The Changing Role of the Supernatural Essay

The progress of mankind can be traced through numerous different venues, not the least of which is humanity’s identification with and understanding of what constitutes the supernatural. These ideas of the supernatural are reflected in the way in which the various characters of various works produced in different time periods interact with the world of the supernatural as it relates to the self.

This tendency to explore these issues seems to come out during periods of greater social questioning, such as during periods of enlightenment and exploration in other areas. This occurred during the age of the ancient Greeks as they ruled the Mediterranean and appeared again during the Elizabethan age of Shakespeare. Great societal shifts were taking place in England during the 16^th and 17^th century, a period particularly influenced by the revival of arts and thinking that had started in Italy nearly 200 years earlier known as the Renaissance and repeated some of the enlightened attitudes that were characterized as being a part of the ancient Greeks.

To understand how these concepts have changed over time, it is helpful to trace the relationship between the self and the supernatural as it is revealed in the great works of history, such as Sophocles’ Oedipus the King and Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

In Sophocles’ Oedipus the King for instance, the supernatural is seen as a widespread public issue as all direction is taken from the Oracles who can purportedly see men’s fates. The Oracles’ prediction that Oedipus will kill his father and marry his mother sets him on his path to destruction. His natural parents first try to avoid fate by abandoning him. Then Oedipus runs away from his adoptive parents attempting to avoid his fate and not knowing his true parentage (Sophocles: 850-873).

He believes himself to have been successful, not only because he has not killed the man he considered his father (1110-1120), but because he had defeated the Sphinx’s question to win Thebes as well (390-480). This information serves as the base for his complex conspiracy theory behind Teiresias’ accusations that Oedipus is the reason for the plague. It is interesting to note that so many people attempted to avoid fate in this story.

Although they considered themselves to have bested the gods, each of these characters becomes the victim of divine justice as a result of their own determined defiance. Laius, the old king, decides to kill his own son to avoid prophecy by leaving him as an infant exposed to the elements, but Oedipus survives to kill him being raised by another king and therefore not knowing he is related to the man he meets on the road (Sophocles: 970-980). This ignorance is necessary for the prophecy to be fulfilled.

Likewise, Jocasta is willing to abandon her son to the elements but ends up unknowingly bearing his children. Finally, Oedipus himself only fulfils his prophecy in response to his defiance of them. How this is so is the particular focus of the play as he defies the wisdom of Teiresais (300-380), the possessor of supernatural knowledge, and brings on his own doom. “I may have just set myself under a dreadful curse without my knowledge!” (893-894). This suggests that while the supernatural ultimately dictates the order of things, the self is responsible for his or her actions.

Widely recognized as a comedy of errors in which various couples become hopelessly entangled in the complications of magical spells and thoughts of love on the eve of a grand wedding, Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream has provided audiences with laughter for centuries while still managing to include an exploration into the effects of the supernatural upon everyday life.

The confusion of darkness as an element of the supernatural in complicating the lives of young lovers is proven to be the principle cause of problems for the characters in both plays – the main play that Shakespeare wrote and the play within the play that is performed by the town players. In the mini-play, darkness prevents the two lovers from finding each other in enough time to enjoy their ‘happily ever after’.

Thisby is frightened from her meeting place with Pyramus by the lion that wouldn’t be roaming if it weren’t dark outside. Pyramus finds Thisby’s cloak torn and wet with blood and chooses not to search the darkness for her but instead immediately throws himself on his sword in order to join her in death. Thisby, thinking he is merely asleep when she returns to the crypt discovers he is dead instead and also chooses to end her life.

It is also the ‘creatures of the night’ in the form of the fairies that cause problems and strife between the young couples roaming around in the woods in the dark. Oberon’s potion causes Lysander to change his mind about who he loves. The apparent purity of young love between Hermia and Lysander is brought into question with the application of Oberon’s pansy-juice. This causes Lysander to change his mind about who he loves and introduces a situation in which he behaves in much the same way as Demetrius himself. Because he doesn’t forget his past love for Hermia, this calls into question the strength of even the purist love to resist the course of life events.

In Act II, scene 2, he says, “I do repent / the tedious minutes I with her have spent. / Not Hermia but Helena I love. / Who will not change a raven for a dove?” (111-114). This separates the couple almost as effectively as the death scene of the mini-play simply because the mini-play cannot be taken completely seriously and is thus seen as a temporary situation, much like that between Hermia and Lysander. What makes him worthy of Hermia’s love is that he does all of this under the spell of fairy magic and is finally able to come to his own senses in the end. Although the two young people finish the play by getting married, Shakespeare has demonstrated how even the most ardent, pure and innocent love can be quickly and easily damaged by a simple change in the wind.

However, being an element of the supernatural is no guarantee that the individual might manage to avoid the risks and uncertainties of the magical element. Shakespeare’s characters Titania and Oberon are fairies who have been married for long ages already before the play has even started. While the simple fact that they are still together should testify to the constancy of love, their bitter squabbling is echoed in the poor weather of the country and illustrates the absence of love in a relationship well-aged. “Their squabbling is trivial: a dispute over Titania’s ‘changling’ boy whom Oberon desires …

The comparison between the two worlds is even more ironically exact when Oberon accuses Titania of an improper interest in Theseus; while she in turn accuses him of harboring base thought about Hippolyta” (Taylor 263). This old love, then, is characterized by petty jealousies and insecurities that compare quite closely to those elements that serve to sever Hermia and Lysander for a while and have a direct effect upon the weather patterns and human emotions around them. To settle their dispute, Oberon resorts to tricking his wife into succumbing to his wishes before he will permit her to be restored to her normal exalted state.

Throughout both of these texts, there is an obvious need to offer some sort of indication of a world that exists beyond the one that we perceive in our waking life. Sophocles finds it in his Oracles’ ability to foresee the twisted path of Oedipus’ future while Shakespeare finds it in the idea of returning spirits. In addition, it becomes the supernatural that drives the characters to their tasks. The Oracles of Oedipus cause both his parents and himself to undertake the actions that will seal his doom. The magic of Shakespeare’s fairies creates the confusion that comprises almost the entire action of that midsummer night’s activities.

However, the relationship between the supernatural and the self appears to be at least marginally voluntary, meaning that the self must participate in some action in order to make the relationship work. This consistent need to discover and/or explain an alternate world beyond our own that is somehow connected to us in a meaningful way suggests our shared ideologies haven’t changed all that much over the years.

Works Cited

Shakespeare, William. A Midsummer Night’s Dream. The Complete Pelican Shakespeare. New York: Penguin Classics, 1969.

Sophocles. “Oedipus the King.” The Three Theban Plays. Trans. Robert Fagles. New York: Penguin.