Shakespearean Drama
By Fuat ÖZKUL, (May 23, 2006; METU - Ankara)
1. A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Discuss how far Helena is a conventional and how far an unconventional girl.
Not With the Eye, But With the Mind
Helena is a conventional girl. She is a prominent, constant and decisive female character. She goes straight for her purpose. However, as she is the lovesick young woman desperately in love with Demetrius, she acts as a fool through the play. She states:
For ere Demetrius looked on Hermia’s eyne,
He hailed down oaths that he was only mine;
And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt,
So he dissolved, and show’rs of oaths did melt.
I will go tell him of fair Hermia’s flight.
Then to the wood will he to-morrow night
Pursue her; and for this intelligence
If I have thanks, it is a dear expense.
But herein mean I to enrich my pain,
To have his sight thither and back again.(1.1.199-206)
Utterly faithful to Demetrius despite her recognition of his shortcomings, Helena sets out to win his love by telling him about the plan of Lysander and Hermia to elope into the forest. Although she is depicted as a tall, beautiful, fair haired girl with long legs, compared to the other lovers, she is extremely unsure of herself, worrying about her appearance and believing that Lysander is mocking her when he declares his love for her. Inadvertently she wakes up Demetrius, on whose eyes Oberon has applied his pansy juice. Demetrius sees her and also falls in love with Helena, saying, “O Helen, goddess, nymph, perfect, divine!” (3.2.138). In the midst of the quarrel over which man loves Helena more, Hermia arrives.Helena assumes that Hermia is part of the mockery, and chastises her for violating the close friendship which they have enjoyed since childhood.
Helena acts foolishly because of her love for Demetrius.Although he does not love her, she still persists in chasing him as she is too dependent on him. Demetrius says, “I’ll run from thee, and hide me in the brakes, And leave thee to the mercy of wild beasts” (2.1. 227-228). “Do I entice you? Do I speak you fair? Or rather do I not in plainest truth Tell you I do not, nor I cannot love you?” (2.1.199-201) Demetrius clearly illustrates to Helena that he has no interest, but Helena persists. Helena says, “And even for that do I love you the more. I am your spaniel; and, Demetrius, The more you beat me, I will fawn on you.” (2.1. 202-204) “Your virtue is my privilege. For that It is not night when I do see your face, Therefore I think I am not in the night;” (2.1. 220-222) This proves that Helena is a reactive and manipulated,and dependent woman who is not in charge of her own destiny, but tricked by the schemes of men and scorned or humiliated as a result of male machinations.In sum, her being a dependent and decisive husband hunter makes her a typical Renaissance girl.
However, she is also an unconventional girl.Among the quartet of Athenian lovers, Helena is the one who thinks most about the nature of love, which makes sense, given that at the beginning of the play she is left out of the love triangle involving Lysander, Hermia, and Demetrius. She says,
Through Athens I am thought as fair as she.
But what of that? Demetrius thinks not so.
He will not know what all but he do know.
And as he errs, doting on Hermia’s eyes,
So I, admiring of his qualities.
Things base and vile, holding no quantity,
Love can transpose to form and dignity.
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind,
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.( 1.1.183-191)
Helena utters these lines as she comments on the irrational nature of love. They are extremely important to the play’s overall presentation of love as erratic, inexplicable, and exceptionally powerful. Distressed by the fact that her beloved Demetrius loves Hermia and not her, Helena says that though she is as beautiful as Hermia, Demetrius cannot see her beauty. Helena adds that she dotes on Demetrius (though not all of his qualities are admirable) in the same way that he dotes on Hermia. She believes that love has the power to transform “base and vile” qualities into “form and dignity”.That is, even ugliness and bad behavior can seem attractive to someone in love. This is the case, she argues, because “love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind” (1.1.190) Love depends not on an objective assessment of appearance but rather on an individual perception of the beloved. Therefore, she is an unconventional girl who philosophizes on the irrational nature of love.
WORKS CITED
Shakespeare, W.A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1969.
