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In 1597 William Shakespeare wrote the tragedy, "Romeo and Juliet". Shakespeare uses imagery to show the positive and negative sides to life. He has a contrast between them and even if something may look beautiful, there may still be evil within it. The play explores the meeting of two children both from feuding families who fall in love, get separated, meet with each other again and eventually commit suicide. In my essay, I will describe how Romeo and Juliet were destined to have an unhappy ending from the start and whether it was all to do with fate and whether or not it could have been avoided.
Was it fate and predestination that made them meet together and was it a coincidence that they just happened to be from rival families? The play is a tragedy and so it will have a fatal outcome involving death and shows fate is malevolent. In the prologue, Romeo and Juliet are described as 'A pair of star-crossed lovers', which shows that they are 'meant to be', from the start and fate will make them meet.
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It is in the stars and God will make sure they come in contact. The 'crossed' part shows that fate has a flaw in it because stars usually aren't crossed so it may not be perfect. This is justified later in the sentence when it says 'take their life'. There is a lot of foreshadowing in the prologue with phrases such as, 'death-marked love', 'rage', 'children's end' which all show that their love will only result in death and their death is the only thing that can stop the violence between their two families.
It is more tragic because Romeo and Juliet are still innocent and they die at such a young age. This is exactly Shakespeare's agenda as he wants to take the lives of the most innocent people in Verona to show fate can be hostile for people. There is more predestination in the phrase, 'O, I am fortunes fool' in Act 3 Scene 1. Romeo says this just after he kills Tybalt. This shows that fate is against him again. The 'fool' part makes it seem as if Romeo is totally helpless and doesn't know what is going on and why. It is as if fate is playing a game with him and he is losing that game. Nothing is going his way, fate is in control of him and he has no power over it. Romeo knows he has made a big mistake by killing Tybalt and 'O, I an fortunes fool' is all that he can say, he is trying to put the blame on fate when it may not all be fate. Romeo could have controlled his anger and just reported that Tybalt had killed Mercutio instead of seeking revenge and killing Tybalt. It just so happens that Tybalt is Juliet's cousin and this will spark even more hatred between the two families of the Capulet's and Montague's. There is foreshadowing of this incident occurring when Benvolio is speaking at the start. The phrase, 'What must be shall be' is said by Juliet in act 4 scene 1. The 'must' part is very dominant which also reflects on Juliet's character. She, like Romeo, realizes she has no control over fate and will just have to take it as it goes. This shows that Romeo and Juliet are connected with each other on a higher level. She is basically saying everything happens for a reason whether the result is good or whether it is bad. This part of the play is when she is planning her fake suicide. She is making it as if fate is in control of everything but she can, if she wants to not kill herself but try to resolve the family feud by another way. She could run away with Romeo or have the Friar talk to the families, as he is a respected man. This speech is with Paris but it is not a love sonnet like it was when Romeo and Juliet met for the first time which shows no matter how hard anyone tries, only she and Romeo can be together because it is written in the stars. 'Then I defy you stars!' is said by Romeo in act 5 scene 1. This links back to the prologue with, 'star-crossed lovers'. Here Romeo is angry at fate and with God. He tries to go against fate, which results in him, stealing his own fate by him dying. He is very impatient to get the poison and Balthasar describes him as 'pale', which implies he is already half-dead. As the prologue stated, both of them will 'take their life' and this is exactly what is happening. All these quotes show that Shakespeare is giving the message that fate is malevolent and results in death. Both families, the Capulet's and the Montague's play a big part in Romeo and Juliet's death because they die over the feuding of the two families. It was all going on even before they were born and it is such a coincidence that Romeo and Juliet happened to be from both families. Nurse, Benvolio, Mercutio, Tybalt and the Friar Lawrence also help decide Romeo and Juliet's fate. It starts when Nurse tells Juliet that Romeo is from the family that she is meant to hate. This somehow makes their love more strong and forces Romeo to come and visit Juliet in secret in their garden. Nurse tells Romeo that Juliet wants to meet him and this is when they know they are to marry each other. Quite soon later on, Friar Lawrence marries them, and even though they have God's blessing, he still gives them a word of warning. In the streets in Verona, Mercutio starts instigating with Tybalt. Benvolio had already warned them no to fight but Mercutio ignored this and kept taunting Tybalt even though Tybalt was pacifying. Tybalt wants to kill Romeo, but Romeo is in a good mood and says he loves Tybalt. Tybalt takes this the wrong way and he kills Mercutio under Romeo's arm. Mercutio gets angry and says 'A plague o'both your houses'. When Mercutio dies, Romeo goes and kills Tybalt. After this, Romeo is banished and this is when he definitely knows fate is against him. Romeo thinks Juliet is angry with him for killing Tybalt but they meet in her bedroom. Capulet then tries to force Juliet to marry Paris making her angry. Juliet drinks the poison to fake her death and everyone thinks she is dead. Romeo gets the message and so he gets some deadly poison. He kills Paris in the Friar's cell and he drinks the poison. Juliet wakes up and finds Romeo dead so she stabs herself. Everything leading to their death has been out of their control. Instead of committing suicide, Romeo and Juliet should have slowed things down and thought of an alternative, this was in their control, but being young, they rushed everything and had an untimely, negative death. Romeo and Juliet were very determined to get married from the beginning. Since they met at the Capulet's ball, they knew they just had to be together. The events surrounding them made them rush their marriage. First, they found out that they were meant to hate each other, not love each other and that Juliet's father had another wedding planned for her. They know that if anyone in the family finds out about them, there will be a war and everything will have to be called off and their relationship will end. After one night at the ball, and one night in Capulet's garden outside Juliet's bedroom, they decide to get married. They get married just a few days after they met. This could be because in the Elizabethan times, life expectancy was much shorter and so everything was done at a much earlier age. They get married at the age of thirteen, which is very young. They don't consider what will happen to both families and what Tybalt thinks so they keep this a secret. The Friar warns them that it will come with consequences. He tells them to be pure and to not be alone. Romeo and Juliet are very eager to consummate their love relationship together and so they achieve this. They feel like husband and wife instead of girlfriend and boyfriend and consummating their relationship signifies that they are adults and not 'pure'. Act three scene one is the most important scene of the play as it is located exactly in the middle of the play. Shakespeare has deliberately put it in the middle to emphasize its importance. The outcome of the scene is two deaths and one banishment. There is a contrast in characters because Tybalt is known for his fiery attitude and Mercutio for his friendship, in this scene there is role reversal and Mercutio becomes the 'bad' guy while Tybalt persists on not fighting. Tybalt insists he does not want to fight Mercutio and that he has only come to fight Romeo. Shakespeare has done this to surprise the audience just as they were settling in and e changes their assumptions of the characters. Act 3.1 also contrasts with the previous scene of act 2.6, which was a very intimate and slow scene in the Friar's cell. It has gone from three characters, to a fast-paced crowded street, which shows juxtaposition. Here, Romeo, (like Juliet), is misunderstood by others as Tybalt thinks Romeo is mocking him when Romeo says that he should love him. The foreshadowing at the beginning of the scene from Benvolio has done nothing to change the outcome, which shows fate cannot be tampered with. Romeo is very swift to realize that he is 'fortune's fool' and so he runs away. This is a 'wake up call' from Shakespeare to show that anything is possible and that fate is predetermined and that it all results in death.
William Shakespeare was one of the most talented writers ever known, one of his greatest achievements, the love story 'Romeo and Juliet'. 'Romeo and Juliet' was written in the late 15th century. It was a very advanced story for it's time and still proves very popular today. Many different versions have been made and edited from the original play script. To be performed on T.V and radio. Shakespeare originally wrote 'Romeo and Juliet' for the stage in Elizabethan theatres all around London. The play was set in Verona on two so called 'star-crossed lovers' Romeo, who is from the Montague family and Juliet from and Capulet family. They fall in love at first sight.
But the problem with this being the Montague and Capulet family have had a feud between one another for as long as either family could remember. Romeo and Juliet meet at a Capulet party and immediately fall for each other. They decide to get married on only their second meeting. But when people start to find out about this secret marriage between a Montague and a Capulet, problems arise. But the story ends with the biggest tragedy. Both not realising what was actually happening; Romeo and Juliet consecutively commit suicide. There are three themes running throughout the story; cruel fate, chance and personal choice, all three having a say in why Romeo and Juliet die. In the prologue Romeo and Juliet are referred to, as 'star-crossed lovers' making it seem as if they are fated to meet, fall in love and then die.
'Chance' occurs quite a lot in the story. So this could have resulted in Romeo and Juliet's death. For example, if Peter the servant was able to read.
Peter: "god gi' god-den. I pray sir can you read?"
(Line 59, Act 1; scene 2).
Romeo would never have been able to get into the party in the first place. Another example of chance would be that Friar John didn't get to Romeo in Mantua to deliver the letter informing Romeo of Juliet's plan because Mantua had been restricted, so that no one could enter and no one could leave, this would had been very common in Shakespeare's time, as he wrote his story around the peak of the plague. So the audiences watching the play in Shakespearean time would have fully understood why this was. So all along Romeo is led to believe that Juliet is dead and not just under the effects of the potion. Also, the last and probably most significant thing that occurs within the theme of chance would be that Romeo takes the poison he has bought from the apothecary; exactly the second Juliet is waking up.
So just as Romeo sees Juliet waking up from the effects of her potion she got from friar Lawrence, the effects of the poison he's just taken starts to work and Juliet dies. Both realising there is nothing either of them can do to save one another. Also the very unlikely chance that Romeo and Juliet were from the two families that had an 'ancient grudge'. The fact that Juliet could had met any man that night at the Capulet's party and out of all the men she could had fallen in love with, the most unexpected thing happens and the daughter of lord Capulet manages to fall in love at first sight with the Son of lord Montague. She even says herself:
Juliet: "my only love sprung from my only hate"
(Line 137, act 1; scene 5)
So obviously she wasn't planning to go to her fathers party and fall in love with the only son of lord Montague, it all happens because of chance.
The second of the three themes, which may have resulted in Romeo and Juliet's death, was 'personal choice'. For example: Juliet decides to initiate the marriage between herself and Romeo, she comes out with the idea first,
Juliet: "Three words, dear Romeo, and good night indeed.
If thy bent of love be honourable,
Thy purpose marriage, send me work tomorrow, ..."
(Line 42-4, act 2; scene2)
Maybe if Juliet hadn't decided to marry Romeo in the first place at such short notice and given it a little more time, she wouldn't had put Friar Lawrence in the awkward position of finally deciding to go along with them and join them together in marriage. Even tough friar Lawrence was aware of all the consequences of this particular marriage; he personally decided to proceed for many different reasons. Friar Lawrence says:
Friar Lawrence: " In one respect I'll assistant be;
For this alliance may so happy prove,
To turn your households' rancour to pure love.
(Line 90-3, act 2; scene 3)
So he is basically saying, I will help you, Romeo by marrying you, to try to unify your feuding families. By the joining of a Capulet and Montague in marriage would bring the two families closer together and end the feud. But this didn't exactly work out to plan. Also, carrying on with same subject. If Romeo had never agreed to marry Juliet, maybe none of the following Tragedies that were just around the corner would had happened to Romeo and Juliet. One tragedy, related to Juliet and because of Romeo that happens later on in the story is when Romeo decided to go out and find then promptly kill Tybalt, Juliet's cousin because of a fight that finished with Tybalt Killing Mercutio, who was Romeo's best friend. This causes a lot of strife in the Capulet family and when Price Escalus discovers what has happened he had to decide on a punishment and he chooses to banish Romeo from Verona and Romeo is then cast off into Mantua. The only was Romeo is able to find out about this devastating news of his banishment is from the Friar Lawrence
Friar Lawrence: " here from Verona art thou banished"
(Line 14, act 3, scene3)
This leads to Juliet deciding to take serious action. She goes to grave measures to see Romeo again, even if it does mean faking her own death. Juliet goes and visits Friar Lawrence to seek help and at the same time threatens to kill herself, as she believes there is no reason for her living if she can't see Romeo. When Friar Lawrence introduces the idea of a special potion that makes the body look lifeless for 42hours. She chooses to jump the offer, as it may be her only chance at this point of ever seeing her husband ever again. But this just causes more problems and falsely leads Romeo into choosing to join Juliet in death by going to see her in the tomb and taking the poison he had purchased of an apothecary just before he left Mantua, whilst lying next to her. Just before Romeo gets to see Juliet, Paris the man who was meant to be marrying Juliet earlier that day confronts him and the door of the tomb. Romeo is to desperate to see Juliet he chooses to murders Paris right there on the door step to Juliet's tomb and just walks straight in. By this point in the story has killed three people killed: Mercutio, Tybalt and Paris. For various reasons, but all relating in some way to personal choice.
The last and defiantly most important theme that crops up throughout the whole of the play is the use of 'Fate', or 'cruel fate' as it never seams to be fate towards a high point or in the story it builds up throughout the play until the end where it seams as if Romeo and Juliet's death has been fated ever since the moment Juliet and Romeo saw one another at the Capulet's party. Fate is mentioned from the very beginning in the prologue. It mentions the phrase,
'Star-crossed lovers'
(Line 6, prologue)
When referring to Romeo and Juliet. Making it seem as if they have been fated since the beginning of time to meet. Then the prologue goes on to refer to their love for one another as,
'Death-marked love'
(Line 9, prologue)
Meaning there is obviously going to be a death within the relationship and it's been fated from the very beginning. As if there is nothing neither Romeo nor Juliet can do to stop. Within the second meeting of Romeo and Juliet fate has already occurred many times, for example, just the way they meet at the Capulet's party it was as if it was meant to happen and there was nothing either of them could do to avoid one another. They were set out to meet each other and that's exactly what happened at this point, they immediately fall in love with each other. Then in the Second Act, in the passage when Romeo and Juliet are devoting their love to one another, fate is occurring a lot here, although neither of them realise they are actually in a way sometimes speaking their unseen future of what is going to happen to them if they were to be together. When Romeo says,
Romeo: "Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven
Having some business"
(Line 15-16, act 2; scene 2)
He is referring back to association them selves as stars, just like in the prologue. Also Juliet says,
Juliet: " Do not swear at all;
Or if thou wilt, swear by thy gracious self,
Which is god of my idolatry,
And I'll believe thee."
(Line 113-16, act 2; scene 2)
She is saying this because earlier on in this particular conversation between Romeo and Juliet, Romeo was swearing on the moon to prove his love for Juliet, but Juliet said not to swear by the moon as it changes monthly and it could then represent their love. So she said to him, if he was going to swear his love by anything, swear it on him self. So as long as he is alive he will be in love with Juliet. But they obviously as these points don't know what events that are about to happen which are going to increasingly change and also, very rapidly end their lives. Before Romeo, Mercutio, Benvolio and friends are on their way to the party, Romeo has a vision; the vision is of his own death! Just when Tybalt has stabbed Mercutio and he is dying after Romeo refusing to fight, Mercutio makes two obvious referrals to fate,
Mercutio: "I am hurt.
A plague on both your houses, I am sped.
Is he gone and hath nothing?"
(Line 93-5, act 3; scene 1)
'A plague on both your houses' is a very well known phrase from Mercutio; he is basically putting a curse on both the Montague and the Capulet mansions, as he is from neither and is angry and the brawling that happens between both of them and after his death, he obviously just wants the feud to end, so no more deaths can take place. But I also get the idea that him putting a curse on the two families is like the families getting a plague in both their houses (like Mercutio says) so he is predicting the future by saying their will be more deaths to come, just like in a plague.
Mercutio: " ask for
Me tomorrow, and you shall find me a grave
Man."
(Line 99-100, act 3; scene 1)
In this phrase I think Shakespeare chose to use 'a grave man' because Mercutio has at this point realised that his time is up, but he tries to make it sound as if they would still be able to come and call on him tomorrow. But when he say he will be a 'grave man' it is kind of pointing out that they all know he is going to be dead, so in a way he still jokes about his death, even when he is on deaths doorstep.
In conclusion, I feel out of the three themes: cruel fate, chance and personal choice. Personally, I think one that strikes me as being the most important in contributing to the death of Romeo and Juliet would have been 'cruel fate'. I thought throughout the whole of the play this theme popped up the most and was made to stand out over all the other themes leading to Romeo and Juliet's death. Although I do still feel the other two, chance and personal choice did play some role in the misfortune of Romeo and Juliet's ending. I believe Shakespeare choose to use Cruel fate in the play as the main subject to rotate the story around, because it is the most difficult to understand. So it draws people into the show. I felt this also when I watched the play, the use of cruel fate makes is more interesting and also enables the play to introduce weird and wonderful theories, like when Mercutio and Romeo are talking about dreams and Mercutio mentions the Queen Mab, who controls your dreams. Also it enables in this particular story the allowance of comparing Romeo and Juliet as star-crossed lovers.
I just feel the story is much, much deeper that what it seems when you just read it or go and watch it on a stage. Only when you have analysed it and written about the story plots and themes, you can get a better understanding of the reasons for Romeo and Juliet's death and cruel fate in this particular occasion I feel has come out on top. The use of not such popular themes as in books I imagine makes it much more interesting to read, just because it's so much different and makes you think a lot about what is happening, it's also a gripping love story, the tragedy and romance just make it very entertaining and watch-able/legible. Also the language that Shakespeare uses is very different to the language we are used to today, so it makes it much more of an interesting read. I personally enjoyed the story thoroughly and now after looking deeper into the themes and story plot it has given me a much better understanding of the whole play.
Romeo and Juliet: Star-crossed Lovers in Prologue. (2020, Jun 02). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/prologue-romeo-juliet-described-pair-star-crossed-lovers-new-essay
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