Shakespeare’s Star Crossed Lovers

In Shakespeare’s play Romeo and Juliet, set in Verona, Italy, Juliet’s own happiness is put on hold due to her parents authority and the lack of control children had in the sixteenth century. John W. Draper’s excerpt “Shakespeare’s Star-Crossed Lovers” also supports my outlook on how Juliet’s life is being controlled by her parents. Juliet is a thirteen year old Capulet who’s family is in a lifelong feud with her love interest’s family, Romeo, a Montague.

In Act three, Scene five, Juliet is forced with a dilemma. Her parents have arranged for her to partake in the marriage of Country Paris. They told Juliet that she shall be wed on Thursday. “I will not marry yet; and when I do, I swear it shall be Romeo, whom you know I hate, rather than Paris” said Juliet to Lady Capulet (her mother). What her parents didn’t know was that she was secretly married to Romeo already. In her bedroom they argue about marriage. The Capulet’s don’t let her live her own life the way she wants. It’s like they are living through her or for her. Her opinion and happiness doesn’t seem to mean anything to her family. They are forcing her into a marriage with a man she has no affection towards whatsoever. She claims to love Romeo. Weather it’s real or not, we will never know, but if it’s what she wants and it will make her happy, I think they should back off of their daughter and let her live her life. If she makes a mistake it would be considered her mistake and misfortune. NOT her parents.

Draper explains how Juliet feels about her and Romeo’s fate of being together. “Nevertheless, over the play hangs a tragic fate....her ‘all-diving soul’ sees Romeo ‘As one dead in the