Friday, June 27, 2014

How does Egeus bring his daughter and her two suitors to Theseus? What does Egeus expect from him?

Egeus goes before Theseus because his daughter is refusing to marry the man that he has chosen for her. Demetrius, his choice, accompanies him to plead his case, and Lysander and Hermia also arrive to beg Theseus to let them be married instead. Egeus is doing this as a formality: he knows that he's right, the law is on his side, he can have his daughter marry whomever he chooses. Because Hermia is being obstinate...

Egeus goes before Theseus because his daughter is refusing to marry the man that he has chosen for her. Demetrius, his choice, accompanies him to plead his case, and Lysander and Hermia also arrive to beg Theseus to let them be married instead. Egeus is doing this as a formality: he knows that he's right, the law is on his side, he can have his daughter marry whomever he chooses. Because Hermia is being obstinate he needs Theseus, as the duke, to give official approval for Egeus to take the next step: to force her to submit to marriage with Demetrius or to be executed. It is actually a capital crime in Athens to defy your father in this way. He arrives confident of a ruling in his favor.


What he doesn't expect is for Theseus to offer her a third choice and to give her time to think it over: in addition to either marrying Demetrius or being executed, option three is she can become a nun and cloister herself away for the rest for life. Egeus is not pleased to have judgment deferred in this way, but we should be, because if she hadn’t been given time to decide, there’d be no play.

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