Dream Country and A Midsummer Night's Dream

After reading the excerpt from Dream Country, I formed a few different opinions about A Midsummer Night's Dream.  First of all, I used to like Puck.  After seeing this image of him I think he looks scary and that is not what I pictured at all.  Secondly, there was a particular quote made by Titania that read, "We thank you shaper.  But this diversion, although pleasant, is not true.  Things never happened thus."  It seems as if Gaiman is almost challenging Shakespeare and saying to readers that these mythical creatures do exist but they have a different story.  I kind of wish he would have gone into more detail about really happened.  So, in a way, Gaiman's interpretation destroyed the classic.  It forced readers to look another direction and wonder what his version of the story was.

Poor Helena...

In Act 2, Scene 2 of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Helena spoke to herself in the forest after Demetrius left her to go find Hermia.  From this speech I gathered that Helena was doing a lot of whining.  While all that happened to her is unfortunate and sad, she sure seemed to complain about it often.  She said she was "out of breath in this fond chase."  I think that she meant overall and not just chasing her love through the forest that night.  She was just getting sick of running after someone who wanted nothing to do with her.  After she said that she started to ramble about how beautiful Hermia was, her eyes in particular, and how she, personally, was as "ugly as a bear."  She thought that Hermia's eyes were only as bright as they were because they hadn't been faded by tears like her own.  She expressed that she is not surprised that Demetrius runs away from her when Hermia is so beautiful.  She then ends with saying that there must have been some sort of evil mirror that lied to her, telling her that she could compete with Hermia.  Overall, I do feel bad for her.  After all, Demetrius did love her first.  Yet, she constantly talked about herself and how horrible she had it.  She should have said that she was too good for Demetrius!

Titania and Oberon?

Even though this play is rather hard to follow, as most of...actually all of the works of Shakespeare's are, this is probably one of my favorites. Even though it starts with some problems for each of the couples it all works out in the end and they all seem to have a good start for "happily ever after." I was, however, a little confused about the relationship between Titania and Oberon. From my interpretation, I gathered that they used to be married and happy but then they ended up on each other's bad side due to the fact the Oberon was jealous of the Indian boy that Titania kidnapped from a king. Oberon wanted the boy for himself but Titania refused. (according to Act 2 scene 1). So...Oberon "drugged" Titania with the magic flower and she awoke to Bottom, with the donkey head, and fell in love. During that time, Oberon managed to trick her into handing over the boy. She was so in love with Bottom that her judgement was blinded and she just gave him up. Then, Oberon reversed the "spell" and Titania loved him again. I believe they got back together and stopped arguing after this incident. If I were Titania I would be slightly angry. My husband drugged me, made me fall in love with a donkey, and stole my child. I would not just fall back in love with him like nothing ever happened. Unless...I didn't remember anything. I'm not sure if he erased her memory or what. Regardless, even if she didn't remember the nights events.....wouldn't she wonder where the child went?

Changed my mind...new thesis

Ok.....scratch the last thesis post. I think I now want to write about education and how it shaped Marjane's life. It's going to be something along the lines of "Education played an important role in Marjane's upbringing and shaped who she is today"...but it will be a little more fancy and hopefully sound more intelligent. Yes? No? Maybe?

Thesis........

I'm thinking about analyzing how Marjane's view of men during her life shaped her relationships with men as an adult. However, I have been trying to research it and am having trouble finding much information. Anyone have any suggestions? Should I change my thesis? I don't know!