Hi Everyone,
You did a wonderful job with your posts on Oedipus Rex and Lysistrata (and some intrepid souls even posted on Spike Lee’s amazing film Chi-Raq). [I will be posting all grades in the gradebook link on course site.] Read through these posts (and my responses) again to get a fuller appreciation of the richness, genius, and wisdom of the playwrights Sophocles and Aristophanes (and Brooklyn filmmaker Spike Lee!!!).
Please watch my video lecture “Shakespeare and the Elizabethan Age,” which introduces our next author and work. Once you watch my video, I ask that you read Shakespeare’s greatest (in my opinion) Romantic Comedy: “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (1596). A mature play published after “Romeo and Juliet,” it’s a brilliant, fun, and zany exploration of true love, true hate, and the arbitrariness of human emotions. As Puck, the mischievous spirit, famously says: “What Fools These Mortals Be”! Indeed, especially when it comes to love!
This week’s homework is as follows:
Read: William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1596)
If you prefer, here is a modern text translation of the play. You can read the modern translation next to Shakespeare’s original text.
View: Film adaptation of the play (1968) by the Royal Shakespeare Company (on Amazon Prime). I recommend watching the film with the SUBTITLES to fully enjoy Shakespeare’s magnificent language.
For a wonderful theater-esque experience, I also recommend the NYC “Shakespeare in the Park” production (1982): (Midsummer Night’s Dream Part I, MND Part II) .
It’s somewhat long but wonderful and gives a sense of what it’s like to watch a live play in New York’s Outdoor Delacourte Theatre. This summer “Shakespeare in the Park” is producing Shakespeare’s “Merry Wives of Windsor” — more on this amazing event later.
Post a Response to a speech, scene, character, theme, or other dramatic element that you find particularly intriguing (due Monday, June 14). BE SURE YOU DON’T REPEAT WHAT A PREVIOUS STUDENT HAS WRITTEN. DON’T USE OUTSIDE SOURCES FOR THIS. I WANT TO HEAR WHAT YOU THINK. The modern text translation of the play may be helpful here.
REMINDER: To post a comment, simply click on “comments” (above), write comment, and “post”
Possible themes and topics to consider (be sure to provide quotes to support your assertions):
- The challenges (frustrations and humiliations) of love
- The role of dreams (and the forest) as representative of the human subconscious
- Puck’s love of mischievousness (the role of the troublemaker or “trickster” figure)
- Transformation (theatre/art as chance to view alternative possibilities) (human fickleness)
- Reason vs. unreason (desire) as opposing forces
- The natural world (of chaos and play) set against the urban world (of laws and obedience)
- Gender/power issues in the play (how is power over others played out?)
- Analysis of the play-within-the-play (what’s so funny about Bottom’s group of actors? What role does it play?)
- The moon as a symbol of “lunacy” – Night vs. Day as symbolism
- Inconstancy vs. constancy (who stays true to themselves? who changes affections regularly?)
- Illusion vs. reality (how does play help viewers distinguish between each?)
Extra Credit: Read William Shakespeare’s Hamlet (1601) and/or watch the 1948 film version of Hamlet (featuring Lawrence Olivier).
For an excellent modern rendition, I recommend the film starring Mel Gibson (Hamlet).
In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Shakespeare focuses on love but uses comical aspects throughout the play. There is love, magic, and jealousy that intertwine to create this funny but complicated story. The character who stood out the most to me was Puck. His character influences the events of the play and creates a comical chain of havoc for all the characters. Without Puck being mischievous the play would have not been as comical. He recognizes the foolishness of love and ultimately changed the love life of Lysander, Hermia, Helena, and Demetrius. His character plays a pivotal role that influences the other characters lives in the play through is mischievousness. In my opinion, the scene that stood out the most is at the end of the play when Puck tells the audience, “And, as I’m an honest Puck, if we have unearned luck, now to ’scape the serpent’s tongue, we will make amends ere long; Else the Puck a liar call: So, good night unto you all. Give me your hands, if we be friends, And Robin shall restore amends.” Puck tells the audience he has made amends for his mistakes, his wrongdoings have good intentions, but he has mischievous ways going about this. He gives the love potion to Lysander instead of Demetrius, which inevitably leads to a disastrous love fight amongst the couples. Lysander loves Hermia, Helena loves Demetrius, and Demetrius loves Hermia instead of Helena. However, Lysander and Hermia, and Helena and Demetrius would not end up together if it were not for Puck giving the wrong love potion. By telling the audience this, he presents himself as the character who in the end, restored the balance of love.
While reading ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, the element I enjoyed the most was how Shakespeare combined different happenings, stories, and their aspects. At the beginning of the play, he has events with the duke of Athens, Theseus, and his fiancé, Hippolyta. Initially, he discusses their wedding, and then all of a sudden he introduces, Egeus confronting, Theseus that his daughter Hermia does not want to marry Demetrius, the man he has promised for her. Not only this but the event that caught my attention the most is that if Hermia does not listen to him in marrying Demetrius, then she will be banished to a nunnery or put to death. I think this event actually stood out to me the most, because, personally, I don’t like the idea of getting forced married to a man knowing I was in love with someone else. Even imagining a situation like this gives me goosebumps, maybe that’s overdramatic, but that’s how I feel. On the other side, Titania and Oberon, fairies in the play, are arguing over the role an Indian boy should play. Here, both Helena and Hermia want men they are unable to have, and this seems to be a very ‘Shakespeare’s thing’ as we have seen such themes in his other writings and work. The way Shakespeare portrays these multiple events in Mid-Summer Night’s Dream is brilliant! Tying all happenings together is actually interesting. Some things I found funny like the potion to make someone fall in love with the person they see first once they wake. However, overall, it was fun to read as in my daily life, too, I like stories and movies and stories that interconnect with each other through different characters and events.
‘Hamlet’ was a good play to read. Although, at the start, I thought it was very slow, soon I realized how short the play was. Overall, I liked Hamlets’ personality which seemed to be very wise and thoughtful. Like when the ghost told him about the murder of his father, Hamlet did not kill Claudius immediately but planned out his revenge. This shows he was a hard thinker. His planning took him very far to kill his uncle. However, I found it a little weird, the way he kills Polonius and acts so carefree. Polonius did not even cause him any major problems. I think it was a little too much how almost all the characters died by the end and Hamlet’s own madness lead him to death too.
I personally liked Hamlet, from all the plays we have read, this by far is my favorite. I never read a play like Hamlet before. King Hamlet is murdered by his own brother Claudius who not only kills his own brother but also marries his wife. The plot of the play is very dynamic and there is plot twist throughout. For example, I did not expect Polonius to be killed by Hamlet by accident. Hamlet goes through a variety of emotions in his attempts to expose and take revenge on Claudius that leads to indecisiveness from Hamlet. On one hand, Hamlet’s decision seems justified after learning the truth about his uncle. However, Hamlet tries to avenge his father’s death and it ultimately leads to the death of himself, Polonius, Laertes, Claudius, Rosencrantz, and Guildenstern. Hamlet indirectly causes the death of Ophelia and his mother Gertrude. In my opinion, the two characters who did not deserve to die were Polonius and Ophelia. It shows how destructive Hamlet’s choices are, even to innocent people around him.
I though it is interesting how in Shakespeare’s “Midnight Summer Dream” the dream in itself is such a key concept. I’m a bit of a.. fond of human psychology myself, and I’ve come to understand, that we fall for the things and people that we put our mind, focus, energy, time and, most importantly, emotion and attention to. When I was younger, many times, especially in the matters of romantic business, I became a “victim” of my own mind. When I was thinking, fantasizing, putting entirely too much time and emotion into imagining things, versus actually living through the real events and honestly reflecting on a “real deal” situation. It’s kind of funny … and humiliating, – but is anyone familiar with a phenomena of falling harder for a person after they already broke up with you(?); just because you would not stop thinking about them and keep “shooting that happy ending movie in your head” regardless of circumstances… just because you choose to keep dreaming of them? And I’d think that William Shakespeare did write his play as a narration of a “just a dream” – is not an accident.
It is absolutelly hilarious to read and watch Titania waking up from her dream under the love spell, exclaiming: “My Oberon! what visions have I seen! Methought I was enamoured of an ass.” And obviously, she is out of her mind, and it is an embarrassment to her and Oberon. But she realizes that she is in love with Bottom, since she dreamed of it, and who can tell her otherwise now.
This interpretation of a play is a bit of a grotesque and an exaggeration, of course, however I do see a very human, very relatable phycology trends there.
It is also very interesting to me, how Demetrius first has his romantic interaction with Helena, then fell for Hermia, was quite mean to Helena and ended up by Shakespeare with Helena. Maybe it also represents a type of overreacting people, who tend to follow every whiff in the wind, but ultimately have to stay humble and find their “place” in life.
Anyways, in the words of Puck:
“And this weak and idle theme,
No more yielding but a dream,”..
It is interesting to me how Shakespeare’s “Midnight Summer Dream” play has a dream in itself as a such a key concept. I’m a bit of a…fond of human psychology and I read and come to an understanding that we are tend to fall for the things, and individuals that we are really putting our mind into: time, effort, resources and, most importantly, emotion. When I was younger, especially in a business of romantic matters, so many time I became a “victim” of my own mind. As kind of cute and funny it as, as humiliating as well, is anyone familiar with a phenomena of falling for the person harder after they already broke up with you? Only because you choose to think and fantasize about them, constantly keep “shooting a happy ending movie with them and you in your head” – not objectively reflecting on the ” real deal” situation, but rather choose to keep dreaming of that person.
And I think William Shakespeare chose to narrate his play as a “just a dream” – is not an accident.
It is hilarious and embarrassing for both: Titania and Oberon to watch Titania waking up after a love spell, exclaiming : “My Oberon! what visions have I seen! Methought I was enamoured of an ass.” But who can tell her otherwise now, since she has dreamed of being in love with Bottom now.
It is also interesting how Demetrius has a romantic encounter with Helena, falls for Hermia and being mean to Helena now, ends up with Helena. As if there is just a rule to the life, where you can not arrogantly choose and force your will onto it, but have to obey. And arrogant people always end up being humbled. And in my vision Helena confirms that a love is nothing but a mind games: “Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind… Love said to be a child, Because in choice he is so oft beguiled”.
And then Bottom says at the almost finale: “past the wit of man to say what dream it was”.
And I think in Puck’s voice Shakespeare himself concludes :
If we shadows have offended,
Think but this, and all is mended,
That you have but slumber’d here
While these visions did appear.
And this weak and idle theme,
No more yielding but a dream
In Act 1 Scene 1 we see Hermia’s father forcing her to get married to a guy named Demetrius because her father believes he is a good match for her. Hermia disagrees with her fathers proposal as she loves another man named Lysander. Although Lysander loves Hermia and is as rich as Demetrius her father wants her to get married to Demetrius. Hermia has time to think about what she wants to do. She either has out of three options, Hermia either listens to her fathers proposal and marrys Demetrius, or she gets exiled and killed. The last option Hermia has is being sent away and becomes a virgin nun who isn’t allowed to have children or a husband. Hermia doesnt even give this a second thought and says she’d rather wither away than lose her virginity to someone she does not love. Seeing the difficult position both Hermia and Lysander are in, Lysander proposes to Hermia to run away. Lysander has an Aunt who lives 20 miles away from Athens and they could get married there where the laws of Athens can not reach them. Hermia agrees to his proposal and agrees to meet him at the forest the next night. A character that I find interesting is Helena. Helena is in love with Demetrius but Demetrius loves Hermia. Helena is giving off a jealousy vibe as she is always mentioning how beautiful Hermia is and how she wishes she was as beautiful as her. Due to her jealousy she is ruining Hermia’s and Lysanders plan of running away the next night. Despite Hermia wishing Helena luck to get Demetrius to fall in love with her after she is gone, Helena is thinking of telling Demetrius that Hermia is running away the next night so he’ll go after her. Helena sees Hermia as her rival.
In Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, I found Helena to be an interesting character to analyze throughout the play. As the play progressed, Helena was seen as an infatuated girl that would go to great lengths to be with Demetrius. It was proven when she told Demetrius that the girl he was planning on marrying, her friend Hermia, was instead planning to elope and run away from Athens with a man named Lysander. She does this in hopes that Demetrius will choose her instead of Hermia.
I found it ironic how Helena betrayed Hermia without a second thought. When they spoke to one another in the forest while the men were under the lovesick spell, Helena accused Hermia of playing a trick on her by having both men act in love with her. “To bait me with this foul derision? Is all the counsel that we two have shared, The sisters’ vows, the hours that we have spent. When we have chid the hasty-footed time. For parting us—oh, is it all forgot?” (Act 3 Scene 2). Helena could not believe that her childhood friend that she even considered a sister would do something so cruel to her, but she failed to realize that she was cruel by betraying Hermia and telling Demetrius about her and Lysander’s plan on running away a day prior.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare is mainly dominated by the theme of love. In this case, the challenges and frustrations of love will be discussed. Despite love appearing as the force that conquers all, the characters in the story face a great deal of challenges in a bid to fight for their love. The difficulties of love come out in Act 1 when Lysander says, “The course of true love never did run smooth;” (Act 1, Scene1). Lysander did say that to point out that there will always be problems and frustrations in a romantic relationship. One should therefore expect to encounter and overcome them throughout the relationship.
Frustrations of love are also displayed by Helena. She finds herself in a mentally distressing situation when Demetrius, who she loves, suddenly shifts his affection towards Hermia. The emotional frustrations of Helena are further magnified when no befitting logical reason explains her situation. Helena knows that she is as beautiful as Hermia and with no logical answer for her troubles in sight, she says, “Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind ;”( Act 1 Scene 1). Helena laments about her romantic woes in the monologue as she watches the love of her life escape her grasp. She concludes that love is arbitrary and focuses beyond the physical or superficial attributes of an individual.
One can also lose his or her dignity, respect and sense of self by engaging in irrational acts due to love. People are often pushed to their limits in a bid to win and keep the individuals they love. In some cases, people engage in acts that can only be likened to foolishness and madness. Helena, being a woman, had to chase after Demetrius which was against logic and social norms at the time. In addition, Puck, a mischievous fairy expressed how he was amused by the foolishness of mortals all because of love. Puck finds the human intellect laughable considering the four bickering Athenian lovers lost in the fairies forest. The mischievous fairy however had a hand in the entire enterprise. He was so amused by the display of foolishness that he brought it to his king’s attention, he said, “Lord, what fools these mortals be!” (Act 3, Scene 2).
I did truly enjoy reading Midsummer Night’s Dream. I always love to see plays that include some aspects of comedy here and there. One of my favorite lines, however, was not comical in the slightest. It seemed real, and in a way motivational. When Hermia says “If true lovers are always thwarted, then it must be a rule of fate… It’s as normal a part of love as dreams, sighs, wishes, and tears.” The reason I say that this is real is because in real life every relationship encounters trouble at some point. Every relationship eventually encounters a problem that has the potential to end everything. It’s as if it is destined to happen. Now I say that this line is also motivational because Hermia recognizes that such problems can not be avoided, so she is prepared to simply be patient and deal with it. There are probably hundreds of people who have read this line while dealing with serious relationship issues, and were moved to make things work out with their significant other. I know that I would be 🙂
The theme of jealousy operates in both the human and fairy realms in Midsummer Night’s Dream. Jealousy plays out most obviously among the quartet of Athenian lovers, who find themselves in an increasingly tangled knot of misaligned desire. Helena begins the play feeling jealous of Hermia, who has managed to snag not one but two suitors. Helena loves Demetrius, who in turn feels jealous of his rival for Hermia’s affections, Lysander. When misplaced fairy mischief leads Lysander into an amorous pursuit of Helena, the event drives Hermia into her own jealous rage. Jealousy also extends into the fairy realm, where it has caused a rift between the fairy king and queen. As we learn in Act II, King Oberon and Queen Titania both have eyes for their counterparts in the human realm, Theseus and Hippolyta
The mindset of Egeus that Hermia “belongs to me and I can do what I want with her—as the law says: I can either make her marry Demetrius—or have her killed”, is repulsive that he sees his daughter as an object figure that he can control where he wants it to go. Shakespeare’s ability to illustrate the idea that love can be a deadly obsession, an obsession where you have no moral boundaries to yourself and will do anything for the sake of no one taking that obsession away from you . In this case the obsession Demetrius has for Hermia vs the obsession her childhood best friend Helena, had for Demetrius. Now there’s a difference when two individuals are in love with each other and can be obsessed with the things their partner brings in the relationship. That is not the case for Demetruis, in which he can betray his morals just for the sake to be with Hermia, even though she is in love with Lysander. It is depressing to see how someone can be so stubborn and obsessed with the idea that she is mine even if her heart belongs to someone else.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a true illustration of how many parents in this world each day commit harmful acts against human rights for the sake of following the norms in their culture, even if it means executing your own kid. Again, we live in a society, where individuals are stubborn and uneducated to the point where they find it “acceptable” to force upon a decision like marraige. In act 1, scene 1, Hermia quotes, “So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord, Ere I will yield my virgin patent up Unto his lordship, whose unwishèd yoke .My soul consents not to give sovereignty(line 80). It is obvious that Hermia would rather wither away in a sense of being labeled by society of what they see her than lose her virginity to someone she does not love. Furthermore, the character of puck or Robin Goodfellow, although influenced the events throughout the play, he brought a sense of happiness in Act II, scene 2, to Helena by putting a spell on Demetrius. On the other hand, puck also has a sense of humor when in the beginning of the play, Lysander makes the promise to run away with hermia. Instead a love potion was casted on him and falls in love with another woman, this left Hernia not marrying Demetruis, but left her saddened Lysnader falling in love with someone else.
One of the scenes from William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream that was
intriguing to me was when Helena stated, “Love looks not with the eyes but with the mind.”
This is because beauty is in the eyes of the beholder and all things have their own
values depending on the person. I noticed one of the gender issues in the play is the
lack of consideration in terms of what women want. An example of this is Hermia’s
father wanting her to marry Demetrius instead of Lysander. In Act 1 Scene 1, Hermia asks Thesus what may happen if she decides to not marry Demetrius. Thesus replies with, “Either to die the death or to abjure Forever the society of men.” Hermia isn’t given much choice as she has to marry Demetrius or possibly suffer such as being executed or never seeing another man ever again. While times have changed, this is still something that exists in some parts of the world. I think this really highlights how some real world issues carry on throughout generations.
sorry if the spacing is weird, i switched over to a different page to post since the other page wanted me to enter an email which usually doesnt happen
Reading “Midsummer Night’s Dream ”, what caught my attention was the beginning of the play when Egues, Hernia’s father stated, “Consent to marry with Demetrius, I beg the ancient privilege of Athens. As she is mine, I may dispose of her—Which shall be either to this gentleman or to her death—according to our law” (Act 1 Scene 1 page 2). We see that this response initiates male dominance at the time and it causes frustration for Hernia since she couldn’t have a say in who she truly wanted to marry. She had to decide whether she wanted to marry Demetrius, the man she doesn’t desire, or be killed. Now, this quote I found shocking how a father would go and threaten his daughter simply so she can obey him.
I also found it intriguing and hilarious of Puck’s action when he turned Bottom’s head into a donkey. I felt as if it was accurate and represented Bottom really well in the play. We saw that Patton wanted to annoyingly participate and play all the roles in the play, and believed that he was a talented writer and actor. This issue demonstrates Bottom’s personality as him being an “ass.”
Reading Hamlet’s famous soliloquy, “to be or not to be” we see Hamlet contemplating on life, death, and whether not he should commit suicide. He compares dying to a peaceful sleep but later, he then questions what happens in the afterlife and whether or not the afterlife is worse or better than living. Showing this side of Hamlet lets out his vulnerability and pain when he found out his own uncle, Claudius was the one who killed his father.
William Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” is a comedy that dives deep into the human subconscious through the themes of romance, marriage, and magic. The characters’ dreams, and the forest itself, contrast their “real world” greatly. The characters that take part in the story come across as both stubborn and adamant in their ideas. They have their own desires and their own goals, and everyone’s story ends up overlapping (to a confusing extent) before being resolved at the end. When I read the original play, it was really hard to follow because of the large number of characters and names being used in Shakespeare’s traditional writing style. For example, there’s Puck, the fairy king and queen, and the traveling play members who each have their own names introduced in a later act.
Egeus wants his daughter Hermia to marry Demetrius or else she’ll be executed, while she actually wants to marry Lysander. Her friend Helena is the one to marry Demetrius, and the fairies and the play members are introduced in the forest. Meanwhile, all of this is happening while Theseus and Hippolyta are supposed to have their own wedding. So, in other words, there are around 3 weddings that are supposed to happen, with the fairies being another relationship. Nothing better represents the idea of the human subconscious being messed with better than when the characters in the story end up in the forest. At the beginning of the story, all the characters are dignified and grounded to an extent. It is the real world, and there is no magic or absurdity. The characters know what they want, and what each other want. Hermia and Demetrius plan to leave through the forest to their aunt’s to get married. The part of the story that takes place in the forest, by comparison, seems like it’s a different world, or a different play entirely. There’s fairy magic, love juice, and a person who’s turned into a Donkey. When all the characters are asleep or lost in the forest, it becomes really difficult to tell each character apart. In a way, I think this was intentional by Shakespeare to play with the idea that in this “new world”, everyone is collectively the same, despite their own unique desires and goals. Humanity is driven by desire and the constant pressures of life, and the forest takes it away. No dealing with execution, marriage, running away, the pressures of society, or complicated love triangles.
The cruel “comedy” aspect of the play is that love can be both a positive and negative force. Theseus and Hippolyta want their wedding to be extravagant and perfect. Hermia and Lysander want their wedding to take place far away from the pressures of her father. Helena is jealous and doesn’t know if she wants to actually marry Demetrius. Oberon and Titania are at odds with each other in their marriage. That’s 4 different relationships in total that are being tested throughout the play. For example in Act 2 Scene 1 Page 7, Helena and Demetrius are at odds with each other. She says “You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant. But yet you draw not iron, for my heart is as true as steel. Leave you your power to draw. And I shall have no power to follow you.” He responds with, “Do I entice you? Do I speak you fair? Or rather, do I not in plainest truth tell you I do not, nor I cannot, love you?” They are both lost in the forest and do not have any feelings for each other. Demetrius still wants to marry Hermia, as her father intended. In conclusion, the forest serves as a representation of the human subconscious in that everyone who enters it unknowingly has their desires and love tested. No matter how unique anyone is, they suffer through the same problems and intentionally blend together in the story. The confusion that stems from coming from a normal and orderly society (in the presence of Theseus and Hippolyta) and then having to face the magical uncertainty of the fairies’ society (Oberon and Titania) subconsciously drives the characters in Shakespeare’s play to test their love for one another.
Really good job at connecting the 4 relationships in the play and how they all differ. There is so much going on! I particularly find it interesting Helena seems to want Demetrious because he is interested in Hermia, jealousy can trick the mind into thinking it wants something when it’s not necessarily that they want that something or that someone but it’s just the lust and the chase after someone who doesn’t want you back.
THE “A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM” WAS QUITE CATCHY. I FELT IT WAS AMUSING AT MOMENTS, YET SAD AT OTHERS. YOU COULD SEE HERMIA’S HEART WAS HURTING WHEN LYSANDER BASICALLY TOLD HER HE DIDN’T WANT ANYTHING TO DO WITH HER AND THAT HE WAS IN LOVE WITH HELENA. THE SEQUENCE IN WHICH PUCK CAST THE SPELL ON TITANIA’S EYE AND SHE FELL IN LOVE WITH A MORTAL WHO LOOKED LIKE A DONKEY WAS THE MOST AMUSING TO ME. MY FAVORITE PART OF THIS PLAY WAS “LOVE LOOKS NOT WITH THE EYES, BUT WITH THE MIND; AND THEREFORE IS WINGED CUPID PAINTED BLIND”. (A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM, ACT 1 SCENE 1). HELENA SAYS THESE WORDS IN RESPONSE TO A QUESTION ABOUT LOVE’S IRRATIONALITY. THEY PLAY A CRUCIAL ROLE IN THE PLAY’S OVERALL PORTRAYAL OF LOVE AS CHAOTIC, INCOMPREHENSIBLE, AND INCREDIBLY STRONG (I.I.227–235). HELENA IS DISTRESSED BECAUSE HER LOVER DEMETRIUS LOVES HERMIA BUT NOT HER, AND SHE CLAIMS THAT DESPITE BEING AS LOVELY AS HERMIA, DEMETRIUS DOES NOT PERCEIVE HER BEAUTY. HELENA REMARKS THAT SHE ADORES DEMETRIUS IN THE SAME MANNER AS HE ADORES HERMIA (ALBEIT NOT ALL OF HIS ATTRIBUTES ARE GREAT). SHE BELIEVES THAT LOVE HAS THE POTENTIAL TO CONVERT “BASE AND NASTY” ATTRIBUTES INTO “SHAPE AND DIGNITY,” MEANING THAT EVEN UGLINESS AND BAD BEHAVIOR MAY APPEAL TO SOMEONE IN LOVE. THIS IS BECAUSE “LOVE LOOKS NOT WITH THE EYES, BUT WITH THE MIND”—LOVE IS BASED ON A SUBJECTIVE IMPRESSION OF THE BELOVED RATHER THAN AN OBJECTIVE APPRAISAL OF APPEARANCE. TITANIA’S ADORATION FOR THE ASS-HEADED BOTTOM, WHICH EMBODIES THE METAMORPHOSIS OF THE “BASE AND FILTHY” INTO “SHAPE AND DIGNITY,” IS PREFIGURED BY THESE LINES. I WAS ALWAYS CURIOUS ABOUT WHAT WOULD HAPPEN NEXT AFTER OUR TEACHER FINISHED FOR THE DAY. THIS IS A PLAY THAT I WOULD SUGGEST TO EVERYBODY; WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE CREATED A MASTERPIECE. THE LOVE TRIANGLE INVOLVING LYSANDER, DEMETRIUS, HELENA, AND HERMIA IN “A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM” PIQUED MY INTEREST. I’M NOT USUALLY A FAN OF ROMANCES, BUT SOMETHING ABOUT WHAT THE FAIRIES ACCOMPLISHED APPEALED TO ME. I THOUGHT IT WAS TRAGIC THAT BOTH OF THE GUYS WERE OVER HEELS IN LOVE WITH HERMIA, AND IT REQUIRED A SPELL TO CONVINCE THEM OTHERWISE. IT’S A REALLY EXCITING PLAY, AND I THINK MORE PEOPLE SHOULD SEE IT.
Wonderful post Erika. I particularly liked your discussion of the Fairyland aspect of this comedy, which really does make it so mesmerizing and otherworldly.
I notice different experiences in the characters of each play. That teaches me to think of things in a new way. This is William Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” I really enjoyed reading and seeing some aspects of it. Both part characters look great to me. Also, I think this is the main goal of the play is love, a subject to which Shakespeare returns constantly in his comedies. In addition, Shakespeare explores how people tend to fall in love with those who appear beautiful to them. It is easy to understand through this drama that love makes us do strange things. Moreover, William Shakespeare is showing us that love is not smooth. On the other hand, we can analyze this love in many ways. Simply put, if a person can’t buy clothes to wear or someone lacks food or clothes, we can buy her/his food or clothes, it can also be a kind of love. Also, this kind of love is not just to make yourself feel great, it has to be with the heart or mind. Hence a part of the play is what Helena is saying about Cupid “Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, and therefore, is minged Cupid painted blind: nor hath love’s mind of any judgment teste.” Basically, Helena utters these lines as she comments on the irrational nature of love. Also, love depends not on an objective assessment of appearance but rather on individual perception of the beloved. So I realized through this drama that it shouldn’t matter what a person looks like, we should respect and honor any human being.
“Hamlet” is a really amazing film to me. Also, I saw some major themes in Hamlet’s film is there are two young men bent on avenging their father’s death in this play, effects of deception, corruption, politics, and so on. Also at the beginning of the play Hamlet is one betrayal and death. Besides Hamlet’s uncle, Claudius kills Hamlet’s father with poison. He does this because he wants to be king. Hamlet becomes more upset when Claudius, his uncle, and his mother, Gertrude, announce they are to be married. Finally, hamlet is also haunted by his father’s ghost. At the end of the play, Hamlet dies.
Excellent response to both plays Forhad. I’m really glad you enjoyed Hamlet so much, which is my all-time favorite work by the Master!
Before I begin I’d like to make a few miscellaneous points on the reading material. The first point I’d like to get across is the fact that this work , “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” b William Shakespeare is as relevant today, if not moreso, as it was when it was released in 1605. The human race may have come a long way technologically, but it seems the human psyche has not.
The second point I’d like to make is an acknowledgement of Shakespeare’s wordplay, diction, prose, etc.—the man was a master of his craft, ahead of his time by at least 4 centuries. The stuff about Bottom wearing an ass’ head was hilarious—bottom and ass, as we know, are interchangeable with the word butt. “Bottom wore an ass on his head” is just f***ing hilarious.
Now, to the real substance.
The challenges of love (frustions, humiliations, etc.) are a prominent theme throughout the 5 acts. We see scenarios like these in modern-day sitcoms because of how relevant and relatable they are. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream we have a four-way romantic entanglement, which is one more than the classic love triangle archetype that I’m sure you are familiar with. Much like in Romeo & Juliet by the same author, the romance in this play is made increasingly complicated by the parents of one or more lovers. All stories need conflict, and this is a prominent one—our protagonist Hermia is advised to marry Demetrius, who loves her, but these are against her wishes. Hermia loves Lysander, who loves her also. Being the daughter of a Duke, arranged marriages were commonplace and, considering her gender during the time the play was published, it was unlikely that Hermia would have her way against the wishes of the men of the court. As such, her and Lysander planned to elope in secret in Athens. Things become increasingly complicated (and interesting) when Hermia tells her friend Helena about her intenions. Hermia was once engaged to wed Demetrius, and she betrays her friend and tries to win Demetrius’ love back by revealing Hermia’s plan. Demetrius follows the two lovers into the nearby woods, who is in turn followed by Hermia. In the woods we are introduced to the faeries.
Shakespeare reveals to the audience his view of the human psyche. As we know, faeries aren’t real. They are mythological. Myths were used to teach lessons about the world around us, often inventing deities, creatures and other spiritual entities to help us fathom forces that are undetectable by the 5 traditional physical senses. The faeries, then, are not literally faeries but rather a metaphor for these psychological forces that are otherwise faceless. Cupid, for example, is not a real dude. HE’s a concept (Get it? Conception? God of Love? No? O.K.) representing the fickleness of love. He is always making people fall in love with the wrong person (we all have a friend that wants to know why she only attracts deadbeats). In the first act Helena says:
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind;
And therefore is wing’d Cupid painted blind:
Nor hath Love’s mind of any judgement taste;
Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste.
In essence, she says that it is no through the eyes one falls in love but rather through the mind, and that once one is in love he/she no longer has the capacity to judge their beloved as they are.
I discussed these concepts today at a local park and everyone wholeheartedly agreed with the ideas, sharing their own personal experiences as anecdotal support to my claims. Shakespeare is a great read, man.
Abdullah, Wonderful, thoughtful, and eloquent post on Shakespeare’s amazing play. Please try to post by the deadline, however. I will not take points off as this really is a great response.
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