Mercutio’s Queen Mab Monologue Explained: Shakespeare’s Lesson on Art
We’re three weeks into rehearsals at Folkteatern in Gothenburg.
I’m playing Mercutio in a new Swedish translation of Romeo & Juliet. The production is stripped down to seventy-five minutes, with masks and music woven through the text.
From day one, I was confronted with Mercutio’s famous Queen Mab speech.
A monologue about Queen Mab, the dream-maker. A fairy who gallops through people’s minds at night, awakening their lust for love, money, and even blood.
The Challenge of Performing Mercutio’s Queen Mab Speech
The speech begins in delicate detail:
“Her wagon-spokes made of long spinners’ legs,
The cover of the wings of grasshoppers,
The traces of the smallest spider’s web.”
In just a few lines, Shakespeare takes us into a microscopic world of detail—beautiful and mesmerizing.
And yet, as an actor, I felt hopeless reading those lines..
Because, on the surface, I couldn’t spot any reason for this speech to exist. It doesn’t advance the story. If it were cut, most people wouldn’t notice.
Mercutio even underlines that himself: “You’re right. I talk of nothing. Dreams, children of an idle brain. Fantasies with no fulfillment.”
So then, why is it there? And what am I supposed to do with it? Run around like a clown and throw beautiful words at the audience?
Why Shakespeare Makes Mercutio Talk About Dreams
For two weeks, I believed this was Shakespeare breaking the rules. Laughing at us.
Saying: I can write whatever I want—and you’ll still listen. Maybe because he is Shakespeare. Or because the beauty itself compels us, even when we don’t have a reason.
But somewhere along the way, I stopped searching for a function, and started listening. Not projecting meaning onto the room, but receiving what was already there.
Shakespeare’s Lesson: Art as Useless Beauty
And then it struck me: Shakespeare isn’t mocking us. He’s teaching us about art. Whispering:
Learn to see. Observe beauty in the smallest of details. Because those who demand function will remain blind. Life will never organize itself according to your rules, your logic, your gaze.
So when Mercutio says, “I talk of nothing,” he is speaking not only about dreams, but about art—and about love.
Because what is art, if not a dream? And what is love, if not a dream? And yet, I would argue that nothing of life would remain if we removed love and art.
What We Can Learn From Queen Mab Today
Maybe the point isn’t mockery at all. Maybe the point is to loosen our grip on “meaning,” and open our senses to the art that is constantly present all around us—in life, in a tram on the way to work, and in our dreams of love.
Discover, don’t invent.
Further Reflections
If you enjoyed this reflection on Shakespeare and the Queen Mab speech. I write regularly about art and creativity while working as an actor and filmmaker.
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