Alexis Wraight

Thomas Mula
Acting 3 Shakespeare
29 September 2016
Midsummer Nights Dream Monologue Analysis
A Midsummer Nights Dream is a classic comedy known around the
world. This play provides hilarious confusion, declarations of love and angst,
magical creatures, fairies and much more. When we reach Act 3, confusion is
abound between the young lovers of the show and many other characters as
well. It is in this scene when the Athenian lovers all wander back to the same
area where they eventually fall asleep again. This is when Puck enters with
the potion to make everything right by morning. In this particular monologue,
many modern ideas are introduced and it would be easy to see this scene in
any standard romantic comedy today.
Helena seems to get the short end of the stick throughout the play.
Being blindsided by the man she loves and betrayed by another woman, who
she believes to be her friend. It is your stereotypical grade school blindsiding,
where boys pick on the nerdy girls and tell them things they would never
say if they were in the right state of mind or had the right intentions.
The monologue starts off with the phrase, O spite! O hell, meaning,
in my own personal interpretation, O how irritating! O damn you! Then she
goes on to say: I see that you are all set and determined to gang up on me
for your enjoyment. If you were just and knew any manners at all, you would

not purposefully do me this much hurt and treat me this way. Can you please
just be forward, and come out and say that you hate me, like I know that you
already do. Must you join together and untie to humiliate me as well, as if
you havent already done enough? If you were REAL men, like you so pretend
to be, you would not treat an honorable and well-born lady this way. You
make promises and vows and you then praise my accomplishments, quality,
physique and beauty, but I know you are both revolted by the sight of me. It
is clear you are both vying for Hermias love. And now you are also
competing to see who can hurt me and make fun of me the most. That is a
fine idea, such a manly thing to do. To bring about a woman to tears. No
noble/respectable person of your class would ever knowingly offend and
torture a virgin in this way for your amusement and entertainment.
Now, moving on from the translation of the monologue, to the rhythm.
This monologue follows the standard Iambic Pentameter setup throughout.
The main faltering interpretation of rhythm is the chunks of monosyllabic
phrases. With monosyllabic phrases, this gives the actor, i.e myself, the
ability to play with certain rhythms and the stress of certain words. Whether
this be that you place stress on all of these one syllable phrases or change
pitch, this is something to play with. The literary rule is to place more
importance on the words that only contain one syllable. This adds more
depth to the monologue and gives a certain meaning and phrasing to the
words being said. Monosyllabic phrases are also key when it comes to stating
the plot of the scene. This is seen throughout Shakespeares works and it is a

great way to grab the audiences attention and explain exactly what, where,
and why this scene is happening in that exact moment.
Throughout this monologue there are several literary tools that stand
out in particular. The first being unusual spelling of words. Such as do
being spelled as doe. This was a hint from Shakespeare to take more time
with that specific word and to add more weight to it. This comes throughout
the monologue. Another example being the word poor. Shakespeare spells
it as poore in order to give the actor the clue to make every sound in that
particular word come through.
Next is the case of unusual capitalization. Like the unusual spelling,
this is a cue to place heavy importance on these words. The first unusual
capitalization in this particular monologue is the word Lady. At this point,
Helena is stating that true men would not treat a gentle lady in this manner.
By placing more emphasis on the word Lady, it then becomes a clearer
objective and statement for the monologue. The next unusual capitalization
is the word Rivals. This is seen several times throughout the monologue
and it is just another clue to place heavy importance on this particular word
itself. I believe that this is used as an insult in its context and by placing
heavy emphasis on the word; it will come across in that manner.
Shakespeare was famous for using many literary devices throughout
his career and they are a key importance when it comes to delivering his
work well. As already stated, this monologue is written in very standard

Iambic Pentameter. With this being said, rhyming is very common throughout
the speech. This literary device helps the monologue to flow in a very
musical way. It is also very intentional and not something that should be
ignored while performing this piece. Another literary device used in this
piece is lists. Whenever a list is used in Shakespeare, it is an excuse to grow
in importance after every comma. This gives the actor or actress the ability
to raise their pitch/ volume and add character to the piece while building
vocally and emotionally. In this monologue in particular, the lists are used as
an insult and as an attention grabber. By raising your voice with each
passing thought, the listeners are engaged and are truly comprehending
what you are saying. One of the final literary devices used throughout the
monologue is antithesis. Antithesis is commonly known as this versus that/
opposites. This literary device is used to heighten the actual idea of the
piece. This monologue offers a lot of different literary rules and places to
play. I look forward to working on this piece and developing/growing this
character through different varieties of tone, pitch, tempo, and much more!

Works Cited
Library, University Of Virginia. "Skip Directly to." The Complete Works of William Shakespeare:
Reprinted from the First Folio. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Sept. 2016.
Schmidt, Alexander, and Gregor Sarrazin. Shakespeare Lexicon and Quotation Dictionary: A Complete
Dictionary of All the English Words, Phrases, and Constructions in the Works of the Poet. New
York: Dover Publications, 1971. Print.
Shakespeare, William, and R. Foakes A. A Midsummer Night's Dream. Cambridge: Cambridge UP,
1984. Print.