fairies in A Midsummer Night’s Dream A Midsummer Night's Dream is William Shakespeare's most enchanting comedy and one of his most popular plays. It is very very lyri lyrica call and and poet poetic ic,, fill filled ed with with magi magica call bein beings gs from from mythological worlds and the power of true love. Shake Shakesp spea eare' re's s age age was was the the great great time time of fairy fairy poet poetry ry in Engli English sh lite literat rature ure,, but but no other other work work has has infl influen uence ced d our our visions of fairies as much as A Midsummer Night's Dream. From the quarrel between the fairy king and queen, to the heroic love of Theseus for his war-conquered Amazon queen, to the love-chase of Hermia, Helena, Lysander and Demetrius, and to the enchanted experiences of Bottom. In near nearlly all all of these ese love ove aff affairs the fairi airie es hav have thei heir (sometimes helping) hand engaged and they are thus very important agents in the main- and in the th e sub-plots One of the the most most noti notice ceab able le and entert entertai aini ning ng elem element ents s of Shakespeare's Shakespeare's Midsummer Midsummer Night's Night's Dream is the presence presence of the fairies. Titania, Oberon, Puck, and the attendant fairies all all affe affect ct the the hum human bei beings ngs in the wood woods s, and and prov provid ide e glimpses glimpses into the fairy realm. Although Shakespeare Shakespeare applies applies several important important aspects of the Elizabethan belief in fairies fairies to A Mids Midsum umme merr Night Night's 's Drea Dream, m, Shak Shakes espe peare are alte alters rs the the conception of fairies not only within the context of the play, but for all time. aspect ct of fairi fairies es that that Aspe Aspect ct of fair fairies ies life life style style:: One aspe Shakespeare left intact was their enjoyments. Shakespeare's fairi fairies es in A Mids Midsum umme merr Nigh Night' t's s Dream Dream enjoy enjoy danc dancin ing g and and musi music, c, whic which h was was the the favo favori rite te past pastim ime e of the the fair fairie ies s of Elizabethan folklore. Fairies were thought to dance in fairy circles, which humans were forbidden to see. Any person spyi sp ying ng on fair fairy y circ circle les s woul would d be puni punish shed ed by pi pinc nchi hing ng.. Shakespeare's correlation of fairies to night is also consistent
with the folklore of his time. Although the fairy "hours" were midnight and noon and fairies were occasionally known to work magic in the day, the main time for fairies was night. Fairies were also active in the summer, and not known to appear after All Hallows' Eve (Halloween). Shakespeare is consistent with this idea of "fairy time" in the play.
Complicated to understand the nature of fairies: The fairies are the most complicated element in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, though it is not their individual characters in which the complexity lies, but in nature of what they represent. It can be difficult to know how to approach the fairies in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. They’re as slippery and insubstantial a group of characters as one might expect when dealing with the denizens of a magic wood. For a start, they give radically different impressions of themselves at different points. When we first meet Puck (in Act II, Scene 1), he is addressed by a fairy as “that shrewd and knavish sprite/ Called Robin Goodfellow.” This very bucolic English name is reinforced by the tricks he is described as playing: hiding in acorn cups, frightening maidens, hindering butter-churning and leading horses astray. Likewise the fairies that wait on Bottom have homely, rural names: Cobweb, Moth, Pease-blossom and Mustardseed. Oberon and Titania, at first glance, seem entirely defined in aesthetical references to nature. Certainly they are concerned with the beauty of nature, flowers and fruit and birds, as well as landscapes: Met we on hill, in dale, forest or mead, By paved fountain or by rushy brook, Or in the beached margent of the sea, (II.i.83-85)
Appearance of the fairies in the play: For that matter, we’re never entirely sure how big the fairies are supposed to be. Titania and Oberon apparently must be the same size as Bottom and the Indian votaress, but their attendant elves are described as hiding in acorn cups when the royal couple fights. At one moment Bottom is small enough to be mistaken for a roasted crab in a drink, then large enough to do duty as a stool. Of course trying to calculate the precise dimensions and origins of the fairies is to completely miss the point. Scholars can shed light on Shakespeare’s sources by pointing out parallels with folklore, classical mythology, ballads and plays, but the fairies in A Midsummer Night’s Dream don’t fall precisely into any previous category. Just as they can become invisible by declaring themselves so, their words can make them any size and transport them to any place – they are fairies after all! It’s tempting to see them as an apt metaphor for Shakespeare’s theatre itself – endlessly ambiguous, with bits of exotic myth and folklore sticking out here and there, verbally inventive, and elusive in the best sense While the idea of Oberon as the fairy king was familiar to the Elizabethans, the name of Titania fbor the fairy queen was not. Titania's name was probably taken from Ovid's Metamorphosis, which describes the fairy queen in a similar vein to the moon goddess Diana. Despite this difference, Titania's train is consistent with the folklore—her time is from midnight to sunrise, she and her fairies sing and dance, she has jewels, and she has possession of a changeling. Shakespeare does add flowers to Titania's image, which had not been previously associated with fairies. It should be noted that although Oberon was a familiar name to the Elizabethans, the fairy queen was considered to be the
reigning monarch of the fairies. However, the play takes place not in the English countryside, but in Athens and the wood nearby. Titania and Oberon have distinctly Classical-sounding names, and their conversation reveals their involvement with the noble couple Theseus and Hippolyta, as well as other mythical Greek characters such as Aegles and Ariadne. The basis of their quarrel, a child whom Titania claims as her squire, suggests that her power stretches well beyond the Athenian wood, even to having an order of votaresses, or worshippers, in India. Even the humble Puck, when called away from bumping the bottoms of dairy workers, can boast that he’ll “put a girdle round the earth/ In forty minutes”, a truly supersonic speed for a rural hobgoblin. Different critics have expressed different views about the manner in which Shakespeare has presented these denizens of the fairy-land.
The Alleged Malevolence of the Fairies: According to one critic, the fairies in this play have been depicted as being evil, or at any rate amoral creatures, as they played with emotions of the lovers and retained no sympathy. This view seems to be one-sided, because it ignores the actual behavior of the fairies in the play. If these fairies were downright malevolent, they wouldn’t bless the married couple at the end. It is true that puck mistakes with Lysander for Demetrius, and applies the love-juice to Lysander’s eyes; but this is a purely accidental error and not a deliberate mischief which rectified later. The fairies are Benevolent: Another view says that king and queen of the fairies are definitely benevolent creatures and they show an active kindness. Titania feels distressed by the hardship which Oberon’s quarrel with her is causing to
the human being and the animals, In fact Oberon intervenes to set the lovers affairs to right; and both Titania and Oberon go to bless the married couples. Even Titania’s child-theft has an affectionate motive; she took the child because of her love for the child’s mother. According to this view, Oberon and Titania are the counterpart, in the spirit-world of Theseus and Hippolyta, like them full of stateliness and dignity.
Conclusion: In the conclusion we can say that the fairies in the “A Midsummer Night Dreams” are hard to understand but still they are most amazing part of the play.