Mercutio

Question 1

Nay, gentle Romeo, we must have you dance.

Answer 1

Mercutio is mocking Romeo and how he goes against the traditional stereotypes of men at the time which characters such as Tybalt and Mercutio perfectly adhered to

Question 2

You are a lover; borrow Cupid’s wings,
And soar with them above a common bound.

Answer 2

Romantic and almost ethereal/angelic imagery is used to present love. However, Mercutio could again be mocking Romeo, saying that he is dreaming, showing his more superficial and practical view of love. This juxtaposes the 2 characters. The reference to Cupid, who was the Roman God of love, as well as the suggestion to borrow his wings perhaps add to the whimsical and witty dimension of Mercutio’s character, additionally portraying him as imaginative and poetic. Mercutio perhaps suggests that Romeo should be the physical embodiment of love

Question 3

To sink in it, should you burden love

Answer 3

Mercutio is telling Romeo that if he is too upset, he will be a burden to his love, portraying him as experienced and skilled in matters of the heart

Question 4

If love be rough with you, be rough with love;
Prick love for pricking,

Answer 4

This phrase has a double meaning. On the one hand, it could be a sexual joke, with the word ‘prick’ meaning a fallice, showing Mercutio’s bawdiness. On the other hand, it could portray traditional gender roles at the time, with words such as ‘rough’ along with the plosive sounds, showing how women were meant to be submissive whilst men dominant. Mercutio acts a foil to Romeo, in terms of their ideas on both fate and love. Romeo focuses on the emotional and romantic aspects of love whilst Mercutio focuses on the physical and sexual aspects of love. His harsh and raw perception of love, emphasised by the plosive sounds, suggests he almost sees love as violent.

Question 5

I mean, sir, in delay
We waste our lights in vain, like lamps by day.

Answer 5

This shows Mercutio as proactive as he realises the longer that they linger, the higher the chance they have to get caught before even getting in. It could also have an alternative meaning as it could be he just wants to hurry so he can party and have fun

Question 6

Sometime she driveth o’er a soldier’s neck,

Answer 6

Perhaps Mercutio sees himself as a soldier, as he obviously knows how to use a sword. The dreams may be a personification of PTSD he has from all the fighting he has done on the streets. It also solidifies traditional gender stereotypes

Question 7

True, I talk of dreams,
Which are the children of an idle brain,

Answer 7

The fact that Mercutio believes dreams are made by ‘idle brain’, shows their percieved emptiness to him. This contrasts him from the vast majority who believed there was a large power within dreams. Mercutio emphasises the insignificance of dreams, suggesting that they are unformed and juvenile. Alternatively, dreams could also be seen as playful and therefore should not be taken seriously. By saying they are less substantial than the air and more unpredictable than the wind, he emphasises this.

Question 8

Beat love down

Answer 8

Mercutio advises Romeo to ‘beat love down’, meaning to confront love aggressively not passively, perhaps suggesting that love is a force to be reckoned with, not gentle and tender but something that can either be succumbed to or resisted, emphasised by the use of the strong verb ‘beat’. Hence, his view on love is shown to sharply contrast that of Romeo’s idealistic belief in the purity and transcendence of courtly love

Question 9

Romeo! Humours! Madman! Passion! Lover!

Answer 9

Mercutio is again mocking Romeo, calling him crazy for being so blindly in love

Question 10

Speak to my gossip Venus one fair word,
One nick-name for her purblind son and heir,

Answer 10

The allusion to the Roman God of beauty and Romeo as her heir again shows Mercutio mocking him

Question 11

I conjure thee by Rosaline’s bright eyes,
By her high forehead and her scarlet lip,
By her fine foot, straight leg and quivering thigh
And the demesnes that there adjacent lie,

Answer 11

Mercutio’s objectification of Rosaline is in stark contrast with Romeo’s heartfelt appeal, again showing how their ideas of love juxtapose, perhaps explaining why the former’s words fail to entice the latter. The fact that the bodily imagery gets more erotic highlights how Mercutio’s language is becoming increasingly indecent in his vain attempts to find Romeo

Question 12

The slip, sir, the slip

Answer 12

Mercutio matches Romeo’s previous pun, demonstrating their closeness and brotherhood at the fact they immediately understand each other

Question 13

A sail, a sail!

Answer 13

Mercutio could be mocking Nurse, saying that since she is quite big she is easily noticeable like a sail in the wind

Question 14

We should have none
shortly, for one would kill the other.

Answer 14

Foreshadowing, since hot-headed Mercutio gets killed by equally fiery-tempered Tybalt, who dies soon after by Romeo’s vengeful hand. Like Mercutio’s curse on their houses, he foreshadows the tragic events soon to come.

Question 15

By my heel, I care not.

Answer 15

Mercutio is shown to match Benvolio’s pun, again showing the closeness and brotherhood between the 2 characters

Question 16

No, ’tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church-door; but ’tis enough, ’twill serve: Ask for me to-morrow, and you shall find me a grave man.

Answer 16

The fact that even though Mercutio is dying, he still cracks a joke, shows that even to the end, he is the comic relief. He highlights the delicacy of life itself by suggesting that even though his wound is not too deep, nor too wide, it’s enough to kill him. ‘Grave man’ is a double entendre it could mean he will be a very serious mood due to his injury or actually dead. Mercutio’s choice of words is also ironic, since his personality is normally the exact opposite of the serious, sorrowful man.

Question 17

A plague o’ both your houses!
They have made worms’ meat of me

Answer 17

There was a widely held belief in the past, that to curse someone, one must say it three times. Traditionally, the first is in jest, the second in anger, and the third is for real. The fact that Mercutio says it thrice indicates the severity of his anger for the feud, and that, although he spent all of the play making jokes, his last words were not a jest; they were spoken with the utmost seriousness. This curse he laid upon the houses foreshadows the tragic end of the play, and references the fact that although the Montagues and Capulets were only wishing harm on the opposite side, their feud harmed them both equally. This could also be an allusion to Mercutio’s lack of faith, or loss of it at the end. He sees no life for himself “beyond the grave.” Mercutio describes his death in euphemistic terms as he does not directly say that Tybalt has murdered him, rather suggesting that he had made ‘worms meat’ of him

Question 18

O calm dishonourable vile submission!

Answer 18

The tricolon creates a lexicon of fragility which emphasises Romeo’s effeminate inability to fight whilst exaggerating Mercutio’s aggressive masculine behaviour