Lysander: A Tale of Sex, Marraige, and Wild Emotions

Lysander reads like an open book. His character's transparency and brutal honesty bring to light his objectives, goals, and several of his personality traits and attributes. His goals revolve around his desire for sex and for love. In Act I Scene I, his wants to marry Hermia, and they make plans to run away and be together. In the forest that evening, he tries to seduce Hermia, to know her in the biblical sense, but she staves him off. Reluctantly, he makes a bed for himself and goes to sleep. When he wakes up, he falls in love with Helena, but not because he is unsure of his love for Hermia. In actuality, Puck anointed his eyelids with love-in-idleness instead of Demetrius. His goals shift, and he wishes to marry and to know Helena, at one point even exclaiming, "And, all my powers, address your love and might to honor Helen and to be her knight." (Act 2, Scene 2, Lines 150-51) Eventually, Puck fixes his mistake, and he again wishes to be betrothed to Hermia.

Lysander's personality is a domineering one. He's a passionate, lustful, overbearing, blunt man, one whose harshness and clarity often causes the distress of those around him. In Act 2 Scene 2, his lust surfaces. While trying to seduce Hermia, he riddles, "One turf shall serve as pillow for us both; One heart, one bed, two bosoms, one troth." (2:2:47-8) Often times, passion accompanies lust; the same rings true for Lysander. "And run through fire I will for thy sweet sake... Where is Demetrius? O, how fit a word is that vile name to perish on my sword!" (2:2:109-13) This exclamation clearly conveys his passion for Helena, as an even-killed monotonous person would not offer to kill in the name of love. Although taking his offer seriously may be reading too literally, it still conveys a message. In addition to being lustful and passionate, Lysander also has a darker side: he can be overbearing and he can be blunt. "If thou lovest me, then steal forth thy father's house tomorrow night..." (1:1:165-66) This shows his overbearing side, as he is asking his love to forsake her family for him, a difficult choice to say the least. Finally, Lysander's bluntness often comes across as rude and deprecating, as evidenced here: "Get gone, you dwarf, you minimus of hind'ring knotgrass made, you bed, you acorn --" (3:2:346-48) He chooses to ignore the societal norm to keep his negative opinons about other people inside his head. Additionally, his way of speaking sheds some light as to his position in society.

Shakespeare barely lets his readers know anything about his characters. He uses indirect characterization, and shows you things about his characters without explicitly telling you. With the exception of the inclusion of Hermia's stature, we don't know how tall they are, the color of their hair, or their attractiveness (or lack thereof). Shakespeare also does not tell us about his characters' pasts. We have to rely on things like language and speech pattern to determine the characters' places in society. Lysander speaks in iambic pentameter, suggesting he has a relatively high place in society and has completed some form of higher education.

Lysander is not a particularly difficult character to understand. His emotions govern his life; his passion, lustfulness, overbearingness, and bluntness make up his personality. His goals revolve around fornication and marriage. In this way, he reinforces the male stereotype that men think about sex more than anything else. Lysander also speaks in iambic pentameter, which suggests he is educated and did not grow up in poverty.