Romeo and Juliet is a tragic love story where two people meet and fall in love, but know their relationship will result in conflict between their two families. We are introduced straight away to the fact that Romeo and Juliet's relationship will end in tragedy and it will be a play full of contrasts, as in the prologue there is a sonnet:
"From forth the fatal loins of these two foes, a pair of star-crossed lovers take their life, Doth with their death bury their parents' strife."
Around the time the play was written the people heavily believed in fate so an Elizabethan audience would understand more than people today as they believed it worked. Also they believed in astrological explanations for things and that love was created in the stars and planets and our future was already made up for us. There are instances in the play which could of changed the whole outline of the play for example Romeo not attending the Capulet ball and if Friar Lawrence's letter reached Romeo also if Juliet had woken a few seconds earlier they could have been together forever it is this idea of fate which creates the suspense throughout Romeo and Juliet.
All the way throughout the play we are told via comments by Romeo and Juliet that their life is going to end in death, like in Act Three Scene Five, where Juliet unwittingly predicts exactly what will happen in the play:
"Methinks I see thee, now thou art so low, as one dead in the bottom of a tomb".
And also in Act Two Scene Six, Romeo rashly challenges death while talking to Friar Laurence about the marriage of himself and Juliet:
"Then love-devouring death do what he dare"
This is all dramatic irony as this is what is going to happen. Also Romeo makes a quote when he was in Mantua, about a dream which he had the night before:
"I dreamt my lady came and found me dead"
Friar Laurence is a very decisive character in the play, as he is the local priest that helps Romeo and Juliet to get married, yet fails to offer them good advice about their situation. As an adult man, priest, and even friend, you would expect him to give guidance to the young lovers, yet he fails to do this. He seems scared of fate, as it is a ‘greater power than we can contradict.’
Romeo unquestionably believes in fate, and is often very superstitious throughout the play. When he is on his way with his friends to the Capulet’s party, he has a premonition that something dreadful will ensue if he attends the party:
“ My mind missives some consequence yet hanging in the stars, shall bitterly begin his fearful date with this night’s revels”
Romeo believes that the things which he does in the course of life is simply to do with fate, and that he is merely fulfilling his destiny. An example of this would be when Romeo has his revenge on Tybalt for killing his best friend, Mercutio. As soon as Romeo has killed Tybalt, he realises that what he did was fate, and that he was destined to kill him. He feels as though is purely a puppet and is just acting out the things which he is fated to do:
“O, I am fortune’s fool.”
Romeo often tries to defy the stars and change the course of his life throughout the play. For instance in Mantua, when Balthasar delivers the sad news of Juliet’s death, Romeo’s response is swift and simple, “Is it even so? Then I defy you, stars!” This shows that in an instant, Romeo has made his decision. He is defying fate by refusing to mourn his lover’s death. He will win a victory in his struggle with the stars by joining Juliet in death.
Another example of this would be when Romeo is in the Capulet tomb lying with Juliet. Moments before he kills himself, Romeo gazes upon Juliet and says, “O, here, will I set up my everlasting rest. And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars. From this world-wearied flesh.” This means that Romeo will take his chances on death, where he hopes to be at peace, his body free at last from the doom of the baleful stars.
In the play, Juliet often unwittingly predicts the future without her knowledge. For instance when Capulet’s party is breaking up, Juliet sends the nurse to find out Romeo’s name. As the nurse chases after Romeo, Juliet says, “If he be married, my grave is likely to be my wedding bed.” She means that if Romeo is married, she will die unmarried, because she will never marry another, but she is also unknowingly foreshadowing her fate, in which her grave does become her wedding bed.
During the play, you are shown previews of things to come. A good example of this is when Juliet is about to drink the vial in Act 4 scene 3. Without her mother, without her Nurse, Juliet has only her vial and her knife. Looking at the vial, she asks herself what will happen if it does not work. Will she then be married to Paris in the morning? Answering her own question and looking at the knife, she says, "No, no, this shall forbid it." The thought that she can kill herself is a kind of comfort to her, and she puts the knife down, saying as though she needs to remember just where she put it in case she needs it. At the end of the scene she drinks the Friar's potion and falls down as if dead. Thus, this scene is a preview of what happens at the end of the play when she tries to drink Romeo's poison, stabs herself with Romeo's knife, and falls down, dead indeed.
Romeo and Juliet’s lives were told to be fate, but if certain characters made different decisions throughout this story, Romeo and Juliet may have not died at all. If things were done differently this play may not have ended the way it did.
Mercutio could have been blamed for the tragedy. The reason he could have been blamed is for convincing Romeo to go to the ball. Romeo at first did not want to go to the ball but the continuous teasing from Mercutio made Romeo reluctantly agree. If Romeo had not been persuaded into going with Mercutio to the ball he would not have seen Juliet that night and their deaths could have been avoided.
Juliet's Nurse could also be blamed for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. The Nurse had a very close relationship with Juliet, even closer than the relationship Juliet had with her mother so it was obvious Juliet would listen to the Nurse very closely. Yet the Nurse failed to give young Juliet guidance on her infatuation with Romeo. If the Nurse had told Juliet not to go through with the wedding with Romeo, Juliet may have listened to her because of the
Closeness between them, and Juliet may not have died.
Friar Lawrence is another person who could have be blamed for the tragedy. He has two reasons he could have been blamed. The first is because of going ahead and marrying Romeo and Juliet. He went ahead with it because he had an image in his mind of the marriage of Romeo and Juliet, Montague and Capulet, bringing the two families together,
" For this alliance may so happy prove, to turn your households' rancour to pure love. "
The second reason that he could be blamed for, was the plan of the poison at the end of the play. It would make Juliet seem as though she was dead for forty-eight hours,
" And this distilled liquor drink thou off…shall run a cold and drowsy humour.”
In my opinion the person to blame was Friar Laurence. I think he was to blame firstly because of the marriage between Romeo and Juliet, and secondly because of the poison plan. Friar Laurence doesn’t seem to think all of his plans through down to every last possibility, so he in my opinion, should be blamed as an alternative to fate, for the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet.
There are also many other reasons for tragedy in Romeo and Juliet. For instance, the great feud between the two families. This feud forces the young couple to meet in secret, and to marry in secret. Their love is a forbidden one. The feud also causes death before the play has begun. The prince tells us this is the “third civil brawl” resulting from this feud in recent days, and that all three forced the families to return to their graveyards.
Another reason for tragedy in this play would be impatience. The entire play takes only four days. There is a sense of urgency and rushing throughout the play. For example, Romeo and Juliet marry on the second day that they have met. Another example would be when Friar Laurence urges Juliet to hurry and run from the tomb. When she refuses to do this, he does, which leaves her in great danger from her own self.
One often wonders if the tragedy in Romeo and Juliet could have been avoided , without the seemingly vital need for bloodshed. Could Romeo have not acted too hastily throughout the play, or Juliet, not have deceived and disobeyed her parents? The answer is that the tragedy was not the fault of any one individual , it was fate that Romeo and Juliet met and fell in love, and fate that they departed.
"A glooming peace this morning with it brings;
The sun, for sorrow, will not show his head
Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things;
Some shall be pardoned, and some punished:
For never was a story of more woe
Than this of Juliet and her Romeo."
