Queen Mab in Romeo and Juliet
Queen Mab in Romeo and JulietQueens and Dreams, Real and Ideal
"A dream is a wish your heart makes," according to Cinderella. Are dreams and fairytales an idealistic notion, or are they actually conceivable? In the play, Romeo and Juliet, Romeo's best companion, Mercutio makes a speech reflecting upon the essence of dreams and fantasy. Basically, it provides a brief comic relief through its mocking tone towards Romeo's latest infatuation. Romeo is obsessed with Rosaline who barely knows of his existence. Mercutio gibes Romeo through his famous monologue, which provides explicit imagery. Romeo remarks that he had a dream and Mercutio adds that he also had a dream. In Mercutio's description of his dream the readers grasps a distinct image of Queen Mab, a fairylike figure who exploits and changes the dreams of people to those of mischief and materialism. Mercutio's perception of Queen, the true nature of his character and the fact that dreams is the product of "routine thoughts of the day" are exposed and represented through this one monologue.
1.Mercutio presents the image of Queen Mab very clearly, and his perception of her is strange and interesting. 2.Touted "the fairies mid-wife", Queen Mab possesses a name which is already ironic due to its wording and content. 3. A "fairy" typifies fantasy as a whole, lovely and untouched, innocent and beautiful. 4. A midwife brings to mind blood, life and death. 5. A fairy is a delicate figure, a midwife, an old hag. 6. The description of Queen Mab is also very mysterious and in a way surreal due to the fact that she is so small and almost scary. 7. "Her traces, of the smallest spider web/Her collars, of the moonshine's wat'ry beams (Shakespeare 1.4.60-61). 8. Mercutio is describing her as ugly, using imagery that perceives her to not be attractive as she continues her mission to dilute the dreams of many people. 9. Her purpose is twisted, at times she gives people the dreams they want, "Through lovers brains', and then they dream of love" (Shakespeare 1.4.70). 10. But, when she is mad, she "blisters with plagues" (Shakespeare 1.4.74). 11. To add to it, Queen Mab can be a woman of grave viciousness. 12. The queen can burden great distress upon an innocent being, allowing us to see the more evil side of Queen Mab. 13. Prototypes for her evil projects may have, "Drums in his ear, at which he starts and wakes/And thus being frighted, swears a prayer or two/And sleeps again" (Shakespeare 1.4.85). 14. Nightmares are terrible, and to inflict nightmares upon someone when able to is a terrible thing. 15. But that is Queen Mab, she is a stone-sized Queen of Fairyland, or is she the Queen of Unfair dreaming? 16. Mercutio's perceives her to be a figure of great complexity, as she can provide wonderful dreaming one moment then...
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