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Minwoo Kim

ENGH 201

Prof. Melissa

2019.09.14

Literary Device Analysis #1

Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream represents a tragic love in the relationshi

p among main characters. By using a magical object, the author are giving both happy and sad

ending about the love in his play. In A Midsummer Night’s Dream, there are many literary de

vices such as metaphor, alliteration, exposition, and simile. Among them, I am interested in si

mile. Simile, in my opinion, is a simple way for author to indicate and for readers to grasp the

circumstance of story as well as characters’ conditions, appearance, way to talk, and even beh

aves. For this reasons, using simile is one of the most significant literary devices in his play fo

r both him and readers ; Shakespeare can directly express the situation going on as well as obj

ects, while readers can easily understand and imagine what he wants to say.

One line in his play, Helena tells “Than to be used as you use your dog” to Demetrius

(Shakespeare 2.1. 210). In this sentence, Shakespeare using simile, readers can easily seize ho

w much Helena loves him and also what situation Helena is presented between their relations

hip. In detail, reading her speech, readers can get Helena’s one-direction love and how she car

es him even she wants to be treated as a dog. Unlike metaphor, simile has specific comparativ

e words like ‘as’, ‘like’, or ‘if’. By using these words, readers can fully understand the circum

stances of them and Helena’s wants. If Shakespeare uses metaphor instead of simile, readers

might misunderstand the story or situation between them. This is because, in my thought, met

aphor has sort of symbolizing meaning. For example, if there is a sentence ‘He is a tree’. Peop

le would think of it in several ways such as he is big, he is reliable and so on. However, if the
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author uses simile ‘he is tall like a tree’, readers can exactly get what he is saying as well as i

magine how tall he is. For this reason, by Shakespeare’s use of simile, readers can easily dra

w how much Helena loves Demetrius and exactly understand the situation among them.

In conclusion, by utilizing simile, Shakespeare gives more direct expression of the circ

umstance in the play and also the characters’ thinking. In addition, simile helps readers to full

y understand them and grasp what the play or scene represents. As mentioned above, I think si

mile is the easiest way to present a certain situation or objects as well as to make readers to fu

lly follow the scene.

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Work Cited

Shakespeare, William. “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” The Complete Works of

William Shakespeare. Massachusetts Institute of Technology,

http://shakespeare.mit.edu/midsummer/index.html.