In Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare extends the theme of fate by having his characters foreshadow the inevitable outcomes of the story. Throughout the play, numerous characters have lines that can resemble premonitions that (if not directly stated) foreshadows the tragedies to come and it is especially around the demise of Romeo and Juliet. When Mercutio shouts “a plague on both your houses” in (3.1.59) This scene is the first to give us and idea f what fate has in store, and is the beginning of the tragedy to come of Romeo and Juliet's deaths. Fate pre-determines the events and speeches in the play. Is it fate for that after the death of the two teenagers, the Capulets and the Montagues find peace with each other? Is it fate that Romeo kills himself when he does? Shakespeare does this to give you an idea of what's to come in almost a comical manner to think that it was previously stated in the play. For example, in (1.4.111-113), Romeo says "By some vile forfeit of untimely death. But He, that hath the steerage of my course, Direct my sail! On, lusty gentlemen." Here, Romeo is basically giving full control to whoever controls his destiny and can steer him wherever they want but what makes this really interesting, is that this is when Benvolio and Mercutio try to convince Romeo to visit the Capulet party which they succeed in doing. Since the Capulet Party is where these chain of events started it is interesting how this line may been Romeo's death sentence since he was giving full consent to what fate had in store for him, it was fate that brought Romeo to the party where he met Juliet. Shakespeare brings out the irony in fate with each prediction of each tragedy early on in the story.
Shakespeare uses the character Romeo to represent someone who is being tortured by fate. Throughout the play there have been several nods to the belief of fate, but they mostly invoke Romeo whether fate is in his favor or not. It can be seen that Rome...