Hasty And Rash Decisions In Shakespeare's Romeo And Juliet

The play shows that hasty and rash decisions can have fatal and tragic consequences for some characters in ‘Romeo and Juliet”

Hasty and rash decisions can dramatically alter the life of anyone in positive and negative ways; poorly thinking an action through and acting only on emotion can lead to egregious consequences. William Shakespeare’s play “Romeo and Juliet’ shows us on an number of different occasions that hasty and rash decisions can have fatal and tragic consequences. Some instances when this is shown to be true is in the circumstance in which Tybalt is murdered by Romeo, Romeo and Romeo’s decision to commit suicide near the end of the play.

Romeos decision to murder Tybalt can be justified as a hasty and rash decision, Romeo

murdered Tybalt when he was in a state of rage and heartache as his best friend Merciuio had just been killed by Tybalt. Before his friends death Romeo was refusing to fight, therefore if Romeo had thought though his decision to murder Tybalt he might not have gone though with it as he would have been able to comprehend all of the possible outcomes, therefore he would not have been banished. Furthermore if Romeos banishment had not taken place we could be lead to believe that Romeo and Juliet’s tragic deaths might not have taken place. Therefore Romeos decision can be said to be a hasty and rash decision in which had a particularly tragic outcome.

Another instance of a hasty and rash decision that leads to tragic consequences exhibited in Shakespeare’s play ‘Romeo and Juliet’ is Romeo and Juliet’s decision to marry. When Romeo and Juliet decided to marry they had only known one and other for a couple of hours, therefore they do not begin to think about each other’s age, character or they family they might come from. Assuming that Romeo and Juliet had thought over their decision to marry they might have been able to apprehend the possible consequences of marrying their families rivals. If the star-crossed lovers had not married and taken the time to think over this particular incidence the tragic ending to Shakespeare’s play could have been avoided.