Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Literary Essay on “The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet,” by William Shakespeare

                Tafura Taslima         805

            After reading the book “The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet,” by William Shakespeare I learned that the message the writer is delivering to the readers is that for every action there is a consequence. This theme is reflected through many conflicts that take place in the story. Many of these conflicts take place after a character has intentionally done something they were not supposed to do and has to deal with the negative outcomes of it.

            To begin with, one action that causes a negative consequence is when Romeo attends the Capulet party even though he is rivals with the family, which led to his death. Romeo is a Montague and so is his cousin, Benvolio. Benvolio convinces Romeo to attend the Capulet party because he believes it will help Romeo get over the recent break up he has been through. Romeo is reluctant but he agrees to go but he says “I’ll go along, no such sight to be to be shown/ But to rejoice in splendor of my own,” {1.5.48-49} this shows that Romeo is only going to please Benvolio. Romeo’s action to go to the party is wrong because he is not welcome there but he still goes in “disguise”, this shows that Romeo knew what he was doing was wrong and he will later suffer the consequences of it. At the dinner, Romeo and Juliet meet for the first time, being in love at first sight the young couple strives to be together but, end up dead when they both kill each other one at a time thinking their love of their life is dead. As the story carries out Romeo and Juliet both end up dead, but if Romeo and Juliet never met each other they wouldn’t have died the way they did. If Romeo hadn’t attended the Capulet party he wouldn’t have met Juliet and he wouldn’t have died. As you can see, Romeo suffered the consequences of his actions severely.  

            In addition, another conflict that reflected this theme is when Tybalt, Juliet’s cousin kills Mercutio, Romeo’s best friend, which resulted in Tybalt’s own death. Tybalt had negative intentions due to the fact that he and Mercutio were rivals. Tybalt threatened Mercutio when he said “That thou hadst done me. Therefore turn and draw,” Mercutio was provoked by Tybalt threat to battle and they both engaged in a terrible quarrel. Tybalt succeeded in killing Mercutio but the consequence for this action is when Romeo took action to kill Tybalt. As the story continues Romeo kills Tybalt which show that Tybalt suffered from his action and his death was the consequence.

            To continue, since Romeo took action to kill Tybalt in revenge of his best friend’s death, Romeo also is affected by the consequences for his actions. For example, after Romeo killed Tybalt he was exiled by the Prince to leave Verona. Romeo was incredibly upset because he had to leave Juliet. Romeo states “Ha, banishment! Be merciful, say ‘death’, / For exile hath more terror in his look, / Much more than death. Do not say “banishment,” {3.3.13-15} this concludes Romeo thinks he would rather be dead than not ever see Juliet. After Juliet heard that Romeo was exiled she made a plan to fake her own death to be with Romeo but, unfortunately Romeo caught her in the act and thought she was actually dead and killed himself. After he killed himself Juliet woke up from her “fake” death and found Romeo dead. Juliet then preceded commit suicide.  If Romeo hadn’t killed Tybalt there might’ve been a chance he could’ve been with Juliet but since he did, he ended up dead along with the love of his life.


            In conclusion, this book has taught readers that for every action that may not have the best intentions will cause damage to some extent caused by consequences. This tragedy shows that consequences can often be disastrous and it may even cause your life.  

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