Metaphors In A Midsummer Night's Dream

A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a play written by one of the greatest playwrights, William Shakespeare. Like almost all writers, Shakespeare uses a wide variety of literary elements to create the story’s components. A major literary element within A Midsummer Night’s Dream is metaphor. Merriam-Webster defines metaphor as “a figure of speech in which a word or phrase literally denoting one kind of object or idea is used in place of another to suggest a likeness or analogy between them” (Merriam-Webster, Incorporated). In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, William Shakespeare uses metaphor to refer to topics such as historical events, love, and the weather. Shakespeare stay true to the meaning of a metaphor and does not use “like” or “as”. For example, in Act 2, Scene 1, lines 124-127, Shakespeare

And sat with me on Neptune's yellow sands, Marking th’ embarkèd traders on the flood” (Shakespeare). William Shakespeare was born in Stratford, England on April 23, 1564 (Biography.com). Over half a century before his birth, England was involved in the notorious Spice Trade. This trade route was a key part in the British economy. British merchants established a trade route with India, in which they would trade spices for gold and vice versa. Many people became very wealthy in a relatively short amount of time, leading others to test the waters in this market. As the British economy began to rapidly increase, people had fantasies of growing rich and living a prosperous life. In the play, Queen Titania uses the metaphor “spicèd Indian air” to describe her time in India. India had become a land of hope and dreams for people due to the vast amount of economic success with the Spice Trade, making it seem fairytale-like. Shakespeare cleverly makes the Queen of the Fairies uses this metaphor so that he can portray the feeling of how India was. “Neptune's yellow sands”