Reason and Love in A Midsummer Night’s Dream

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.

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.

When James Joyce was a teenager, a friend asked him if he had ever been in love. He answered, "How would I write the most perfect love songs of our time if I were in love - A poet must always write about a past or a future emotion, never about a present one - A poet's job is to write tragedies, not to be an actor in one" (Ellman 62). I mention this because - after replacing the word "comedy" for "tragedy" and allowing a little latitude on the meaning of the word "actor" - Joyce is subconsciously giving A Midsummer Night's Dream's argument about the role of the artist. That is to say, an artist must be removed from the action, or, at least, not prone to normal temptations. This emotional distance gives the artist the type of perspective that Theseus likens to a madman's. It also, however, gives the artist a vantage point from which he can give the other characters' experiences meaning. Therefore, I will argue that, in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Shakespeare sees the artist as someone who is removed from the play's main action, but gives meaning to the play's experience (for both the audience and the other characters). I will show this by examining the roles of the two counterpart artists: Bottom (who supercedes Peter Quince as Every Mother's Son's artist), and Puck (whose art is changing people's hearts and minds). My first four paragraphs show how Shakespeare uses Puck and Bottom allegorically to represent two different components of the artistic mind. Secondly, I show how Shakespeare leaves them emotionally distant from the main action of the play. Lastly, I will show how they end up interpreting the play, thereby, giving it meaning.

Schanzer, Ernest.  "_A Midsummer-Night's Dream."  26-31 in Kenneth Muir, ed. Shakespeare: The Comedies: A Collection of Critical Essays.  Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1965.

Schanzer, Ernest.  "_A Midsummer-Night's Dream."  26-31 in Kenneth Muir, ed. Shakespeare: The Comedies: A Collection of Critical Essays.  Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1965.

Throughout A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare, there are multiple analyses that one can follow in order to reach a conclusion about the overall meaning of the play. These conclusions are reached through analyzing the play’s setting, characterization, and tone. However, when one watches the production A Midsummer Night’s Dream directed by Michael Hoffman, a completely different approach is taken on these aspects, leading to a vastly different analysis of the work. Though there are many similarities between the original written play A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare and the on-screen production of the aforementioned play which was directed by Michael Hoffman, there are differences in setting and

In A Midsummer Night's Dream, playwright William Shakespeare creates in Bottom, Oberon, and Puck unique characters that represent different aspects of him. Like Bottom, Shakespeare aspires to rise socially; Bottom has high aims and, however slightly, interacts with a queen. Through Bottom, Shakespeare mocks these pretensions within himself. Shakespeare also resembles King Oberon, controlling the magic we see on the stage. Unseen, he and Oberon pull the strings that control what the characters act and say. Finally, Shakespeare is like Puck, standing back from the other characters, acutely aware of their weaknesses and mocks them, relishing in mischief at their expense. With these three characters and some play-within-a-play enchantment, Shakespeare mocks himself and his plays as much as he does the young lovers and the mechanicals onstage. This genius playwright who is capable of writing serious dramas such as Hamlet and Julius Caesar is still able to laugh at himself just as he does at his characters. With the help of Bottom, Oberon, and Puck, Shakespeare shows us that theatre, and even life itself, are illusions that one should remember to laugh at.

Shakespeare, William. A Midsummer Night’s Dream. ed. David L. Stevenson. New York: Signet ……….Classic, 1998. Print.

“A Midsummer Night's Dream” is probably the only play written by William Shakespeare that does not draw its plot from an earlier historical source and is exclusively based around four major themes which are: Love and Marriage, Order and Disorder, Appearance and Reality, and Creative Imagination. Shakespeare uses these four themes and creates four different worlds and stories into one . Order and Disorder is the need for a balance between the rational and irrational rules a...

Shakespeare, William. A Midsummer Night’s Dream Mowat, Barbra and Werstine, Paul Ed. Washington Square Press, New York: 1993