannot bring himself to face Capulet's anger. Or possibly he may be concerned that Capulet will want to take out his anger on Romeo. Lady Capulet isn't afraid to arrange Romeo's death, so why should Capulet hesitate to have him killed so the widow can marry Paris?

Answer 3

It is not clearly stated, but we can assume that he is frightened that they would be angry with him if he revealed that he had performed the marriage. This doesn't look so good on him since he said that the reason he agreed to marry them in the first place was that he hoped the families would reconcile when they found out that Romeo and Juliet were married. His original plan was clearly to tell the parents, but later he lost his nerve, particularly after the death of Tybalt and the banishment of Romeo.

It's interesting to speculate what he might have done if Juliet had refused to go along with his potion plan.

Answer 4

Good question. If Juliet let Paris into the secret he would certainly tell her father. After the death of Tybalt, Capulet is not exactly kindly disposed to Romeo, and Lady Capulet even less so--she wants to hire a murderer to kill him. Capulet was violent enough when she said no more than "I'd rather not".

Friar Lawrence is in the same predicament: he is being asked to perform a bigamous marriage. The opportunity to get out of it without revealing the secret marriage must have come as a great relief to him.

Answer 5

Great question! After all, the marriage was supposed to reconcile the warring families, and it was not likely to do that if nobody knew about it. So why didn't the friar tell?

There may be more than one answer to this, but there are a couple of factors. First, a marriage which had not been consummated could easily be annulled. As long as the bride and groom had never slept together, it would be an easy thing just to have the marriage legally cancelled. But once they had slept together, the church law considered the marriage to be beyond divorce. So it was important that the Friar not tell anyone until after the marriage is consummated, or the whole effort would go for nothing.

But in the meantime, Romeo gets banished for killing Lady Capulet's favourite nephew, no less. Romeo expects that their marriage will be annulled before it can be consummated: he refers to it as a "cancelled love".

Once the marriage is consummated, why does Friar Lawrence not reveal it? Partly, because the stakes are higher. The Capulets might have been angry with Juliet before, but now their fury would be incredible--in Lady Capulet's case, because she hates Romeo more than anything for killing her favourite nephew, and in Capulet's case, because it wrecks up his marriage plans for Juliet and Paris. Partly also because although the Capulets cannot make Juliet a virgin, they can make her a widow. And we know that Lady Capulet is quite happy to plan Romeo's murder without the added incentive of freeing Juliet from the unwanted marriage. But also, Friar Lawrence doesn't tell because, quite frankly, he is a coward. He just doesn't have the nerve. We know this from his cowardly flight from the tomb, leaving Juliet alone to face the music. It is really a despicable act, and he is forgiven all too easily for it.

Answer 6

Because he is fared that Capulet might kick out juliet from house.

OR

Friar thought thing might go worser than what was.