Teenagers Impulsiveness and Lack of Thought You stand on the edge of the building. The pool is practically 30 feet away, you start to reconsider. “Come on! You can make it! Just jump already!” you hear someone shout. Why did this seem like a good thing again? It was just a spur of the moment thing. Just a quick decision made for fun. Similar to how the teenagers in William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet make rash, ill advised decisions, modern day teenagers also make many impulsive and dangerous choices without really thinking. Throughout the entirety of Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet, teenagers are portrayed as behaving hastily. There are many such examples of these being made, particularly by Romeo and Juliet themselves. One instance …show more content…
When Juliet discovers Romeo hiding in her garden, she says “If they do see thee they will murder thee.” (Shakespeare II.ii 70). To this, Romeo replies “Alack, there lies more peril in thine eye / Than twenty of their swords. Look thou but sweet, / And I am proof against their enmity.” (Shakespeare II.ii 71-73). Romeo goes to Juliet without a second thought, despite the fact that he could easily be killed for doing so, which is very spontaneous and impulsive. Romeo and Juliet aren’t the only characters that make these sorts of choices, though. Mercutio and Tybalt, when talking, begin to fight. After a short dispute, Tybalt asks Mercutio what he wants, and Mercutio replies with “Good King of Cats, nothing but one of your nine / lives, that I mean to make bold withal, and, as you / shall use me hereafter, dry-beat the rest of the eight.” (Shakespeare III.i 48-50). After this jokingly made insult, this seemingly harmless quarrel turns incredibly grave when Tybalt lashes out at Mercutio, and kills him with a blow of his sword. While this was not his original intent, Tybalt’s lack of thought caused another man’s death. What is likely the most