Why is Romeo a tragic hero, as seen in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet?

Aristotle has
given us the most commonly accepted definition of a tragic hero in
his book Poetics. Aristotle defines a tragic
hero as one who is of high social standing. In other
words, a tragic hero is not just a peasant or a common man because seeing a ruler or leader fall
is for more tragic than just the common man. A tragic hero must also be a generally noble, or
"good and decent" person ("Aristotle & the
Elements of "). The tragic hero won't also be a villain; instead, he is someone the reader
or audience will feel did not deserve his fate because of his general goodness. However, the
tragic hero must also have what is considered to be a "fatal
flaw" ("Aristotle"). In other words, while the tragic hero is a
good person, he is not a perfect person. He has some character flaw
or "moral blindness" or makes an "error" that leads to his
downfall ("Aristotle"). So in order to see howfits the definition of a
tragic hero, all you have to do is consider those three things. As we are limited in space,
below are a couple of ideas to help get you
started.

Romeo certainly is a character with
high social standing. We know he has high social standing because
his father is a Lord, which is a noble title. In fact, Shakespeare makes a point in his
openingof describing the two feuding families as being "[t]wo households, both alike in
dignity," and the word dignity can be translated as "rank"
or "station" (Prologue.1; Random House Dictionary"). While a Lord, or the only
son of a Lord who will inherit the title, is not the highest social position, like a prince or
king, a Lord is certainly a leader of society. Therefore, Romeo's
standing as the only son of a Lord certainly does give him a high enough social position to fit
the definition of a tragic hero.

The second and most important reason why
Romeo fits the definition of a tragic hero is because he has
a fatal flaw. His fatal flaw is easily
seen as being that he allows himself to be governed by his rash, passionate
emotions rather than by his rational mind. We first learn about how he allows
himself to be guided by rash, passionate emotions when we see his reaction to having been
rejected by Rosaline in the very first scene. He's seen staying out all night long and crying
each morning. In fact, his father is so worried about his behavior that he fears Romeo may harm
himself if no one councils him.tries, but Romeo's only reaction to Benvolio's plea that he
forget about Rosaline is, "O, teach me how I should forget to think!" (I.i.228). It's
this same emotionalism and lack of rationalism that leads him to
make other rash decisions, such as allowing himself to be persuaded to crash the Capulet ball,
even though he knew through a dream he considered to be prophetic that the "night's
revels" would cost him an "untimely death" (I.iv.116-18). Had he not allowed
himself to be persuaded into crashing the ball, he never would have angered , and his life never
would have been put in jeopardy. His second emotionally driven, rash decision was avenging
himself on Tybalt, even though rationally he knew that Tybalt would have been justly killed by
the law. This rash decision led to his banishment, as well as to his own death and 's as
well.