Which Shakespeare lover doesn't know the famous words:
"If love be rough with you, be rough with love.
Prick love for pricking, and beat love down."
These words are spoken when Romeo, Benvolio and Mercutio first enter the stage. With just a few words you know immediately that Mercutio is skeptical when it comes to love. This contradicts with the lovesick Romeo and levelheaded Benvolio, who don't doubt true love exists. Mercutio is a hit with the public, but dies relatively early in the play, why would Shakespeare kill such an important character? A diversity of reasons could be found for this, but first you have to know who Mercutio really was.
Mercutio first enters the stage together with Romeo and Benvolio, in act 1 scene 4 the talk about the party Romeo wants to go to, the reason for this is because of love. Mercutio here expresses his disapproval towards love in the famous Queen Mab speech. He compares love to a wish which originates from dreams, these dreams are visited by the queen of the fairies Mab. In this speech Mercutio shows he is quick-witted and headstrong. He also used a lot of puns, like when Romeo tells him he is talking about nothing.
…show more content…
These puns continue all through the play and even when he is dying.
The queen Mab speech could even be seen as foreshadowing, because he talks about love being just a dream and dreams are just for a few minutes. Those minutes lasted a little longer for Romeo and Juliet, but they still only had three days together. These days could be seen as an extended dream, which ended as soon as they got the love they wanted. Mercutio tells Romeo the love he wants is just an illusion and in the end that becomes