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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Taming_of_the_Shrew

<>-Alchin, Linda K. “Elizabethan Marriages and Weddings.” Elizabethan Era, http://www.elizabethan-era.org.uk/elizabethan-marriages-and-weddings.htm (6 diciembre 2012)

  Alchin, L.K. Elizabethan Women. <http://www.william-shakespeare.info/elizabethan-women.htm%20<http://www.william-shakespeare.info/elizabethan-women.htm>>

Webmaster: Copyright © 2006 ArticlesBase.com, Free Articles

Consulted:5 december 2012

<>-Alchin, Linda K. “Elizabethan Women.” Elizabethan Era, http://www.elizabethan-era.org.uk/elizabethan-women.htm (5 december 2012)

-Pérez Gallego, Cándido. “La relación padre-hija en Shakespeare.” En torno a Shakespeare, vol. II. Fundación Instituto Shakespeare, Valencia, 1992.

“Shakespeare, William.” Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica 2007 Ultimate Reference Suite. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, 2007.

▪Greenblatt, Stephen.The Norton Shakespeare: “Twelfth Night” . Ed. Stephen Greenblatt. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1997 (pages 1768-1821).

Google Book Search: Gayle Greene, Carolyn Ruth Swift Lenz, Carol Thomas Neely. The Woman’s Part: feminist criticism of ShakespeareHero with a Thousand Faces. Illini Books edition, 1983.

▪Gray, Timothy M. Twelfth Night . <www.variety.com/review/VE1117922229.html

Webmaster: Copyright © 2005 William Shakespeare info     

< http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Midsummer_Night%27s_Dream>

Bruce R. Smith,Pride, Politics and Prejudice,                                                                                                            

<http://www.shakespearetheatre.org/plays/articles.aspx?&id=163>

Donald Foster. Bottom, Titania, and sex. Shaksper, The Global Electronic Shakespeare Conference. 2005..http://www.shaksper.net/archives/1994/0537.html

Peralta, T. “The Taming of the Shrew” English 28: Shakespeare’s Plays. Cerritos

            College. Norwalk, CA, 1996.

Women and the History Plays http://www.engl.uvic.ca/Faculty/MBHomePage/ISShakespeare/Resources/Women/histories.html (5 december 2012)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelfth_Night

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Midsummer_Night’s_Dream

Shakespeare is one of the most important playwrights in the world.

He uses his plays to denounce some conditions of his period but with imagination using the comedy in order not to be condemned.

In these comedies I have analysed he pays attention to the conditions of women in Elizabethan period. He shows people how women are treated by men; he uses strong women who want to change their own fate in order to be equal. He uses different kind of female women to highlight the diverse position which women take part of, so we find women as Bianca and Helena who humiliated themselves and are submissive and other kind of women as Kate, Viola and Hermia who try to get the equality, and not to be dominated by men.

Women are considered merchandise for her family, they use them selling them to a man in order to achieve money or a great agreement related to possession of lands.

These conditions are not only related to marriage, they could not vote or have opinion at their own house.

Now, we are going to see the similitude and differences among these female characters:

‘There is only one happiness in life, to love and be loved.’ (Happiness quotes by George Sand.) But to achieve this love is not easy as many people think and two good examples of it are Viola and Helena who suffer about love.

Viola is disguised in Cesario and she works to Orsino with who she falls in love, she always thinks before act, so her love is silent. One day, Orsino send her to pretend in his figure to Olivia, but suddenly the lady falls in love with her (she obviously thinks Viola is a man).

I cannot love him: let him send no more; Unless, perchance, you come to me again, To tell me how he takes it. Fare you well:I thank you for your pains: spend this for me.’

(Olivia, Twelfth night, Act 1, scene 5)

Viola suffers because being a man (to get costume in order to be a man is not because she want to disguise as a game but in order to be saved because in this period a woman cannot be alone without a man) she cannot express her feelings to Orsino, she tries to show her love using her words, saying that a mysterious girl loves him.

A blank, my lord. She never told her love, But let concealment, like a worm i’ the bud, Feed on her damask cheek: she pined in thought,
And with a green and yellow melancholy She sat like patience on a monument, Smiling at grief. Was not this love indeed? We men may say more, swear more: but indeed
Our shows are more than will; for still we prove Much in our vows, but little in our love.

(Viola,Twelfth Night, Act 2, scene 4)

She takes the costume because she can go around the city without any worry about to be jailed or to join to any man she does not want, so she can enjoy the condition of being man. The disguise becomes an instrument for women to put them at the same social level as men.

There is a close resemblance between Helena and Viola. Helena suffers due to the love she feels to Demetrius. Demetrius rejects her and she has to face it but she still showing her feelings.

The more you beat me, I will fawn on you: Use me but as your spaniel, spurn me, strike me, Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave, Unworthy as I am, to follow you.

(Helena, Midsummer’s Night Dream, act 2 scene 1)

Both of the two loves, are bad, because the silent love of Viola is killing her little by little and the Helena one is painful.

Other similitude we find in these two characters is that they are involved in a love triangle. Viola as Cesario loves Orsino but Orsino loves Olivia and this last character loves Cesario.

My master loves her dearly,

And she, mistaken, seems to dote on me.

What will become of this?

In A Midsummer’s night Dream is similar Helena loves Demetrius who loves Hermia who loves Lysander. In the first one the problem begins when Viola disguise as a man, Cesario, and in the second one when Puck uses the liquid to charm people.

As I said in the previous paragraphs, the freedom of a woman depends on her social range, that means that women from a high classes could take lesson privately at her homes, we can see this fact in The turn of Shrew where Kate and Bianca take lesson of Latin, music and art at their home, his father takes care about their education, but only an education in language and art, not sciences. The women from low classes do not receive any kind of education, the only important thing for them to learn is how to keep clean a house and keep her husband happy.

Helena and Hermia represent the classical aspiration of women from this period because both of them want to be married. The only difference with the rest of the women of this period is that they want to live all their life with the men they are completely loved, in this period we have to take into account that it is so difficult because women do not choose but their father do it for their in order to get some political and economic advantages.

They get their freedom when they finally decide which one is going to be their choice, which is possible because all the play is like a dream.

Another difference is that Viola does not have a submissive character toward men, but Helena is submissive toward Demetrius, she is able to do what Demetrius wants in order to get his love.

Bianca as I said before she always obeys to her father or to any man. She is the perfect woman of this period; she is the Katherine’s sister and she marks the difference between them, making Katherina as a strong woman, but Katherine does not want to follow the women patron and she does not obey men, so she is disobedient, she does not take into account the opinion or rules of her father, she wants to be loved and to love the man she chooses. She finally changes her opinion because she finds a man who respects her behavior and tries to show her that her aggressive behavior is not the correct, at the end of the play she is an obedient Elizabethan woman.

In contrast with all the women that submit the power of men, we find Titania who never obeys any man figure, when she falls in love with Bottom; she has power over him telling him to stay in the wood with her.

Out of this wood do not desire to go:
Thou shalt remain here, whether thou wilt or no.
I am a spirit of no common rate;
The summer still doth tend upon my state;
And I do love thee: therefore, go with me;

(Titania, A Midsummer’s Night Dream, act III scene I, lines 73-77)

The rivalry between women can be reflected in the plays The Taming in the Shrew and A Midsummer’s Night Dream, in the characters Kate and Bianca and the other couple of women are Titania and Hippolyta. The first couple as I said before they are sisters and Kate is the complete opposite of Bianca at the time the first one is nonconformist and the second one is obedient. The second couple, both of them are queens, the first one is from the fairyland and the other one is the queen of the Amazons, who was to leave her thoughts in order to pleasure her husband Theseus.

“The Amazons is a mythological society where only women could take part and men are excluded. According to Montrose “Amazonian mythology seems symbolically to embody and to control a collective anxiety about the power of the female not only to dominate or reject the male but to create and destroy him. It is an ironic acknowledgement by an androcentric culture of the degree to which men are in fact dependent upon women: upon mothers and nurses, for their birth and nurture; upon mistresses and wives, for the validation of their manhood.” (Montrose 1996: 108)

The patriarchal society could be seen as well in the relation between Katherine and her father, who choose for her who is going to marry her and Hermia and her father who have the same kind of relation, the parental conditions are primary to other kind of relation.

There are different female characters in the plays of Shakespeare that are clever, wit and sarcasm with their condition of being a woman.

Thanks to the play we see through them how these women have a mental capacity which is not less than the men one, and sometimes it could be superior.

The development of that female characters break down with the associated rules that women carry on, that means, they do not follow the passive role. Shakespeare give them some tools in order to express themselves using the disguise technique and the humour to help them to feel themselves free, and deny the power they suffer by men.

These female characters finish becoming wives because Shakespeare do not have to forget the Elizabethan patrons of live in order to pleasure the public, for not to be named as heretic or revolutionary.

Finally, these women are married happily with the man they want instead of being imposed on them by their fathers

To show how Shakespeare reflects the society of this period, I am going to talk and compare them the following plays:

–          The Taming of the Shrew

–          Twelfth Night

–          A Midsummer’s  Night Dream

Using these plays, I am going to talk about the submission of women in this time by men. So, I am going to focus on the main female characters of each play to reinforce the affirmation above named.

In this paper, we are going to find the different oppression women have to suffer like the social one, the father one and the marriage oppression.

In the first play The Taming of the Shrew, who is the most important play at the time to reflect the strong battle between the two genders we find two characters Katherine and Bianca.

Katherine, well known as Kate, is a strong woman, she is the daughter of a rich man of Padua his name is Baptista. Katharina is a different woman, because she does not have any kind of problem to get a man and be married but she does not want to have anyone. She does not have the strength to obey his father’s desires; she wants to be completely free. She suffers due to her sister and her father.

Not only is Kate unhappy because of her father’s oppression and willingness to sell her to the highest bidder, she is jealous of his treatment of her sister Bianca (Tillyard, 78).

Bianca, who is the contrary of her sister, is the perfect woman in this society. She is loved by all men, because she is obedient, she is the favourite one of her father, because she does not reject any rule proclaimed by her father.

She is so intelligent so she does not want any man, until she meets Petrurchio she always feel angry and she thinks she is not valuated as a clever woman.

A little summary of this play: the story takes play in Italy, Kate belongs to a rich family, she has a sister who is desirable by all men, she is the opposite, and she does not want any man. Bianca has a lot of men around her, but she falls in love with one who disguise as a teacher in order to stay closer to her, there is another candidate who invent a plan to get the Bianca’s love, because Kate and Bianca’s father says that he will permit her little sister be married when the old one get a man who wants to get married. So the second contestant suggests Petrurchio to get Kate’s love. Finally, Kate valuates Petrurchio because she understands her and she tries to show her how she acts violently and showing her this behaviour is not going to help her in her situation. So, once Kate is married, Bianca have the possibility to get married, she will get the one she wants because her father want him too, because he has offered lots of money.

In the second play we find the female character of Viola who is a young woman who belongs to the high class, she has a twin brother called Sebastian, she lives with him, but after a ship accident they are separated, she thinks he is dead. She disguises herself into a man in order to avoid to be controlled by someone or maybe be killed because she does not have any one to protect her as a woman. The name she takes as a man is Cesario. Finally, she falls in love with Orsino, Illyria’s Duke, but she cannot tell him until the end.

A brief summary: two twins brother who are separated after a ship accident. Each other believe that the other is dead. Viola disguises as Sebastian using the name Cesarino her brother to be saved and to be alone and free. She works as a servant to Orsino and she falls in love with him. Orsino order her to go to pretend Olivia in order to get a date, but Olivia falls in love with Cesarino, because she does not know Cesarino is a woman. Finally, Sebastian comes back and Olivia believes he is Cesarino and gets married to him and Orsino discovers the real identity of Viola and they get married.

The last play has as female characters Helena and Hermia.

Hermia is from the high class of the city of Athens, she is forced to leave her lover Lysander in order to obey her father and get married to Demetrius, the one chosen by her father.  She decides in order to escape getting away from the Athens Law to the forest in which she feels free.

Helena is from the high class as well, but she feels unconfident with herself, she feels she is not as beautiful as Hermia. She is in love with Demetrius but he does not love her, so her feelings are killed her slowly. She is seeking for a husband, get married and be happy as people suppose women do.

A brief summary of this play is: there are two couples of young lovers who want to be together, but the main problem is the decision of Egeus, Hermia’s father, which consist of the choice of who is going to get married, he only base on the money the contestant gives him, so the true lover of Hermia is not chosen. Anyway, the couple decide to go away to the forest where with the other couple (Demetrius who loves Hermia and Helena who loves Demetrius) suffer a charmed realized by Puck, the other subplot is done by Titania and Oberon, queen and king of fairyland, they have an argument but finally they solve it.

As I said in the previous paper, Elizabethan period was a period full of prejudices to women.

The stereotypical images were very marked for men and women.  Women born in order to be wives and look after their husbands, children and home and when they are outside them they have to be with a man, and men to be served and govern their own life and take any decision related to their wives.

So, women were controlled by men; they have to accept any rule of them. Men work and bring money to home while women stay at home keeping it clean, so we are talking about a patriarchal society.

In fact, women have problems with the law, they do not have the opportunity to vote if they are the oldest inherit at their homes they do not have the chance to have the money if they have a brother although he is younger than them.  Although it seems that the marriage is the worst option for women, it is not true at all, in fact it is the best option because if they are not married they have just two options, the first one is to be a nun and the other is to be a domes tic servant.

Men have the supremacy over women. They do not have freedom to choose what they want or do.  People expect of women to be faithful. According to John Knox, a Scottish protestant leader, “Women in her greatest perfection were made to serve and obey man.”

Women cannot heir the wealth of her father they only can keep the money to give it to her future husband. A woman depends on the social class she belongs, because it is not the same to be from the high class instead of the lower classes.

This paper consists in an analysis about three plays written by Shakespeare. The first one is A Midsummer’s Night Dream, the second one Twelfth Night and the third one The taming of the Shrew.

I have chosen these plays to highlight the women condition in this time through the plays written by William Shakespeare.

First of all, I want you to put in context, so we are going to read about the Elizabethan women conditions.

Secondly, about the female characters of these plays in order to know why they are difference from other female characters of others plays, and the Shakespeare intention to give voice women in order to denounce their condition.

Then, we are going to learn about the similitude and the difference between these female characters.

The play narrates the troubles that two young couples have at the time to be married when Hermia is obligated to get married to Demetrius instead of her true love Lysander, because her father chooses him by her.  Other kind of submission is found inside the relationship between the Duke Theseus of Athens and Hippolyta, who is an Amazon warrior. Theseus has recently conquered and brought back to Athens to be his bride. The play finishes with the weeding of this couple. To celebrate people have found the four lovers, they decided to share their wedding ceremony with the two young couples: Hermia and Lysander, Helena and Demetrius, who have gone away into the forest to escape the Athenian law.

It was a law in the city of Athens which gave to its citizens the power of compelling their daughters to marry whomsoever they pleased; for upon a daughter’s refusing to marry the man her father had chosen to be her husband, the father was empowered by this law to cause her to be put to death; but as fathers do not often desire the death of their own daughters, even though they do happen to prove a little refractory, this law was seldom or never put in execution, though perhaps the young ladies of that city were not infrequently threatened by their parents with the terrors of it.

(Athens law from wikipedia )

However, in the representation of marital life, women are in other category because women are sometimes humiliated in order to prove the power which men rule. One example could be the struggle between Oberon and Titania, other example is Hippolyta who was a warrior and she has to change her behavior to please her husband who has the dominant role in the relationship.

It shown that the story takes place in a patriarchal society not only with the relation which I have mentioned before but with the act in which Egeus’ rule about with which one his daughter has to married, “choose love by another’s eyes” (act I, scene 1). Egeus offers her to Demetrius in order to show him the good predisposition he has. She wants to be free to choose the man who loves, in this case, that man is Lysander. That means that Elizabethan Period was ruled by the domination of men over women, the latter do not have an inner opinion upon their life. They have merely to obey them. So, the play is a rebellion by women, as you can see in the person of Hermia who runs away from the ones who try to dominate her, she reveals men in order to choose between two contestants, the first one Lysander is her love, the second one has not her love, but he is the one who has chosen her father for her.. His father abuse her, he uses bad words to refer her as a “cat”, “vile thing”, “dwarf”, “minimus” and “acorn”.

Another fact that helps me to show the man domination is that Theseus is the law, so he forces her to choose between obeying his father, who gives her the life, or to be alone.

She tries to solve the problem going away into the forest with Lysander, because as we will see, the forest is a allegorical, non-real world in which a social institution which belongs to real world cannot happen.

However, the election of Hermia, the resistance done by Hyppolyta and the argument between Titania and Oberon constitute disobedience to the patriarch and all punished for it.

Other female character who has an important role is Helena. She is a young girl from Athen as well, she is friend of Hermia and she is in love with Demetrius, the one who is chosen to be the Hermia’s husband by Egeus. She feels she is ugly and unattractive, so she says that she does not have any opportunities to get Demetrius’ love, she does not valuate her body, so we notice that in The Elizabethan Period, beauty was an important tool to be a successful woman. Helena suffers a difficult situation because she has to face Demetrius’ rejection almost the whole play.

I love thee not, therefore pursue me not. Where is Lysander and fair Hermia?’

(Demetrius, A Midsummer’s Night Dream)

 Helena is so lovesick that she is blind.

The more you beat me, I will fawn on you: Use me but as your spaniel, spurn me, strike me, Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave, Unworthy as I am, to follow you. What worser place can I beg in your love,– And yet a place of high respect with me,–Than to be used as you use your dog ’

(Helena, A MidSummer’s Night Dream)

So when Demetrius and Lysander fall in love with her, because of Pucks’ potion, she thinks they are mocking he showing she feels unconfident.  She could never come to her mind that two men could love and fight to get her love.

Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born? When at your hands did I deserve this scorn? Is’t not enough, is’t not enough, young man, That I did never, no, nor never can, Deserve a sweet look from Demetrius’ eye, But you must flout my insufficiency?’

(Helena, A Midsummer’s Night Dream)

Helena drags herself in order to achieve Demetrius’ love. She is sick of love so she tries to stay always closer to him and take the most out of being with him although she is strong to control her feelings over him, she will die for him and that is why she confesses the plan that Hermia and Lysander was dealing with.

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.’

(Helena, A Midsummer’s Night Dream)

She is using all the tools she possesses because she wants to show him she is the perfect one and Hermia does not love him and she does it to the extreme.

The last female character that shows us how the woman is considered in this period by men is Titania, the Queen of the Fairies and the wife of Oberon. She denies her husband Oberon the Indian prince, she suffers a charmed by Puck, who is advised by Oberon to punish her wife for not give him the prince, but after all Titania shows that she is the strongest woman in the play , she is powerful, she does not act as the typical submissive Elizabethan women.

OBERON

Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania.

TITANIA

What, jealous Oberon! Fairies, skip hence:
I have forsworn his bed and company.

(MND act II  scene I lines 61-63)

As Oberon describes her, Titania is a proud woman and authoritative, she acquires a passive attitude towards the persistent wishes of Oberon and does not succumb to his request for authority as her owner, her lord.

OBERON

Tarry, rash wanton: am not I thy lord?

TITANIA

Then I must be thy lady

During the enchantment, Titania as a proud and strong woman disappears to give way to a weak woman in love with an ass head Bottom. Finally she accepts the condition of her husband and she is not the strong woman we met at first. The final resolution of this war between Titania and Oberon reflects the conventional male-dominated society at the time.

To conclude, I have to say that this play shows the contrast between two places one of them ruled, the city of Athens and the second one which is non-ruled, completely freedom

To conclude with this paper, I have to recognize when I began this paper I had another different perspective about his play, I just thought it was a good plot, but now I can appreciate how Shakespeare worked hard in the composition of that magnificent play. How he uses the figure of a woman to highlight her condition in this period and creating a heroine in her time. He composed a deeply research about women. I have never thought before how Shakespeare shows that fact without call the attention of powerful men of this time in order not to be censored.

My favorite character is with any doubt Hermia, she is a woman who fight against the established rule which condemns her to get married to a man he does not love in order to be a good daughter for her father.

I think it is necessary the character of Helena, but I do not like her, because she is weak, she does not valuate herself, he only wants to be loved by the man she loves although she detests her and has bad attitude towards her. Women do not have any voice, and they have to serve men because they are considered inferior. The context of this period is full of reasons which justify this difference between women and men.

We could see the importance of marriage in this period in order to get some economics conditions or power conditions. But in this novel the true love overcomes all the problems.

Each detail has been thought in depth to make sense and to be connected with the whole play, the common Shakespearean characteristics are easy to find here.

I believe ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ is the most completely one, and it can be the best example to show these characteristics, especially the denunciation of women condition.

-Montrose, Louis Adrian. “A Midsummer Night’s Dream and the Shaping Fantasies of Elizabethan Culture: Gender, Power, Form” in Rewriting the Renaissance. Ed: Margaret Fergusun, Maureen Wuiling, Nancy Vickers. Chicago 1986: 65-87.

-Shakespeare, William. Shakespeare’s Comedy of A Midsummer-night’s Dream. Ed. William J. Rolfe. New York: American Book Company, 1903. Shakespeare Online. 20 Dec. 2009. (10/10/12) < http://www.shakespeareonline.com/plays/midsummer/mdsrolfe.html >.

-Mabillard, Amanda. Shakespeare’s Writing Style. Shakespeare Online. 20 Aug. 2000. (10/10/12) < http://www.shakespeare-online.com/faq/writingstyle.html >.

-J.L Styan. The English Stage: Drama and Performance. Shakespeare’s Practice. Cambridge University Press (1996). page 134

-J.L Styan. The English Stage. A history of drama and performance. Cambrige University 1996.

-Shakespeare’s Fairies: The Triumph of Dramatic Art. From Shakespeare’s Comedy of A Midsummer-night’s Dream. Ed. William J. Rolfe. New York: American Book Company.  http://www.shakespeareonline.com/plays/midsummer/mdsrolfe2.html

–Encyclopedia Britannica site

http://www.britannica.com/shakespeare/article-232322

-BBC Shakespeare Animated Tales- A Midsummer Night’s Dream- Part 1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Midsummer_Night’s_Dream

-Midsummer Night’s Dream- Part 1 (1999) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCZndWMALOo

-Supernatural in Shakespeare’s Plays

http://www.field-of-themes.com/shakespeare/essays/Esupernatural.htm

-Shakespearean Comedy

http://www.field-of-themes.com/shakespeare/essays/Ecomedy.htm

-The Artists of Fairies World

http://www.fairiesworld.com/famous-fairies/titania.shtml

-Characterization in Shakespeare Comedies

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&ved=0CCsQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fmural.uv.es%2Fayanoglu%2FGROUP%2520PAPER%25202%2520-%2520CORREGIDO.doc&ei=Qbt1UPbQA6Oi0QWwtoGYAg&usg=AFQjCNGUQLRBjfSzT5yGZwY68JLbnOLHqg&sig2=8N4UXpBHLLSNzVYhLZj0aQ

-Athens law from wikipedia  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Greek_marriage_law

-A Midsummer Night’s Dream

http://www.field-of-themes.com/shakespeare/essays/Emidsummer.htm

-Origin of characters’ name:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egeus

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oberon

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisandro

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demetrius_(Shakespeare)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titania

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theseus

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hippolyta

-Biography of William Shakespeare from Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Shakespeare

– http://mural.uv.es/abordel/GP2.pdf

 “William, Shakespeare: Romantic comedies” 2006 Encyclopedia Britannica. 4 Diciembre 2012<http://www.britanicca.com/shakespeare/article>

“Titania” From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. last modified 01:34, 4 Diciembre 2012  http://en.wikipedia.org/

Emily Squyer, The Feminist Subtext of Shakespeare’s Leading Ladies. 4 Diciembre 2012 <http://www.wsu.edu/~delahoyd/shakespeare/sample5.html>

A Midsummer Night’s Dream has as a theme the love, which is the central topic of all the Shakespeare’s comedies.

First of all, I want to explain the background of this period, well known as Elizabethan Period, in particular the view point about sex difference.

In every play written by William Shakespeare we can notices the supremacy of men over women. This play obeys of course this patron, women do not have right to decide what they want to say or do, they are not free. People expect of them to be faithful to their fathers, husbands and brothers, it means to men.

The identity of a woman fringed upon that of her husband; in fact, the woman was seen as an extension of the man. Women were “objects of male desire and dependent on that desire for their status, livelihood even their lives” (Newman, 7). The handbooks urged them against any opposition to their husband; they were to accept their husband as teacher and master. One woman perceived men as having an active role in maintaining women’s virtue: “Eue was a good woman before fhe met with the Serpent, her daughters are good Virgins if they meet with good Tutors” (Sowernam, A3). This reflected the patriarchal influence of Renaissance society, as respecting and obeying the husband or father was parallel to respecting and obeying the king. Obedience was one of the most important virtues a woman could display: “Obedience is better then Sacrifice: for nothing is more acceptable before God then to Obey”(Women and the History Plays, Sowernam, 9)