A Midsummer Nights Dream1

A detailed Summary of A Midsummer Nights Dream1

Theseus More strange than true. I never may believe

These antic fables nor these fairy toys.

Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,

Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend

More than cool reason ever comprehends.

The lunatic, the lover, and the poet

One sees more devils than vast hell can hold:

That is the madman. The lover, all as frantic

Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt.

The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,

Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth

to heaven And as imagination bodies forth

The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen

Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing

Such tricks hath strong imagination

That, if it would but apprehend some joy,

It comprehends some bringer of that joy;

Or in the night, imagining some fear,

How easy is a bush supposed a bear!

Theseus, in Scene V of A Midsummer Night's Dream, expresses his doubt in the verisimilitude of the lover's recount of their night in the forest. He says that he has no faith in the ravings of lovers- or poets-, as they are as likely as mad

"Flower of this purple dye, hit with cupid's archery, sink in apple of his eye! When his love he doth espy, let her shine as gloriously as the Venus of the sky."(III,ii,101-7)

Theseus is the voice of reason and authority but, he bows to the resulting change of affection brought about by the night's confused goings on, and allows Hermia, Lysander, Helena and Demetrius to marry where their hearts would have them. This place

Puck doesn't change Helena's nature, nor does he change her features. When Lysander wakes, he beholds the same Helena that he's always despised and suddenly he is enthralled. For Theseus this is merely caprice and in no means grounded in reality.

Theseus is also a lover, but his affair with Hippolyta is based upon the cold reality of war, "Hippolyta, I wooed thee with my sword, And won thy love doing thee injuries..."(I,i,16-17). He is eager to wed Hippolyta and marriage is the place where reason and judgement rule. He wins the hand of his bride through action not through flattery, kisses and sighs inspired by her beauty. In lines 4-6 of his monologue he dismisses the accounts of lovers and madmen on the grounds that they are both apt to imagine a false reality as being real. When, in I,i,56, Hermia tells Theseus, "I would my father looked but with my eyes", Theseus responds, "Rather your eyes must with his judgment look."(57)

Some common words found in the essay are:
Ii56 Hermia, , Helena Demetrius, Night's Dream, Demetrius Lysander, bodies forth forms, forms unknown, unknown poet's pen, pen shapes airy, forth forms unknown, forms unknown poet's, beauty brow, unknown poet's, forth forms, shapes airy, poet's pen, pen shapes, poet's eye, imagination bodies, bodies forth,

Approximate Word count = 921
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English

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A Midsummer Nights Dream1

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