The Tragedy Of Romeo And Juliet

“For never was a story of more woe than this of Juliet and her Romeo” (Shakespeare 5.3.314-315). In the final lines of the play, the Prince says that the story of Romeo and Juliet will always be the most tragic story there is, but it did not have to be that way. In Romeo and Juliet, by William Shakespeare, six people died of differing causes. However, these could have been prevented if more freedom had been allotted to the characters of the play. One of the subthemes of the play, giving people freedoms can stop violence and death, has strong backing from the events of the story. The deaths of Romeo and Juliet, County Paris, Tybalt and Mercutio, and Lady Montague could have all been averted if Romeo and Juliet had been allowed to marry each

The first of them to die was Romeo, but he killed himself because of Juliet’s suppositious death. She had poisoned herself and pretended to die, but she did this in response to her parents moving up the wedding day between her and Paris to the next day. Because of her earlier marriage to Romeo, Juliet knew that she could not marry Paris, so she pretended to die to prevent the impending marriage. “Betroth’d and would have married her perforce to County Paris. Then comes she to me and with wild looks bid me devise some mean to rid her from this second marriage” (Shakespeare 5.3.242-245). If her parents had given her the freedom to choose who she wanted to marry, then she would never had needed to go to such extreme measures that eventually resulted in both Romeo’s death and her

The fight started after Tybalt challenged Romeo to a duel. Tybalt challenged Romeo because he saw him at Juliet’s party, and that offended him. If the people had open minds and allowed their children more freedoms, then Tybalt might have retracted his proposition after Romeo wed Juliet. Romeo knew that he could not tell Tybalt that he had married Juliet, but he tried to insinuate it. “I do protest I never injur’d thee, but love thee better than thou canst devise till thou shalt know the reason of my love” (Shakespeare 3.1.60-63). If Romeo could have told Tybalt the truth, the prospect of a duel might been retracted because Tybalt would not want to shed his cousin’s blood. Of course, Romeo did end up killing Tybalt, but that was only because he slew Mercutio initially. Tybalt and Mercutio could have avoided their gruesome demises in the street fight if the freedom to marry whom they wanted to was given to Romeo and