Act IV
Demetrius asks, “Are you sure that we are awake? It seems to me that yet we sleep, we dream.” How is this an alternate explanation for a human’s visit to the fairy world of spells and being enchanted? Remember to include what would be absurd behavior on Demetrius’ part were he not under a fairy spell. What about behaviors from the other characters? Knowing that during Shakespeare's time writing about magic & spells was "taboo", why else might Shakespeare attribute all this business to dreaming? How might this effect the audience's view of the play?
posted by dmteacher @ 9:28 AM
23 comments
23 Comments:
I think what is going on his he thinks that life is a dream, and that we are not sure what to make of it. He really doesn't know what, and all the others are probably wondering what he's thinking. This is odd because Demetrius is usually serious. Shakespeare probably said all this about a dream to distract the authority of the time so he can subtly provide new ideas. Of course, he was already liked by the royalty of the time, so that helped to protect him. It encourages the audience to think about their experience.
I think it mean that some times when you are dreaming you think you are in real life and not sleeping. Then to wake up and find your self asking if that was a dream. Demetrius is one of the characters in the play i think to not believe any thing like that. The other character i think were just ads confused at Demetrius. By the time Shakespear probably wrote this play he was pretty popular so it didn't really matter that he wrote about magic and stuff like that. Again people understand more thing if they can relate to it, and i bet people can relate to having weird dreams and thinking they were real.
I think that this is a alternate explanation because maybe that is what they went through. Maybe it is saying the entire time they were in a partial dream and partially awake. This is not like Demetrius because he is usually more serious, and more commanding. He seems calmer and even tempered. Also Lysander is even tempered. Helena is happy and Hermia is more sure of herself now that all the spells and medalling over. Shakespeare may have said it was a dream so he was not beheaded or had an angry crowd. The audience would have been appalled if it hadn't been a dream, and they may have killed or just attacked the people involved in the play.
I think it means that sometimes life seems like you were sleeping and it was all a dream and your not really sure what to do. This was weird because Demetrius does not joke around often. I am sure it was not that different for Helena. I think that Shakespeare made it seem like a dream because so he would not get in serious trouble. So he could write a play that has something horrible in that time and get away with it. I am think the adienec was probably appaled that he wrote about that stuff but he plays were to good to care.
I think it means that Shakespear is comparing what is like to be awake and be asleep. Sometimes crazy stuff happens in life...but some feel it is only a dream. Or vise versa. No one knows what to make of this confusing turn in the play. I think Shakespear wanted people to think about this and ask themselves 'Does this happen to me?" to distract them when the play gets a bit boring. This keeps the viewers on their toes. They never know what will happen next. That is exactly what Shakespear is going for. :)
It is an alternate explanation because Demetrius can not make sense of the situation. Since this isn't common, he blames it on the fact that they might be dreaming. This is probably his way of trying to assure himself and others that everything is okay. Demetrius is a proper man, so it would be absurd for him to be involved in something outrageous like the fairy world. Since none of the characters realize what is going on, their behavior is very different. I don't know about back in the 1500's but I know that today it isn't really acceptable to fall deeply in love with the friend of who you loved the day before. Shakespeare might attribute the oddities to dreaming because it will create another problem within the group of friends, besides the love situation. My guess is that somebody ends up changing their mind because of the dream element. That could end up being a disaster for somebody, ending up on the outside of the love situation.
This explains how humans don't always believe something that seem like a rare occurance. So we find a different way to explain them for example dreaming. An absurd behavoir from demetrious is how he decides he loves Helena insted of Hermia. Lysander also has the same thing happen to him. During the time period of Shakespeare he had to sexplain that it was a dream or he could be punished severely
I think that Demetrius doesn't quite know what's going on. It makes sense because he is a human in a fairy's world, so he thinks he's dreaming but he's not. It is an absurd comment because he is under a spell. The other characters where probably confused because Demetrius is usually a serious character. Shakespeare probably was well liked by the royalty at the time so he could get away with stuff normal people couldn't. I think that he wanted to encourage people to use their imagination so he wrote about magic and things that were commonly rejected by society. People can understand if they can relate to things they see in the performance. And most people could probably relate to weird and wild dreams at that time.
I think it means that sometimes you just want to stay in your dreams and when you wake up you get mad. It is also like when you think your in real life but your in a dream. I think Demetrius is just overwhelmed and wasn't thinking. The behaviors of the other characters were normal i thought. I think Shakespeare wrote about this because he was on a role and he wanted to try this. He might have also wanted to see if he could get away with it. By putting in the dreaming part of it it will confuse the audience a little pit.
I think that Shakespeare is trying to say that sometimes our dreams can seem so real that when we wake up it seems like a dream. It could also be showing how we can dream about the craziest things and then wake up confused what happened. If Shakespeare hadn't wrote it making it seem like a dream he might have been in deep trouble with the law, so it makes everyone believe that maybe it was just a dream and that it's believable because of that. If the audience comes to believe that the magic and spells really was in there imagination it could actually help the play move along in the end.
I think that it is saying that sometimes it is better to live in your dreams then in real life or the other way around. It could also mean that something as big as this couldnt happen unless it is a dream and Demetrius is saying that he doesnt see how it could happen. This is absurd behavior for Demetrius because he is usually really serious and he doesnt really say things about dreams and magic. I think that this helped show how living in a dream can sometimes be better or worse depending on how you feel about it then living in reality. The audience back then probably would have had a hard time seeing the difference between reality and a dream especially if talking or writing about magic and spells was "taboo" back then.
This is an alternate explanation for a human's visit to the fairy world or spells and other "taboo" because proper men, like I am assuming Demetrius to be, were expected by society not to believe in that sort of, well, to put it in a way, crap. Me may remember everything that happened, but thinks of it as a dream because he may not have done everything conciously. If he were to take it as if he were under a fairy spell, everyone would have thought he was out of his mind!I think we get the same reactions from all of Shakespeare's characters in the book, except for those who actually know what's going on, like Puck and Oberon. Even Titania thought it was a dream, and she is a fairy! The fairy-in-the-woods setting might attribute to the audience's view of the play because they also were expected to believe that fairies and such didn't exist, so they might have also thought of it as a dream, but know in the play that it wasn't.
It is saying that sometimes it seems like we are dreaming even though we are really awake. When something "magical" or interesting happens we feel like it is a dream, even though it is reality. Demetrius is usually very serious, so this is strange behavior for him. He probably wouldn't be acting this way though if he wasn't under the fairy spell to fall in love with Helena. All of the characters are clearly acting different from how they were at the beginning of the book, because two of them are under a fairy spell. Of course that effects the other two so they are all acting different now. The play has changed and the audience's view of the play has changed as well. Now Demetrius is in some type of dream world and it seems like he can never tell when he is sleeping and when he is awake. Shakespeare probably did this and made it seem like a "dream" because he didn't want to get into trouble. They weren't allowed to write about magic and all of that stuff back in his day. That is why Shakespeare is making it seem like Demetrius is dreaming.
This is an alternate explanation for this because Demetrius can't make sense of the situation, because of this he thinks he is dreaming. Demetrius had a changed a lot from the last time he had talked to Helena. Last time she was crazy and Demetrius hated her. Now he is in love with her and she is still crazy because she thinks Lysander and Demetruis are in love with her. Then Helena and Hermia get in a fight because Helena thinks that all three of them are mocking her but really they are in love with her. Helena didn't ever suspect that both of the guys would be in love with her that is the only reason that she is getting upset. Shakespeare might have written about it and called it a dream because if he didn't he might have gone to prison. This might affect the audience's point of view because then they would have realized that it really was and would have thought it was just normal.
Well when you see things that don't really exist then you start to think that you are dreaming. Demetrius, Helena, Hermia, and Lysander probably don't think that the fairy world and spells exist, so they think they are in a dream. If Demetrius ws not under the spell of the flower, then he would most likely still try to kill Lysander. Lysander loved Helena just because of the flower's spell. When the spell was removed he was back to normal. Helena thought that everyone was playing a trick on her or mocking her. This thought came to her after Demetrius and Lysander start saying that they love her and all that crap. Demetrius never loved Helena and Lysander loves Hermia, so she thought the were mocking her. Hermia didn't know what was going on with Lysander when the spell was put on him. He acted like he hated her, but that was because of the nectar from the flower. Shakespeare attributes this business because it shows the way that Demetrius came to love Helena and not Hermia. This will not effect the audiences view of the play in any way.
I think that since he is in the forest, the fairies must have a distractor spell to stop him from seeing them. The spell then must make it seem like a dream. If he wasn't under a fairy spell he would probably see the fairies and go insane. The Hermia and Helena are really confused because Demetrius and Lysander stopped loving Hermia and now they love Helena. Helena thinks it is a joke but she finds out that they are serious and now she is really wondering what is wrong. Shakespeare might attribute all this to dreaming because in a dream anything can happen. I think he did this to make the play more interesting to the audience.
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I think Shakespeare is comparing what the difference of awake/asleep is and the feeling your awake when you're really in a real-life dream. I don't really think it makes sense, but that is what they might of thought back then.
I have a feeling that Shakespeare made kind of a crazy transition with this part in the story. I feel like he got kind of bored with the whole story and tried just to wrap it up.
Demetrius isn't the kind of person that acts normal and doesn't ever joke.... these aren't his normal actions.
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