Fate plays a huge role in the play Romeo & Juliet, and eventually leads to the death of the two protagonists. From the prologue, the reader learns that fate will be of great importance to the storyline. Throughout the play Romeo and Juliet were considered soul mates, which portrays them as being young, naïve, and reckless. Fate is a huge part of the play, and it influences some characters experiences for the better, but some for the worse as well. Fatalism shows up in scenes involving Romeo’s careless love, Romeo and Juliet’s rebelliousness, and finally, the Capulet’s party.
Shakespeare refers to the young love of Romeo and Juliet as being very careless. He refers to them as “star-crossed lovers” (Prologue.6). The prologue tells the reader that fate was against them and their love, mainly because of their parent’s disagreements. The literal translation of this quote is that since the stars were crossed, it means that they would never settle together. There were several unfortunate events that led up to the eventual death of Romeo and Juliet. Fate did not want them to be together, and in the end, fate got its way.
Romeo and Juliet knew that they were not supposed to be together, but as rebellious teenagers, this made them want each other even more. From the start, they had a feeling that the ongoing arguments between their families would eventually get the best of their relationship. Their love was referred to as being “death-marked” (Prologue.9), which means that they basically had no control over what happens, and never would. The well-known concept of fate ‘whatever happens, happens’ comes into play in this scene, because the anger of their families would be inevitable. Their parent’s disagreement complements to the yearning desire they have to fall in love.
The incident with the Capulet’s party was extremely dependent on fate. It seems like several characters went out of their way to pave a rocky, fate-filled road for Romeo and Juliet....