Oberon who initiates the pranks not only changed Bottom and Titania’s lives but also Lysander, Hermia, Helena, and Demetrius. He watches the frivolous exchanges between the four characters and he decides to intervene. He wishes to simply make Demetrius fall in love with Helena. He orders Puck, a fairy, to use a plant to make Demetrius infatuated with Helena. With this plan a comical yet a complex play is unfolded.
Gabriel Elisavetsky 10/15/2013 Per. 3 A Midsummer Night’s Dream Essay In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, by William Shakespeare, the adventurous story of love is clearly apparent throughout the play. The quest for love has the power to make us foolish and irrational. In the play, magic love juice from flowers causes characters to fall irregularly in and out of love as they chase each other around the woods, where a Fairy Queen literally falls in love with an ass. The forest plays a very big role in the play; it creates a crazy, dark, wild, and mysterious atmosphere in which the magical elements of Shakespeare’s plot can be played out.
Characterization of Helena Kate Steneker The caracter Helena, in Shakespear’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, changes drastictally throughout the play. Or, rather seeing as it is a script and not a novel, the reader observes her reactions to other characters change. In the first segment of the play that takes place in Athens, Helena is seen as the loveless friend of the much sought-after Hermia. In love with Demitrius, Hermias intended husband, Helena is jealous of Hermia’s talent in attracting men. She even goes so far to ask Hermia to “teach [her] how [Hermia] look[s], and with what art [she] sway[s] the motion of Demetrius’ heart” (10).
“The opening scene of A Midsummer Night’s Dream leads the audience to expect an ordinary comedy plot.” (Rene Girard, ‘Myth and Ritual in Shakespeare: A Midsummer Night’s Dream’) “But A Midsummer Night’s Dream does not always do exactly what we might expect, and in this way it keeps its audience guessing...” (Catherine Belsing, ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream: A Modern Perspective’.) Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet around the same time he wrote A Midsummer Night’s Dream. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Shakespeare mocks tragic love stories through the escapades of the lovers in the forests and the ridiculous version of Pyramus and Thisbe that Bottom and his company perform. So, at the same time Shakespeare was writing the greatest ever love story ever told, he was also mocking the conventions of such love stories. It’s almost as if Shakespeare was saying “Yeah, it’s tired, it’s old, and I can still do it better than anyone else ever could.” A Midsummer Night’s Dream is very unique because it is a play within a play.
That leads to Helena telling Demetrius what was going on, hoping Demetrius would give her another chance, but they both end up tracing the run away couple in the forest. Both sets of couples end up in the forest; they run in to Oberon & Titania, the King and Queen of the fairies. Titania recieves a young indian prince, from the prince's mother, Oberon wants to turn him into a knight. When Titania refuses her prince be turned into a knight, Oberon orders Puck to go recieve a magic flower (love potion). Puck must sprinkle the flower on their sleeping eyeleds, and whoever they lay eyes on first upon waking, they will fall madly in love.
In the play, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, written by William Shakespeare, it is true that “the course of true love never did run smoothly”. The two couples Hermia and Lysander and Helena and Demetrius both experience many difficulties in trying to attain love. The law of Athen’s, gender and Robin Goodfellow’s acts all play a role in the couples’ pursuit for love. The law of Athen’s in the play didn’t permit a female to marry the man of her choice unless he was the same choice of her father. “As she is mine I may dispose of her”, Egeus, Hermia’s father, says this because in the past a daughter was regarded as a father’s property and was forced to obey her father.
In A Midsummer Night’s Dream love is portrayed both as a reasonable and an irrational force that causes many absurd and excessive actions. In the forest we observe the uncontrollable force of love strongly affecting both humans (Hermia, Lysander, Helena, and Demetrius) and fairies (Titania and Oberon), causing all of them to question the very nature of their loves. These irrational actions become even more silly when the “love potion” comes into play, whose very power causes one to fall in love with someone over which they have no volition. Significantly, in the end, these characters do achieve true love, but their choice is made only after the mistakes of the dream-like night. Shakespeare seems to be suggesting that while love may flourish, its course is not entirely rational.
This point of view seems rather disputable, especially if you imagine Heathcliff how he was in the end of the book – old, vindictive, cruel and detestable. But he starts his course of life rather Romantic-like. Heathcliff is a founding, brought to Wuthering Heights by Mr. Earnshaw. Nobody knows about his past, nobody knows where he comes from and who his parents are. Maybe he is even an illegitimate child of Mr. Earnshaw and Catherine’s half-brother (incestual love, Gothic novels…)?
The wood, flowers and moonlight are essential to the development of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and are a cause of the chaos, confusion and madness experienced by the young lovers and the workmen before the nuptials of Theseus and Hippolyta. The wood is mentioned first by Lysander when he and Hermia plan to elope. The workmen also decide to practice the play Pyramus and Thisbe, which they would perform on Theseus’ wedding day, in the wood wanting to remain unseen. It is also a place where the magical and enchanting world of the fairies is brought to life. Here we meet the ever-mischievous character of Puck and the king and queen of the fairy world, Oberon and Titania.
Towards the beginning of the play A Mid Summer Nights Dream Lysander states that ‘the course of true love never did run smooth.’ Throughout the play along with the love song ‘Wild Horses’ by U2 we learn that love does not always make sense, that love is about emotions rather than rules and that love can cause us to both laugh and cry. Both the play and song use sophisticated language techniques that helps the audience understand certain emotions and believe certain truths about love. Love is about emotions rather than rules therefore can be unpredictable and can be chaotic. This is shown through the characterisation of Hermia. Hermia is in love with Lysander despite the Athenian rules.