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Clip: Oberon and Titania 1935 (clip available on You Tube)
Foolish fairies and mortals: Multiple interpretations of Shakespeare's a Midsummer Night's Dream
Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream has been interpreted and reinterpreted many times. One of the most popular cinematic versions, directed by Max Reinhardt in 1935, depicts the play as a fantastic spectacle. The fairy king Oberon and the fairy queen Titania are shown as otherworldly beings, flitting through the air, shimmering and transparent. Oberon is manly and aggressive, while Titania is shy, retiring, and feminine in her tenderness.
However, the actual text of the play seems to belie such an interpretation. Shakespeare's words stress the humanness of the fairy characters as well as their fantastical nature. Oberon is frustrated with his inability to control Titania on their first meeting. He wants a young boy in her entourage, the child of a woman whom Titania loved. Although the fairy king and queen are lovers, they are not monogamous. Titania implies that Oberon was the former lover of Theseus' current bride, and...
Their sexuality is also seen in the intensity with which the two talk about the 'changeling' boy and Titania's relationship with the boy's mother. This seems to suggest that the two have had bisexual affairs. Although the relationship is sexually charged between the fairy king and queen, it is not analogous to a conventional, heterosexual coupling or marriage.
This unconventional relationship is more accurately represented in the 1999 Michael Hoffman version of the Shakespearean comedy. Although Oberon and Titania are still dressed in fantastical garments, they spar with one another in a very human-like fashion. Their passions and their magical powers are transcendent but they are still subject to the same passions and envious feelings as mortals, just as Titania falls prey to the magical love potion as easily as her human counterparts. When Titania seduces Bottom she is lusty and sexy, and when Oberon commands her to give up the boy there…
Work Cited
Shakespeare, William. A Midsummer Night's Dream. Shakespeare Homepage.
http://shakespeare.mit.edu/midsummer / [30 Aug 2012]
Midsummer and Elizabeth A Midsummer Night's Dream is a comedic drama that centers on marriage. Indeed, it is traditionally held that Shakespeare penned the play for a friend's wedding; therefore, it should be no surprise to find that the theme of marriage runs through and through Midsummer, from the young adults to the nobility (and even to the fairy world, where marital strife is encountered). Yet, being penned in an age
He forgives her and order is restored in the fairy world thanks to the proper balance of love between head and heart. As for the actors who go into the woods to prepare for their play before the king and queen of Athens -- they too show a side of love. Bottom shows what happens when one lacks imagination: he is the most unimaginative actor in the history of theater
Even fairies struggle with love and romance. Oberon and Titania bicker; because of Puck's potion, Titania even falls in love with an ass. Puck's potion illustrates the fleeting nature of sexual attraction, too. At the opening of a Midsummer Night's Dream, Demetrius is in love with Hermia but Hermia is in love with Lysander. Lysander returns the affection. Hermia's best friend Helena, on the other hand, does love Demetrius and
The soul of girl/woman Jenna is returned to normal at the end of the film, and the girl's knowledge about working as an adult editor on a magazine, the true nature of her chief junior high school tormenter, and Matt's worth as an older man make her a more mature thirteen-year-old, thus the delving into fantasy make the real world 'better,' as in "Midsummer," and more moral and thus more
However, Titania appears in this scene and so does a fairy who is probably female. The biggest problem for the audience would be Titania, who is supposed to be beautiful and wise, which helps the audience understand why Oberon is so obsessed with gaining her love. If Titania is not believable, the play will not work. This scene also needs to show Oberon's weak will, but not turn him
Midsummer Night's Dream William Shakespeare's play, "A Midsummer Night's Dream" was written in 1595. A woman's role in her family and community were determined by a patriarchal society. It was during this time, after all, that women were being burned at the stake all across Europe. The play begins in an Athenian palace just before the wedding of Theseus, Duke of Athens, to Hippolyta, "Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour /