Puck and Bottom in A Midsummer Nights Dream Essay -- Midsummer Night

Puck and Bottom in A midsummer Nights romance When James Joyce was a teenager, a friend asked him if he had continuously been in sack out. He answered, How would I write the most perfect love songs of our time if I were in love - A poet must always write about a past or a future day emotion, never about a present one - A poets descent is to write tragedies, not to be an actor in one (Ellman 62). I mention this because - after replacing the word comedy for tragedy and allowing a little latitude on the meaning of the word actor - Joyce is subconsciously giving A Midsummer Nights Dreams argument about the role of the artificer. That is to say, an mechanic must be removed from the action, or, at least, not prone to common temptations. This emotional distance gives the mechanic the type of perspective that Theseus likens to a madmans. It also, however, gives the artist a vantage point from which he can give the new(prenominal) characters discovers meaning. Theref ore, I will argue that, in A Midsummer Nights Dream, Shakespeare sees the artist as someone who is removed from the plays main action, but gives meaning to the plays experience (for both the audience and the other characters). I will lay out this by examining the roles of the two counterpart artists Bottom (who supercedes Peter Quince as each Mothers Sons artist), and Puck (whose art is changing peoples hearts and minds). My first four paragraphs show how Shakespeare uses Puck and Bottom allegorically to represent two different components of the elegant mind. Secondly, I show how Shakespeare leaves them emotionally distant from the main action of the play. Lastly, I will show how they end up interpreting the play, thereby, giving it meaning. It is im... ...speares lively Comedy A Study of Dramatic Form and Its Relation to social Custom. Princeton Princeton University Press, 1972. Bonazza, Blaze O. Shakespeares Early Comedies A Structural Analysis*. The Hague Mo uton, 1966. Briggs, Katharine M. The Anatomy of Puck. capital of the United Kingdom Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1959. Frye, Northrop. Characterization in Shakespeares Comedy, Shakespeare Quarterly Vol.IV (1953), pp.271-277. Nevo, Ruth. humourous Transformations in Shakespeare. New York Routledge, Chapman & Hall, 1981. Palmer, John. Comic Characters of Shakespeare. London Macmillan, 1946. Rhoades, Duane. Shakespeares Defense of Poetry A Midsummer Nights Dream and The tempest. Westport, CT Greenwood Press,1986. Young, David. Something of Great Constancy The Art of A Midsummer Nights Dream. New Haven, CT Yale University Press, 1966.