A Midsummer Night’s Dream
In Shakespeare’s comedy A Midsummer Night’s Dream one finds the typical use of love and nature that is evidence of Shakespeare’s youth and experimentation. He creates in this play another world, a fairy world where Puck is the ringleader and love is everywhere. Called "fancy’s child" by Milton, Shakespeare brings out his cheerful happiness in its most light-hearted manner in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
A frequent observation by most critics is Shakespeare’s use of nature imagery. It is most obvious in this play because of the setting: it is hard to escape nature and its effects when the majority of the play occurs in the wood. Shakespeare uses birds to create an audible atmosphere ("more tunable than lark to shepherd’s ear" I.i.184), to tell the time, and to measure movement ("hop as light as bird from brier" V.i.391). He also puts great stock in the weather, its effects on the earthly world and the effects of the fairy world on the weather. Oberon and Titania, King and Queen of the fairies believe that because they are immortal, their arguments will have some manifestation on earth, either in the relationship between Theseus and Hippolyta or in the weather (Bevington, xxii).
The most prominent piece of imagery in this work is the moon. Shakespeare credits it for many events in the story. Noted by most critics and discussed in most introductions, the moon is a prime part of the play and what happens in it. The word is found 28 times just in this play, three and a half times more than any other play. Six of the eight times that the word moonlight occurs in his works are in A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Spurgeon 260). Shakespeare even named one of the characters of the play within the play ‘Moonshine...
... middle of paper ...
...o., 1945.
Hunt, Maurice. " ‘The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia,’ Shakespeare’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream,’ and the School of Night: and intertextual nexus." Essays in Literature Spring 1996: 3-18. http://web7.searchbank.com (12 Nov. 1998).
Hunter, G. K. Shakespeare: The Later Comedies. Ed. Geoffrey Bullough. London: F. Mildner and Sons, 1962.
Plasse, Marie A. "The human body as performance medium in Shakespeare." College Literature Feb. 1992: 28. http://www.epnet.com (12 Nov. 1998).
Rogers, Ellen. "Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream." The Explicator Spring 1998: 117. http://web7.searchbank.com (12 Nov. 1998).
Spurgeon, Caroline F. E. , Shakespeare’s Imagery and What It Tells Us. Cambridge: University Press, 1958.
Vickers, Brian. "A Midsummer Night’s Dream." The Review of English Studies May 1998: 215. http://web7.searchbank.com(12 Nov. 1998).
The second color that is represented in The Great Gatsby is green. The color green could symbolize many different things but in this book, it symbolizes "The Green Light" and of course money.
Some of the most well-known and intriguing symbolic imagery in The Great Gatsby comes from F. Scott Fitzgerald’s use of the color green. Fitzgerald used green primarily to represent two human traits in Gatsby: longing for things beyond one’s reach and hope for the future. The color green was first used symbolically as the character Nick Carraway returned from a party at the Buchanans’ house. He stopped before going into his home, seeing the mysterious Jay Gatsby in the distance. Carraway described Gatsby, saying, “…he stretched out his arms toward the dark water in a curious way, and, far as I was from him, I could have sworn he was trembling. Involuntarily, I glanced seaward – and distinguished nothing except a single green light, minute and far way…” (Fitzgerald 20). As revealed later in the novel, Jay Gatsby bought his house on West Egg in order to be near the love of his life, Daisy Buchanan, the dock of whose house projected the green light mentioned by Carraway. Although Gatsby was so close to Daisy, he was unable to rekindle their romance because of her husband. The green light served as the manifestation of Gatsby’s desires, strong enough for him to gaze upon, but far enough away to retain its heart-wrenching intangibility. Th...
Fairies, mortals, magic, love, and hate all intertwine to make A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare a very enchanting tale, that takes the reader on a truly dream-like adventure. The action takes place in Athens, Greece in ancient times, but has the atmosphere of a land of fantasy and illusion which could be anywhere. The mischievousness and the emotions exhibited by characters in the play, along with their attempts to double-cross destiny, not only make the tale entertaining, but also help solidify one of the play’s major themes; that true love and it’s cleverly disguised counterparts can drive beings to do seemingly irrational things.
...ny control over himself in order to let go of Curley’s wife’s hair. Lennie is an example of one of Steinbeck’s naturalistic characters because he does not have free will over his actions. These scenes are examples of indirect characterization through Lennie’s actions in order to emphasize naturalism.
The Great Gatsby is full of symbolism, colors, for example. Throughout the book the author uses them to represent different themes of the novel. Some of these colors are white, yellow, grey, green, pink, red and blue. However, I picked white and green for my commentary because I think these colors have a special meaning different from the others. White is mainly used to describe the character’s innocence, fakeness, and corruption. While green represents Gatsby’s hopes, ambitions, and dreams. In addition, sometimes green symbolizes the jealousy of certain characters.
The Great Gatsby is full of symbolism. Colours, for example, are used to represent many different things; some even represent a theme of the novel. White, yellow, grey, green are just some of the colours which Fitzgerald uses in a special way, because each of these colours has a special meaning, different from the ones we regularly know or use.
In conclusion, in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Shakespeare effectively uses the motifs of the seasons, the moon, and dreams to show that love, irrationality, and disobedience directly cause chaos. By calling to mind the seasons in unnatural order, describing the moon behaving strangely, and discussing the dualistic, irrational nature of dreams, Shakespeare effectively evokes a sense of chaos and disorder. Linking each of these motifs to the themes of love, irrationality, and disobedience allows Shakespeare to illustrate the disarray that is bound to result from any romance.
Clark, W. G. and Wright, W. Aldis , ed. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. Vol. 1. New York: Nelson-Doubleday
Shakespeare, William. The Norton Shakespeare. Edited Stephen Greenblatt et al. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1997.
The “Great Gatsby” uses a wide variety of colors in it’s story. Every single color was put in it’s spot to mean a certain thing, to convey a certain message. That message would change if siad colors were not used. The colors of the “Great Gatsby” are important and change depending on how you view the meaning of certain colors. If two people look at one color they could perceive it as meaning two different things or feel two different emotions. Fitzgerald realizes this and uses it to his advantage in the story. If Fitzgerald did not use the colors in the story the meaning and symbols would change completely. The foreshadowing would be completely gone. In other countries such as Russia and America colors mean different emotions, Fitzgerald uses these different meanings to change the ideas The Great Gatsby.
F. Scott Fitzgerald used the imagery of colors in his masterpiece The Great Gatsby. The colors are used very frequently as symbols, and the hues create atmosphere in different scenes of the book. White is a clean and fresh color, but the author shows how it can be tainted as well. Next, yellow illustrates the downfall of moral standards of the people of West Egg. Lastly, green, the most dominant color in the book, symbolizes wealth and Gatsby's unattainable dream.
Cohen, Walter, J.E. Howard, K. Eisaman Maus. The Norton Shakespeare. Vol. 2 Stephen Greenblatt, General Editor. New York, London. 2008. ISBN 978-0-393-92991-1
F. Scott Fitzgerald created the famous, American classic, The Great Gatsby, with thought-provoking detail and color symbolism. Critics have been deeply analyzing it since it was published in 1925. There are a few memorable color symbolisms that are throughout the book. Everyone interprets literature in their own way so there are many different theories; there are even people that do not believe in color symbolism. Certain colors are continually being associated with a specific character/theme, which allows one to conclude that Fitzgerald intended on colors being symbolic.
Shakespeare, William. A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Ed. Barbara A. Mowat and Paul Werstine. New York: Washington Square Press, 2004.
Considered to be the greatest playwright to ever have lived, William Shakespeare’s works continue to fascinate and entrance audiences around the world. Imbued with imagery, his comedy A Midsummer Night’s Dream is perhaps one of his more fantastic but none the less intricate plays. Presiding over the proceedings, the moon is the uniting feature of the play. With its multi-layered symbolism it is the thread that connects the different characters and weaves the tale together.