'A Midsummer Night's Dream' and 'The Tempest' in the mirror of changing critical approaches

Thesis (M.A.) from the year 2007 in the subject American Studies - Comparative Literature, grade: gut, University of Dusseldorf "Heinrich Heine", language: English, abstract: Shakespeare is one of the most analysed and ¿criticised¿ poet in the history

of literature. Why Shakespeare? The answer is easy. He is not only most

analysed but also the most popular dramatist that has ever existed.

Shakespeare¿s drama has been fascinating his audience and readers through the

centuries. The plots of Shakespeare¿s drama seem to be simple, dealing with

human and social themes like love, marriage, murder, intrigue, complot and

revenge. On a first sight, they remember us of a good and entertaining

Hollywood Film. But is this all what Shakespeare has to say through his

drama? Did he really intend to write commercial plays, without giving a deeper

sense to his literary work? I don¿t think so. I think Shakespeare achieved

through his ¿simple¿ plots to get deeply into the minds and souls of his

audience, in order to make them conceive the complexity of their own lives and

feelings. I do not intend to find out his personal message in the drama or to

interpret his intentions. I will rather concentrate on his work and try to find out,

what kind of message Shakespeare¿s comedy transmitted to his audience and

above all to his experienced readers, better said, to his literary critics. My paper

shall reveal the complexity and the deep psychological meaning of

Shakespeare¿s comedy. Returning to my first question why Shakespeare? I

would like to answer it, by quoting one of my favourite critics, Northrop Frye:

¿For all that has been written about it, Shakespearean comedy still seams to me widely misunderstood and underestimated, and my main thesis, that the four romances are the inevitable and genuine culmination of the poet¿s achievement, is clearly less obvious to many than it is to me.¿ 1

I consider Frye¿s assumption on Shakespearean comedy the adequate answer to

my question. In this paper I intend to seek the deep sense of A Midsummer

Night¿s Dream and The Tempest, by posting them in a mirror of changing critical approaches, beginning with the mythological view, continuing with the

political and new critical perspective and ending with my personal notes. My

main purpose in this paper is to demonstrate that Shakespeare¿s comedy does

not only have a delighting function but also exercises a deep psychological

impact on the old and new generations. In my opinion he was not only a genius

of the drama, but also an initiator of the renaissance of mythical and archaic

values in the modern world.