Feud In Romeo And Juliet

In reading The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, characters seem to pop off the page and into the readers’ minds. Romeo and Juliet are introduced, along with the long time feud between the Montagues and Capulets. The feud between the families is the core of the lovers’ fateful death. Throughout the play, the families continue to show their hostility and hate towards each other, proving to the reader that the family feud is a important role in the story.
From the very start of the story, the reader is introduced to the family feud. The story lays it’s scene in Verona and immediately goes to the family servants opposing and disrespecting each other. Setting the mood in a way the reader will later understand to be growing tension. During one of the early scenes, Mercutio and Benvolio attempt to make the heartbroken Romeo feel better by crashing the Capulet party. That tells the reader that the families are constantly in a fight. Later on in the story, the infamous Tybalt, kills Mercutio because he was a friend of Romeo’s. That symbolizes that the feud does not only affect the two families but rather everyone around.
This causes more than one problem. In their parents’ eyes this would be considered treason but it also means that the lovers want to see each other. As Juliet states in act two, scene two, line seventy,”if they see thee, they will murder thee!” For this reason the lovers continue to see each other in secret. They are forced to marry in secret for fear of their families. The lovers soon find out that if they wish to speak to each other they had to tell the Nurse and/or Friar Lawrence. Which later in the play causes serious and deadly problems. Even after the lovers marry it is still obvious to the reader that they will face more problems till they can be