In Shakespeare’s most famous play, Romeo and Juliet, both of the main characters go to Friar Lawrence for help during the various conflicts that arise. Throughout the play, he gives them advice and keeps them together – but eventually leads to both of their deaths. How does he help them, why, and what goes wrong at the end?
The first time the Friar helps the two teens is early on in the play when Romeo asks him to marry him and Juliet. As the Friar himself makes clear, he is quite surprised. We can see this in the text in Act II, Scene III, where he says “Holy Saint Francis! what a change is here! Is Rosaline, that thou didst love so dear, So soon forsaken?” Here he is saying that he is amazed at how soon Romeo forsook Rosaline, his previous crush, and latched on to Juliet. Although there is a moment of hesitation, the Friar does agree to
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Romeo kills himself because he thinks Juliet is dead, Juliet kills herself because her love is dead, and everyone is sad. But why did Romeo think Juliet was dead? Shouldn’t he have been notified of the plan? Well, everyone makes mistakes – including Friars. Friar Lawrence gave a note to Friar John, who was supposed to take it to Mantua. However, he wasn’t let into the city because the people suspected that he was “in a house Where the infectious pestilence did reign…”. In today’s language, this would mean they suspected he was “from a house with a horrible sickness.” Because of this, the message never got to Romeo that Juliet was feigning death, and he had to hear about it from someone else. That “someone else,” however, didn’t know that she was going to “come to life” within the next couple days and told him that she was completely dead. This was so depressing to him that he went to her grave and killed himself right before the Friar made it to the same place. When Juliet awoke and the Friar helped her out of her vault, she saw her dead husband and killed herself once the Friar had