Romeo And Juliet By Shakespeare Essay Research

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The play, Romeo and Juliet written by William Shakespeare, is a story of two star-

crossed lovers. Their love generated conflicts which they never imagined would lead to tragedy.

These two young people did nothing wrong except fall in love. However, they had figures in

their lives that caused their relationship to be disastrous. Without these influences in their lives,

they could have possibly lived happily, but that was not the case. The three main influences that

persuaded destruction included the feud between the two families, the nurse and her betrayal of

Juliet and the Friar, whom ultimately was most responsible for the tragic events.

The feud between the two families, Montague and Capulets, was one factor that effected

the love of Romeo and Juliet being a lamentable circumstance. The two families held much

hostility toward each other. This feud even created problems for the young lovers. These two

young lovers understood the situation and which forced them to marry in secrecy. They would

have made their children’s lives miserable if their parents discovered their secret. Romeo and

Juliet would have never been able to see each other. These two families were very stubborn and

virtually nothing that would have made them become allies. When he play is introduced the

audience, the tension between households is immediately noted. “Doth with their death bury

their parent’s strife”. (Romeo & Juliet, Prologue, l.8) Neither household would have accepted the

marriage. Keeping the marriage a secret caused Romeo and Juliet to turn to other people for

help. At times these people mislead them with bad advice or even betrayed them.

The Nurse can be seen as a character which betrayed Juliet. The Nurse was quite

possibly Juliet’s closest friend, but she turned against her at a crucial time. The Nurse blatantly

told Juliet to marry Paris. “I think it best you married with the county”. (Romeo & Juliet,

pg.101, III, v, l.219) This treachery by the Nurse abandoned Juliet. Juliet was now left to make

important decisions by herself. If the Nurse was around to help Juliet the circumstance could

have drastically changed. She obviously could not have seek guidance from her parents because

Romeo was a Montague and that was enough for them to turn away from any possibility of being

with Romeo. The Nurse was supposed to be one of Juliet’s best friends. Now when it was

important for Juliet to have someone there, she was all by herself.

Ultimately, Friar Lawrence is most responsible for the tragedy in this play due to his

misjudgement. The Friar is an extremely intelligent man, but he does not think his decisions out

too well. First of all, he should have never married the Romeo and Juliet because of the tensions

between their families and their overeagerness. As a figure for guidance, he should have

prepared them for the problems that they would encounter once married in secrecy. Also, he

was inefficient in delivery the letter to Romeo informing him of Juliet’s fake death. He gave the

letter to Friar John who, apparently, was not capable of delivering the letter as fast as possible.

Lastly, he once again fell short when he arrived just after Romeo had drank the poison. Had he

arrived sooner, he could have prevented his suicide. Although his intentions were good, Friar

Lawrence caused the most harm resulting in the tragedy for his lack of judgement.

In conclusion, this tragedy was highly influenced by other figures in Romeo and Juliet’s lives. To begin with, the Capulet and Montague families abhorred each other and the marriage between Romeo and Juliet would have been complicated from the start. In addition, the Nurse was not supportive enough with Juliet which led a young girl to make difficult decisions by herself. Above all, Friar Lawrence consistently fell short of guiding the two lovers to make the right decisions and several events with his timing could have changed the entire situation. It makes one think, what would have the circumstance have been if these instances were different?