2020-2021学年人教版（2019）选择性必修第一册导读莎翁经典：仲夏夜之梦 学案.docxVIP

选择性必修一 导读莎翁经典：仲夏夜之梦 导读莎翁经典：仲夏夜之梦（上） A Midsummer Night’s Dream By the light of the moon, a group of youths sneak into the woods, where they take mind-altering substances, switch it up romantically and brush up against creatures from another dimension. “A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream” sees Shakespeare get psychedelic-and the result is a treat in the theatre and on the page. First performed in the 1590’s, this play is one of Shakespeare’s friskiest works, filled with trickery, madness and magic. Set over the course of one night, Midsummer progresses at a rollicking pace. The plot is structured around patterns of collision and dissolution, where characters from different worlds are thrown together and torn apart. Shakespeare uses these patterns to mock the characters’ self-obsession and question authority with a comic twist. The action is set in Ancient Greece, but like many of Shakespeare’s plays, it reflects his contemporary concerns. The magical setting of the woods at night disrupts the boundaries between separate groups with bizarre results. Here, the bard plays with the rigid class system of his own time, taking three distinct groups and turning their society upside-down in a world where no mortal is in control. The play opens with young Hermia, raging at her father Egeus and Theseus, the king of Athens, who have forbidden her to marry her lover Lysander. Hermia has no interest in her father’s choice for her of Demetrius—but her best friend Helena definitely does. Furious at their elders, Hermia and Hysander elope under cover of darkness, with Demetrius in hot pursuit. This is further complicated by Helena’s decision to follow the all into the woods, in the hope of winning Demtrius’s heart. At this point, the woods are getting crowded, as the lovers are sharing the space with a group of “rude mechanicals”—a troupe of workers drunkenly rehearsing a play, led by the jovial Nick Bottom, unbeknownst to them, the humans have entered into the world of the fairies. Despite