23rd May 2017

Fate essay



In William Shakespeare’s play, Romeo and Juliet, is a tragic play where a boy and girl from opposing enemy families fall in love. But fate has played a huge roll in this play. Fate is an idea that your future is already set, it is being controlled by a greater force or being. In this case, the greater force or being is GOD. Shakespeare tells us that when he spells He with a capital H. Which is meaning that He is God. In the first act of fate that I noticed, created a chain reaction that led to the death of the “Pair of star-crossed lovers”. In this essay, I will be stating what the religion was and how it affected their lives in the 15th century, how Romeo trusted in God to steer him in the right direction, what God wanted for the two families, and how God mislead Romeo and Juliet.

In the 15th century, most people had strong Christian beliefs, and were comfortable with the idea of fate dictating their lives. Shakespeare wrote this play based on his beliefs in his time. Romeo trusted in God fully to lead him in the right direction. We know this because Romeo says, “He that hath the steerage of my course, Direct my sail.” When Romeo says this, he is referring to fate, and that he is the Boat, and God is his captain, he accepts that God is in control of his life.

In this play it seems like God is trying lead Romeo and Juliet to their death. God might want this to happen so the Two families resolve their ancient quarrel for the greater good of Verona. They resolved their problem near the end of the play when the families offered to make golden statues of the other families child. An example of when God/fate has misled Romeo is when Friar Lawrence tried to send a letter to Romeo about his plan for Juliet and Romeo to escape. Due to a sickness in another town (when there is a sickness in a town they seal that town off) the person delivering the letter had to go a different route which made him take longer. That is why the letter could not reach him in time. This is related to fate because when there is a sickness in a town,(in Shakespeare’s time) it was usually brought on by God. This is one example of God misleading Romeo.

The prologue tells us a short summary of the play and refers to fate. For example, when the prologue says “star crossed lovers”, it is meaning that their relationship is doomed to fail and is referring to heaven as the stars. Heaven was thought to be up, in the stars in Shakespeare’s age. Which links back to fate.

Some other examples of fate are, when Mercutio was dying he said, “a plague on both your houses”. When he says this, he is cursing both Montague and Capulet. This was the beginning of the tragic deaths of Romeo and Juliet and some other characters. This is when the audience is reminded about the tragicness of the play.

Fate dictated the outcome of the play which led to the death of Romeo and Juliet. This play would have been based on Shakespeare’s beliefs. Which also gives us glimpse of what the beliefs where back in his his time. This shows us how Fate played its part in the play. God mislead Romeo and Juliet, caused deaths and more. But the two households broke their ancient grudge. In some people’s opinion, fate is not really understood in the world today, reading this play gives me a feeling of not knowing what will happen and makes me realise that i take life for advantage too much.



Join the conversation! 2 Comments

  1. This is progressing very well, Phoenix.

    You have organised your ideas well into separate paragraphs and each of them so far deals well with the topic. You’re showing both insight and originality.

    The areas to develop are:

    1) Your paragraph on the metaphor “He that hath steerage of my course” still needs a little more explanation of how this is a reference to fate – It’s not clear in your analysis that this means that Romeo is going to put his future in God’s hands.

    2) There are small fragments of lapses in your spelling and grammar. The grammar can be resolved by reading the work aloud – this is a great way of ‘hearing’ the mistakes in your own writing which you often don’t see when you read over your own work in your head (your brain tends to auto-correct).

    3) You’re also making good progress over-all, which means you’re allowing yourself time for finer editing in the future. That’s important as this will allow you to remove parts that are weaker and also develop the flow of your argument.

    Nice going!


  2. Reading: 6B
    Writing: 5P


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