Essay: Uncontrollable Events in Romeo and Juliet Affect Love, Lives, and Actions of Characters

Romeo and Juliet’s love is heavily influenced by outside forces, as are many feelings, actions, and other relationships in and out of Romeo and Juliet, a play by Shakespeare. Romeo and Juliet is a story about two teens in love who are separated by the generations long feud between their families, the Montagues and Capulets. This outside effect and other outside effects like a misunderstanding that changes the lives of everyone in Verona affects Romeo and Juliet’s love and the lives and actions of many other people in the village of Verona. The uncontrollable events and effects in the world of Romeo and Juliet demonstrate that there are simply some things in the world that you cannot control.
One outside force that specifically impacts the lives and relationship of Romeo and Juliet is the decades old feud between their two families. For example, this affects the life of Romeo and Juliet because they couldn’t directly contact each other, instead Romeo has to sneak into the Capulet secretly to go and talk to Juliet, “If they do see thee they will murder thee./Alack, there lies more peril in thine eye/Than twenty of their swords. Look thou but sweet,/And I am proof against their enmity./I would not for the world they saw thee here./I have night’s cloak to hide me from their eyes”(2.2.70-75). Romeo must be cloaked by the night for his safety because of the fight between his and Juliet’s family and if he is seen with her he may be killed. The parents fighting cause them to risk their lives and freedom for meeting one another in their so called love. Another outside force that affects the actions and emotions of Romeo and Juliet is the misunderstanding of Juliet’s death. This misunderstanding that neither Romeo nor Juliet could have predicted or prevented inevitably causes the suicide of both Romeo and Juliet. Romeo believes that Juliet had actually died in her and Friar Laurence’s plan to get her out of the marriage with Paris, “Come, bitter conduct, come, unsavoury guide./Thou desperate pilot, noe at once run on/The dashing rocks thy seasick, weary bark./Here’s to my love! (drinks the poison) O true apothecary,/ THy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die”(5.3.116-120). This poor communication that Juliet couldn’t control because she was unconscious and that Romeo couldn’t control because he was not told causes the suicide of Romeo, because he believes that Juliet was dead, and later, the suicide of Juliet because of Romeo’s death.
Not just Romeo and Juliet are affected by outside forces. Their families, the Montagues and Capulets, are very much impacted by an outside event. The deaths of Romeo and Juliet affected the families very much. The deaths affected them so much that they even agreed to keep peace and resolve their feud, “O brother Montague, give me thy hand./This is my daughter’s jointure, for no more/Can i demand./But can I give thee more,/For I will raise her statue in pure gold,/That while Verona by that name is unknown,/There shall no figure at such rate be set/As that of true and faithful Juliet./As rich as shall Romeo’s by his lady’s lie,/Poor sacrifices of our enmity”(5.3.296-304). After they lost what may have been two of the most important people in their lives, Montague and Capulet realize that this fight has been going on for too long and it has gone too far. The deaths made them realize that the worst can come out of feuds like this and it could have gotten worse had it kept going on
In summary, outside factors and events greatly affect the lives of the characters in Romeo and Juliet. Romeo and Juliet risked their lives to meet each other because of a feud between their parents that they could not control, and their suicides were caused by a misunderstanding and miscommunication that they could not control. However, some good came out of outside events in the play because after the death of their children, Montague and Capulet ended their family feud and fight. From Romeo and Juliet, we can learn that it is important to be able to see other sides of the story and that there are some things that you just can’t control and that is inevitable.