Mythology in Shakespeare
From larger-than-life heroes that miraculously rescue the damsel in distress from the nefarious monsters plaguing the cities, to the dainty, but powerful, fairies that reside in the forest and emerge in the shadows to work their magic, mythological tales like these fill the works of many famous authors. These authors, like William Shakespeare, can be credited for playing a huge role in the passing on of these stories by filling their work with allusions to these ancient characters. Some of the plays that accomplish this, like, Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet, , have even become just as well known as the myths they allude to. Much of Shakespeare’s work, especially A Midsummer Night’s Dream, contain many allusions to
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The main source of mythological inspiration in A Midsummer Night’s Dream derives from Ovid’s A Metamorphosis (Lamb). A Metamorphosis is a long epic that details the history of the creation of the world involving gods. It contains stories of mythological characters that undergo a sort of transformation, or metamorphosis, in each story that, in the end, “ties them all together” (“Ancient Rome-Ovid-Metamorphosis”). Considering the general plot line of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, one can see that Shakespeare utilizes the same idea of including something that brings all of the different storylines together in the end. For example, in the beginning, Demetrius and Lysander both like Hermia, and Helena does not have any suitors. However, because of the conflict between Oberon and Titania over the little indian boy, Helena resultantly obtains a suitor (Demetrius) from Puck’s antics, thus showing the seemingly different storylines coming together after the transformation from Puck’s lotus flower love potion, which parallels A Metamorphosis. Shakespeare also borrowed the name “Titania” for the fairy queen from A Metamorphosis, which, again, shows the parallel between the two
In Shakespeare’s Midsummer’s Night Dream he entices the reader using character development, imagery, and symbolism. These tools help make it a wonderful play for teens, teaching them what a well-written comedy looks like. As well as taking them into a story they won’t soon forget.
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.
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.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream, by William Shakespeare, is a play that illustrates a good picture of woman’s lack of freedom. It is a story of several couples, among which there is a fairy king, Oberon, who proves his sovereignty over the queen of the fairies, Titania. The two have an ongoing conflict about who should keep the Indian boy, whose mother had recently died. Titania doesn’t want to give him up because she and the boy’s mother knew each other very good; whereas Oberon has no relations to the boy, but really wants him as a servant. Ultimately, Oberon wins the boy by using a trick of his on Titania, revealing her weakness. Shakespeare uses Oberon to show this power of man over woman and to expose woman’s unheard, meaningless, and feeble opinions through Titania. In several scenes throughout the play, the female character, Titania, struggles to do as she desires; however, Oberon takes things under his control and helps to portray the female as weaker than the male.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream, penned by the acclaimed author William Shakespeare, demonstrates erratic relationships in the form of a romantic comedy. The play takes place in ancient Athens where Theseus, duke of Athens, and his fiancé, Hippolyta, prepare for their grand wedding. During the preparations, Theseus must settle a dispute between a man named Eugeus and his daughter, Hermia. Hermia desires to marry a charming young man by the name of Lysander, however, her father forces her to wed Demetrius. Throughout the story, Hermia and many other women, battle with their love affairs. Through these chaotic love affairs, the predominant female characters show their strengths as well as their weaknesses through various events in the play. Two
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.
All of literature is littered with symbolic archetypes, from the night to the forest to the hero to the star crossed lovers, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream is no exception. In this piece, as with every other great work of fiction, Shakespeare shapes his characters and the setting to fit into these universally recognized molds. Before analyzing this piece of literature through these archetypal eyeglasses, it is crucial to understand what archetypes are, and why they are used.
A very old Shakespeare’s play “A Midsummers Night Dream” believed to be written in 1590 and 1596 was a classical idea of fantasy. It portrays the journey of four young lovers and their interactions with fairies. They story takes place in a mythical city called Athens with an enchanted forest, where a fairy king misguides the star-crossed lovers and plays tricks on his fairy queen by transforming a poor actor into a half-donkey. This work focuses on human interactions with falling in love.
In the play A Midsummer Night’s Dream, several events occur that cause chaos and confusion among the people. The writer of the play, Shakespeare draws the reader to focus on the small but important details in the story, to understand what is happening, and why. I believe Shakespeare focuses on these characters mainly and their stories; the young Athenian lovers, Titania & Oberon, and Nick Bottom. These are the characters that are greatly affected by the magic of Cupid’s arrow and Oberon’s mischievous works. The theme magic is what really begins each characters story and what carries it, but what also causes all of the problems. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Shakespeare emphasizes the theme magic to allow the reader to view how the power of magic affects each character differently.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream portrays magic through many places in the text. Magic is a key component to the plot of the story. Magic can make a problem disappear, or it can intensify the problem. There are many reasons magic is powerful, but one of the main ones is because not everyone understands it. Magic in one way or another affects everyone in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, but the perspective with which each character views magic is different. The power of magic is something that is hard to understand, even those who use magic often cannot fully understand magic because in many ways it is irrational and inexplicable.
A Midsummer Night's Dream is, in a way, Romeo and Juliet turned inside out--a tragedy turned farcical. The tragedy both are based on is the story of "Pyramus and Thisbe." In one, Ovid's story is treated as a melodrama (in Romeo and Juliet) and in another, it is fodder for comedy (in A Midsummer Night's Dream).
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
In today’s society, the concept of dreaming and dreams, in general, has been featured in a variety of different mediums, such as literature, film and even music. While the mediums of film and music are both prime examples of this concept, the medium of literature, on the other hand, contains a much more diverse set of examples pertaining to dreams and dreaming. One key example is William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. While the portrayal of dreams, in general, plays a prominent role in Shakespeare’s play, the exploration of many aspects of nature, allows readers to believe that dreams are merely connected to somewhat unconventional occurrences.
The Role of the Fairies in A Midsummer Nights Dream Introduction = == == == ==
The first interpretation of the title of the play that comes to my mind was the magical dream-like night in the woods, when Robin Goodfellow and Oberon, the king of the fairies, used several kinds of love potions, and messed everything up. When the lovers awoke in the morning they thought all of the ridiculous things that had happened or been said the night before had just all been a dream. However, if Oberon had been more specific in his directions to Robin, "a sweet Athenian lady is in love with a disdainful youth. Anoint his eyes... thou shalt know the man by the Athenian garments he hath on," all of this could have been avoided and everything would have been fine (page 53). This gives insight to the thematic nature of the work by setting a magical like atmosphere for the lovers to be in.