Mercutio is a relative of the Prince of Verona, so he is of high status, but he never really shows this. He has a very cocky, arrogant, and funny personality, and is always joking around even in serious times. Though this trait helps to lighten the mood, it also ends up being a negative trait, and his cocky attitude does anything but help him. Tybalt goes looking for Romeo by asking Mercutio if he knows where he is. Mercutio taunts him to fight him instead of Romeo. After Romeo comes and tries to stop the fighting, Mercutio ignores him and starts to fight Tybalt. Because of his arrogance and cockiness, Mercutio ends up stabbed. He still has time to make jokes about it though, when he yells “Ask for me tomorrow and you shall find me a grave man!” (3.1.83). If Mercutio had not taunted Tybalt to fight, then he would not have been stabbed. Needless to say, Mercutio ends up dead from the stab wound. Because he dies, Romeo goes after Tybalt and kills him. This in turn gets Romeo banished from Verona. Since Romeo is now banished, Juliet takes the potion to make her seem dead, so that she can go to Romeo. When Romeo gets the news that Juliet died, he takes his own life, and Juliet in turn takes hers when she sees Romeo dead. Mercutio’s death not only affected himself, but everyone around him as well. Fate seems to be a very large role with Mercutio’s tragic fate. It seems like more than just coincidence that his death caused so much other suffering and loss. It may also be connected to when Mercutio cursed both the Capulet and Montague houses when he shouts, “A plague o’ both your houses!” (3.1.84). This could possibly mean that he himself fated everyone else to all of their outcomes.
By Mercutio’s dying, it twisted the whole story. It was the turning point. Once it happened, all the negative parts of the story started happening. The characters began to fall victim to fate. All the death, and sadness, and suffering of everybody were all brought on by a simple, cocky boy trying to have fun.
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