‘For this alliance may so happy prove
To turn your household s’ rancour to pure love’
This would be a decision that the Friar would soon regret, in fact it did not bring the households together and it just worsened their friendship between the two families. It angered Tybalt and it posed a difficult dilemma for Romeo as it would not be easy for him to see Juliet.
This marriage angered Tybalt and made him want to kill Romeo, but Romeo didn’t want to fight:
‘Therefore farewell’
The offer of the fight from Tybalt is declined because he is happy because he has just married Juliet and Tybalt is now a part of his family. The reason Tybalt was enraged by Romeo was because he married Juliet and Tybalt hates Romeo. Mercutio thought that Romeo was being a coward:
‘O calm, dishonourable, vile submission!’
Mercutio was then killed by Tybalt; Romeo then killed Tybalt in a revenge attack:
‘Immediately we do exile him hence’
Romeo was exiled for this crime. The decision was Romeos to kill Tybalt, but he came to this decision as a result of Mercutio’s actions as he did not have to fight Tybalt he could have just walked away.
Juliet was arranged to marry Paris. This caused a number of different things to happen: Friar Lawrence telling Juliet to drink some Potion, Juliet not wanting to marry Paris and being threatened with being disowned by her father. This is another key factor that leads to the deaths of Romeo and Juliet:
‘She shall be married to this noble earl’
This happened purely by chance, Juliet is told that she has no choice in the matter of whether she marries Paris as her father is forcing her to do so:
‘I’ll ne’er acknowledge thee’
Her father is saying that he will disown Juliet if she does not marry Paris. This puts a lot of pressure on Juliet, the nurse and Friar Lawrence as he cannot marry another person to Juliet, and Juliet has gone behind her fathers back and married Romeo. Juliet is going on the backing of the Nurse. If her father had found out about the marriage of Romeo to Juliet then he would have also disowned her for marrying a foe.
Then the Nurse advises Juliet to marry Paris to appease her Father. This is good advice from the nurse and if Juliet had followed the advice she would not have died:
‘Marry, I will, and this is wisely done’
Juliet merely agrees with the Nurse to keep her happy but all the time Juliet is hoping to solve her problem another way. Juliet even considers suicide. The fact that Juliet is to marry Paris puts pressure upon the Friar:
‘If, rather than to marry County Paris,
Though hast the strength of will to slay thyself,
Then is it likely though wilt undertake
A thing like death to chide away this shame,
That cop’st with Death himself to scrape from it;
And if though dar’st ill give thee remedy.’
He cannot allow Juliet to commit bigamy and understands she is willing to take an extreme course of action, therefore he lays before her a risky alternative with a potion that will make her appear dead.
`Friar Lawrence then sends a message via Friar John to Romeo telling him about Juliet’s condition. This message does not arrive with him because of the factors of coincidence and fate:
‘Suspecting that we both were in a house
Where the infectious pestilence did reign,
Sealed up the doors, and would not let us forth’
Friar John could not deliver the message because of a suspected outbreak of the plague. Therefore Romeo is still under belief that Juliet is dead:
‘Thus with a kiss I die’
Romeo decided that life was not worth living without Juliet and therefore he killed himself. When Juliet wakes:
‘Poison I see hath been his timeless end’
She sees Romeo has killed himself with poison and having no other option she stabs herself. The reason for this is because she feels she cannot be without Romeo and as everyone thought that she was dead, she could not go back to her family and Paris. The actions of Romeo and Capulet led Juliet to stab herself.
Fate also plays a key role in the deaths of Romeo and Juliet:
‘Methinks I see thee now’
Juliet tells Romeo that she has seen him dead in the family vault. Romeo also dreamt that Juliet found him dead:
‘I dreamt my lady came and found me dead’
Later on in the play this event occurs and therefore this seems to be a premonition. This is a hint to the reader that Romeo would die in the tomb and Romeo fulfils this prophecy. But I don’t think that these events however unusual they are contribute to the deaths of Romeo and Juliet, they are just a strange coincidence.
After this analysis of the events that contributed to the deaths of both Romeo and Juliet I can see that there are a number of main factors; Mercutio, Friar Lawrence, choice and coincidence. From what I can see there is no main factor that contributed to the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. All the factors are intermingled with each other and when one factor occurs it sparked another chain of events which ultimately lead to the deaths of both Romeo and Juliet. Therefore I think that the ‘star crossed lovers’ had been brought to their deaths because of their love and passion for each other and their unwillingness to be parted even in death.