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Who Is Puck In A Midsummer Night's Dream

671 Words3 Pages

Every story has an array of characters that serve multiple purposes: villains, heroes, comic relief, the underdog, protagonists, antagonists, lovers, and more. On the surface of A Midsummer Night's Dream, it is easy to say that Robin Goodfellow, Puck, exists solely for mischief. However, there is more depth to Puck than meets the eye. When we delve deeper into his purpose, we find that he is a supporting character whose mischief is in charge of moving the play along and creating the conflict and the resolution.
Though he undoubtedly causes the problems in each of the story lines, Puck is also the one who fixes them. At the end of the play, shortly before the epilogue, Puck remarks, "I'm sent with broom before, To sweep the dust behind the door" (Shakespeare, 264). As he is literally cleaning up the mess of the play in its entirety, he is symbolically alluding to the way he has corrected every error. This notion carries through in the production as Taymor has chosen to send Puck onto the stage without a broom. The lack of the physical broom brings more attention to the presence of the metaphorical broom.
The mishaps and tragedies that occur in Shakespeare's tragedies are a result of characters' actions, but in this particular play, the fault …show more content…

Early in the play, we hear Puck's reputation that proceeds him from one of Titania's fairies. Puck himself even affirms the claims and goes on to name his other antics, however, nowhere else in the play do we focus upon these games he plays. The only mischief Puck commits in the story is for Oberon and for the purpose of driving the play. It is necessary that Puck have these traits; his personality is what enables his actions. If Oberon's right-hand man was a boring fairy, he might not be willing to comply with Oberon's wishes of medaling with the elements. This would eliminate the entirety of the

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