There are so many references to "the eyes" in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" that one would expect there to be a solid and consistent reason for their appearance. However, this does not seem to be the case. Indeed, the images associated with the eyes are so varied, and shift so frequently, that it is practically impossible to define what it is they represent. This difficulty reflects the problem of distinguishing between what is real and what is illusion -- a central theme of the play.

Confusion and misunderstanding abound throughout "A Midsummer Night's Dream." The lovers' chase through the forest is perhaps the most obvious example. The "mechanicks'" bumbling performance of "Pyramus and Thisbe" is perhaps the most comic. However, as the play commences, it is a misunderstanding between Egeus and Hermia that threatens to throw the court into turmoil.

This particular misunderstanding revolves around Hermia's love for Lysander. Although Egeus has arranged for his daughter to wed Demetrius, it is Lysander that Hermia really wants to marry. However, Egeus refuses to ascent to their marriage, threatening to enforce on his daughter the "ancient privilege of Athens" (1.1.41) if she does not condescend to his original choice. Even though this would entail her entering a nunnery (or perhaps even being executed), Egeus' opinion cannot be swayed. His stubbornness leads Hermia to exclaim: "I would my father looked but with mine eyes" (1.1.56).

Clearly, Hermia believes that if her father could see Lysander in the same light as her, then he would quickly form a different opinion of him. In this instance, then, the eyes symbolize judgment. Theseus' response to Hermia not only develops this symbolism, but also points out the futility of Hermia's desire: "Rather your eyes must with his [Egeus'] judgment look" (1.1.57). Here, Theseus reminds Hermia that filial duty alone demands that she close her eyes to Lysander, and instead train her sight on the man her father deems more appropriate, i.e. Demetrius. This supposed power of the father's, to manipulate his daughter's actions, reflects Theseus' description of the "ideal" father-daughter relationship, in which he likens the daughter to "a form in wax" (1.1.49).

Not surprisingly, Hermia's inability to pull the heartstrings of her father drives her to despair. In expressing her anguish to Lysander, she advises him to look into "the tempest of [her] eyes" (1.1.131) for the source of her troubles. Here, rather than cold, clinical judgment, the eyes denote fiery, turbulent emotion. This shift in imagery can be seen to represent the contrasting character traits of Egeus and Hermia; and, on a broader level, man and woman.

Another shift in imagery takes place when Helena bemoans her inability to lure Demetrius away from Hermia, during which she compares the latter's eyes to "lodestars" (1.1.183). Here, Helena suggests that Hermia's eyes are a kind of light by which Demetrius' love is guided. This image is revived by Lysander when he informs Helena of his decision to flee from Athens with Hermia: "Tomorrow night, when Phoebe doth behold/Her silvery visage in the wat'ry glass/Through Athens gates have we devised to steal" (1.1.209-210, 213). In this instance, the moon, rather than the stars (the eyes), becomes a kind of nightlight by which love is guided.

Lysander's and Hermia's decision to quit Athens is not without its dangers. This sense of adventure is reflected in Hermia's farewell speech to Helena: "… in the wood/… Lysander and myself shall meet/And thence from Athens turn away our eyes/To seek new friends and stranger companies" (1.1.214, 217-219). In entering the wood, the lovers must return to nature, explore unfamiliar territories, and discover a new way of life. Here, once again, the eyes present a different image. This time, instead of judgment, passion, or guidance, they portray exploration and discovery. This image is furthered when one considers that, while the lovers are missing, the eyes of Athens presumably will be seeking them out.

However, the lovers, in their innocence, do not envisage any difficulties. This shortsightedness is born out of their love for each other; indeed, it could be said that their love deceives them. Deception is encountered again when Helena, in her frustration, postulates that "love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind" (1.1.234). Here, she suggests that love deludes the eyes, and makes them see things in a situation, or person, that they would not normally see. This is clearly the case when Titania, after having the "love juice" applied to her eyes, confesses to Bottom: "[Mine] eye [is much] enthralled to thy shape" (3.1.123). However, considering that Bottom has, by this time, been "translated" (3.1.105), the declaration is rendered totally absurd, and proves that the love juice has deluded Titania.

The fact that neither Titania, nor any of the lovers are aware that they are being deluded raises several interesting questions concerning love and its ability to deceive, and, more generally, about the distinction between reality and illusion. Significantly, it is the eyes that are most often centered upon as the medium through which deception is allowed to creep. For instance, the fact that the love juice is applied to "sleeping eyelids" (2.1.170) suggests that sight is the sense that is most often relied upon to provide information about reality. The implication here is that illusions (or dreams, which occur during sleep) are normally separated from reality by virtue of what is seen when the "eyelids" are opened. Whether or not this is a reliable method of determining reality is a fundamental concern of the play.

For example, when Bottom boasts of his acting prowess, he predicts that his audience will be moved to tears if he "discharges" Pyramus: "If I do it, let the audience look to their eyes" (2.1.20). In saying this, he suggests that the audience will "look to their eyes" for confirmation of whether or not what they are seeing is real. However, a play, no matter how skillfully performed, is not real. Although, if it is able, as Bottom argues it is, to make people believe that what they are seeing is real, how is the act (or illusion) different from reality?

This question is raised once more when the "mechanicks" witness the "translated" Bottom for the first time. On seeing Bottom, the players "sever themselves…/As wild geese that the creeping fowler eye" (3.2.23, 20). Clearly, they rely on the evidence of their eyes for conformation of Bottom's transformation, even though, like a play, it is an illusion. Their eyes, however, tell them that it is real, and so they are deceived. Once again, the problem arises of how to separate reality from illusion by virtue of the eyes.

The suggestion seems to be that the characters of the play place too much emphasis on appearances. Helena, for example, repeatedly bemoans what she sees as her unattractive physical appearance, wishing that she could look more like Hermia: "Happy is Hermia…/For she has blessed and attractive eyes" (2.2.96-97). Her small-mindedness in these situations possibly reflects the shortsightedness of taking at face value what is seen with the eyes.

At least Helena is not alone in her shortsightedness. Indeed, it seems to be a prominent characteristic of the youths of the play; all four young lovers consistently display this "quality." For instance, prior to their escape from Athens, Lysander and Hermia fail to foresee the problems they eventually encounter. The debacle in the forest, and their subsequent return to the city, adequately convey the inaccuracy of their vision.

Demetrius demonstrates his shortsightedness in his pursuit of Hermia. Even though he is directly spurned by the object of his affection, his sights remain firmly set on her, to such an extent that Helena (whom he has, after all, made love to) never once receives "a sweet look from Demetrius' eye" (2.2.133). His "tunnel vision" is further emphasized when, still under the influence of the love juice, he completely reverses his opinion: "The object and the pleasure of mine eye/Is only Helena" (4.1.167-168). His confusion, and the confusion surrounding the lovers in general, is neatly summed up by Hermia when she declares, "Methinks I see things with parted eye/When everything seems double" (4.1.186-187).

Hermia's comment once again raises the problem of separating illusion from reality. In her case, the evidence of her eyes is not sufficient for her to prove whether or not the dreamlike events of the previous night have been real. The issue, it seems, is far too murky. As Hermia says: "Dark night… from the eye his function takes" (3.2.178). In other words, nighttime clouds the vision; objects lose their color, shape and definition; boundaries become blurred; the eye can no longer distinguish between things of vastly differing forms -- between what is real and what is illusion. In this way, the events played out in the forest by the four lovers are simply a metaphor for the whole problem of making this distinction.

It is left to Bottom, the play's most asinine character, to sum up the dilemma: "The eye of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not seen, man's hand is not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his heart to report what my dream was" (4.1.204-207). Here, he confuses the senses in his attempt to get a grip on reality, thus demonstrating the blurred boundary between reality and illusion.

Clearly, then, the eye alone cannot be trusted to provide adequate information about the nature of reality. The fluid, endlessly shifting imagery of the eyes serves to represent this problem, adding to the dreamlike quality of the play in the process. Possibly, it is left to the "poet's eye" (5.1.12) to make the distinction between reality and illusion: "The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen/Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing/A local habitation and a name" (5.1.15-17).
 
 

Works Cited
 

Shakespeare, William. "A Midsummer Night's Dream." The Norton Shakespeare. Ed. Stephen Greenblatt. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1997. 814-861.