Victims Of Fate In Shakespeare's Romeo And Juliet

People of the Italian Renaissance placed a great importance on the stars, and believed that the different alignments controlled their fate. Romeo and Juliet had to have been victims of fate because stars controlled them. Shakespeare uses careful word choice to directly and indirectly reveal that his characters believe this. On the way to Capulet’s party, Romeo and his friends are talking. Romeo suddenly says, “My mind misgives / Some consequence yet hanging in the stars” (1.4.106-7), and continues to announce his foreboding feelings that the outcome of that night would not be in his favor. Somehow, Romeo senses that the stars are not aligned in his favor and that continuing to the party would result in an untimely death. Nonetheless, he continues on and is correct in his misgivings, for at the party he meets Juliet. This single meeting changes both of the protagonists’ lives and is enough to propel them into a short couple days of love before their fated deaths. Romeo realized he could not change his fate, but that does not stop him from trying to deny it. …show more content…
The stars controlled their fate. Don Cameron Allen alludes to this in The Star-Crossed Renaissance, saying a dramatist can use fate to add depth to a renaissance plot, “assuming that stars dominate the flesh and perhaps the spirit of man” (qtd. in Waters). The stars were believed, through the omnipotence of their God, to have complete control over earthly interactions, both physically and spiritually. Romeo and Juliet had no control over fates fall in love as orchestrated by the stars. However, they are enemies through fortune, and while this affects the circumstances of their death, the could not have escaped their ultimate demises. Romeo realizes this and perhaps this is why, even after sensing some ill alignment of the stars, he continues on to Capulet’s party. Later, he tries his best to defy the power of the celestial