What Makes Romeo and Juliet a Tragedy and Who or What Is to Blame?

Romeo and Juliet is written by William Shakespeare and is a Shakespearian tragedy about two young lovers who are destined to be together. Their two families hate each other bitterly, which forces them to realise that they would rather be dead than live their lives apart.



In this essay I am going to look at who or what is to blame or responsible for this tragic loss of life.



Most people see a tragedy as a sudden unfortunate event, which leaves people sad, upset and possibly grieving. A Shakespearian tragedy is very different. A Shakespearian tragedy had to have more than one unfortunate event leading up to one major tragic event. The audience needs to feel pity, fear and a sense a waste of life. A Shakespearian tragedy is brought about by fate and inevitability, it also has a main big topic usually love or greed.



The main tragedy of Romeo and Juliet is they choose kill themselves rather then live their lives apart. It is also a tragedy as there is such a tragic waste of life, Juliet was only thirteen and Romeo was in his early twenties.



I do not think that there is one specific person or thing that was responsible for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. I feel that it was combination of factors that are responsible for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. The main factors I feel were; Fate, the Feud, the nurse, Old Capulet and Friar Laurence.



An Elizabethan would have blamed fate for the loss of the young lovers’ lives. They believed that fate was like a wheel of fortune, sometimes you were on the top but as easy for the wheel to turn and you could be at the bottom. Fate also meant that it was going to happen no matter what got in the way, this was the case in Romeo and Juliet. Romeo and Juliet’s fate was discovered even before they were born as it was written in the stars. Even though fate traps Romeo and Juliet by their fatal flaw, many things happen to their misfortune and is not their fault....