Love and tragedy have a common place in most of Shakespeare's plays but would one expect fairies and love potions? A midsummer night’s dream has just that. The play centers around three Athenian couples that are currently having problems. At the beginning of the play, Lysander says that, “the course of true love never did run smooth.” This acts as a theme for the entire play. This is especially true for one of the Athenian couples, Helena and Demetrius. The theme proves itself at three certain points during the play at the beginning middle and end of the play.
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Talking to Hermia, at the beginning of the play, Helena says, “O, teach me how you look and with what art you sway the motion of Demetrius’s heart.” Currently in the
play Helena is desperately in love with said Demetrius, but he, tragically, is in love with Hermia. The quote itself means ‘teach me how you look the way you do and what tricks you used to make Demetrius fall in love with you’. Hermia, though, had not tried to capture the attention of Demetrius, for she was in love with Lysander. Helena is jealous of Hermia because of her beauty, charm, and, of course, her unintentional ability to entice Demetrius. At this point, Helena’s desire to become Hermia is becoming borderline creepy, but the audience knows poor Helena is just frustrated by the fact that Demetrius is not in love with her. Helena and Demetrius’ course to love and happiness would have been a lot smoother if Demetrius would’ve simply returned the favor of Helena’s affection. Further into the play, more problems occur for the two future lovers. The scene opens on Helena following Demetrius into the woods. She is trying to convince him to love her back or, at least, allow her to love him, “I am your spaniel. And, Demetrius, the more you beat me, i will fawn on you. Use me but as your spaniel--spurn me, strike me, neglect me, lose me. Only give me leave, unworthy as I am, to follow you.” Helena has lost all self respect during this part of the play. She is basically telling Demetrius to treat her as a dog: to kick her, hit her, and insult her. All she wishes in return is for his consent to follow him. She is so desperate for love that she is willing to be beaten. This conversation is the lowest point of their so-called relationship. Helena literally begs for love and Demetrius rudely refuses. Luckily for Helena, Demetrius’ feelings towards her will change with the help of a few woodland fairies. At the end of the play, Helena and Demetrius and the other couple wake up in the forest after a long, magical night. Demetrius accounts for what has happened to his previous devotion to Hermia, “But by some power it is--my love to Hermia, melted as the snow, seems to me now as the remembrance of and idle gaud which in my childhood I did dote upon. This means that Demetrius’ love for Hermia has been suddenly diminished. He says that it now seems like love for a cheap toy that he played with as a child. As the couples had only remembered the fights, jealousy, and sudden bursts of love as a dream, the audience knows that it was in fact reality and the characters in the story were put under the spell of a love potion. While Lysander and Demetrius were both made to fall in love with Helena, only Lysander’s spell was reversed. Now, Demetrius is in love Helena and vice versa, but he is still under the influence of the potion. Perhaps Demetrius is happy, but one has to wonder if it is really true love. On the other hand, Helena is content, for Demetrius finally loves her back. While the coarse to love was rough for both Helena and Demetrius, it has a happy ending.
The hilarious play, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, by William Shakespeare, tells the twisted love story of four Athenians who are caught between love and lust. The main characters: Hermia, Helena, Lysander, and Demetrius are in a ‘love square’. Hermia and Lysander are true love enthusiasts, and love each other greatly. Demetrius is in love with Hermia, and Helena, Hermia’s best friend, is deeply and madly in love with Demetrius. Hermia and Lysander try to elope in the woods because Egeus, Hermia’s father, disapproves of Lysander.
Is love controlled by human beings who love one another or is love controlled by a higher power? There are many people who believe that a higher power has control over love. An example of a higher power would be a cupid, a flying angel-type creature who is supposed to shoot arrows at people to make them fall in love. There are other people who reject the idea that a higher power controls love and that the people who experience love can control it. In the novel, "A Midsummer Night's Dream", by William Shakespeare, several examples of love's association with a higher power are presented. With the use of examples from the above novel, this essay will discuss the evidence that love is associated with a higher power. Examples like: Thesius arranging a marriage between himself and Hippolyta, Egeus choosing who Hermia should marry and the fairies who have the ability to control love in the Enchanted Forest.
Love can be quite chaotic at times. As much as poets and songwriters promote the idea of idyllic romantic love, the experience in reality is often fraught with emotional turmoil. When people are in love, they tend to make poor decisions, from disobeying authority figures to making rash, poorly thought-out choices. In the play A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Shakespeare uses various motifs to illustrate how love, irrationality, and disobedience are thematically linked to disorder.
In this play, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, true love plays a huge role in the play. Several relationships begin with true love such as Hermia and Lysander’s and Hypolyta and Thesus’ but some that did not begin with true love, end with true love such as Helena and Demetrius’. Helena and Demetrius, in my perspective, were meant to love each other so that everyone may be able to love each other in harmony. The love potion was only the push Demetrius needed so that he could be happy forever.
What is love? Love is a very powerful emotion! Love is something that can come at any time in your life. It can appear in any way, shape, or form. In the famous play “Midsummer Night's Dream,” by William Shakespeare, love is a major theme that affects many people and causes many challenges. In order for love to conquer these challenges one needs to stay true to their love, they may need the help of some magic, and must be persistent.
Infatuation causes Helena to lose all sense of dignity, as can be seen when in the woods, she desperately pleads with Demetrius to ?but treat me as your spaniel?. Here, Helena also becomes irrational, obsessed with pursuing Demetrius, though it is obvious that Demetrius is fixated on winning Hermia?s hand in marriage. Helena?s infatuation also causes her to see things from a skewed perspective, for she falsely believes that when she divulges Hermia?s plans for eloping with Lysander, Demetrius? love for Helena will rekindle. As the audience, we know that the most probable course of action for Demetrius upon hearing such news is to pursue Lysander and Hermia, or to report them to Theseus or Egeus. Clearly, infatuation has clouded Helena?s ability to think clearly, and she sees things in her own idealistic way.
Some of the most prominent themes in A Midsummer Night’s Dream are the omnipresence of love and desire and the tendencies of characters to manifest their defining traits. Helena and Hermia are two perfect examples of this. Hermia is the lover, and Helena the desirer, and both thrive off of their obsessions. In fact, both women are so tied to these traits that when they are taken away, their characters deflate and fall static.
William Shakespeare’s writings are famous for containing timeless, universal themes. A particular theme that is explored frequently in his writings is the relationship between men and women. A Midsummer Night’s Dream contains a multitude of couplings, which are often attributed to the fairies in the play. Each of these pairings has positive and negative aspects, however, some relationships are more ideal than others. From A Midsummer Night’s Dream the optimal pairings are Lysander and Hermia, Demetrius and Helena, and Oberon and Titania; while the less desirable pairings are Theseus and Hippolyta, Hermia and Demetrius, Lysander and Helena, and Titania and Bottom. Throughout A Midsummer
Love is a powerful emotion, capable of turning reasonable people into fools. Out of love, ridiculous emotions arise, like jealousy and desperation. Love can shield us from the truth, narrowing a perspective to solely what the lover wants to see. Though beautiful and inspiring when requited, a love unreturned can be devastating and maddening. In his play, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, William Shakespeare comically explores the flaws and suffering of lovers. Four young Athenians: Demetrius, Lysander, Hermia, and Helena, are confronted by love’s challenge, one that becomes increasingly difficult with the interference of the fairy world. Through specific word choice and word order, a struggle between lovers is revealed throughout the play. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Shakespeare uses descriptive diction to emphasize the impact love has on reality and one’s own rationality, and how society’s desperate pursuit to find love can turn even strong individuals into fools.
The Theme of Love in A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare In the play ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ many aspects of love are explored. In this essay I will be exploring how Shakespeare conveys the theme of love including illusion, confusion, escape, harmony and lust. Historically, it has been suggested that ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ was written for a wedding, signifying the importance of love in this play, however there is no real evidence to prove this myth. Rather, the Lord Chamberlain’s men performed ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ on the London stage.
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.
She thinks it is a cruel joke and tells him to stop abusing her. Helena says, "Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born? When at your hands did I deserve this scorn? Is't not enough, is't not enough, young man, that I did never, no, nor never can, deserve a sweet look from Demetrius' eye, but you must flout my insufficiency? Good troth, you do me wrong, good sooth, you do, in such disdainful manner me to good.
Love plays a very significant role in this Shakespearian comedy, as it is the driving force of the play: Hermia and Lysander’s forbidden love and their choice to flee Athens is what sets the plot into motion. Love is also what drives many of the characters, and through readers’ perspectives, their actions may seem strange, even comical to us: from Helena pursuing Demetrius and risking her reputation, to fairy queen Titania falling in love with Bottom. However, all these things are done out of love. In conclusion, A Midsummer Night’s Dream displays the blindness of love and how it greatly contradicts with reason.
In "A Midsummer Night's Dream," William Shakespeare explains the difficulties of the nature of love. Both false love and true love prevail in the end, leading the reader to come to the conclusion that all types of love can triumph. Hermia and Lysander represent the existence of a "true love", while Helena and Demertrius represent the opposite extreme. Shakespeare presents the idea that love is unpredictable and can cause great confusion. Love is something that cannot be explained, it can only be experienced. Shakespeare challenges us to develop our own idea of what love truly is.
The play shows how the ideal relationship is that in which the affections and the reasonable mind are both in harmony. At the start of the play, both Demetrius and Helena are clearly at fault. Demetrius has allowed his love for Helena to abate; she, by fawning on him, is guilty of doting, which exacerbates his dislike. An honourable man would stand by his promise and try to re-discover his love for Helena, and it is this which draws Lysander's taunt that Demetrius is "spotted and inconstant". In time, perhaps, Demetrius might reconsider Helena's merits, but in the brief ti...