Student essay: Romeo and Juliet – Destiny or Free Will

By Rebecca N.

[Note:  This is a condensation of an essay by a home school student who participated in our 2012 Summer Shakespeare Seminar.  It was written in partial fulfillment of the high school credit certificate offered in connection with the Seminar.]

     At first glance, Romeo and Juliet seem to be unfortunate but innocent victims of fate, or of the stars. This assumption isn’t surprising when we see that the prologue calls the lovers “star crossed.”  Focus on the Family’s review of Romeo and Juliet takes from the phrase, “star crossed” the conclusion that destiny rather than God guides the lovers. But is Romeo and Juliet really just “a tragedy of unawareness?” (Amanda Mabillard, “Themes in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.”) Or could the fault actually belong to them because of their choices along the way?

     While things such as fate, fortune, and the stars are mentioned throughout the play, Romeo is almost always the one talking about them. In addition, he is the only character who refers to the stars as having authority. What could be his reason for this?  H.B. Charlton says Romeo “disowns responsibility and throws it on Destiny, Fate.” 

     Romeo makes many poor moral choices, each of which brings him one step closer to his doom. He chooses to hastily and secretly marry Juliet, murders Tybalt and later Paris, and finally commits suicide. We do not see Romeo assume responsibility for any one of these choices, or recognize how those choices are affecting his life.

     We cannot place all the blame on Romeo, however. Other characters are at fault also. For instance, though Friar Lawrence warns Romeo against haste, he agrees to marry the pair, and later offers Juliet the sleeping potion that leads to her death as well as Romeo’s. Juliet’s nurse bears some blame by choosing to help the two lovers get secretly married. If the Montague and Capulet families had been reasonable and settled their differences long ago, Romeo and Juliet may not have felt it necessary to keep their love a secret, and then to resort to suicide.

     So, while on the surface it appears that Romeo and Juliet were victims of destiny doomed from the beginning of time by fate, if we look closer it is easy to see that not destiny, but foolish choices by several characters came together and resulted in this tragedy.

Romeo & Juliet: Married to their Graves

In this post I want to look at chastity and marriage, death and suicide, topics that tragically intersect in Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet. 

At least four characters use metaphors in which the marriage bed and the death bed overlap, starting with Juliet’s comment about Romeo at the masquerade party before she even knows who he is or whether he is single. “If he be married, My grave is like to be my wedding bed,” she says. (Act I, Scene 5, lines 148-149.) The day of the pair’s secret wedding and the untimely killing of Mercutio leading to Romeo’s banishment, Juliet hopes fervently for a wedding night with her groom before he flees, and vows that if it doesn’t happen, “I’ll to my wedding bed, And death, not Romeo, take my maidenhead,” (III.2.149-150). Even after their consummation, and the charming “lark and nightingale” scene, she looks at Romeo and her “ill-divining soul” imagines seeing him in a tomb (III.5.54-57). 

That very morning, Juliet’s mother unwittingly takes up the same theme in frustration when Juliet refuses the marriage to Paris that her parents have arranged. “I would the fool were married to her grave,” (III.5.145). As the argument continues, Juliet says—in what turn out to be her final words to her mother—that if her parents insist on this marriage they may as well “make the bridal bed” in the family tomb (III.5.213). The next day when Juliet’s father discovers the apparently dead body of his daughter, he laments to Paris, the intended groom, “Death hath lain with thy wife,” (IV.5.41-45). 

Away in Mantua the banished Romeo, who has heard none of this, has his own similar—but temporarily hopeful—forebodings. “I dreamed my lady found me dead” but brought him back to life as an emperor with her kisses, (V.1.6-10) Don’t miss the irony of what will actually happen soon as a result of Juliet kissing Romeo when she finds him dead! And of course within a few lines, Romeo will have heard the report of Juliet’s ostensible death, and will promise, “Well, Juliet, I will lie with thee tonight,” (5.1.37). 

Suicide

Several of the lovers’ statements just cited imply or directly state that suicide will be the solution to their dilemma. This is probably the most problematic element of the play for Christian readers/ viewers and suggests that while the young people are honest and earnest about their love, and respectful of marriage and sexual fidelity as we shall see, they are immature in their understanding of God’s wisdom, love, and ability to provide the solutions for their problems.

Friar Lawrence, as the voice of the church and Christian orthodoxy, vehemently warns Romeo against “doing damned hate upon thyself” (III.3.128). Meanwhile Juliet is considering her own alternatives and clearly including suicide among them, (III.5.255). As soon as she can meet with Lawrence, she tells him she will kill herself if he has no better solution (IV.5.55-68) and even as she privately prepares to put the Friar’s scheme into effect, she sets the suicide knife at hand as the back-up plan (IV. 3.24).

Romeo, of course, makes specific provision for his death (V.1.37-91) calling the lethal liquid that he will swallow a “cordial [stimulating drink] and not poison” (line 90). When he does drink the mixture, it is in the style of a toast, “Here’s to my love,” (V.3.119). Both lovers have treated suicide as brave and virtuous under their circumstances, ignoring or unable to grasp the warning of Friar Lawrence or the reality of God’s sovereignty.

A High View of Chastity

I’ve addressed the point in a previous post that Juliet has a high moral standard when it comes to sexuality, and that Romeo, if he did not have one before meeting Juliet (think about I.1.216-232) certainly does after meeting her. See “Romeo & Juliet: Sexual Propriety and Impropriety,” dated 4-24-12, and “Sexual Morality” dated 7-22-10. Notice how Romeo in II.2.1 pivots quickly away from Mercutio’s bawdy joking about Romeo’s attraction to Rosalind (by then a non-issue anyway) and into the stark contrast of the famous, innocent garden and balcony scene. The young man is, on the one hand, covertly peeping in at this girl late at night from her back yard, but his private fantasy goes like this: “Oh, that I were a glove upon that hand, That I might touch that cheek,” (II.2.25-26). Later, in one of his most sensitive utterances in the play, he describes the “vestal modesty” of her kisses (III.3.39-41). Even the couple’s very brief “wooing scene” is an exchange of word play on religious terminology—shrine, pilgrims, saints, prayer, purging of sins (I.5.104-121).

A High View of Marriage

It should naturally follow that high respect for chastity means high respect for marriage as well, and in Romeo & Juliet it does. Draw your own conclusions as you survey statements made by the lovers and by Friar Lawrence in the following lines: III.2. 133-155, II.3.64-65, II.6.36-37, III.5.217-220, IV.1.56-60, 89-90. Of course, these good marital intentions on the part of all three characters are flawed by the haste and secrecy in which the marriage is entered, and that may well be the central explanation for why the story ends so tragically. At the same time that we take into account the extraordinary circumstances of the feud between the two households that drives the risky choices that are made, we can take from the play the kind of lesson that all tragedies are supposed to convey. In this case it seems to be a caution against ignoring the “unchanging counsel of God” in decision making. Psalm 33:11 promises, “The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of His heart from generation to generation.” The corresponding warning is in Psalm 106:13, “They quickly forgot His works; they did not wait for His counsel.”

Taming of the Shrew: A Student Evaluates Peter Leithart’s Analysis

The last paper one of my senior students wrote as part of his independent study preparation for the English Literature Advanced Placement Test this year was an evaluation of The Taming of the Shrew chapter in Peter Leithart’s fine book Brightest Heaven of Invention.  (See my recommendation in the “Teacher’s Resources for Shakespeare“ blog entry dated 8-27-11.)  I’ve condensed Jordan’s paper as follows to give other students and teachers a brief example of a good college-entry level essay.

Peter Leithart’s Brightest Heaven of Invention includes an analysis of Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew in which he intertwines the script and the Bible for a Christian perspective.  For example, he used Proverbs 10:11, “The mouth of the righteous is a fountain of life, but the mouth of the wicked conceals violence” to show that words have power to create (as in God speaking to create the world) and to destroy.  In the case of Petruchio, he says, words are used to create a new Katherine.  He also points out physical correction leading to wisdom (Proverbs 29:15) and relates that to the physical element of Petruchio’s taming of Katherine.  It is important to remember, though, that the script portrays their courting not as a physical wrestling match as much as a verbal one.  When Kate throws a literal punch, Petruchio sets a new precedent in their relationship going forward by not striking back but by threatening verbally.  Leithart aptly observes, “Their conflict is not about physical strength; it is a conflict about whose word will gain supremacy.”

Although Leithart is clearly well versed in working Shakespeare and the Bible together, he sometimes tries to prove too much and in one case is totally wrong, claiming that Petruchio and Katherine’s relationship is the only one in the play that doesn’t involve disguises and deceptions.  From the beginning of their relationship both characters wear figurative masks.  Petruchio’s is his initial “love” for Katherine which starts as nothing more than concern to marry rich even if “she has not a tooth in her head.”  This mask dissolves, however, as the two actually do fall in love.  Katherine’s mask is simply her shrewishness.  Even if she did have a predisposition to be shrewish, her wrath is actually brought about by jealousy for her sister.  In retaliation for being pigeon-holed as a lost cause and starved for love, she puts on her full shrewishness to deny her sister what would make her happy:  marriage.

Leithart stretches his major idea too far asserting that Petruchio’s taming of Katherine is much like Christ’s taming of His bride, the church.  His biblical examples do not help the analogy either, for example citing Christ correcting His bride in Revelation chapters 2 and 3.

Moral Choices, Not “Inauspicious Stars,” in Romeo & Juliet (with a conjecture on Romeo’s tragic flaw)

Shakespeare’s tragedy Romeo and Juliet has acquired a reputation for putting forth a fatalistic world view, as if these young lovers’ lives (and possibly everyone’s) are dictated more by astrology than by the consequences of human choices.  But this reputation is ill-deserved and comes from too much shallow reading of the play.

Yes, line 6 of the opening Prologue calls the lead characters “star-crossed lovers,” and Romeo, upon hearing of Juliet’s supposed death, defiantly cries, “Then I defy you, stars!”  In his last speech before his suicide Romeo says he is about to “shake the yoke of inauspicious stars” (Act V, Scene 3, line 111, or V.3.111, in the Folger Shakespeare Library edition). 

Very early in the play, before crashing the Capulet’s masquerade party where he will meet Juliet, he expresses fears that:
“Some consequence yet hanging in the stars
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night’s revels…”  (I.4.114-116).

After he has rashly killed Tybalt in the play’s pivotal scene, Romeo laments that he is “Fortune’s fool” (III.1.142) rather than expressing any remorse for a tragic moral choice.  In the final scene he professes himself to be “writ… in sour misfortune’s book” (V.3.82).

Isn’t that enough to constitute a theme of the play?  Not if we look closer.  Notice that every one of these references—other than the line from the Prologue—is in the words of one character:  Romeo.  Other characters refer to “heaven” or “the heavens” (clearly a metonymy for God) as having power to influence the action.  See Friar Lawrence in IV.5.100-101 and Prince Escalus in V.3.302-303.  Juliet uses “the clouds” very similarly (III.5.208).  But these are references to a superintending deity exercising moral judgment, not the impersonal zodiac.

Moral Choices

The play is driven at every turn by the free moral choices of its major characters.    Inordinate haste in matters of love and marriage, especially matters hidden from both sets of parents, is a moral issue that the characters are aware of yet hurry ahead regardless.  Juliet in the famous balcony scene pushes the romance forward precipitously despite confessing “no joy” at a contract that is “too rash, too unadvised, too sudden” (II.2.124-127).  Friar Lawrence soon seconds her concern, urging Romeo, “Wisely and slow, they stumble that run fast,” (II.3.101) yet the young lovers hasten ahead with his assistance.  Lawrence even foresees that “These violent delights have violent ends” (II.6.9).

Morally irresponsible decisions by the characters themselves create virtually every development leading to the final tragedy.  Romeo’s fatal vengeance on Tybalt, (III.1.88-91) which he admits is abandoning mercy in favor of “fire-eyed fury” (III.1.128-129) is provoked by Tybalt himself, but still not excusable on biblical grounds (“Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord,” Rom. 12:19) and Prince Escalus does not totally excuse it (III.1.196-197).  [It is worth noting, however, that Escalus reduces to banishment his previously-threatened penalty of death even as he moralizes that “Mercy but murders, pardoning those who kill” (III.1.207).  He will later regret his leniency (V.3.304-305) and blame that moral fault in himself for additional deaths—those of his own kinsmen.]

In the final graveyard scene Romeo kills Paris unnecessarily and seems to blame the victim for the sinful act, even acknowledging that his killing of Tybalt was similarly sinful.  “Put not another sin on my head by urging me to fury” (V.3.62-63).

We should not let Friar Lawrence himself escape our moral scrutiny.  He does marry a 13-year-old girl to the young son of her household’s mortal enemy without telling either family, and then puts the young bride through a “desperate” exploit (IV.1.70), which goes fatally wrong after all, in an effort to keep the matter hidden.  Even more inexcusably in the graveyard scene, he leaves the desperate Juliet to her suicide in the tomb (after V.3.165) because “a noise did scare me from the tomb” (V.3.271).  He will admit that his action was blameworthy (V.3.234-236) and express his willingness to die for this guilt (V.3.275-278) but Escalus immediately (and leniently!) excuses him as a “holy man.”

The only crucial plot development that was nobody’s fault is the miscarried message from Friar Lawrence to notify Romeo of the pseudo-death stratagem involving Juliet, which Lawrence will only call “Unhappy fortune” (V.2.17) and an “accident” (V.2.27 and V.3.260) rather than blaming it on the stars.

We’ve examined moral choices of Romeo, Friar Lawrence, and Escalus, and we could do the same with other important characters including Juliet.  But we can probably afford to excuse her for being 13, and even without her the evidence seems as overwhelming as it is generally overlooked.  Romeo & Juliet is not a play about fatalistic celestial interference in innocent lives, but a straightforward cautionary tragedy with the standard Aristotelian features of a tragic hero and his tragic flaw which brings about his tragic fall.  (See my 7-26-10 post titled “Tragic Heroes”.)  Too often Romeo is easily dismissed as an exception to Aristotle’s rule, but here is the conjecture on his tragic flaw promised in the title.  Isn’t Romeo, young as he is, fatally flawed with moral denial—that is—a refusal to acknowledge his own responsibility for his woes and a “default reaction” of blaming, instead, the stars (fate) and even the victims of his fury (Tybalt and Paris)?

James 1:13-16 warns us not to be deceived into thinking that our sins result from forces outside ourselves (even God, specifically) that impel us to sin.  It is temptations and lusts within ourselves, not acknowledged and resisted in a godly way, that lead to sin and “bring forth death.”  If we refuse to take responsibility for our own sins, we are calling God a liar, says the apostle in First John 1:8-10, a text that Romeo desperately needed to understand and obey.  

Well, there’s the big ending for now.  But I have at least one more post that I want to get into words before long dealing with another serious moral issue of the play.  Suicide.  It’s not just the bleak outcome of the play, it’s a recurring theme throughout, and it deserves a Bible-based exploration one of these days.

As You Like It

As You Like It, a romantic comedy with a title that seems to have no plot-related meaning but simply promises to be an audience-pleaser, has kept that promise since its debut in 1599. Its story merges several comic devices that Shakespeare knew to be popular with his theatre-goers including a female character masquerading as a man, multiple couples wooing and wedding, bitter sibling rivalries resolved, and a court jester to compound the humor at every turn.

Few of Shakespeare’s plays rely as much on direct and indirect biblical references. The allusions to the Garden of Eden in particular are so numerous that they become a major theme of the story.

The plot centers on two pairs of brothers, both consisting of an evil brother casting a good brother out of his rightful place. Both outcasts resort to the Forest of Arden, an unexpectedly Edenic place where their banishments turn out to be blessings. Duke Senior, legitimate ruler of the realm, is overthrown by younger brother Frederick and banished to the forest along with his top advisors. Meanwhile Oliver, a wealthy young gentleman, plots against the life of his youngest brother Orlando, forcing him to escape into the same forest.

None of this sounds romantic, but there’s more. The evil Duke Frederick has a daughter Celia who is inseparable from her beloved cousin Rosalind, daughter of the rightful Duke. Rosalind is soon banished also, but Celia determines to escape with her cousin into exile and persuades Touchstone the jester to go along. Still no romance? Well, Rosalind and Orlando have laid longing eyes upon each other before their escapes to Arden, and that’s enough to set in motion not just one, but four love matches. 

The “disguised female” feature results from Rosalind’s decision to dress as a man for safety in the forest. When she finds out Orlando is also in Arden, she takes (unfair?) advantage by role-playing as an advisor to the lovelorn without Orlando realizing he is dealing with the woman of his dreams. 

Biblical references and themes 

“Adam” is the fourth word of the play, and the recurring theme of Creation and Garden of Eden will follow. This Adam is the faithful, aged servant of the late Sir Rowland de Boys who will shortly abandon Sir Rowland’s evil heir Oliver, give his life’s savings to young Orlando, and attend him into the forest.

When we first see Arden, Duke Senior is addressing his fellow-exiles and we find that the forest is not the wild and threatening place the men had feared. In Act II, Scene 1, lines 1-11 (II.1.1-11 in the Folger Shakespeare Library edition) he rejoices that they are safer there where they “feel not the penalty of Adam” than they were in “the envious court.” Jacques laments the need of killing deer for food (II.1.21-25) as inconsistent with Arden’s unsullied environment.

Orlando assumes the forest to be “uncouth” upon first venturing into it (II.6.6) but is soon happy to find it full of gentleness (II.7.111-114). The cold winds that might arise (II.5.6-8) are declared to be not a curse, but a blessing compared with human sinfulness (II.7.182-184). Even the diabolical creature who invaded Eden to ruin mankind also has a sinister equivalent in Arden (the serpent in IV.3.114). Besides these reflections of the Garden of Eden, Rosalind’s casual remark that the earth is “almost 6000 years old” (IV.1.100) assumes the traditionally estimated date of the Genesis creation, 4000 B.C.

Direct references to Bible accounts in As You Like It include the prodigal son (I.1.37 and 74), God’s feeding of the ravens in Luke 12:24 and the sparrows in Matthew 10:29 (II.3.44-45), the woman as the “weaker vessel” from I Peter 3:7 (II.4.6), a tree yielding “bad fruit” from Matthew 7:18 (III.2.117), and animals coming in pairs to the ark from Gen. 7:8-9 (V.4.36-37).

Less direct allusions include the Judas kiss (III.4.8-9) and Ruth’s gleaning of harvest leftovers (III.5.106-111). Even the wicked usurper Duke Frederick seems to know Jesus’ lost coin parable from Luke 15:8 in his “seek him with candle” command (III.1.6). That parable leads directly into the better-known prodigal son story which Shakespeare had used more obviously in Act I.

In very general terms an orthodox God-centered worldview is further reflected in expressions like “sermons in stone” (II.1.17), “Is he of God’s making?” (III.2.209-214), “thank heaven fasting” (III.5.62-63), and the disclaimer that Rosalind’s “magic” is “not damnable” (V.2.63-65).

Respect for biblical marriage is upheld throughout the play despite the jester’s inclination to lower that standard with a questionable wedding. He is reprimanded by Jacques and persuaded to get properly married (III.3.83-105). Even the lowly shepherd Silvius professes a love for Phoebe that is “So holy and so perfect…” (III.5.106). All four couples, socially diverse though they are, share a respectable quadruple wedding at play’s end after chaste courtships.

Shakespeare oddly brings a representation of a Roman deity onstage to solemnize the ceremony (V.4.190-191), but the biblical tone is restored immediately as the closing scene is interrupted by miraculous news. Duke Frederick, upon entering the Forest of Arden with evil intent, has met an “old religious man,” been “converted from the world,” and surrendered his usurped crown (V.4.159-168). Not coincidentally Oliver, the play’s other villain, had earlier undergone a conversion soon after entering this beneficent forest. Jacques now declares he will go find Frederick and learn from this “convertite” (V.4.190-191).

So the story’s climax features the launching of four marriages, repentance of the villains, their reconciliation with their brothers, and a final picture of religious devotion with Eden restored.  

Similarities to other Shakespeare plays

Kings/Dukes usurped by younger brothers: As You Like It, The Tempest, Hamlet. (The princes in Much Ado About Nothing almost fit the category, as Claudio has apparently put down a rebellion led by Don John just before the action of the play begins.)  

Weddings of multiple couples performed or impending: As You Like It, Midsummer Night’s Dream, Twelfth Night, Much Ado About Nothing, The Taming of the Shrew, The Merchant of Venice. 

Women disguised as men: As You Like It, Twelfth Night, Two Gentlemen of Verona. [Mind-bending bonus: The As You Like It version of the gender disguise adds an extra twist when Rosalind masquerading as the male Ganymede proposes to role-play a woman—herself! Remember, female stage roles in Shakespeare’s time were played by boys dressed as women. So the first audiences of As You Like It were treated to a male playing a female disguised as a male role-playing a female!]

2012 Student Shakespeare Seminar

Get ready to go!

• World-class performances of Romeo & Juliet and As You Like It! 
• Backstage tours of all three theaters!
• Seminar notebook and Bible-based teaching & discussion   
• Completion Certificate if you want transcript credit 
• And not to forget the 2012 S4B T-shirt!

It's coming August 23-24.  Click here for more info!

Romeo & Juliet: Sexual Propriety and Impropriety

In an earlier post I generalized that Shakespeare typically shows his upper class characters adhering to much higher standards of sexual behavior than the “servant class” does. In Romeo and Juliet, this difference is not as much a social class distinction as it is a marker of sincere love contrasted with crude shallowness.

Romeo’s companions (with the possible exception of Benvolio) engage in the equivalent of boys’ locker room humor, as do the young men of the opposing house of Capulet. In the dramatic structure of the play this creates a shady, worldly backdrop that in turn makes the idealized love of Romeo and Juliet shine all the brighter.

The play can be directed in a style that moderates this contrast by deemphasizing the immature male joking (much of which can be lost in the “translation” to a modern audience anyway). The 2012 production on the Ashland stage, however, sometimes underlines the coarse humor through inflection and gesture. It will be helpful for viewers to understand Shakespeare’s purpose in these scenes in order to appreciate the innocence and comparative maturity of the famous young couple’s romance.

See Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s own description of the age-appropriateness of their 2012 Romeo & Juliet at www.osfashland.org/education/teachers/recommendations.aspx#Play1. On the same web page you will find descriptions of their other plays also, including As You Like It.)