How Shakespeare uses characters to resemble his personalities

Essay by stealthytrooperCollege, UndergraduateB+, February 2013

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Shakespeare's Character Resemblance to His Personalities

In A Midsummer Night's Dream, Shakespeare uses the characters in his play in order to resemble his different personalities. Like Bottom, our famous playwright has aspirations of coming up in society regardless of his humble beginnings. He also uses this character as a way to mock himself in the process. Shakespeare also likes to dominate and control everything he does in his plays. In that, Oberon comes into play since he is always behind the scenes manipulating the outcome of each character in the play. We could say that the rest of the characters are an orchestra and he is in the conductor's podium guiding everyone along. Lastly, Shakespeare also relates to Puck in being invisible to characters and using their flaws and a little mischief as a way of self-amusement. Through these three characters, Shakespeare is able to point out that art and life are just a figment of our imagination.

We should also stop and learn to laugh at ourselves.

Shakespeare uses Bottom as a way of making fun at himself and his aspirations. Both not being born into high society or aristocracy, Bottom is a symbol of humanity always looking to put on a front in order to create a misleading impression on others. Bottom's destiny is to become a weaver by trade but he aspires to be an actor or even a director. Bottom is portrayed as an ass not only symbolically but literally as a product of Oberon's magic. Bottom is also very overzealous and overly confident of his talents. During rehearsal, he would interrupt the director by offering his own two cents and telling other actors: "Take pains; be perfect"(Shakespeare 1481). He would also promote is overconfidence by wanting not only to play Pyramus, he...