Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Where does Mercutio say that people falling in love are fools in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet?

After the Capulet party, when Romeo escapes his friends and jumps the wall into Juliet's garden, Mercutio calls to him, saying, "Romeo! Humors! Madman! Passion! Lover!" (2.1.9).  In saying this, Mercutio implies that a lover is a madman, or someone who lacks sense, like a fool.  Such a lover is motivated by his humors (the four bodily fluids that ancient physicians believed directly influence our temperament and health) and his passion rather than his intellect or ability to reason or use sound judgment; this makes him a fool.


Mercutio later says that, for Romeo, compared to his love, Rosaline, Petrarch's "Laura [...] was a kitchen wench [...], Dido a dowdy, Cleopatra a gypsy, Helen and Hero hildings and harlots, Thisbe a gray eye or so, but not to the purpose" (2.4.41-45).  He implies, then, that each lover believes his love to be the most beautiful and wonderful; this makes each lover a fool, then, because they cannot all be right.  Mercutio lists some of the most exceptionally beautiful women in history and says that Romeo would (naturally) believe that his love is the best.  It seems as though there is something about loving that turns the lover into a fool who can no longer accurately discern reality. 

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