Who was most responsible for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet?

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Who was most responsible for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet?

During the story of Rome and Juliet many characters play important roles, which eventually affect the out come of the final tragedy.

Each individual scene contributes to the ‘grand ending’ when Romeo and Juliet are discovered, to have committed suicide. This small amount of information, gives us evidence that on the whole, every character plays an important role in the deaths of both Romeo and Juliet.

As a result of me believing that almost every character plays a responsible role in the deaths of Romeo and Juliet, I will only be able to concentrate on a few of the characters.

The first character I will give evidence about is Friar Lawrence. Throughout out the play he comes across as a, rather, neutral character. He was the character that married both Romeo and Juliet, ‘in one respect I’ll thy assistant be.’ These are Friar Lawrence’s words when he agrees to marry the couple.

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Furthermore he is the character that gives Juliet the sleeping potion, to trick the family into thoughts that she had died, so she wouldn’t be forced into marrying Paris.

One of the principal mistakes Friar Lawrence creates is that when he distributes the sleeping potion to Juliet he forwarded a message to Romeo, explaining that Juliet is not dead, and that he is not to be concerned regarding her. The message was sent via another Friar and not Friar Lawrence himself, so Romeo didn’t actually receive the message. This was due to an epidemic of plague in the town where ...

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