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Theme Of Love In A Midsummer Night's Dream

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Within Shakespeare’s play, “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, the reader is exposed to the idea that love is an over-arching shadow that casts itself over the entirety of the play, despite it being the most fundamental theme within the plot it is the main cause of nearly every major event that happens within the play. This is seen within Theseus’ monologue where he discusses the ideas of: love being able to drive you to do insane acts, love altering one’s perception of reality, and the lengths one is willing to go to in the name of love. When viewing Theseus’ monologue the first thing he mentions within it is how “Lovers and madmen have such seething brains…”, it is apparent that this statement is littered with dramatic irony in the sense that the audience is aware that Theseus’ statement is false due to the fact that their perceived hallucinations are in fact based in reality (A Midsummer Night’s Dream 5.1.5-10). Aside from this one setback, there are many of times within the play where love has caused the characters to partake in endeavours that would normally be perceived as insane. This can be seen within act 3, scene 2 when Helena and Hermia get into an altercation over Lysander; Lysander’s love for Helena results in him insulting his previous lover, Hermia, which ended in the altercation between Helena and Hermia (A Midsummer Night’s Dream 3.2.290-335). This instance proves that despite Theseus’ denial of mythological interactions, Lysander’s love was still the

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