Romeo and Juliet

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Who (in your opinion) is most to blame for this tragedy?

Throughout the whole play, there are a series of events that lead up to the final tragedy. Some may argue that it was the family feud rather than any moral weakness that lead to the death of the lovers. Their deaths are the inevitable outcome, so in a wider sense, the responsibility for their downfall may lie outside the characters- in the workings of so-called fate.

However fate has its own tools, which in Romeo and Juliet’s case could involve the characters. Fate is the very thing that brought them together (when Romeo read the guest list, which seemed natural, but it was just the beginning of a chain of events that brought Romeo and Juliet together) subsequently it has the same power to bring about their separation and death.

Some may argue that what brought about their death was really due to the lovers themselves. The negative outlook of the match delivered by both Romeo and Juliet encouraged such a dramatic ending. Romeo sensed it before he met Juliet. When he went to the ball, with the intention of meeting Rosaline, he has a feeling that something is about to happen that ‘blows us from ourselves’ stopping him from seeing her. He asks the forces of fate to help him, ‘But He that hath the steerage of my course / Direct my sail’. Romeo fears that ‘Some consequence, yet hanging in the stars’ may lead to his death.

We see this same attitude from Juliet, there is a grim truth in Juliet’s view that her ‘grave is like to be (her) wedding bed’. Also after the first meeting, Romeo in particular, senses that his love for Juliet may have darker implications, when he talks of the ‘Prodigious birth of love’. 

Both Romeo and Juliet were very hasty in their actions, which triggered many other disasters, speeding up the events, bringing the final tragedy closer. It began from Juliet’s declaration of love to herself on the balcony ‘My bounty is as boundless as the sea, / My love as deep.’ This is a convenient dramatic device, as it speeds up the action, and Romeo is thereby free to step forward, announce his presence and immediately pledge his love. This soon leads to the very rushed decision of getting married the next day. The speed, in which events ran, indicates that issues were not talked over, they were ‘too rash, too unadvis’d, too sudden’.

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One of the factors that helped speed up the events was the interference of the Friar. He bared considerable responsibility for the lovers’ untimely ending; he promoted all their behaviour and their marriage, with the intention of turning their ‘households’ rancour to pure love’. Despite his desperate scheme to re-unite the families, ‘violent delights have violent ends’.

The Friar was Romeo’s confidant, so the actions he took throughout the play were to please Romeo. He therefore did many things that acted as a catalyst; he performed the wedding; arranged for Romeo to go to Mantua; supplied drug for Juliet; and attempted ...

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