A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare There are so many references to "eyes" in "A Midsummer Night's Dream" that you would expect there was a solid and coherent reason for their appearance. However, this does not appear to be the case. In fact, the images associated with eyes are so varied and change so frequently that it is virtually impossible to define what they represent. This difficulty reflects the problem of distinguishing between what is real and what is illusion - a central theme of the work. Confusion and misunderstandings abound in "A Midsummer Night's Dream." The chase of the lovers in the forest is perhaps the most obvious example. The clumsy performance of the "mechanics" in "Pyramus and Thisbe" is perhaps the most comical. However, at the beginning of the play, it is a misunderstanding between Aegeus and Hermia that threatens to throw the court into disarray. This particular misunderstanding revolves around Hermia's love for Lysander. Although Aegeus arranged for his daughter to marry Demetrius, it is Lysander who Hermia really wants to marry. However, Aegeus refuses to accept their marriage, threatening to impose the "ancient privilege of Athens" on his daughter (1.1.41) if she does not acquiesce to his original choice. While this would result in him being sent to a nunnery (or perhaps even executed), Egeus' opinion cannot be swayed. Her stubbornness leads Hermia to exclaim, "I would that my father would look but with my own eyes" (1.1.56). Clearly, Hermia believes that if her father could see Lysander in the same light as him, then he would quickly form a different opinion. of him. In this case, therefore, the eyes symbolize judgment. Theseus' answer to Hermia not only... half the paper... and, nor his heart to report what my dream was" (4.1.204-207). Here he confuses the senses in his attempt to grasp 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 and changing images of the eyes serve to represent this problem, adding to it in the process to the dreamlike quality of the work, it is perhaps 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. /It turns them into forms, and gives to the 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.W.W. Norton & Company,Inc., 1997. 814-861.