Mercutio’s mood changes rapidly, at the start of the scene he is lecturing Benvolio for being a hypocrite and more argumentative than himself as he talks about Benvolio being “as soon moved to be moody, and as soon moody to be moved”. This shows Benvolio isn’t as innocent or such a peace maker as he appeared to be before as his friend has just confronted him. By doing this, Shakespeare makes the audience question whether any of the characters are what they appear to be. He then changes mood and becomes all calm and joking about.
Benvolio sees the Capulets and says “By my head, here comes the Capulets” with panic in his tone as he knows something bad is about to happen and Mercutio’s reply is “By my heel, I care not”. Mercutio is clearly expressing his feelings towards the Capulets and showing he doesn’t care and at the same time, doing so in a relaxed manner. This also shows the close relationship between Mercutio and Benvolio as they can finish each others sentences and the opposite of personalities compliment each other.
From that point on it is then clear that Mercutio is looking for a fight and creating any excuse to have one. Shakespeare plays on words and uses puns, for example, Tybalt says to Mercutio “thou consort'st with Romeo”, simply meaning that Mercutio is a friend of Romeo. However, Mercutio purposely misunderstands this and says “Consort? What, dost thou make us minstrels?”. Although he knows what Tybalt really means and says it jokingly, he insists he is insulted and outraged at what he has just been called. Mercutio then takes it one step further and pulls out his sword “Here's my fiddlestick”, he does this in a rude manner which would be found as entertainment to the Elizabethan audience and would be still humorous today.
Romeo enters and the mood changes dramatically. Tension builds as nobody knows what is going to happen next as Romeo is acting strangely and tries to walk away and says calmly “therefore, farewell”. This outrages Tybalt more and he orders Romeo to “turn and draw”. Romeo insist he loves Tybalt and refuses to fight him and just want to settle the peace, “good Capulet- which is a name I love like my own name” by saying this, Romeo annoys Mercutio as he is letting down his family and by saying that he is forgetting the long time feud which means so much to both, the Montague’s and the Capulet’s. The audience knows the real reason to Romeo’s strange behaviour, as he has only just been married in secret, to Juliet Capulet, a treachery to his family. This leaves the audience tense as they want to know what will happen if the families found out, peace or death?
Mercutio and Tybalt begin to fight, much to the delight and entertainment of the Elizabethan audience. This is the climax of the scene as the atmosphere is very tense and somebody has to die as it is a fight to the death. “Gentle Mercutio, put thy rapier up” Romeo insist, but it is too late, Mercutio will not back down, so Romeo and Benvolio have to intervene and ‘beat down their weapons’. However, Tybalt manages to sneakily stab Mercutio under Romeo’s arm.
Although Mercutio has been stabbed and is dying, he still jokes around. He says things like “'tis not so deep as a well nor so wide as a church-door, but 'tis enough”, Shakespeare uses these metaphors to shows Mercutio is in pain and injured but trying not to let anybody realise the true fatality of his wound. He also keeps on repeating “a plague o’ both your houses” he says this several times in anger as he believes the two families arguing for such a long time needs to stop and if they are cursed they will stop. Nobody actually believes Mercutio is hurt as throughout the play, he is seen as a joker; therefore everyone believes he is just joking and exaggerating. It is only when Mercutio dies off stage that the other characters and audience realise the damage done.
During Romeo’s short soliloquy, he mentions “O sweet Juliet Thy beauty hath made me effeminate”, basically he is admitting he was love struck, and so busy thinking about his new wife he has become feminine and weak, where as before meeting her, he was masculine and a fighter with the other men. He soon hears Mercutio has died and suddenly becomes angry and aggressive, “fire-eyed fury be my conduct now” he wants revenge and his anger is controlling him.
Romeo’s anger posses him to hurl abuse at Tybalt. The audience is on edge at this point as they have never seen Romeo so angry and wonder how it will turn out. “Either thou or I, or both, must go with him”, the audience then knows Romeo is serious at it will be a fight to the death. Eventually Romeo kills Tybalt and is in such shock, he has to be told to run away or else “The Prince will doom thee certain death”. Before Romeo exits his last words are “Oh, I am fortune’s fool!” this is Shakespeare’s message of fate or free choice tying in to the play as the Elizabethans all strongly believed in fate amongst other superstitious things.
I believe Romeo and Juliet is still a very popular play today, as it was hundreds of years ago, as the themes and messages of love, hate, conflict, rivalry, fate and religion all apply today and the dramatic devices used by Shakespeare keep the audience hooked and interested.
