A Midsummer Nights Dream - Book Report/Review Example

Character Study Today all sorts of tools, speed dating, blind s and internet sites, pair people. All of which, in literature, could make for some interesting story line. Take for instance the use of the internet-dating site. All of the characters within the story could be matched based on the mathematical computations that determine compatibility. If we used this same premise to examine the characters within the plays of "The Importance of Being Earnest" by Oscar Wilde and "A Midsummer Night's Dream" by William Shakespeare, would the characters have matched into a love connection First looking at Wilde's lampoon of Victorian high society, in "The Importance of Being Earnest," we can take the two sets of love interests, Gwendolen and Jack and Cecily and Algernon to see if how they match. Jack and Gwendolen is an interesting pair. Both are completely meshed into the formalities of the Victorian high society of appearances are all that counts. Jack uses an alias to escape to the city to fulfill some fanciful dallies to protect his place within the society that he jests about on a consistent basis. Gwendolen refuses Jack's marriage proposal because his name is not melodic enough for her fanciful idea of the perfect husband which is bred out of her Victorian protocols. They both have responsibilities to keeping up the pretences of the society in which they live and they take those responsibilities very seriously at least in action if not in word. They both make comments about they lives they live but do not do much to try to change it. These two, Jack and Gwendolen, although mirrored in character and personality seem not to be matched within the context of the play because Jack's first and last name. Jack plans to change his name to Ernest (his alias which is known as his wicked brother) but can not find his true last name as he is an orphan that was raised by a well-to-do family but his parentage is in question. Jack plans to change his name to Ernest to please Gwendolen but cannot do anything about his family name until the end of the play where it is discovered that he is the older brother of Algernon. Gwendolen is a silly but sly character. She makes a fuss in the way Jack is asking for her hand in marriage in a certain way. She refuses Jack because of his first name and her whims to marry someone named Ernest but she still pursues Jack as a love interest (without consent of her mother) even becoming jealous of the beauty of his young ward Cecily. The possible love connection within the internet site would probably happen as they are compatibly matched. While on the subject of compatibly matched characters, you find Algernon (Algy) and Cecily: They see things as children. Algy is narcissistic and deceptive. Both are traits of Victorian high society. He flatters himself as being a man of the world while all of the time making sarcastic comments about the life he leads Like Jack, he is a man of deceptions and uses an imaginary friend named Bunbury to avoid social responsibilities. Algy would seem to be most happy when breaking rules. Cecily is a sheltered young woman being educated in the ways of propriety by her governess, Prim. She fantasizes all sorts of odd affairs and even fawns after Ernest, Jack's alias and imaginary wicked brother. She is nave in the ways of the world, which adds a rich spice to collaborating with Algy. Life for her is one big romance novel. When Algy and Cecily meet, it is under false pretenses as Algy has taken on the alias of Ernest. He falls completely enamored with Cecily and so proposes marriage. Cecily shows him how she has written about meeting him, Ernest, how they would fall in love and be married. What becomes so mirroring about these two is their youthful carefree attitude about things and the aspects of their personalities that are differing allow for growth in relationship. They too would be a perfectly matched on this fictitious website. At the end of the play, the characters, Gwendolen and Jack and Algy and Cecily are allowed to wed, the path taken to get to said end was one of constant struggle with Victorian repression. At any time within the play the course of their love matches could have been directed to another by the like of Lady Bracknell (Gwendolen's mother) or Prim (Cecily's governess). Within the play, "A Midsummer Night's Dream" by William Shakespeare, you have to understand that this story has a strong message about women being victims of the society of the times. In this story, the Hermia is being put on trial by her father because she will not marry the man he wants her to marry, Demetrius. She is in love with Lysander. It is somewhat strange because the two men are depicted as dull and bland in both looks and personality. They are true-mirrored images of each other and Hermia could just as well marry Demetrius as Lysander as the men are that similar. Another aspect of Hermia, besides her rebellious nature, is the she is described as dark and short. These body characteristics make Hermia self-conscious. She sees herself as undesirable especially next to her friend, Helena. Helena is tall and blonde and during the play, both men become infatuated with her due to a love potion by Puck. Helena has been in love with Demetrius and he wishes nothing to do with her. She chases him through the woods likening herself to Apollo when in chase of Daphne. She becomes such a nuisance to Demetrius at one point during the play that he threatens violence. Another interesting point about Helena is that she believes that her friend Hermia is beautiful; more beautiful then her. These women, although physically different, share many personality traits, strengths of character and flaws of self-consciousness. These two characters are the mirrored image match within personality. On the other hand, Lysander and Demetrius is exactly a mirrored pair as they are both bland and have the same personality. They could love connect with either Hermia or Helena and if not for the meddling of Puck, then the two couples would have matched in a different pattern from Hermia/Lysander and Helena/Demetrius. In conclusion, Wilde's play, a lampoon of Victorian High Society, has created characters that would personify that Victorian image or self-absorption and triviality. This makes the doubling easy to interpret and rather humorous. In Shakespeare's case, his story centered on the plight of women in his time and so he gave his two main female characters much personality and though they do not mirror each other in appearance, they do so in personality. The two male love interests, on the other hand, are exactly alike. The doubling of these couples are interchangeable and so helps to produce a play of fun. Works Cited Shakespeare, William. A Midsummer Night's Dream (The Pelican Shakespeare). New York: Pelican Books, 2000 Wilde, Oscar and Cave, Richard, Allen. The Importance of Being Earnest and Other Plays. NewYork: Penguin Classics, 2000 Read More