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Character development of Romeo and Juliet by williams shakespeare
Romeo and Juliet fate vs choice
Fate vs choice romeo and juliet
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Authors often make their characters make decisions rather than relying on the notion of fate to explain the cause, effects, and endings of their stories. This leads to better developed plots and less question as to why a major character just died or other similar events. Fate is rarely present in the real world, and people’s decisions generally lead to what is perceived as their “fate”. This rule is present in Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare, Pyramus and Thisbe by Ovid, and in the honor killings of a remote Indian village.
Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet relied heavily on a web of intertwined choices and effects. An excellent example of this is when Friar Lawrence decides to give Juliet a sleep inducing potion in an effort to prevent her suicide. He tells her, “Hold, daughter. I do spy a kind of hope,/ Which craves as desperate and execution/ As that is desperate which we would prevent./ If, rather than to marry County Paris,/ Thou has the strength of will to slay thyself,/ Then is it likely thou wilt undertake/ A thing like death to chide away this shame” (4.1.69-75). In...
Choices determine every outcome, A better way to put it is “What we do in life, echoes in eternity”, essentially every single decision one makes, no matter how minuscule, will always have an impact in one’s life. Fate isn’t real; Fate is a term commonly used by those that refuse to accept that they control their own future. Teenagers ever since the beginning of time were and still are expected to make poor choices due to their age. But once they learn to take responsibility for their actions, they become adults. Both Romeo and Juliet make multiple decisions, such as marrying, killing and suicide, without stepping back and thinking about the consequences.
The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare is a love story that has been read for hundreds of years and is still studied today. The story is about a young boy and a young girl who are in love with each other but both of their lives end in tragedy. Many of the play’s character’s actions affect the outcome of the play, but no character can be put to blame of the outcome. The one thing that these events can be credited to is fate. Fate did many things in the play, such as caused Romeo and Juliet to meet and it caused Romeo to believe Juliet was dead.
In society, people have varying opinions on fate. Many question whether life’s events are pre-determined by fate or whether people have a destiny to serve a greater purpose. Fate versus free will is an archaic topic among philosophers that is ultimately up for interpretation.The question on whether or not something else is controlling life’s events or if they are simply a coincidence faces us in some point of our lives. In Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare plays with the idea of fate and its control on the events in the play. He forces us to realize the destiny between Romeo and Juliet involves the fate between the two opposing households as well. Shakespeare blurs the line between fate and free will in his play Romeo and Juliet to show that the outstanding cause of Romeo and Juliet’s tragedy was not something decided- it was fate. It is evident by the events in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet that fate was the main cause of the tragedy in the play, and that Romeo and Juliet held the destiny to finally end the feud between the Capulets and the Montagues.
Romeo and Juliet is widely known to be a tragedy, but what caused the atrocity for which it is so renowned? Some may argue fate was to blame for Romeo’s and Juliet’s deaths, that the situations these young lovers faced were depicted as being out of their control. Could Romeo have refused to attend the Capulet masque? Was Romeo destined to duel the raging Tybalt? Did Romeo and Juliet truly have to kill themselves? If one considers the specific circumstances and causes of these situations, the fact that all scenarios are the result of choice rather than chance, and the notion that the characters were never left without options, only one conclusion can be determined. It was unarguably the decisions made by characters, not those made by fate, that were responsible for the tragedy in Romeo and Juliet.
Shakespeare, through the dialogue and action of his characters, readily provides the evidence that both choice and fate are integral parts of human life. For example, Shakespeare illustrates fate through the words of Romeo who states, “I fear, too early, for my mind misgives some consequences, yet handing in the stars…” (I, IV, 116-117). Romeo believes that it is the stars that influence his life. It is not he who determines his life. He initially believes that his fate ultimately governs his choices, choices that cannot be controlled by humans. In addition, Shakespeare also reveals that choice plays a crucial role in determining fate. It is choice then that drives the decisions of the characters but these choices are made in the circumstance of their lives. And these circumstances cannot be removed from their consciousness. For instance, when Juliet says in her soliloquy before she drinks the sleeping potion, “Romeo, I come! This do I drink to thee” (IV, IV, 60) she is saying it is my fate and my choice to be with you. She chooses to drink the potion thus putting her into a coma-like sleep, and ultimately resulting in the death of them both. When Romeo declares, “Then I defy you, stars!” he is making the choice to challenge his fate of living without Juliet who he believes has died. Shakespeare has provided the evidence that fate and choice re so intertwined that they cannot be separated. Even the structure of his play alludes to this same perception.
Fate is an inevitable – seldom disastrous – outcome; regardless of one’s desire to veer it in a different path, fate is adamant. In Macbeth, by William Shakespeare, there is a steadfast question of whether Macbeth is a victim of fate or that he chooses his own path. By instilling his character, Macbeth, with ambition and ruthlessness, Shakespeare demonstrate that a person – in this case Macbeth – is doomed not by fate, but by flaws in his/her character.
The suicides of Romeo and Juliet reflect their hasty and impulsive decisions as well as the dishonesty of Friar Lawrence and the Nurse. Romeo’s haste in drinking the venomous poison, Friar’s cowardice in handling the consequences as well as the Nurse’s choice of standing against the relationship of Romeo and Juliet contribute equally to their fatal end. Therefore, dishonesty and haste can result in undesirable circumstances to any individual.
Once in a while many people make bad decisions. Usually these decisions don’t cause them any harm in their futures, unlike Romeo Montague’s and Juliet Capulet’s decisions. In Verona, a city in Italy, two lovers fall in love. The catch is their families despise each other. Eventually Romeo get’s banished from Verona, and Juliet is forced to marry someone she doesn’t want to marry. Juliet takes a potion that knocks her out for 42 hours, and feigns her death, hoping she does not have to marry Count Paris. Romeo assumes Juliet is dead, and drinks a potion that kills him, and when Juliet wakes up and realizes that Romeo is dead, she stabs herself. In William Shakespeare’s tragic play, Romeo and Juliet, the main protagonists, Romeo and Juliet, make poor choices which eventually lead to their death at the end of the story.
...that fate. Events that lead to other events will eventually lead one to their fate. “Oedipus the King” is a great play that sets an example of what fate is. Oedipus chooses to flee from home, in attempt to avoid the god’s statement of his fate from coming true. However, Oedipus’s decision for fleeing is what was necessary to make his fate come true. Undoubtedly, this is what was meant to happen because Oedipus allowed it to. Perhaps if Oedipus ignored the god and never did a thing then perhaps the outcome could have been different for Oedipus. However it did not turn out that way and the choices that Oedipus made is what led him to his doom.
Shakespeare in The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet depicts the conflict between fate and free will through use of his characters’ actions and beliefs. Fate is the main driving force between the demise of the two main protagonists. Because of it, superstition, the actions of others, and the idea of chance are allowed a main role in the play building up to events that lead to a tragic end.
Romeo and Juliet made many choices out of their own free will, including an irreversible decision that ended in despair for all characters. “All are punished!”(5.3.305). In the play “Romeo and Juliet” by William Shakespeare, the actions of Romeo, the actions of Juliet, and the actions of others prove that free will is more paramount than fate in the plot of the play.
We are all condemned to death; it is inescapable. Even if a person doesn’t believe in the concept of destiny, it is undeniable that every person is fated to die at some point. Most people, however, are not aware of when exactly the inevitable will approach. Often in works of fiction, the reader, or sometimes even the character, is aware of their fate. There are many different understandings of destiny, which is one of the reasons why it has played such a large role in so many different literary works throughout the world and history. Fate is one of the principal literary devices used in Homer’s epic poem, The Iliad, Shakespeare’s tragic play, Antony and Cleopatra, and Tolstoy’s pedagogical novella, The Death of Ivan Ilych.
The concept of fate has existed since the time of the ancient Greeks. The Greeks believed very strongly in fate, which can be defined as either a power beyond human control that determines events, or the outcome or end. In "Oedipus Rex," King Oedipus lives and dies by fate. Fate influences the entire plot, thereby allowing for some interesting developments that may be unpredictable to the audience.
Fate and the circumstantial downfall of characters (usually surrounding the protagonist) is a reoccurring theme seen throughout the Eras of theatre (specifically between the plays Oedipus Rex [Greek Theatre] and King Lear [Elizabethan Thatre.]) Fate and falling victim to circumstance is one of the same; fate is just a predetermination made by a higher being (gods,) while circumstance is almost always the result of causation; contrary to the psychological phrase correlation does not imply causation which means that a relation between two variables does not imply that one is the cause of the other. For those who lived during the Greek Theatre Era (600-200 BC,) the explanation of “fate” was considered an acceptable means to justify the unknown, and/or to gain information/knowledge. Audiences eventually became more literate and the reliance on the gods to help make sense of why something has happened slowly diminished; this cultural reformation demanded the same change to occurr within the theatre, which correlated fate with falling victim to circumstance. In th...
The Capulets send out an illiterate servant to deliver invitations for a party, who just so happens to ask Romeo for help, ‘can you read anything you see?’ (1.2.60). This encounter originally encourages Romeo to attend the party in hopes of seeing Rosaline, but he ends up meeting Juliet, who he falls madly in love with, ‘did my heart love till now?’ (1.5.51), even though by social relation she happens to be his ‘great enemy’ (1.5.136). It is quite an ironic coincident that Romeo goes to the party to find Rosaline, the girl he loved to find Juliet, the girl he loves so much that he dies for her. Romeo’s response to the servant, ‘Ay, mine own fortune in my misery’ (1.2.58), could be interpreted as him recognising fate playing a role of misery his love life. A series of unlucky coincidences involve Romeo not receiving Friar Laurence’s letter in Mantua, causing Romeo much distress, which led him to buy poison from an Apothecary who, coincidentally, sells it to Romeo only because ‘my poverty, but not my will, consents’ (5.2.75). Romeo arrives at the tomb to find Juliet “dead”, provoking him to drink the poison, ‘Here’s to my love!’ (5.3.119). Moments later, Juliet wakes up to realise Romeo is dead and she too is prepared to ‘die with a restorative’ (5.3.166). Curtesy to fate, the Friar’s letter did not reach Romeo in Mantua which encouraged Romeo to buy poison, which it had to be from an Apothecary in need of money. This led to another unfortunate coincidence of Romeo killing himself by Juliet's side just moments before she woke up. The many coincidences that take place throughout the play are clear examples to prove that Romeo and Juliet lived their entire lives according to their predetermined