The Conflict In Romeo And Juliet Essay Example

Conflicts between different groups can go out of hand, to the point where it can even lead to death. In “Romeo and Juliet” by William Shakespeare, two houses Capulet and Montague are in Verona, when Romeo and Juliet from opposite houses fall in love and later take their own lives. One of the Capulets, Juliet, has many conflicts revolving around her. Conflict is presented through Juliet’s internal conflict when she realises that Romeo is a Montague, this leads to another conflict when Juliet and her father argue about whom to marry. After all this, Romeo and Juliet both take their own lives, and this results in the biggest conflict of all coming to an end.

When Juliet realises that Romeo is a Montague, she is forced to break her morals to marry Romeo. During the ball of the Capulets, Romeo sees Juliet, and they instantly fall in love with each other. When Juliet must leave to talk with her mother, the nurse tells her that he is “Romeo, and a Montague, the only son of [her] great enemy.”(A1/S5/L143). Juliet is surprised and realises that “[Her] only love [was] sprung from [her] only hate.” (A1/S5/L145) This juxtaposition shows the extent to which the two houses are apart. This also shows that Juliet has never loved before and the only love she has ever known is from her biggest hate. 

After Romeo and Juliet get married secretly in Act 2, Scene 5, Romeo leaves for his exile, and they say their goodbyes to each other. Then, Lady Capulet comes in and tells her that she is going to marry Count Paris not knowing that she is already married, just after, Capulet comes. When he finds out that Juliet does not wish to marry Paris, he calls her a “disobedient wretch” (A3/S5/L166) and threatens her by shouting that she can go “hang! Beg! Starve! [And] die in the streets!” (A3/S5/L203). These quotes show the degree to which Capulet wants Juliet to marry Paris, and also shows how reckless Capulet can be, even to his daughter.

Due to all this arguing, Juliet decides she can not stand this anymore and wants to take her own life. She tells Friar Laurence the cleric, but he suggests to her to drink a sleeping potion. Later, when she is alone in her room, she takes the poison and falls asleep. The next day, everyone is shocked to find Juliet dead, meanwhile, Friar Laurence sent a letter to Romeo saying that Juliet is alive, but unfortunately, Romeo did not see it. Then Balthazar who is Romeo’s servant and also does not know that Juliet is alive tells Romeo that Juliet is ‘dead’. Romeo shouts out, “I defy you, stars!” (A5/S1/L24) this refers to ‘fate versus free will’ and means that Romeo is going to refuse to follow his fate.

In the play, the conflicts are portrayed through Juliet’s internal conflict of her loving someone in the opposite house of hers and the conflict between Juliet and her father. These result in the conflict of fate versus free will and leads to Romeo and Juliet taking their own lives, therefore ending the biggest conflict of the Capulets versus the Montagues. Conflict is important to the story because it creates suspense and apprehension which makes the reader more interested, but for ‘Romeo and Juliet’ the conflict is to show the hatred between the Capulets and the Montagues, this is important because this can show how harsh humans can be, therefore telling us to not hate but to be kind to one another.