Shakespeare
This is the type of English Shakespeare uses in his writing.
What is Elizabethan English?
These two characters rule over the forest.
Who are Titania and Oberon?
The fairy King and Queen are squabbling over this.
What is the lil' changeling boy?
These, thought to have deeper significance than originally thought by Sigmund Freud, appear throughout the play.
What are dreams?
This literary devices helps to serve as characterization for Helena's low self-esteem: "I am as ugly as a bear."
What is a simile?
All of Shakespeares comedies end this way.
What is everyone gets married?
This character is transformed into a donkey: "Thou art translated!"
Who is Bottom (AKA Pyramus)?
This is the cause of Helena and Hermia switching roles in ACT III.
What is a magic potion found in a special flower?
The allusion to Cupid is a motif throughout the play and representing this: "I swear to thee by Cupid’s strongest bow."
What is love?
This literary device, and what it symbolizes, appears throughout the play, also making it a motif: "I swear to thee by Cupid's strongest bow."
What is an allusion symbolizing love?
This is the way all tragedies end.
What is everyone dies?
Hermia defies her father’s wishes by running away with this character.
Who is Lysander?
All Shakespearean comedies end with marriage. These are the three couples featured at the end of Act V.
Who are Theseus and Hippolyta, Hermia and Lysander, and Helena and Demetrius?
This meta inclusion shows Shakespeare's critiques and celebration of the arts, artists, and audience.
What is the play within the play?
When Lysander expressed his new-found love for Helena, Helena responds with "Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born?". This is the type of literary device, and narrative device, being used here to create humor and conflict.
What is dramatic irony?
Shakespeare created these two types of plays.
What are Comedies and Tragedies?
This character fawns over Demetrius, albeit unrequited.
Who is Helena?
This is the reason for Hermia and Lysander running away to the forest.
What is Eugeus requiring Hermia to marry Demetrius or die?
"The course of true love never did run smooth" best supports this theme.
What is love's difficulties?
This device, which relies on appealing to two or more senses, is used when describing the nature and magic of the forest: "I know a bank where the wild thyme blows, / Where oxlips and the nodding violent grows, / Quite overcanopies with luscious woodbine, / With sweet muskroses, and with eglantine. / There sleeps Titania sometime of the night."
What is imagery?
Shakespeare's theatre was forced to shut down twice because of this.
What is the plague?
This character defies Eugeus' wishes by agreeing to wed both Athenian couples at the end of the play.
Who is Theseus?
The following excerpt characterizes Helena in this way: "No, no, I am as ugly as a bear, / For beasts that meet me run away for fear:/ Therefore no marvel though Demetrius / Do, as a monster, fly my presence thus."
What is having low-self-esteem and poor self-image?
"Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born? / When at your hands did I deserve this scorn? / Is’t not enough, is’t not enough, young man, / That I did never, no, nor never can / Deserve a sweet look from Demetrius’ eye, / But you must flout my insufficiency?" The excerpt here best supports this theme.
What is be gentle with people's hearts? What is build each other up? What is be kind to one another? What is lead with love? What is love thyself before loving someone else?
This literary device gives people-like qualities to inanimate objects: "O, that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill!"
What is personification?