Benvolio is unwittingly responsible for Romeo and Juliet meeting, and therefore he’s responsible for their deaths too. At the beginning of the play before we meet Romeo his mother and friends are very concerned about him because he seems very troubled. When he makes his first appearance we discover that he believes he is in love but Rosaline doesn’t return his love “Out of her favour where I am in love.” Romeo’s love for Rosaline seems artificial as though it doesn’t come from the heart. In Elizabethan times Courtly Love was very fashionable in young men. It was when young men would set their sights on an unobtainable woman to fall in love with. They would then worship her from a distance and behave in a melancholy way because she didn’t return their love. When Romeo speaks about his love for Rosaline, it all sounds very false he uses rhyming couplets “For beauty starved with her severity/ Cuts beauty off from all posterity.” Romeo sounds as if he’s in love with the idea of being in love and uses lots of oxymorons “O heavy lightness, serious vanity,” Which all sounds very artificial not heartfelt. To cheer Romeo up Benvolio invites him to come and gate crash Tybalt’s party. Tyablt is Juliet’s cousin and that could mean trouble for them even though Benvolio wants him to go so Romeo can see there are more beautiful girls than Rosaline. At the party Romeo and Juliet fall in love at first sight. When Juliet discovers he is a Montague she says, ‘My only love sprung from my only hate.’ Romeo’s reaction is ‘my life is my foe’s debt.’
Mercutio is indirectly to blame for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. The events start when Tybalt tries to pick a fight with Romeo. At the beginning of the scene Benvolio as usual is trying to avoid trouble and says to Mercutio “... let’s retire: The day is hot, the Capels are abroad, And if we meet we shall not scape a brawl.” Mercutio replies “..thou will quarrel with a man that hath a hair more or a hair less in his beard than thou hast;” which we know isn’t true so we know we know it is Shakespeare uses comedy because Benvolio is always a peacemaker and Mercutio and Tybalt are the ones always wanting to fight. When the Capulets do come back Tybalt asks for “a word with one of you” and Mercutio replies “make it a word and a blow.” But Tybalt seems only interested in fighting Romeo. When Romeo does enter Tybalt starts insulting him “..thou art a villain,” “..therefore turn and draw.” Romeo can’t tell Tybalt about his secret marriage but hints at the reason why he won’t fight him “..love thee better than thou canst devise… good Capulet, which name I tender As dearly as mine own.” Romeo is trying to make peace with Tybalt even thought he has insulted him calling him a “villain” and “boy.” Mercutio is disgusted with Romeo for this “vile submission” and draws his sword ready to fight Tybalt “Will you pluck your sword…. lest mine be about your ears ere it be out.” Romeo tries again to make peace “Gentle Mercutio, put thy rapier up.” but they end up fighting and Romeo stepping between them allows Tybalt’s sword to reach past him and wound Mercutio. Nothing could have stopped Mercutio fighting because he was hot “these hot days”, he’s always ready for a fight, he’s in a bad mood because Tybalt has been insulting his friend Romeo and he is ignoring it. Mercutio is very loyal to the Montagues and wants to defend their honour. Tybalt says “here comes my man” and Mercutio replies “But I’ll be hanged, sir, if he wears your livery.” He hates Tybalt because they’re so alike always ready for a fight with swords or even words. Romeo feel responsible for his friends’ death and he in turn fights Tybalt and kills him. After this Romeo is banished because The Prince doesn’t want any more deaths because he feels personally responsible which leads to Romeo and Juliet’s deaths.
The Nurse is partly responsible because she arranges for Romeo and Juliet to marry and Juliet regards her as a mother, even Lady Capulet says “Nurse, give leave a while, We must talk in secret. Nurse, come back again, I have remembered me, thou s’hear our counsel. Thou knowest my daughter’s of a pretty age.” The Nurse is the one who tells Romeo that Juliet is a Capulet and tells Juliet that Romeo is a Montague. When Romeo tells her about his plans for Friar Lawrence to marry him and Juliet she agrees to help Juliet be there “this afternoon, sir? Well, she shall be there”, “I must another way, to fetch a ladder.” After Tybalt’s death she advises Juliet to keep quiet about her marriage to Romeo and marry Paris because he can give her all the material things in life and she thinks it’s too hard for Romeo and Juliet to work it out because of the family feud. She is trying to comfort Juliet, however Juliet is furious and this is the end of her friendship with the Nurse who has been her advisor all her life.
Friar Lawrence was the one who thought up the whole plan of trying to get Romeo and Juliet back together. Friar Lawrence has good intentions just like the Nurse. He’s very educated and agrees to marry them in secret because he thinks this might be the answer to ending the feud “so smile the heavens upon this holy act,” however he is too naïve thinking that their marriage would bring the two families together but has not thought of the outcome if his plan failed. Friar Lawrence helped them again by hiding Romeo after Tybalt’s death and was the one to tell him about his punishment “…turned that black word ‘death’ to ‘banishment’.” He gives Romeo good advice that he should go and talk to Juliet and then leave for Mantua and promises he will tell everyone about their marriage and get the Prince to pardon him so he can come back and be with Juliet “To blaze your marriage…. beg pardon of the Prince, and call thee back.” He persuades Juliet to take the potion but is unlucky because Romeo never receives the letter. He then rushes to Juliet before she wakes but is too late to save Paris and Romeo. When Juliet refuses to escape with him he is filled with panic and runs away so he doesn’t save either of them “A greater power than we can contradict Hath thwarted our intents. Come, come away… I dare no longer stay.
Romeo and Juliet are both young teenagers but their characters are very different and so they’re also responsible for their own deaths. Before Romeo meets Juliet he is immature in the way he’s talking about his love for Rosaline. He doesn’t seem to notice what’s going on around him he’s just walking around talking about how sad he is “Alas that Love… Should be so tyrannous”, “Griefs of mine own lie heavy in my breast.” When Romeo is talking about his love for Rosaline he uses rhyming couplets which make it sound very artificial as though he is infatuated not in love. “Tut, I have lost myself I am not here, This is not Romeo, he’s some other where.” Juliet is younger than Romeo and is a very obedient daughter who has agreed to marry Paris because her mother has suggested it as she also married an older, wealthy man for the security. When they see each other for the first time they both experience love at first sight before they know they’re from opposite sides of the feud. This could be the way to settle the feud if both sides could just accept each other for who they are instead of as enemies. Juliet says ‘What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet’. After they had secretly got married Romeo didn’t want to fight Tybalt because they were both family which led to Romeo being banished.
Juliet’s parents don’t seem to be that involved and interested in her life but Romeo’s parents just want him to be happy. At the time a family relationship was very distant so the way Juliet’s parents have a Nurse to look after her was normal. Juliet’s parents can be held responsible for her death because when she refuses to marry Paris they get really annoyed with her “out on her, hilding!” which urges her to get help from Friar Lawrence, who gives her a sleeping potion which then leads to Romeo thinking that she’s dead.
In Elizabethan times they had an idea they called fortune which was a woman who span a wheel where at one moment it’d be right at the top (nothing bad in your life) and then suddenly the wheel would turn and you’d find yourself down the bottom(something bad would happen in your life). The reason why the wheel would change so much was because Fortune was said to be capricious(she changed her mind all the time). Fortune was related to the idea of the future in the stars where you couldn’t choose what you did it was already decided. If fortune was true none of the characters in the play could be held responsible for Romeo and Juliet’s deaths because fate was already decided as soon as Romeo and Juliet existed. None of the characters would have had any choice over what they would have done because it would have already been decided.
When I first started thinking about who was responsible for the deaths I was sure that the feud was to blame because if the feud hadn’t have been there in the first place there wouldn’t have been any problems and they would have been able to get married. As I began to explore all the other possibilities I became more uncertain, and now I think that everything that happened was down to fate. It was fate that they fell in love, that they met and that they came from feuding families. It was fate that Friar Lawrence agreed to marry them and thought up a plan so they could be together, but fate had other things in store and had already decided that Romeo wouldn’t know about the plan and kill himself because he couldn’t carry on living without Juliet. The final blow was when Juliet woke and found Romeo dead and took her own life. Friar Lawrence calls fate ‘A greater power than we can contradict.’
