Not only are dreams toys, as Antiogonus so elegantly states, but sometimes "dreams" determine how we see the world. (And I'm not just referring to the types of dreams that occur in our sleep.) Dreams can be the way we wish the world was, and when we start to over think it we start to believe the fantasy and live in the dream. Sometimes we want something so bad that we strive to make it the reality so that we can be happier. For example, sometimes we think the cute boy down the hall has a crush on us because he comes over, when in reality he is infatuated with your roommate.
But these dreams aren't always good. Sometimes it seems we live in a nightmare. All of the world seems to conspire against us. In the same day we wake up late, fail a test and get caught in a downpour on the way home. So naturally as you walk into your apartment and hear laughter you automatically assume its about you, because hey, the world hates you. But it doesn't really. It's all a dream that is toying with you instead of the other way around. This is the situation that Leontes finds himself in. He is stuck in a dream, but not one he has developed for his own fanatasy, rather one that seems to have caught him.
Your actions are my dreams/You had a bastard by Polexines
He let his dream toy with him, just as sometimes ours toy with us. The real challenge then seems to be to try to find a dream that we can catch hold of and toy with, but not let it determine our lives.
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ReplyDeleteInitially I thought you were talking about literal dreams and I was about to panic because my sleeping dreams tend to be completely irrelevant and utterly bizarre. But these types of dreams make much more contextual sense. I really like the conceit(?) you ran with here: the idea of dreams and toys. I could really picture dreams almost literally toying with us and visa versa and it made dreams seem so much more tangible or corporeal, like we can be in control of them or lost in them but it's really up to us. It actually kind of inspired me to really pay attention to who's in control, me or my dreams.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Kara. I really enjoy what you did there. :)
ReplyDeleteI'm going to post off of yours i hope that is alright... I loved you post! The power of that idea comes from the way Shakespeare said it... my Dream
ReplyDeleteyeah thats totally fine! I can't wait to read it
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