In this scene Mercutio shows his spontaneity and creativity very vividly. The Queen Mab speech goes from being a speech with a fairytale quality to a speech with very violent images. ‘Her wagon-spokes made of long spiders’ legs’, shows this magical quality, while ‘And then dreams of cutting foreign throats,’ has the opposite affect and is very violent. The Queen Mab speech flows with each subject going step by step, we think this is very witty and clever and shows us the spontaneous nature of Mercutio.
When Mercutio calls to Romeo in this scene we see he has a very mocking tone in his voice.
Again he refers to classical references to love. He is mocking Romeo because Mercutio thinks he is in love with Roseline, when he is not. ‘I conjure thee by Roseline’s bright eyes’. We think this is very witty but we don’t approve as he being unfair to a friend and is taking the wrong view of love. We like him in this scene for his wit and clever use of words. He puns ‘normal’ sentences and makes them witty and humorous. Mercutio entertains us by being quite bawdy and rude and we think this is funny because it shows us Mercutio only has a side which thinks about sex and not the love and spirituality of being in a relationship ‘now will he sit under a medlar tree.’ We find this amusing but don’t approve as Mercutio is being graphic about sex and mocking his friend while doing so. When Romeo says at the end of Act 2 Scene 1 ‘He jests at scars, that never felt a wound.’ This tells us that Romeo has a deep and meaning nature about love, this is the total opposite to Mercutio.
In Act 2 Scene 4 Mercutio again mocks Romeo, he also criticises his view of love an example of this is ‘Why, that same pale hard – hearted wrench, that Roseline’, here he uses alliteration. By mocking Romeo he is mocking his spiritual view of love. He refers to love and violent images to mock ‘Alas, poor Romeo, he is already dead, stabbed with a white wrenches black eye’. He is talking about Roseline while mocking both her and Romeo. Here Mercutio become more original in what he says but unfortunately he still has the same view of love. Also in this scene Mercutio pokes fun at and critises Tybalt who is Juliet’s cousin for his affected manner. ‘The pock of such antic, lisping, affecting fantasticoes, these new tuners of accent.’ This shows us that Mercutio doesn’t like artificial behaviour. The language that Mercutio uses shows use that he has a very mocking nature and uses alliteration to do this. He also criticises Tybalt for his style of fencing he things that this is also fake ‘he fights as you sing prick-song keeps time, distance, and proportion.’ Mercutio thinks Tybalt fights as people sing it rehearsed like you would a song. The banter in this scene between Mercutio and Romeo show us the quick wit of Mercutio and yet again we seen the spontaneity he his so famous for. Mercutio and Romeo pick up on each others words and seem to turn them around and pun them into witty, clever sentences. We admire them both for their jesting view but Mercutio seems to have advantage and is able pun on words better than Romeo.
Soon in this scene Juliet’s nurse appears, he is very insulting towards her using very bawdy and lewd words to mock and insult. ‘Tis no less, I tell you; for the bawdy hand of the dial is now upon the prick of noon.’ He also sees her as a figure of fun and picks up on other people’s words to ridicule and insult her, ‘Good Peter, to hide her face; for her fan’s the faire. Although we approve of his comic words we don’t approve of his outrageous actions.
In the beginning of Act 3 Scene 1 Mercutio is being very argumentative, He is showing that he is spoiling for a fight by arguing with Benvolio ‘by my heel, I care not,’ this shows us the belligerent and aggressive side to Mercutio's nature. In response to this Benvolio says ‘Follow me dose, for I will speak to them, good e’en! A word with one of you.’ Meaning that he does not want a fight, he just wants to sort it out. I this scene Mercutio criticises Benvolio a lot ‘Come, come thou art as hot as a jack in thy mood as any in Italy; and as soon moved to be moody, and as soon moody to be moved.’ He is saying that Benvolio is just as quarrelsome as him once he has had a drink.
When Tybalt enters the scene Mercutio is still in a hot-tempered mood and starts to provoke Tybalt in to having a fight ‘Consort? What, dost thou make us minstrels!’ He does this by punning on what Tybalt says and turning it round so that Tybalt looks a fool. At this point in the scene we only approve of what Mercutio is doing because of his language and wit, but we don’t approve of the way he is proving Tybalt and is aggressive. Mercutio's language puns on what Tybalt says and insults him using his own words, ‘Here’s my fiddlestick, here’s that shall make you dance.’ When Romeo appears Tybalt straight away offers him the chance to fight but Romeo refuses because they are now related through marriage. Mercutio feels betrayed by Romeo and is disgusted that he will not fight him this tells us that Mercutio has a very honourable this is the first time in the play that Mercutio as shown us this side of his nature. We do admire him for this but we don’t approve of his fighting nature. When Mercutio is stabbed he knows that it is a fatal wound he reacts by joking about it ‘I am peppered,’ even on his death bed Mercutio can still pun and make humorous comments ‘They have made worms meat out of me,’ and show us his witty nature. In this final scene we are extremely impressed with the way Mercutio speak because he still comes across as the same witty, spontaneous person we see him as in the rest of the performance, he is still punning and showing his the witty nature he has portrayed throughout the rest of the play.
Having looked at all of the scenes that Mercutio appears in, we find that he is seen at his best in Act 3 Scene 1. This is the scene we find him at his wittiest, most humorous and also his most honourable. Even on his death bed his is able to mock and pun. Therefore we think this is his scene Mercutio is at his best in.