One of the most famous plays in the world is Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare. In this play Romeo and Juliet fall desperately in love, however because of their families’ feud and extreme hate for each other they cannot pursue this relationship in public, and thus pursue it in secret. They make hasty decisions to marry, respond poorly to Romeo’s banishment and eventually choose to commit suicide because of this secretive relationship fueled by their parents hate for each other.
The second Romeo and Juliet meet they make hasty and secretive decisions because of their ‘love’ for each other. This is prevalent even in the beginning of their relationship, where not long after meeting each other, they decide to get married.
After Romeo leaves the Capulet’s party he scales the garden wall outside of Capulet mansion. This shows just how emotionally immature Romeo is but also how impulsively rash he can be and how the Montague and Capulets feud made him rush into pursuing Juliet. He did so without thinking of the high possibility of death, or any consequences at all.
This is proven by Juliet’s quote (Act 2: Scene 2) “If they see thee they will murder thee.” Showing their families intense hate for each other and how impulsive and reckless Romeo is for not giving a second thought about it. Desperate to connect to each other despite this, the two make a decision that would only otherwise happen after a very long time of reflecting and in depth talking with each other, they choose to marry.
They’ve only known each other for the span of a couple hours and this situation really shows how emotionally immature, impulsive and ‘in love’ they are. Seeing as they never give a second though to the possibility that this secretive arrangement might cause more harm than good.
I felt rather confused when I read this part in the play, mostly because I couldn’t believe how fast Romeo and Juliet rushed into marriage and the fact that they would do so in secret.
However when I realised that they were pressured to ridiculous amounts by their families feuding I felt a little more sympathetic. To me it seems like the two really just want to experience a form of safe haven, they wanted to have something to hold themselves to when the families fought. This is why I think they turned to each other and latched onto the barest glimpse of love that they could see.
Romeo and Juliet further show their emotional immaturity when they react poorly to Romeo’s banishment from Verona, which was spurred on by the fight that resulted in Mercutio’s death.
You can see how immature Romeo and Juliet are when they hear of Romeo’s banishment. Really they should be grateful, as Romeo ‘s sentence could have been death. They don’t stop to consider how they could use this situation to their advantage, how lucky they are that the Prince did not sentence Romeo to death or how Romeo wasn’t killed in the fight that got him exiled in the first place.
The quote by Romeo. “There is no world without Verona walls-” And. “Then “banishèd,” Is death mistermed-” Show just how bad he feels leaving Juliet would be, his feelings have also been enhanced by the recent death of his best friend Mercutio.
Juliet’s reaction to Romeo’s banishment is also harsh and emotional, however she is also reacting to the death of her cousin Tybalt. The latter is what her family assumes she cries over. You see her high emotions when she says.“Romeo is banishèd. To speak that word, is father, mother, Tybalt, Romeo, Juliet. All slain, all dead.”
She is stating, essentially, that Romeo’s banishment is akin to her family, Romeo and herself being murdered.
All these emotions are spurred on by the fight that happened between Romeo, Mercutio and Tybalt not a few hours ago. The fight was originally intended by Tybalt to end Romeo’s life and instead ended his and Mercutio’s life. This pressure forces Romeo and Juliet into an emotionally unstable corner, where they will begin to do anything to get back to each other and out of all the death and destruction happening outside of their ‘bubble’.
When I read this passage of Romeo and Juliet I began to really feel for them but I also felt like they almost had it coming.
By keeping their relationship a secret they are making things much harder for themselves than it would be if they were going out in the public eye.
This makes me feel like they should have talked to their families a little more, rather than immediately going into such an intense relationship in such a secretive manner. But then I also looked back at the fight that caused Romeo’s banishment. It only happened because Romeo went to the Capulet’s party and Tybalt saw him.
I felt very conflicted by this point in the play, as on one side, I feel sympathetic towards Romeo and Juliet’s plight and how much they want to be together but can’t. But I also feel like some of the events that happened were kind of coming to them.
Romeo and Juliet, in an act of final desperation to be free together, to never be subjected to the horrors of the dangerous and cruel world they live in ever again, commit suicide. This is the result of a failed plan concocted by Friar Lawrence, that was put in place because of Juliet’s arranged marriage to Paris.
Juliet has been crying for a long time and because of this her father arranges for Juliet to marry Paris, in an attempt to make her happier. This has the opposite effect (as she is already married, in secret, to Romeo) and instead she runs to Friar Lawrence and she feels so trapped and conflicted that she threatens to take her own life.
But Friar Lawrence stops with an elaborate plan that he has made, Juliet pretends to be dead via the help of a ‘sleeping potion’ and her marriage to Paris is called off. However Romeo is misinformed and believes this charade, which leads to him visiting Juliet and killing himself before she wakes. And then when she does wake, not a minute after, she sees him dead and thus kills herself.
Juliet threatens to take her life, and eventually does so, because of many outside factors. One of which is her family pushing her to get married to Paris in an attempt to ease her grief. However this is a marriage she wants no part in. This is seen in her quote. “I will not marry yet and when I do, I swear it shall be Romeo -whom you know I hate – rather than Paris”.
Her father reacts violently to this saying, “Hang thee, young baggage, disobedient wretch! I tell thee what: get thee to church o’ Thursday, or never after look me in the face. Speak not; reply not; do not answer me.” After his borderline abusive comments towards her she feels trapped and scared, after all she’s lost Romeo and now she’s being forced to marry another man. This is part of the external conflict that drove her to kill herself. At the end of the play they die together, with their last spoken words being that of- “Thus with a kiss I die.” and “O happy dagger, this is thy sheath,” Show just how trapped and desperate they feel, for they don’t even give a second thought or anything before taking their own lives.
With Juliet feeling conflicted between her forced marriage, Tybalt’s death and Romeo’s banishment and then Romeo, feeling trapped because of his banishment, his best friends death and his wife’s(Juliet’s (faked)) death, they are both being torn apart by the outside worlds chaos and their families explosive feuding.
At this point in the play I couldn’t really understand how these two people would take their own lives for each other after knowing each other and being married for less than a week, I thought it would have made more sense if Juliet, in a moment of panic and emotional vulnerability, ran away from Verona rather than going straight to Friar Lawrence.
However as I look back on the conflicts that dragged both Romeo and Juliet apart and how desperate they were to be together I could see how their families feuding, the deaths that occured and just the stress in general of having a secret relationship drove them to want to give up, to want to leave all of that behind.
So in conclusion you can see how the two houses, Capulet and Montague, forced these to young adults to ultimately kill themselves.
Through the forced secret relationship and marriage, to the banishment of Romeo from Verona and to their final dying moments you can tell the sorrow and desperation that ran through them the whole story.
If these two houses had not been feuding in the first place things would have turned out much better and happier for all involved in the story, but as that is not the case things ended in a tragedy.
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