The Nature Of Love In William Shakespeare's Romeo And Juliet

Romeo and Juliet are famously called "the star-crossed lovers," having been established as thus at the play 's first audience address: "a pair of star-crossed lovers take their life." "Stars" refers to "fate" - an inescapable control, whereas "crossed" refers to an unfavorable outcome. This indicates that the iconic couple was doomed to fail from the very beginning. Their death, their tragedy -- it was all predetermined and manipulated outside of their control. Two outside forces that worked against them are the inevitability of fate and the forcefulness of love. The impending nature of fate is promised in the first act and fourth scene when Romeo claims that he 's had a dream that warned him not to go to the ball: "and we mean well in …show more content…
It is too rough, too rude, too boisterous, and it pricks like thorn." This forcefulness is yet another thing that acts against Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare writes love to be very powerful, rendering those if affects helpless to it. The suddenness of seeing Juliet and becoming so smitten with her is enough to uproot the formerly deep-rooted love Romeo held for Rosaline. This does not necessarily mean that Romeo 's former love was only deep in words and not in heart, but rather that love 's force became so profoundly heavy between Romeo and Juliet that Romeo 's love for Rosaline paled in comparison. This unbalancedness can be illustrated through Mercutio 's quote in the second act and first scene: "He jests at scars that never felt a wound." If Romeo 's love for Rosaline is the scar Mercutio calls it, then surely it can be agreed that the love between Romeo and Juliet can be the wound. The mistake Mercutio makes is one that is often made by readers as well: a scar is nothing to be scoffed at. Romeo loved Rosaline, but love 's force hit him harder with Juliet. This was not through fault of Romeo and his heart 's "decisions" or any supposed "shallowness", but through the fault of the nature of