Midsummers night dream
Midsummer night's dream
The Couples of "A Midsummer Night's Dream": Romantic Love Satirized On the surface "A Midsummer Night's Dream" appears to be a celebration of romantic love. Romantic love should be understood as an attraction between two people that creates a committed, mutually beneficial relationship, not dependant on sexual attraction and where both participants are of equal status. The play begins with a upcoming marriage between Theseus and Hippolyta; the initial conflict that begins the play is Lysander and Hermia having to fight for their relationship and by the end all the couples are reunited. However by examining how each couple enters the play and how each couple developed and constructed by the end, it appears that Shakespeare is using each couple as a tool to satirize each level of a relationship. Helena and Demetrius represent the pre-relationship state; Lysander and Hermia represent the relationship; Theseus and Hippolyta represent the engagement and marriage is represent by Oberon and Titania. By taking apart each stage of a romantic relationship, Shakespeare seems to be critiquing idealistic assumptions of romantic love and that romantic love is often created for lustful or superficial reasons rather than for true romantic love as defined above. Throughout the
play the magical flower juice potion is used throughout the play to symbolize the notion of lust or superficial love. The potion is always applied on the eyes and creates instant and extreme physical attraction, comparable to lust, which is concerned only with the physicality of a person and instant in its hold on people. Ultimately as a result of the representations of love in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" it would appear Shakespeare is satirizing the idea of romantic love, painting it as a delusion to hide the selfish personal influences of lust and power. As the play begins the character Demetrius claims that he is in love with Hermia but it is later revealed by
The Couples of "A Midsummer Night's Dream": Romantic Love Satirized On the surface "A Midsummer Night's Dream" appears to be a celebration of romantic love. Romantic love should be understood as an attraction between two people that creates a committed, mutually beneficial relationship, not dependant on sexual attraction and where both participants are of equal status. The play begins with a upcoming marriage between Theseus and Hippolyta; the initial conflict that begins the play is Lysander and Hermia having to fight for their relationship and by the end all the couples are reunited. However by examining how each couple enters the play and how each couple developed and constructed by the end, it appears that Shakespeare is using each couple as a tool to satirize each level of a relationship. Helena and Demetrius represent the pre-relationship state; Lysander and Hermia represent the relationship; Theseus and Hippolyta represent the engagement and marriage is represent by Oberon and Titania. By taking apart each stage of a romantic relationship, Shakespeare seems to be critiquing idealistic assumptions of romantic love and that romantic love is often created for lustful or superficial reasons rather than for true romantic love as defined above. Throughout the
play the magical flower juice potion is used throughout the play to symbolize the notion of lust or superficial love. The potion is always applied on the eyes and creates instant and extreme physical attraction, comparable to lust, which is concerned only with the physicality of a person and instant in its hold on people. Ultimately as a result of the representations of love in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" it would appear Shakespeare is satirizing the idea of romantic love, painting it as a delusion to hide the selfish personal influences of lust and power. As the play begins the character Demetrius claims that he is in love with Hermia but it is later revealed by