Who Is To Blame For The Fall Of Romeo And Juliet Essay

In the tragic play by William Shakespeare called Romeo and Juliet, two lovers fall victim to the rivalry of their families. The families of Romeo and Juliet are arch enemies, but that never stops the uncontrollable love that Romeo possesses for Juliet. This overpowering love takes over Romeo and drives him crazy and his insanity leads him to making bad decisions about other characters in the play. The rash actions of Romeo, that he learns from the family rivalries, have a tragic effect on three characters in the play: Mercutio, Tybalt, and Juliet. One of the first to fall victim negatively to the impulsive behavior of Romeo is Mercutio. As the play fight between Mercutio and Tybalt goes on longer, Romeo goes to break up the fight. Thinking the fight is real, he steps in the middle and this causes Tybalt to accidentally stab Mercutio in the chest and kill him. Before Mercutio dies, he tells Romeo “A plague o’ both your houses!” (Act 3: Scene 1) because the feud of the Montagues and the Capulets have been the reason for his death. Romeo was also responsible for his death because he steps in the middle of them while they are just play fighting and gets Mercutio killed. This action leads Romeo to make an even worse decision

Not even five minutes after the death of Mercutio, Romeo ran after Tybalt and threatens him. Although Tybalt is his brother-in-law, he is overwhelmed by his anger and gets into a fight with him and kills him. He then finally regains his sanity and starts to think the worst possible scenario. Romeo feels so guilty that he even tries to kill himself! Friar Lawrence has to give Romeo a long talk to keep him from this by asking what Juliet is supposed to do with him gone and that it will be very difficult for him to try to convince Juliet not to kill herself either if he lets Romeo kill himself. The decisions of Romeo affected this last character the most...the “wife”,