There is a myriad of themes and enthralling characters in the play “Romeo and Juliet” written by William Shakespeare in the late 16th century. In my opinion, Mercutio, a kinsman of the Prince and the best friend of the young Petrarchan lover Romeo, is the most interesting as he is such a vivid and complex character. Mercutio brings colour, life, and humor to the play with his vulgar puns and jokes. He is very loquacious, erratic, always ready to guard his family and friend's honor and anti-romantic (just like the Nurse, he treats love only as a sexual attraction), which contrasts with peaceful, quiet and romantic Romeo, making Mercutio his antithesis. The audience sees his salience as he tries to save Romeo from melancholy and his courtly …show more content…
For example, in the act III, scene I, Mercutio changes the aura from hazardous and nervous to demented as he gets wounded by Tybalt and starts laughing from pre-death …show more content…
When Tybalt, from the house Capulet (which are the great enemies of house Montague, from which is Romeo) searches for Romeo to chastise him for coming to the Capulet's ball, first Mercutio stands more or less quiet, without getting into the centre of the fight, but when Romeo tries to prevent the quarrel by saying that he “have to love thee”, Mercutio's mercurial temper shows. He calls Romeo a “calm, dishonorable, vile submission” and goes to Tybalt himself, trying to protect friend's honour. Infuriated, Mercutio refers to Tybalt as the "Good King of Cats" because his demeanor and actions are very similar to cat’s: lithe, agile, predatory and territorial; he also refers to the Italian swear word “cazzo” (according to Wikipedia), which shows his vulgar temperament; and links Tybalt to Reynard (which is the main character in a literary cycle of allegorical Dutch, English, French and German fables. Those stories are largely concerned with Reynard, an anthropomorphic red fox and trickster figure, according to Wikipedia). When Tybalt leaves Mercutio a injury, which nobody thought serious about, despite Mercutio's “Ay, ay, a scratch, a scratch. Marry, 'tis enough.”. The fact that other characters think about his words as a joke, substantiates his joker reputation. He uses the word “scratch” like it is something irrelevant, but says that “’tis enough”, joking and emphasizing how delicate humans are. But the