The
Lunatic, the Lover and the Poet
William Shakespeare
Introduction
to the Poet
William
Shakespeare (1564–1616) has been universally acknowledged as one of the
greatest figures in the world of letters. Born on 23rd April, 1564 at
Stratford-on-Avon, a town in Warwickshire, England, Shakespeare became the most
popular playwright of the Elizabethan Age. Apart from writing famous ragedies
like Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello and King Lear and equally famous comic plays like
As You Like It, The Merchant of Venice, The Tempest, etc., Shakespeare wrote a
series of 154 sonnets, which were published together in 1609. While 126 of
these sonnets are addressed to an unknown friend called Mr.W.H.', 28 of them
revolve around a 'dark lady'. His plays as well as his sonnets exhibit an
exceptional understanding of life and a remarkable insight into the
complexities of human nature. Shakespeare was a gifted poet and a dramatist who
possessed, as Dryden rightly remarked, 'the largest and most comprehensive
soul'. Some of his plays also contain poems which will continue to give
pleasure to the readers through all ages.
Introduction
to the Poem
'The
Lunatic, The lover, and the Poet' is a passage taken from Shakespeare's play A
Midsummer -Night's Dream. These lines are spoken by Theseus, Duke of Athens, to
his betrothed Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons, in Act V, Scene i. A mad man, a
lover and a poet, the Duke explains, share the faculty of intense imagination,
which enables them to create and inhabit a world of fantasy. The poet emphasizes
the power of imagination in both transforming the ordinary into the
extraordinary and creating entirely new fanciful situations from almost
non-existent realities. Such imaginative constructs, the poet lightly observes,
remain the exclusive domain of lovers, poets and madmen, away from the
commonplace and the humdrum in ordinary mortal life. The lover for example,
sees 'Helen's beauty' in 'a brow of Egypt', while the poet has the creativity
to produce concrete shapes to 'airy nothing'. The lovers, poets and mad men are
generally away from the ordinary worldly life and remain in their own world of
imagination. The central idea of this poem is the power of imagination that
invents imaginary joys and fears from imaginary causes.
Explanation
of Important Passages
(Lines
1—5)
The
lunatic, the lover, and the poet,
Are
of imagination all compact.
One
sees more devils than vast hell can hold:
That
is, the madman; the lover, all as frantic,
Sees
Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt;
Word-meanings:
1. compact = made up; 2. vast = large; 3. brow = face; 4. frantic = insane,
wild, excited; 5. lunatic = brow of Egypt = a gypsy; the reference is to the
belief that the gypsies were of Egyptian origin.
Reference
to the Context: These lines have been taken from the poem 'The Lunatic, the
Lover and the Poet' written by William Shakespeare. This poem is an extract
from Shakespeare's play A Midsummer-Night's Dream. In this poem, the poet
brings out the similarity between a lunatic, a lover and a poet. This
similarity lies in the faculty of their imagination.
Explanation:
In these lines the poet says that a mad man, a lover and a poet are wholly made
up of imagination. One of them sees more devils than even the vast hell can
hold. He is a madman. The lover has an equally insane mind. He sees Helen's
beauty in the face of an Egyptian gypsy woman. There is no doubt that the
lunatic, the lover and the poet are highly imaginative persons. The lunatic
imagines shapes and figures which do not actually exist. Anyone who has ever seen
the behaviour of a lunatic would agree on this point. The lover too has his own
illusions. He thinks his beloved to be the most beautiful woman on earth,
though she may be a woman of average beauty. The poet too has his own
imagination. His imagination can soar to heights which even the imagination of
a lunatic or a lover cannot reach.
(Lines
6—11)
The
poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,
Doth
glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;
And,
as imagination bodies forth
The
forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns
them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing
A
local habitation and a name.
Word–meanings:
1. Frenzy = madness; 2. glance = look; 3. bodies forth = gives a shape to; 4.
airy
nothing = something that does not exist at all; 5. eye = the eye of
imagination.
Reference
to the Context: These lines have been taken from the poem 'The Lunatic, the
Lover and the Poet', written by William Shakespeare. This poem is an extract
from Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream. In this poem the poet brings
out the similarity between a lunatic, a lover and a poet. This similarity lies
in the faculty of their imagination.
Explanation:
In these lines the poet explains how the power of imagination works in a poet.
His imagination moves from heaven to earth and earth to heaven. By his power of
imagination the poet can give a name to the unknown things. He can give a
concrete shape even to imaginary and intangible things. Thus the poet has a
great gift of imagination. The eyes of a poet roll in a fine glow of
inspiration. They wander from heaven to earth, and from earth to heaven. Thus
they cover the entire universe. While the poet's eyes are rolling everywhere,
his imagination creates forms and shapes which are completely divorced from reality.
Then through his pen, the poet describes those forms and shapes in such a way
that they seem real to the reader.
(Lines
12—16)
Such
tricks hath strong imagination,
That,
if it would but apprehend some joy,
It
comprehends some bringer of that joy;
Or
in the night, imagining some fear,
How
easy is a bush suppos'd a bear!
Word-meanings:
1. apprehend = find, sense; 2. comprehends = grasps, perceives; 3. tricks =
arts; 4. Bringer = cause.
Reference
to the Context: These lines have been taken from the poem 'The Lunatic, the
Lover and the Poet' written by William Shakespeare. This poem is an extract
from Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream. In this poem the poet brings
out the similarity between a lunatic, a lover and a poet. This similarity lies
in the faculty of their imagination.
Explanation:
In these lines the poet says that a strong imagination has wonderful faculties.
If it invents some kind of joy, it can invent the cause of that joy also. If
one imagines some frightening object in the darkness of the night, even a bush
appears to be a bear to such a person. In these lines the poet tells us about the
power of imagination. According to him imagination is very powerful. It can
bring joy as well as fear. When an imaginative person finds joy, he imagines
the bringer of that joy also. At night, a man sees a bush. In his imagination,
he may take the bush to be a bear. Thus imagination can give both joy and fear
to a man.
Stanzas
for Comprehension
(Lines
1—5)
The
lunatic, the lover, and the poet,
Are
of imagination all compact.
One
sees more devils than vast hell can hold:
That
is, the madman; the lover, all as frantic,
Sees
Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt;
Questions
1.
What is the similarity between the lunatic, the lover and the poet?
2.
What does the lunatic/madman see?
3.
What does the lover think about his beloved?
4.
Who was Helen?
5.
How does the poet compare the lover with the lunatic?
6.
What does the poet mean by 'a brow of Egypt'?
Answers
1.
They are all led by intense imagination.
2.
The madman sees more devils than the vast regions of hell can hold in his
imagination.
3.
He thinks she is as beautiful as Helen of Troy.
4.
She was said to be the most beautiful woman in the world. She was the wife of
the king of Sparta but
ran
away with the Prince of Troy.
5.
The poet says that the lover's imagination is as frantic as that of the
lunatic.
6.
By 'a brow of Egypt' the poet means an Egyptian Gypsy girl.
(Lines
6—11)
The
poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,
Doth
glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;
And,
as imagination bodies forth
The
forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns
them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing
A
local habitation and a name
Questions
1.
Name the source of the poem?
2.
What has been said about the poet's eye?
3.
What does the poet's imagination do?
4.
What does the poet's pen do?
5.
What is meant by 'airy nothing'?
Answers
1.
This poem has been taken from Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream.
2. The poet's eye has
a fine glow of inspiration. It rolls from the sky to the earth, and from the
earth to the sky.
3.
The poet's imagination gives concrete shape to things that are unknown or
non-existent.
4.
The poet's pen describes the imaginary forms and shapes in such a way that they
seem to the reader as
realities.
5.
By 'airy nothing' means something that is non-existent and purely imaginary.
(Lines
12—16)
Such
tricks hath strong imagination,
That,
if it would but apprehend some joy,
It
comprehends some bringer of that joy;
Or
in the night, imagining some fear,
How
easy is a bush suppos'd a bear!
Questions
1.
What happens when the imagination apprehends some joy?
2.
When does the imagination mistake a bush for a bear?
3.
Does the imagination always lead to joys only?
4.
What do the following words mean in the given lines:
a.
tricks
b.
bringer
5.
Who is the writer of these lines?
Answers
1.
When the imagination apprehends some joys, it can invent the cause of that joy
also.
2.
In the darkness of the night, the imagination mistakes a bush for a bear.
3.
No, the imagination leads to fears also.
4.
(a) Tricks—(devices and arts) – A strong imagination has wonderful tricks. It
can invent joys in life.
(b)
Bringer—(cause) – A strong imagination can invent the cause of joys.
5.
Shakespeare is the writer of these lines.
Short-Answer
Questions
Q.
1. In what respect are the lunatic, the poet and the lover alike?
Ans.
The lunatic, the poet and the lover, all have intense imagination. The poet
says that the lunatic in
his
imagination sees so many devils that even hell cannot hold. The lover's
imagination is also very
strong.
With his power of imagination, a lover finds Helen's beauty in every beautiful
woman. And
a
poet's eye of imagination rolls from heaven to earth and from earth to heaven.
His pen gives
concrete
shape to things that are unknown or completely non-existent. In this way the
lunatic, the
lover
and the poet are alike.
Q.
2. Give Shakespeare's account of the power of imagination?
Ans.
Shakespeare says that imagination is very powerful. It can bring joy as well as
fear. When a person
finds
joy, he imagines the bringer of joy also. At night, a man may imagine a bush to
be a bear and
may
become afraid of it. For example, a mad man will see devils all around him. A
lover will see
Helen's
beauty in his beloved's face. A poet will give concrete shape to unknown or
non-existent
things.
Thus the power of imagination makes unreal things look real.
Q.
3. How does Shakespeare describe a poet's power of imagination?
Ans.
The poet's imaginative eye has the fine glow of inspiration. It rolls from
heaven to earth and from
earth
to heaven. It can visualize each and every corner of the universe. The poet's
imagination gives
concrete
shape to things unknown or things that are non-existent. Then his pen describes
them in
such
a manner that they seem to the reader as real things.
Essay
Type Question
1.
Give a critical analysis of the poem: 'The Lunatic, the Lover and the Poet'
OR
Outline
the development of the central idea of the poem.
Ans.
'The Lunatic, the Lover and the Poet' is a poem taken from Shakespeare's play A
Midsummer
Night's
Dream. These lines are spoken by Theseus, Duke of Athens, to his betrothed
Hippolyta,
Queen
of the Amazons, in Act V, scene i. A madman, a lover and a poet, the Duke
explains, share
the
faculty of intense imagination, which enables them to create and inhabit a
world of fantasy. The
poet
emphasizes the power of imagination in both transforming the ordinary into the
extraordinary
and
creating entirely new fanciful situations from almost non-existent realities.
Such imaginative
constructs,
the poet rightly observes, remain the exclusive domain of lovers, poets and
madman,
away
from the commonplace and the humdrum, in ordinary mortal life. The lover for
example, sees
'Helen's
beauty' in 'a brow of Egypt', while the poet has the creativity to produce
concrete shapes to
'airy
nothing'. The lovers, poets and mad men are generally away from the ordinary
worldly life and
remain
in their own world of imagination. The central idea of this poem is the power
of imagination
that
invents imaginary joys and fears from imaginary causes. The poet illustrates it
by giving the
examples
of the lunatic, the lover and the poet. He says that they are all made up of
imagination.
They
are led by their imagination entirely. For example, the madman sees devils all
around him.
The
lover sees Helen's beauty in the face of his beloved. And the poet 'gives to
airy nothing a local
habitation
and a name'. In other words, he describes his imaginary shapes and forms in
such a way
that
the reader takes them as truly real. Such is the power of strong imagination.
Thus imagination
is
a source of both joy and fear.
Objective
Type Questions
Q.
1. Who was Helen?
Ans.
Helen was a Greek lady. She was the most beautiful woman of Greece.
Q.
2. What is the similarity between the mad man, the lover, and the poet?
Ans.
They all have intense imagination.
Q.
3. How is the lover's imagination?
Ans.
The lover's imagination is frantic.
Q.
4. What does the lunatic see?
Ans.
The lunatic sees devils in his imagination.
Q.
5. What does the poet mean by 'a brow of Egypt'?
Ans.
By 'a brow of Egypt' the poet means an Egyptian gypsy girl.
Q.
6. What are the tricks of imagination?
Ans.
The imagination can give strange shapes to things.
Q.
7. What does imagination do in case of joy?
Ans.
It creates the bringer to that joy.
Q.
8. What does the lover see in the brow of his beloved?
Ans.
Helen's beauty
Q.
9. Who gives to airy nothing a local habitation and a name?
Ans.
The poet.
