Midsummer Night's Dream Magic

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.

The themes of this play are mostly to do with love and magic however the play as a whole is a comedy. The magic scene is the scene that brings the whole play together. Without it the lovers would not be called lovers and there wouldn’t be a marriage. Before puck put the love potion on them Lysander was in love with Hermia but her dad wanted her to marry Demetrius; and Helena was in love with Demetrius on the other hand Demetrius was not in love with either of them. Puck sorted things out by putting a love potion on Demetrius so that he falls in love with Helena. The funny part about it all is when they are all confused when they awake from what they think is a dream which is a dramatic irony because we know it wasn’t a dream but in fact a reality.

After observing the senseless behavior of the Athenian lovers, Puck exclaims to Oberon, “Lord, what fools these mortals be” (III.ii.115)! This line, aimed at Lysander’s foolish behavior is meant to be humorous, but it also cleverly addresses the prominent theme of the story: that love is not under human control. Puck is clearly referring to the foolishness and exaggerated emotions of the four lovers in the play; however, Shakespeare also intends to target the audience members by emphasizing that humans in general have the tendency to do and say crazy things because of love’s powerful grasp on their emotions. Therefore, a character such as Puck, according to Robert Diyanni, “may remind us in some ways of ourselves; they may appeal to us because they differ from us” (Diyanni 1270). Although the Athenian lovers neglect to realize the extent of their ludicrous behavior, their unbalanced emotions are very noticeable to the fairies, who replace the audience’s role in this scene. Moreover, it signifies the contrast between both the human lovers, who become so entangled in a disarray of emotion, and the enchanting fairies, always playful and rascally in

The theme, fate vs. free will, occurs multiple times in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Fate vs. free will, occurs in Acts, One, Two, Three, Four, and Five. Shakespeare uses the magic of fairies, or character to influence situations and people. The fairies take away free will on multiple occasions, which creates conflict or a comical tone during scenes. Few occurrences of free will take place in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Firstly, Eques will not allow Hermia to marry Lysander. Hermia loves Lysander, but Eques, her father, disapproves of Lysander. Next, Puck, a magical fairy, influences multiple characters throughout the play. Characters include, Lysander, Demetrius, Bottom, and Titania. These characters lose free will and are all influenced

I decided to do this part of the play because it's  where everything goes wrong. Oberon asked Puck to smear the potion on Demetrius eyes so that he will fall in love with helena. But Puck spreads the magic potion over Lysander’s eyes, thinking Lysander is Demetrius. Lysander falls into love with Helena, who thinks he is toying with her. Then, Puck spreads the potion over Demetrius’ eyes, so that he, too, is in love with Helena. Helena thinks that both boys are cruelly mocking her, while Hermia is left alone and equally confused. Puck's mistake separated true lovers that is hermia and lysander. This part therefore is very significant to the play.

A Midsummer Night’s Dream is recognized to be one of the most popular plays written by William Shakespeare, alongside favorites such as Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, and Macbeth. A Midsummer Night’s Dream is an outlandish comedy with profound roots within Greek mythology, granting the audience and readers of the play a greater understanding of the main characters within the work. With Greek mythology being well known during the Elizabethan period (1558–1603), various writers of the era used mythological beings to convey to their audience and readers a deeper sense of the characters and overall themes. Because of this, the way an author presented mythology in his or her writing gave the writer ‘creative slack’ to alter how the new work was received

There are many instances of struggling with balance and accord between the two worlds, fairy, and mortal. Puck was told to give a love potion to Demetrius for him to fall in love with Helena, but instead messed with the lovers and their couples by giving the love potion to both Lysander and Demetrius, “ [He anoints Lysander’s eyelids with the nectar.] When thou wak’st, let love forbid Sleep his seat on thy eyelid. So, awake when I am gone, For I must now to Oberon” (2.2.85-89). Through Puck’s mistake, he has made both Demetrius and Lysander fall in love with Helena. This can be seen as a struggle of balance of power and accord as Puck is showing his superiority and show to the lovers his capabilities. There is no true agreement in this part of the play, the Athenian lovers don’t agree with what has happened to them. The love potion that Oberon and Puck use has lead to many disagreements for the couples, in this

Shakespeare’s play A Midsummer Night’s Dream presents an assortment of characters whose difficulties with their lover’s present itself in many situation of the play through these unique relationships. In Act 3 Puck is reporting to Oberon about Titania and Bottom when Demetrius and Hermia enter the scene Puck states “This the woman but not this the man” (3.2.44). Puck’s quote holds a simple but repeated metaphor of the play itself and its reoccurring themes on the mystery love presents. Puck’s motives throughout the play don’t ever seem to get clearer aside from knowing that he services Oberon, and makes one mistakes to shake up the entire story before choosing to cause his own mischief. Through the entire story the fairy Puck plays one of the main antagonists, even from the beginning he is responsible for a lot of problems but later solutions. Shakespeare cast Oberon and Puck as character to create a living metaphor for the mystery behind conflict and resolution experienced in relationships.

However, Puck is not aware of the two Athenian men in the forest that night and unknowingly confuses Demetrius for Lysander. To solve this, Puck puts the love potion on Demetrius's eyes so both Athenian men fall for Helena. As a result, this mistake forms major conflicts between a lot of characters for several reasons. The first reason being that Helena believes that both Athenian men (with Hermia) are not sincere and playing a joke on her. The second would be that since Lysander is now pursuing Helena, Hermia no longer has a companion.

He insists that he has made a mistake in loving Hermia, but this only angers Helena and she eventually storms off. This was an interesting first interaction for audience members to see as we can see the contrast of blind love and true love in the character of Lysander. We, as an audience, watched Puck enchant Lysander and observed the transition from his true love with Hermia to his blind love with Helena. We are called to imagine the despair that Hermia must have felt upon realizing that Lysander did not love her (so he thinks) and, thus, the

In A Midsummers Night Dream, by William Shakespeare the biggest comparison you have to decipher is the difference between real life and fantasy. The role of magic is used in the play to help the mortals find love because in this play love is expressed so no mortal knows how strong love's effects has on someone. Love goes past the comprehension of a human being and that is where fantasy comes into play with the fairies. They are here to show how magic and love become one thing.

Magic is a mysterious and whimsical affair that confuses but also enchants the user and beholder. Magic creates a great deal of conflict and confusion in stories told all throughout history, but it also enhances the tales and gives them an unusual aura that other non-magical stories lack. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare, he uses the element of magic to his advantage and creates confusion and discord between four young citizens in ancient Greece. He also uses magic to introduce the fairies to the plotline and they too add to the complications and comedy of the story. Throughout the play, magic proves to create the comedic aspects of the story while also adding to the conflicts and the thematic ideas of the tale.

Plays, shorts stories and other works of literature of that time were full of the out of this world wonder of magic and sorcery. A few of the best compositions to be brought out of the Renaissance integrated magic into its wording, such as plays by Shakespeare, Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Tempest. Shakespeare's a Midsummer Night's Dream was inspired by his interest in Renaissance magic. The play's plot is centralized around the mystical world of fairies and the result when they use magic disorder the usual control of things. It made apparent that the use of magic in the play Midsummer Night’s Dream is especially important, without it there would hardly be a show. Shakespeare as a Renaissance writer had the motivation from magic as his final play The Tempest was modeled on John Dee. In Shakespeare’s work, he demonstrated two sides of magic: the first being that magic can easily cause chaos, and subsequently magic can fix things. Shakespeare’s writing about magic as an object of positive and humorous was unusual for the Renaissance era, unlike common displayed of fear and

This is when Lysander and Hermia are going through the woods to get to his aunts. And Helena decided to tell Demetrius that they were eloping, so they were also in the woods looking for them. When Demetrius and Helena were together in the woods Oberon noticed that Demetrius was being very rude to Helena. He was saying that he does not love her and never will. So when puck returned with the love potion Oberon told Puck to give Demetrius the love potion so that when he wakes he will be madly in love with Helena. But Puck cause a lot of problems and he accidently gave the potion to Lysander instead. So when Lysander woke up the first person he saw was Helena, which made him love her instantly. And this cause even more problems. Helena and Hermia ended up fighting. Helena didn’t want to fight with her, and she tried to get the guys to help her. “I pray you, though you mock me, gentlemen, Let her not hurt me: I was never

The story of A Midsummer Night's Dream was mainly about love and its abnormal dealings. In the play, Shakespeare tried to show that love is unpredictable, unreasonable, and at times is blind. The theme of love was constantly used during the play and basically everything that was said and done was related to the concept of love and its unpredictable ness. Shakespeare made all of the characters interact their lives to be based on each other’s. At first, everything was very confusing, and the characters were faced with many different problems. In the end, however, they were still able to persevere and win their true love, the love they were searching for in the first place.