No Fear Shakespeare
Romeo and Juliet
Get this No Fear to go!
Act 2, Scene 4, Page 2
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BENVOLIO
The what?
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BENVOLIO
He knows what?
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MERCUTIO
The pox of such antic, lisping, affecting fantasmines, these new
tuners of accents! “By Jesu, a very good blade! A very
tall man! A very good whore!” Why, is not this a
lamentable thing, grandsire, that we should be thus afflicted with
these strange flies, these fashion-mongers, these
“pardon me’s,” who stand so much on
the new form, that they cannot sit at ease on the old bench? Oh,
their bones, their bones!
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MERCUTIO
I hate these crazy, affected guys who use foreign phrases and
newfangled expressions. I hate their strange manners and their weird
accents! I hate it when they say, “By Jesus, this is a
very good blade, a very brave man, a very good whore.”
Isn’t this a sad thing, my good man? Why should we put up
with these foreign buzzards, these fashionmongers, these guys who
say “pardon me,” these guys who care so much
about manners that they can’t kick back on a bench without
whining? “Oh, my aching bones!”
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Enter ROMEO
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ROMEO enters. | |
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BENVOLIO
Here comes Romeo, here comes Romeo.
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BENVOLIO
Here comes Romeo, here comes Romeo!
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MERCUTIO
Without his roe, like a dried herring. O flesh, flesh, how art
thou fishified! Now is he for the numbers that Petrarch flowed in.
Laura to his lady was but a kitchen-wench— marry, she
had a better love to berhyme her—Dido a dowdy, Cleopatra
a gypsy, Helen and Hero hildings and harlots, Thisbe a grey eye or
so, but not to the purpose.— Signior Romeo,
bonjour! There’s a French
salutation to your French slop. You gave us the counterfeit fairly
last night.
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MERCUTIO
He looks skinny, like a dried herring without its eggs, and he
hasn’t got his girl. O flesh, flesh, you’ve turned
pale and weak like a fish. Now he’s ready for Petrarch’s poetry. Compared to Romeo’s girl, Laura was a
kitchen slave. Surely she has a better love to make rhymes for her.
Dido was shabbily dressed. Cleopatra was a gypsy girl. Helen and
Hero were sluts and harlots. Thisbe might have had a blue eye or
two, but that doesn’t matter. Signor Romeo,
bonjour. There’s a French
greeting that matches your drooping French-style pants. You faked us
out pretty good last night.
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