A Midsummer Night’s Dream: Themes

Difficulty of love

One of the important themes of A Midsummer Night’s Dream is the conflict that love encounters and ultimately overcomes. Though it is often said that the play is about romantic love, a closer look reveals the agonies and challenges that lovers experience. In the play, it is the agonies and challenges that become a source of amusement. Shakespeare ridicules the emotions of the characters, which distances the characters from the audience, but the play is lighthearted to the extent that the audience never doubts that the characters will be ultimately united.

The difficulties of love are portrayed through the motif of triangular love, where two men are in love with the same woman. Both Lysander and Demetrius are in love with Hermia, whereas Hermia is in love with Lysander. Helena on the other hand, loves Demetrius who does not love her back. The play is an attempt to correct the imbalance in these pairings, and by the end the problem is resolved, achieving the traditional outcome of a romantic comedy. We see a similar imbalance in Titania and Oberon’s relationship, where Oberon’s desire for Titania’s Indian boy outweighs his love for her. Titania’s love for the Bottom also elicits humor since it seems improbable; whereas Titania is beautiful, whereas Bottom has the head of a donkey.

Dreams

Dreams are another important theme in the play. Many characters in the play have dreams that in turn become explanations for bizarre events. Shakespeare is interested in the nature of dreams where things happen without any apparent reason; there is no linearity or causality. The intervention of the fairies in the forest alters the characters’ minds and desires. The play itself takes place in a magical environment: in enchanted woods. Those who lie down are administered Oberon’s love potion, which causes several romantic misunderstandings in the play. Lysander falls asleep in love with Hermia, but wakes up in love with Helena. Titania is angry with her husband when she goes to sleep, but she wakes up in love with a donkey-headed mortal. All four Athenians believe that the events of the evening were a dream. Titania tells Oberon about her dream of being in love with an ass, and Bottom believes that his love affair with Titania was a dream. Toward the end of the play, Puck tells the audience that if they have been offended by the play, they should think of it as nothing more than a dream.

Magic

Shakespeare uses magic in the play to create a surreal world and to hint at the supernatural power of love. It is magic that creates misunderstandings in the play when Puck accidentally applies the love potion on Lysander’s eyelids, thereby making him fall in love with the wrong woman. But magic also alleviates suffering and resolves the misunderstandings between the four lovers in the play. The woods represent magic and the fantastical, which are in sharp contrast to reality. In the play, the woods also represent a place free from societal restrictions and offers a space for conflict resolution.