The Pursuit of Love: Complications Ending in Happiness
One of the biggest parts of loving and learning in life is falling in love. In the books "Only in the Movies" by William Bell and "Twelfth Night" by William Shakespeare, the main plots and storylines are centered on the idea of love and the main characters' pursuit of love. Both stories have several situations where humorous conflicts are the outcome of a love triangle/ someone not loving you the way you love them. There are many similarities between the love in Only in the Movies and Twelfth Night. Love is a very complicated part of life. Sometimes it can be beautiful, but more often can cause great pain. Both of these stories involve love in similar ways, including the idea of a love
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The same goes for Olivia's feelings for Cesario/Viola. Once she realizes the person she loves is not who she says she is, she realizes Sebastian is the person she is meant to be with. The same type of scenario can be found at the end of William Bell’s book. The girl that Jake thought he was in love with finally tells Jake that she will go out with him, but she is too late. By this time Jake had realized that the person he truly loved was his best friend, Vanni. Jake is distraught because he knows she will never love him back either, due to the fact that "boys aren't [her] thing" (Bell 79). Jake takes this as Vanni suggesting she likes girls instead of boys, so he rules out the possibility of her ever loving him. But, Vanni really did love Jake, which she admits to him using a line from a poem. The way this book ended and the way the play ended have many similarities, because in both stories the main characters realize who they are really meant to be with. Viola ends up with Orsino, Olivia ends up with Sebastian, and Jake ends up with Vanni. The way these stories come to a conclusion is further evidence that love can have a happy outcome of a complicated
The play A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare and the film The Princess Bride directed and co-produced by Rob Reiner share unlikely literary parallels. As Catherine Belsy states in an essay “A Midsummer Night’s dream…proposes that love is a dream, or perhaps a vision; that is absurd, irrational a delusion, or, perhaps, on the other hand, a transfiguration; that it is doomed to be momentary, and that it constitutes at the same time the proper foundation for a lifelong marriage” (A Modern Prospective 182). The Princess Bride the movie is an encapsulation of the main themes of true love and the fantastical elements that surround it. The Princess Bride the story the young boy’s grandfather tells him is simply a storybook, like a fairytale
People come up with contradictory answers when they try to describe love. Love lasts forever between two people whom fate matches together. Love changes like the tide; it spreads any direction on a whim as one gleans new information about the object of his or her affection. Some people say they control their own emotions; they allow themselves feel what they want to feel. Yet others say free will does not apply to emotions, love in particular, and that everyone lives without knowledge of what can appear just around the corner. In the Elizabethan era romantic comedy, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, William Shakespeare uses hilariously absurd situations to attempt to explain human behavior in the face of love, to prove that love turns people into complete fools when they fall for someone else.
Love is such an abstract and intangible thing, yet it is something that everyone longs for. In Shakespeare’s play A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the difficulty of love is explored through the obstacles that characters have to face while pursuing their loved ones. Those characters that are in love in the play were conflicted with troubles; however, the obstacles of love do not seem to stop them from being infatuated with each other. The concept of true love is examined throughout this play. By creating obstacles using authority and a higher power, Shakespeare examines the power of love. Through Hermia and Lysander’s loving words, it is reasonable to conclude that love conquers all if you believe in it.
Shakespeare uses many different themes to present love; relationships, conflict, magic, dreams and fate. Overall, he presents it as something with the ability to make us act irrationally and foolishly. Within A Midsummer Night's Dream we see many examples of how being 'in love' can cause someone to change their perspective entirely. 'The path of true love never did run smooth' is a comment made from one of the main characters, Lysander, which sums up the play's idea that lovers always face difficult hurdles on the path to happiness and will usually turn them into madmen.
Love comes with many complications and faces many obstacles. Shakespeare clearly portrays illustrates these difficulties this them through various relationships in his play, ‘A Midsummer Night's Dream’. The characters face different obstacles which affect their relationships negatively. In the play, ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream,’ the main obstacles that cause negative effects on love are the use of magic, the law, and misunderstandings as well as and false assumptions.
In the play twelfth night, Shakespeare covered three types of love : Lust, true love and brotherly love. Love is one of the most confusing and most misunderstood emotions that we as humans posses. Love is an extremely diverse emotion which is why it was used as the main topic in twelfth night.
In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, as in many of Shakespeare's plays the main theme is love. Shakespeare presents many different aspects of love in the play. He shows how love can affect your vision of reality and make you behave in irrational ways. He presents many ways in which your behavior is affected by the different types and aspects of love. The main types of love he presents are; true love, unrequited love, sisterly love, jealous love, forced love, and parental love. Shakespeare tries to show what kinds of trouble, problems and confusion, love can get you into.
According to Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, love is defined as “strong affection for another arising out of kinship or personal ties; attraction based on sexual desire; affection and tenderness felt by lovers; affection based on admiration, benevolence, or common interest; or an assurance of love.” In William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, three different types of love are experienced: friendship love, true love, and self love. Each character experiences a different type of love, and in some cases it is not what they originally expected. The twisted, yet intriguing love story allows the reader to get lost in each characters emotions and development throughout the play. Many instances of love in the play are overwhelmed with a
Orsino's love, however, is a courtly love. He claims to be in love with Olivia but seems rather to be in love with the idea of love and the behavior of a lover. Orsino is a Petrachan lover who chooses an object that will not return his love. Because he is not ready for commitment, he courts Olivia in a formal way. By sending his messengers to her house instead of going himself, he does not have to speak to her directly. Early in the play, Viola realises that Orsino's love for Olivia is denied and that she would also reject all men for a period of seven years. Viola believes that Orsino might not be rejected if he visited Olivia himself and says to him: "I think not so, my lord," but Orsino, not wanting to see Olivia himself and wanting to keep up the role of the disappointed lover, insists that Cesario woo her.
Shakespear portrays the women as fragile, with the way they act, and the way others act towards them, Viola is seen as a very emotional woman, who is in mourning for the death of her brother in (1.2.4) "My brother he is in Elysium", but at the same time falls in love with duke Orsino as shown in (5.1.130-131) when she says: "After him I love/More than I love these eyes, more than my life,". While Viola is in love with Orsino, Olivia falls in love with Viola who, while masquerading as a man is charged with delivering massages of love to Olivia. Olivia's love becomes obvious when in (2.2.21) Olivia, desperate to spend more time with Cesario/Viola sends Malvolio to return a ring to Cesario/Viola which had never been his/hers to begin with. Viola quickly
In William Shakespeare’s play Twelfth Night, love as the cause of suffering is one of the most prominent theme of the story. Even though this play ends in love and wedded bliss, Shakespeare also shows us that love can also cause pain. The characters often view love as a curse, something that is thrust upon you and you cannot easily or willing escape. Examples include Malvolio’s love for Olivia, the love triangle between Olivia, Duke Orsino, and Viola as Cesario, and Antonio’s crush on Sebastian. There are countless occasions where unrequited love for another results in heartbreak and sorrow.
In the play Twelfth Night, written by William Shakespeare, covers three types of love, Lust, true love and superficial. Love is one of the most confusing and most misunderstood emotions that we as humans possess. Love is an extremely diverse emotion and allows for multiple opinions on what it truly is which is why it was used as the main topic in twelfth night.
Two of Shakespeare’s works, The Merchant of Venice and Twelfth Night, both have a parallel plot structure which involves a woman disguising herself as a man in order to accomplish some goal. In the former, Portia disguises herself as a lawyer so as to enter the Duke’s court and help her husband’s friend, Antonio, avoid having a pound of his flesh cut off. In the latter, Viola disguises herself as Cesario so she can enter Duke Orsino’s court and work as a page. This parallel structure is further strengthened by the fact that in both plays, the woman in disguise has to perform some task that (during Shakespeare’s time) was usually performed by a man. Portia has to defend her husband’s friend, Antonio, in court, while Viola has to engage in a sword fight with Sir Andrew. Despite the many similarities, there is a subtle difference: Portia seems much more confident in her role as a man when compared to Viola. We see when Portia is effective and confident as a lawyer but Viola is reluctant to spar with Sir Andrew in a sword fight, and also when she is weary that the Fool has caught on to her disguise. This difference reflects the theme of challenging prejudice in The Merchant of Venice, and also reflect the theme of highlighting gender difference in Twelfth Night, which reveals a lot about both plays as a whole.
Twelfth Night, written by William Shakespeare, is a comedy about love. Love can be things that are not always what they seem and or it can be foolish and it can also be a weakness. Foolishness and weaknesses are the most of what we see in the play, Twelfth Night, the audience sees that, yes there is a tragedy but, that is not what the play revolves around. The audience sees that later on in the play all the love that is being described is foolish as well as something a child would do. The love that is being described can not happen for a certain reason and when the characters find out that someone loves them and they were not just saying that they would do something for them, the character just sort of accepts it and let fate intervene and take place. Everyone in the world has a weakness or have done something foolish in their life. It only counts
With Shakespeare being born in the sixteenth century, there were still three centuries to go before women started the feminist’s movement. However, with his storyline in both The Merchant of the Venice and Twelfth night, the females leads disguised themselves as males to accomplish what needs to be done. Both plays, shows the heroine choices which challenges the characters they interact with. These endearing characters shows similar and different traits. The focus of these plays was based on Portia’s and Viola’s ambition which showed Shakespeare’s respect for women.