Examples Of Overreaction In Romeo And Juliet

The brilliant, author, actor, and mom, Amy Poehler once expressed, “It's never overreacting to ask for what you want and need.” (Amy Poehler) Overreactions are solidly based on the fact that one is very passionate and does not think things through because of it. People are blinded because of ignorance and they refuse to listen to what others have to say. In the classic play, Romeo and Juliet, star crossed lovers take their lives after a series of unfortunate events. William Shakespeare uses overreaction as a motif to develop the theme when people use passion instead of reason, disaster follows.
    Shakespeare starts the play with conflict, and consequences for this conflict. When Gregory and Sampson, Capulet servants, begin to annoy members

of the Montague family, it brings a lot of attention to the center of town. Tybalt, always ready to fight, tries to fight Benvolio, a friend and cousin to Romeo, even though Benvolio was not one of the original people quarrelling. The Prince finally comes out to  lay down the law. He threatens, “If ever you disturb our streets again/ Your lives shall pay the forfeit of the peace.” (1. 1. 91-91) The Prince just told both families that if they fight again, they will be put to death. Sure, the fighting is not necessary, but it does not give reason for death. This is used to tell them to stop fighting. To make this point, he overreacts, but when it comes to his own family, he may let things slide.
    Furthermore, not truly believing in something can cause disaster in the long run.

When Romeo goes to Friar Lawrence, Romeo’s mentor, he is not sure he should marry these two adolescents. He finally agrees because he thinks it will end the feuding between the two families. But, when he is actually going through with it, he begins to have second thoughts. Friar cries out, “So smile the heavens upon this holy act/ That after hours with sorrow chide us not!” ( 2. 6. 1-2) If he is truly worried that he will be punished for this later, he should have stopped right there. Instead, he married them. This overreaction leads to lying and death in scenes to

come.
Within a few hours, the first major disaster takes place. Romeo is walking the streets when he finds Mercutio, Romeo’s witty friend, and Tybalt about to fight. When putting his own life in danger, Mercutio is killed. Romeo refuses to let it go, which makes things worse for everyone, and it all started with four simple words, “This shall determine that” (3. 1. 129) this fight leads to a death, and Romeo’s banishment. In this case, overreaction is used to continue moving the plot of the story forward, which brings disaster.     
After Romeo sees his life flash before his eyes, he runs away to the Friar’s chamber. There, he finds out he will be banished from Verona to Mantua. In act 3, scene 3, Romeo offers to stab himself. Before he can follow through, the nurse takes away the dagger. This overreaction eventually will lead to disaster, because this is the first instance that he expresses his thought that suicide will fix his problem. No matter how hard Friar tries, he will not be able to get that out of Romeo's head before it is too late.
Shifting the tone, we learn that it's not only the children that are irrational, but so are the adults. When Juliet expresses that she does not want to marry Paris, her father is enraged. He does not fail to show this by saying, “Hang thee, young baggage! Disobedient wretch/ I tell thee what- get thee to church a’ Thursday/ Or never after look me in the face.” (3.5.160-163) He is mad because his plans do not match up with what Juliet wants. This marriage will be the ultimate reason for both death and lying in the play.
When Juliet says she will not marry Paris, Capulet decides the cant be a part of the family. After rudely making fun of Juliet, Capulet says, “Graze where you will, you shall not house with me” (3.5.188). Family is supposed to back each other up no matter what, but when things don't go Capulets way, he overreacts. He blows up on Juliet, and goes as far as disowning her. This leads everyone to make bad decisions, and disaster will follow.
Ultimately, Shakespeare uses death to elaborate on topics.

He continually uses suicide to show how the teens think. In this case, he shows how distrust can lead to suicidal thoughts. When Juliet feels the nurse, the person she has always gone to,  is going against her, she says, “If all else fail, myself have the power to die” (3.5.242) Juliet is overreacting about everything. There are multiple ways to solve this. One of which is just for her to leave and go to Mantua with Romeo. But sometimes it's better to overreact than run away from a problem. But then again, by committing suicide it's just escaping a situation

anyway.
Every person knows someone that everyone goes to when they have a problem. This would describe the Friar. He hears most of the overreactions provided by Romeo and Juliet. After Juliet is having problems with her father, she cries out to Friar, “Do thou but call my resolution wise/ And with this knife I’ll help it presently” (4.1.53-54). Juliet is overreacting about everything. She could easily get out of this without involving death. This overreaction leads Juliet to later say things like “bid me go into a new man-made ground/ And hide me with a dead man in his shroud” (4.1.83-85). These overreactions lead to him actually putting her in a tomb, which leads to her death because of misunderstanding.
After everyone thinks Juliet is dead, including Paris, the man she is suppose to marry, he shows the audience that he is a very dramatic, and didn't really care for juliet, but instead that he really just wanted to get married. Instead of saying he was sorry for the family and giving them his condolences, he says, “Beguil’d, divorced, wronged, spited, slain/ Most detestable death, by thee beguil’d/ By cruel, cruel thee quite overthrown/ O love! O life!- not life, but love in death” (4.5.55-58). This makes things worse for the family, because Capulet and Juliet got in a fight the day before about the guy that is just feeling sorry for himself right in front of them. Paris did not make things better for the situation, he only made things worse.
This last act is the definition of overreacting. Starting from the beginning when Romeo finds out that Juliet is dead. He does not knot that she is not really dead because the letter never got to him.  He decides his life is nothing without this girl he met four days ago. Again, the thought of just committing suicide comes back to his thoughts. He expresses this by saying, “let me have/ A dram of poison, such soon-speeding gear” (5.1.60-61). This poison would be the ultimate disaster of the whole play.
Shifting the focus, Shakespeare brings the overreactions back to fighting. When Paris thinks that Romeo is trying to do something to vandalize the Capulet tomb, he is ready to kill him and says, “And here is come to do some villainous shame/ To the dead bodies. I will apprehend him” (5.3.52-53). This was an overreaction that lead to the death of Paris. If he would have just called the guards, he wouldn't have lost his life. This shows that he is very irrational, and didn't think his consequences through before he encountered Romeo.
After Juliet wakes up, she finds her husband, and the man she is suppose to marry laying dead on the ground, she begins to freak out. She takes Romeo's dagger, says “This is thy sheath; there rust, and let me die” (5.3.170), and then kills herself. At this point, nothing can get worse. This is the disaster of the play.
Throughout the play, the events happening are just leading up to the death of the two teenagers. Fighting and suicidal thoughts lead to the death of these characters. Death of any kind is a disaster for everyone around. As the audience sees overreactions more, they can see that all of the overreactions lead to the death of multiple characters and no resolution to the original conflict. To step back and look at overreactions guides one in the right direction not to react that way again.