Irrational Decisions In Romeo And Juliet

Throughout William Shakespeare’s famous tragedy, Romeo and Juliet, Romeo has a difficult time controlling his actions because of his emotions. Characters Romeo cares about, such as Mercutio, Tybalt, and Juliet, are affected by his behavior and actions. The choices Romeo makes are very impulsive and cause many characters throughout the story to be victimized. The first victim who suffers from an irrational decision of Romeo is Mercutio. During the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet, Tybalt and Mercutio, challenge each other to a brawl. Mercutio has the ability to hold his own ground and take on Tybalt himself, but Romeo intervenes. While the two are fighting, Romeo gets involved in the altercation; he does not want anything to happen to either of

Juliet’s tragic downfall began when Romeo killed Tybalt, banishing himself to a lifetime of separation from her. Emotionally demolished by his sentence, Romeo says, “ Ha, banishment? Be merciful, say ‘death’”, indicating that Romeo would rather die than be banished from Verona. Romeo’s banishment by the Prince then causes Juliet and the Friar to come up with the idea to drink a potion that portrays Juliet to be as still as death. Once Romeo believes that Juliet is no longer alive, he makes another rash decision to bribe an apothecary for poison. Later in the tragedy, Romeo sees Juliet dead in the mausoleum, and decides to express his love for her, then drink the poison. Once Juliet awakes from her deep sleep and sees Romeo dead, she takes her own life with a dagger. Both Juliet and Romeo’s tragic downfall could have been avoided if Romeo thought about the consequences before he murdered Tybalt. Romeo’s rash behaviors in Romeo and Juliet resulted in many negative consequences, and he consistently acted impetuously that impacted others in an unnecessary way. The actions he committed to were ideally the cause of the death for three major characters . If Romeo would have not been so eager to immediately fix a problem and take a few moments to consider all of the possible consequences, these characters may have been able to live happily ever