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Act I, scene i The course of true love never did run smooth. Egeus, a citizen of Athens, strides into the room, followed by his daughter Hermia and the Athenian youths Lysander and Demetrius.
Egeus has come to see Theseus with a complaint against his daughter: Egeus demands that the law punish Hermia if she fails to comply with his demands. Theseus speaks to Hermia sharply, telling her to expect to be sent to a nunnery or put to death.
Theseus admits that he has heard this story, and he takes Egeus and Demetrius aside to discuss it. Before they go, he orders Hermia to take the time remaining before his marriage to Hippolyta to make up her mind.
Hermia and Lysander discuss the trials that must be faced by those who are in love: He proposes a plan: At her house, Hermia and Lysander can be married—and, because the manor is outside of Athens, they would be free from Athenian law.
Hermia is overjoyed, and they agree to travel to the house the following night. Hermia and Lysander confide their plan to her and wish her luck with Demetrius.
Helena remarks to herself that she envies them their happiness. She thinks up a plan: For the sake of symmetry, the audience wants the four lovers to form two couples; instead, both men love Hermia, leaving Helena out of the equation.
The women are thus in nonparallel situations, adding to the sense of structural imbalance. By establishing the fact that Demetrius once loved Helena, Shakespeare suggests the possibility of a harmonious resolution to this love tangle: The genre of comedy surrounding the Athenian lovers is farce, in which the humor stems from exaggerated characters trying to find their way out of ludicrous situations.
Shakespeare portrays the lovers as overly serious, as each is deeply and earnestly preoccupied with his or her own feelings: Hermia is stubborn and quarrelsome, while Helena lacks self-confidence and believes that other people mock her.
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.A Midsummer Night's Dream (an Early Festive Comedy) Theseus (the Duke of Athens) announces he will marry Hippolyta, the queen of the Amazons in four days.
He hears Egeus' complaint that his daughter Hermia refuses to marry his chosen suitor, Demetrius, since she's in love .
- Realism and Romanticism in A Midsummer Night’s Dream In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, by William Shakespeare, love is viewed in different ways.
While the four main characters believe in romanticism, Theseus is a strong supporter of realism.
Read this Literature Essay and over 88, other research documents. Midsummer Nights Dream. William Shakespeare intensifies the emotion of love and foolishness in the epic tale of four lovers and an enchanted forest.
Ana Isabel Bordas del Prado.
Universitat de València, Although there is little character development in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and no true protagonist, critics generally point to Puck as the most important character in the play.
The mischievous and witty sprite sets many of the play’s events with his magic, through deliberate pranks on the human characters and unfortunate mistakes. Essays and articles on Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, from your trusted Shakespeare source. I.
Thesis Statement: The characters in William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream are successful, after many trials and tribulations, in acquiring their desired relationships.
II. Hermia.