Preview

Who Is Helena In A Midsummer Night's Dream

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
654 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Who Is Helena In A Midsummer Night's Dream
Could you imagine someone calling themselves a dog. Well there is one person whose name is Helena. Yes, Not only does does Helena act like a dog, but she herself calls her a dog as well. Let’s just say she has a lot to do with love, especially in the story A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare. Helena often tends to make love a little more complicated throughout this stories in more ways than one. She is in love with Demetrius, who does not carry that same love for her. Hermia, her best friend does not love Demetrius, who is in love with her. Hermia instead is in love with Lysander, who seems to be not so favored by the father of Hermia, Egeus. Egeus wants Hermia to marry Demetrius instead of lysander. This leaves poor little Helena all alone, drowning in her own love. There are 3 things I’m going to get to, including Her love for Demetrius, her affair with Hermia, and the juice that gave her the one thing she wanted all along, love. Helena has been in love with Demetrius for a long time, and throughout the story she seems to get more and more desperate. Whether it’s when she says “You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant. But yet you draw not …show more content…
This is where we first start to see jealousy kick in from Helena and Hermia. Lysander gets a juice that makes him fall in love with Helena. Hermia confused by this, due to the love her and Lysander possessed before. While Helena thought this was a prank of fake love, it became apparent to Helena that it was actually true. “What love could press Lysander from my side?” (Shakespeare 188). The fact that the readers know something that Hermia doesn’t know makes the readers understand that love can confusing, and that’s what Helena shows us throughout this whole story as well. When Helena hears this she goes ballistic on Hermia. She tells Hermia how ungrateful she is and how she’s had love and her chance, and how they used to be best friends, until

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    As Theseus, the Duke of Athens, and Hippolyta prepare for their wedding, Egeus, a nobleman of the town, comes before them to seek assistance with his disobedient daughter, Hermia. Egeus wants her to marry Demetrius, but she wants to marry Lysander. According to the law of Athens, she must marry the man her father chooses or die. Theseus acknowledges that Egeus has the law on his side, but offers Hermia the alternate choice of becoming a nun. Lysander and Hermia decide to run away so that they can be married. Before they leave, they see Helena, Hermia’s best friend, and tell her of their plans. Helena is in…

    • 109 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Why is Helena upset when Demetrius says he loves her? Isn’t this what she had wanted all along?…

    • 344 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    AMSND Study Guide

    • 1616 Words
    • 7 Pages

    In the forest, the fairy Puck accidently puts the love potion on Lysnader’s eyes instead of Demetrius’s resulting in Lysander falling in love with Helena. As the night goes on, Lysander and Demetrius both fall in love with Helena, who thinks that they are mocking her, and Hermia challenging Helena to a fight. In the end Puck fixes his mistake, Lysander once again loves Hermia and Demetrius falls for Helena. The two couples marry and go to watch the play.…

    • 1616 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    When they are talking to the duke he is cold toward Lysander and makes it clear he wants to marry Hermia. Then during their escapades in the woods, Demetrius is enchanted to love Helena instead. He disregards the time he thought of marrying Hermia and only has eyes for Helena. When Egeus and Theseus’ party find the two couples in a meadow Demetrius states to the duke that he was a fool to think he loved Hermia. Again Egeus being betrayed helps bring the different lovers…

    • 472 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Hermia and Lysander speak about the pain of their love and how they wish they had obstacles such as social standings or an age barrier, showing that they see them being together as almost impossible, yet they are still fixed on being with each other. Lysander also suggests that Hermia and himself run away to his Aunt’s house where they can be together and married – the fact that he is prepared to marry Hermia even though it is forbidden makes it clear that he loves her more than he fears death, which also relates to ‘Romeo and…

    • 432 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Lysander and Hermia, both young and well-off, are unpermitted, according to the Ancient Privilege, to wed each other without the approval of Hermia’s father, Egeus. However, not quite prepared to end their relationship, the lovers very ambitiously and suddenly run into a nearby forest. They have done so without considering the consequences, and as a result, find themselves lost. Lysander suggests this, when he says, “Fair love, you faint wandering in the wood, and in truth, I have forgot our way,” (II. ii. 41-42). Later in the play, the duke of Athens, Theseus, overbears Egeus’ will, and insists Lysander and Hermia wed each other on his marriage day. Hermia, in quickness and happiness, agrees, without considering her father’s reaction. By doing so, she may be sacrificing her relationship with him. In both situations, the young Athenians pay no attention to the consequences of their relationship, which supports the idea that love ignores all…

    • 491 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Blind love is common in todays society and culture. Shakespeare, a fifteenth century playwright, wrote “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” where four characters compete for with each other for love. One of the characters, Helena, is like the “fourth point in a triangle”, a love struck friend whose love interest is in love with her friend. Helena desperately loves Demetrius who constantly rejects her. She is the love-struck friend, desperately in love and is insecure about herself, this makes her persistent and foolish.…

    • 1134 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Helena loves Demetrius but he is in love with Hermia but Hermia is in love with Lysander. Oberon tells Puck, his servant, to create a love potion and squeeze it into Demetrius’ eyes so he stops being rude to Helena and falls madly in love with her. Puck instead sprinkles love potion in Lysander and Robin sprinkled it in Demetrius’ eyes while resting and when they awoke they both saw Helena and fell in love with her. This fiasco causes a misunderstanding between Helena and Hermia. Helena believes that both Demetrius and Lysander and Hermia are playing a cruel trick on her and Hermia swears Helena as stolen her beloved Lysander from her. When the audience knows more about the other characters than they do is what makes this play a comedic one and after Hermia tried to attack Helena made the reader have an urge to keep reading and intrigued because it can relate to everyday life. Shakespeare’s diction allowed the reader to see the emotions both Helena and Hermia had on their faces. He emphasized the theme of the night and how the main characters are so infatuated with one’s look or appearance…

    • 899 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Midsummer Nights Dream

    • 776 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Meanwhile, Helena is desperately in love with Demetrius at the start of the play. An example of this is: “what worser place can I beg for your love; than to be used as you use your dog”. This shows that Helena is in love with Demetrius because she would rather be near him and be treated like a dog than having to keep begging him to love her. In addition, when she said that, she didn’t have any dignity. Besides that, Helena is best friends with Hermia at the start of the play. An example of this is: Hermia: “I frown upon him; yet he loves me still”. Helena: O that your frowns would teach my smiles such skills”. This…

    • 776 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    A bit more into the play Helena expresses her confusion and betrayal towards Demetrius. “For ere Demetrius looked on Hermia’s eyne, / He hail’d down oaths that he was only mine./ And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt,/ So he dissolv’d, and showers of oaths did melt.”In this metaphor Helena is saying that Demetrius had made so many promises to her like balls of ice (hail stones) but when Hermia came along he made broke them causing Demetrius’s promises to have melted. We feel sympathetic towards Hermia as Demetrius…

    • 978 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    When Helena Is Foolish

    • 221 Words
    • 1 Page

    Helena is the definition of foolishness in love. She shows this in many different ways. One way that Helena shows that she is foolish is that she has fallen hard for Demetrius and she would do anything for him to fall in love with her. She even said that “I am your spaniel, and, Demetrius. The more you beat me I will fawn on you, Use me but as your spaniel: spurn me, strike me, neglect me, lose me…” (II, I, 210-213). What Helena is saying here is that Demetrius could abuse her in any way he wants if that would make her fall in love with her. She is being foolish here because she has no self respect, as long as Demetrius loves her she does not care about herself. Another way that Helena is foolish is that she puts love in front of her friendships.…

    • 221 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Hermia and Helena's relationship has changed greatly after the intervention of Puck with the love potion. Once best friends, they have become each others enemies, and all for the love of Lysander and Demetrius.…

    • 922 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    I grew interested in the play’s conflict, since it seems modern day typical. I, for one, enjoy watching love stories and dramas. This play, served just that purpose. Reading of the avenged lover’s, Hermia and Lysander, plan to run into the forest to marry seemed likely to be seen on a Wednesday night, 9:00PM, drama series. Which, I absolutely love! Then, the play takes a twist from reality. Helena acquires information related to Hermia and Lysander’s plan to marry, which provides her initiative to tell Demetrius. She intends on winning back the love of Demetrius. The two of them go out in search of the Lysander and Hermia, and find that they’ve all landed themselves in a forest filled with “fairies.”…

    • 819 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Considering from all the hurt she’s been through and all the harshness from everyone including the person she loves the most, she doesn’t give up on him. This shows the audience that she’s very determined and wants to prove people wrong in some aspects. I show this when Lysander (Will) says ‘Demetrious loves Hermia and loves you not’ this is when Demetrious wakes and realises that he in love with Helena after all. This is when Helena looks at Lysander smug as if she’s proving him wrong. However then comes to think that it’s all too good to be true and that it’s a joke between Hermia, Demetrious and Lysander and gets angry with them both and pushes Demetrious away from her. In order to get my characters emotions across I needed to over exaggerate to make it look how she would react. By over exaggerating it gets the character across more to the audience which makes it more interesting to watch.…

    • 1210 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Whatever Helena sees or hears always has something to do with herself in her eyes, that’s how the world is like a mirror to her. Helena proves herself to be self absorbed more than once throughout the play. During her soliliquy; in act one, scene one; Helena explains what she plans to do with the new information that has come to light. This information being that Hermia and Lysander were going to run away together. Her plan is to “...go tell him of fair Hermia’s flight” (1.i 246). Meaning, she was going to tell Demetrius that Hermia and Lysander were fleeing Athens. She hopes that some how Demetrius will chase after them in the woods. When he finally catches them he’d either be so heartbroken that he’s turn to Helena;…

    • 1006 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays