Love in" A Midsummer Night's Dream"

Paper Summary:

This paper analyzes the use of love and magic in William Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream". The paper looks at how magic is used to bring the effects of love to light and how the magical setting of the play is emphasized by the language of the play, which also stresses the parallelism between love and magic. The paper concludes that, in this play, Shakespeare wonderfully uses magic to emphasize the power of love in A Midsummer Night's Dream, a love which he is describing as a magical force.

From the Paper:

"The powers of love are not only shown in language, but also in the transformations that the characters are enduring in the play. Magic and love are closely linked by the symbol of the love flower, "Before milk-white, now purple with love's wound" (2.1.167) because of Cupid's mistake. The flower has endured the power of both magic and love, and is now carrying its transformation on to the ones on which its juice is applied. This is what happens to Titania, the queen of the fairies when she wakes up under the influence of the love potion in front of Bottom. The transformation of Bottom into an ass is an important magical change in the play. It has the effect of revealing Bottom's true nature, since, as Quince says, "[he is] translated" (3.1. 113). Titania's falling in love with Bottom, namely with an ass-head creature, makes us realize how love is not logical. Shakespeare thus says that love does not follow logic in any way, and can even fool a queen. Consequently, magic, under the form of the love flower, is used to emphasize the illogical nature of love."

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