The REAL reason Romeo and Juliet died.
on Rosaline & the Bro Code
Rebecca Serle’s When You Were Mine was supposed to be, for me, a super low-effort, auto-pilot reading experience, the type of book I can turn my brain off and enjoy, then forget about until I latch on to the next new, shiny TikTok recommendation. Instead, it lit up my brain like a frickin’ airplane switchboard, and I realised a few things about the story of Romeo and Juliet.
The play is full of drama. Forbidden love, miscommunication, a generational feud… basically a 1300s telenovela. But there is one interesting factor that sets it apart from Shakesie’s other works, and that is that there aren’t any ‘real’ villains. No bastard sons strangling women (King Lear) or Machiavellian advisors plotting regicide (Othello). And yet, there are quite a few deaths. Six, in fact — the most prominent being the two titular lovers.
QUIZ TIME!
Who do you think killed Romeo and Juliet? Is it:
(a) Friar Lawrence, who marries them in secret and gave Juliet the potion
(b) Their parents/families, for stubbornly refusing to reconcile
(c) Lady Capulet, who insists Juliet get married ASAP to Paris
(d) Fate itself, Destroyer of Young Love and Master Architect of Murphy’s Law
Well, I say it’s (e) None of the above. IMO, it’s not one person responsible, but three.
Young and inflated with youthful hubris, it is Romeo, Mercutio, and Benvolio who embroils themselves in a series of hijinks that unfortunately snowballs into an unstoppable, deadly avalanche.
Together, the three boys form a sort of ‘bro clan’ that is every bit as ignorant and horny as tween boys of that age. And it all started when Romeo got his first rejection from a girl.
What?? Romeo was in love with a girl who isn’t Juliet?? YES, you best believe!
The story of R&J has cemented itself so firmly into the collective human psyche that it’d be a feat to count the great love stories it has inspired across time and borders. In fact, the romance goes so hard that it’s difficult — nay, impossible — to imagine that Romeo was ever in love with anyone else before he met Juliet.
But he was. Her name is Rosaline, and she is the unseen character who exposes Romeo & Co. for the complete prats they are.
Rosa-who?
Rosaline Capulet is kind of an enigma because we don’t know much about her. She’s only mentioned in the first few acts because Romeo won’t shut up about how depressed he is that she doesn’t love him back. To cheer him up, his best friend Mercutio gets the grand idea to crash the Capulet’s ball, just for shits and gigs. At the ball, Romeo claps eyes with the gorgeous Juliet and Rosaline is never mentioned again.
Oh, and if you’re wondering why Rosaline shares Juliet’s last name, it’s because Rosaline is Juliet’s cousin. Awkward.
Though Rosaline is sometimes credited as one of the triggers for the subsequent events that unfold, she never actually appears on stage. She is simply a dramatic device that gets the plot going; reduced to a mere function in one of history’s greatest literary works — which is totally unfair, because, in the words of Gretchen Weiners from Mean Girls:
JK. It’s not Juliet’s fault she’s forced to marry a posh himbo and needed to jump ship pronto. We’re not trying to attack Juliet here.
Quick disclaimer: Romeo and Juliet is my favourite play by Shakespeare of all time. I mean, that first-meet scene?? Unmatched. And if a guy kissed me and said: “Sin from my lips? O trespass sweetly urged! Give me my sin again”, I would go absolutely feral.
But as the saying goes, every rose has its thorns… the thorn in this case being Romeo and his dumbass friends, one of whom, on top of getting Romeo killed, also gets himself killed in the process, which is just peak buffoonery — I’ll come back to this. Let’s return to Rosaline for a second.
O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou a massive prick?
Here’s the tea: Rosaline doesn’t return Romeo’s affections mainly because she wants to remain chaste. As in, to not have sex.
Shock! Horror! I mean, god forbid a (presumed) 15-year-old girl desires to remain celibate for a bit longer. She may as well have donned a habit and banished herself to a monastery.
So, like any boy who can’t get any, what does Romeo do? He falls in love with the next pretty girl he sees. Naturally.
Sure, he went to the Capulet’s party intending to meet Rosaline, and gatecrashing wasn’t his idea in the first place. Still, he literally goes from loving one girl to another in a whopping 0.4 seconds. Considering how obsessed he was with Rosaline before, that’s just dickish behaviour — even for a tween boy running on nothing but hormones and vibes.
What’s more insane is that if you pay attention to the things Romeo says about Rosaline at the beginning, you’ll find it’s the same BS he spouts to (and about) Juliet later on.
For example, in Act 1 Scene 2, he describes Rosaline as “the all-seeing sun”. Then, in Act 2 Scene 2, he stands under Juliet’s balcony and says: “But soft! What light through yonder window breaks / It is the East and Juliet is the sun.”
I mean, it’s like he has Barney Stinson’s playbook hidden in the folds of his cape and was secretly referring to it while soliloquising or something. It also doesn’t help that the people around him are lowkey toxic as well.
*spotlight swings to two pimply teenage boys*
Suit up. Score chicks. Be awesome.
Bevolio is Lord Montague's nephew, i.e. Romeo's cousin. He is the (often unsuccessful) peacemaker throughout the play, but he does have some iffy moments.
Mercutio, on the other hand, is the Class Clown who serves as comic relief. He is Romeo’s best friend and unabashedly an asshole. Oh, and he also happens to be related to the Prince of Verona, which technically makes him a neutral party in the feud. However, because of his friendship with Romeo, Bro Code dictates that it is to House Montague his loyalties must lie.
Bro Code also demands that when your best friend is down bad for a girl, you are obliged to call her a “pale, hard-hearted wench” and blame her for “tormenting” him (2.2.4–5). Benvolio, also eager to make some big-brained contribution to the circlejerk, comments that Rosaline will look like a crow next to the other girls at the party (1.2.87). Ha-ha! Attacking a girl’s appearance because she rejected your friend. Top banter. Really.
All because Rosaline won’t have sex with Romeo. ROMEO DIES BECAUSE A GIRL DIDN’T WANT TO HAVE SEX WITH HIM. Let that sink in.
And remember when I said one of Romeo’s friends killed him? Yeah, I was referring to Mercutio.
Let me try to put things in perspective: Romeo is Ted Mosby, Mercutio is Barney Stinson, and Benvolio is Marshall Eriksen. Like Barney, Mercutio is selfish and knows the sway he has on his friends. He is constantly stirring the pot without thinking of the consequences, leaving others to clean up the mess in his wake.
Two examples:
He bigs up Romeo and urges him to go to the Capulet’s party despite fully comprehending the gravity of the families’ feud. One might even say he eggs Romeo on not because he cares for his best friend, but because he wanted a laugh and a funny anecdote to tell the chicks at the tavern — cheering up Romeo is just a pleasant side effect.
Mercutio antagonises Juliet’s grouchy cousin Tybalt, who is already pissed off with (a) the party-crashing and (b) having been told off by his uncle after trying to kick them out. A playfight then breaks out between Tybalt and Mercutio. Romeo, arriving at the scene late, misconstrues what is happening and tries to stop them. In the commotion, Tybalt stabs and kills Mercutio. (Mercutio then has the audacity to curse a plague on both houses, because of a fight he started, lol?) Romeo kills Tybalt in anger and revenge, which gets him promptly booted out of the city. This ultimately leads to Friar Lawrence plotting with Juliet to reunite her with Romeo by faking her death… and you know the rest.
It’s totally the boys’ faults.
There are many counter-arguments for what caused the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. Some blame their families’ ancient feud, others curse the poor fellow who failed to deliver Juliet’s message to Romeo informing him of this plan in time. The pedantic, as well as fans of the cosmological argument, might trace it all the way back to Fate, especially because it’s mentioned in the prologue, “star-cross’d lovers” and whatnot.
And of course, there are those who blame Rosaline for rejecting Romeo, because if she hadn’t, Mercutio and Benvolio wouldn’t have suggested crashing the party.
That is a really weird and inherently sexist opinion because… why are we blaming a girl for saying “no” and standing by it? Sis was just trying to live her life in peace and purity, let’s leave her alone, goddamn!
I wonder what she thinks of the utter shitshow that followed her rejection of Romeo. I bet she was sipping limoncello on her balcony, hair freshly washed, body moisturised, skincare done. Living her best life knowing she dodged a whiny, pimply, melodramatic bullet. That’s why I really like When You Were Mine (read my review). It’s a pretty great interpretation of her character and thought process.
Regardless, I think we can all learn from Rosaline, and that is to never give overly desperate “nice boys” the time of day, or bad things will happen. Like, really bad things. So there.
Read my previous rant on ‘Nice Guys’ 👉 How to Be a 'Nice Guy' in 3 Easy Steps — THE SORROWS OF YOUNG WERTHER
Or check out previous issues!
[Reviews & Recs] Ranking All 38 Books I Read In 2022
Bro Code also demands that when your best friend is down bad for a girl, you are obliged to call her a “pale, hard-hearted wench” and blame her for “tormenting” him (2.2.4–5).
Ngl, I freaking died. boy school 101