『한여름 밤의 꿈』(A Midsummer Night’s Dream)에 나타난 사랑의 이율배반적 구조

Abstract

This essay examines the ways in which Shakespeare dramatizes the antinomic structure of love in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Starting from the assumption that love operates only in its antinomic structure of ‘absoluteness’ and ‘relativity,’ this essay aims to show that Shakespeare’s two young couples experience two irreducible nature of love simultaneously throughout the play. Specifically speaking, Shakespeare sets up a legal scene in which absolute love and relative love collide against each other, resulting in the illustration of the antinomic structure of love, given that a court is the best place for the opposing argument of love to be heard. Needless to say, Hermia and Lysander argue for absolute love because they pursue true love. They believe that love is neither replaceable nor negotiable under any circumstances. Rather, it requires only faithfulness in the form of mutual oath between lovers. Love even transcends law in its creation of a new law and a new world. Demetrius and Egeus cannot buy this claim because love is also a certain business deal on the basis of the rationality of economy. Love is no exception to law, another form of rationality, either. However, as the play goes on, Shakespeare demonstrates how each argument contradicts itself, especially through the wood scene in which the young couples go through the mispairings and reparings. Consequently the play seems to affirm that love is neither absolute nor relative, but rather it requires both of its nature at the same time.