A Midsummer Night's Dream: The Hidden Astrologial Keys
()
About this ebook
The “Shakespeare and the Stars” series celebrate the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death and offer fresh and exciting insights into the ever-popular works of the world’s greatest playwright. Each analysis specifically highlights Shakespeare’s use of the archetypal language of astrological symbolism in both obvious and subtle ways. Such references would have been well known in Shakespeare’s time, but their deeper significance is lost to modern-day playgoers and readers.
By keying each play to a specific zodiacal sign and its associated (or ruling) planet, Shakespeare alerted his audience to their significance in revealing character, foreshadowing the plot, and establishing key themes for each play.
Each book ranges widely, incorporating related and relevant information from astrological tradition, classical and Renaissance philosophy, Greek and Roman mythology, esoteric wisdom, modern psychology (especially that of C. G. Jung), and great literature. Modern readers will find that each book will illuminate its play from a fresh perspective that deepens and profoundly transforms one’s understanding of these magnificent classics.
Each book is 64 pages and is designed to be taken to performances or studied before and after reading and enjoying the play.
The first three titles in the series are: The Merchant of Venice, King Lear, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Examining A Midsummer Night’s Dream, we will study its relation to the Sign of Cancer and its Ruler the Moon.
Priscilla Costello
Priscilla Costello is a teacher, writer, and counseling astrologer based in Toronto. She frequently travels to the U.S. to see clients and lecture. She has been instrumental in the organization of Canadian astrology and currently serves on the Advisory Board of NCGR. Her Master's thesis on Gnosticism and Jungian psychology (1993) won the Master's Scholar Award from the NE Association of Graduate Schools. She is founder and Director of the New Alexandria, a center for spiritual and esoteric studies.
Read more from Priscilla Costello
Shakespeare and the Stars: The Hidden Astrological Keys to Understanding the World’s Greatest Playwright Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Weiser Concise Guide to Practical Astrology Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Tempest: The Hidden Astrologial Keys Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsKing Lear: The Hidden Astrologial Keys Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRomeo and Juliet: The Hidden Astrologial Keys Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMacbeth: The Hidden Astrological Keys Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Merchant of Venice: The Hidden Astrologial Keys Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to A Midsummer Night's Dream
Related ebooks
The Merchant of Venice: The Hidden Astrologial Keys Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMacbeth: The Hidden Astrological Keys Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCosmos, Chaosmos and Astrology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMythic Astrology: Archetypes in the Horoscope Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEros and Psyche (Barnes & Noble Digital Library): A Fairy-Tale of Ancient Greece Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAstrology as Art: Representation and Practice Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAstrology and Cosmology in the World’s Religions Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsStar Stories: Constellations and People Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Zodiacal Symbology and Its Planetary Power Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWhen the Dragon Wore the Crown: Putting Starlight Back into Myth Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsImagining Other Worlds: Explorations in Astronomy and Culture Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Mythology of Venus: Ancient Calendars and Archaeoastronomy Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Soul's Journey Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAt This Point in Time: Charting the History of the Human Spirit Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHeavenly Discourses Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings5: The Venus Pentagram Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Astrology's Twelve Great Myths: The Twisted Archetypes of a Dominator Culture Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Foreseeing the Future: Evangeline Adams and Astrology in America: An Evangeline Adams Mystery Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Astrological Imagination: Where Psyche and Cosmos Meet Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAuroras, Petroglyphs, and Pagans Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA History of Western Astrology Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Future of Astrology Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Anima Astrologiae Or a Guide for Astrologers Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Astrology Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSimply Now 2: Personality and Love Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Return of Planet Sedna: Astrology, Healing, and the Awakening of Cosmic Kundalini Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTraditional Astrology: Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe primal horoscope of the modern stock exchange. Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsScience of Astrology: X-rays of The Divine Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Influence of the Stars: A book of old world lore Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Book Notes For You
Chaos: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties by Tom O'Neill: Conversation Starters Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Gavin de Becker’s The Gift of Fear Survival Signals That Protect Us From Violence | Summary Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V. E. Schwab: Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson: Conversation Starters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Midnight Library: A Novel by Matt Haig: Conversation Starters Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art by James Nestor: Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The 5 AM Club Summary: Business Book Summaries Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Summary of The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Summary: The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Eight Dates: Essential Conversations for a Lifetime of Love by John Gottman: Conversation Starters Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Summary of Poverty, by America By Matthew Desmond Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men by Caroline Criado Perez: Conversation Starters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Workbook for Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones by James Clear Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Summary of 12 Rules For Life: An Antidote to Chaos by Jordan B. Peterson Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5SUMMARY Of The Plant Paradox: The Hidden Dangers in Healthy Foods That Cause Disease and Weight Gain Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Compound Effect: Jumpstart Your Income, Your Life, Your Success by Darren Hardy: Conversation Starters Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I Will Teach You To Be Rich by Ramit Sethi: Summary by Fireside Reads Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Summary of Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones by James Clear Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Summary of Ichiro Kishimi's and Fumitake Koga's book: The Courage to Be Disliked: Summary Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Summary of How to Know a Person By David Brooks: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides: Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Workbook & Summary of Becoming Supernatural How Common People Are Doing the Uncommon by Joe Dispenza: Workbooks Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Reviews for A Midsummer Night's Dream
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
A Midsummer Night's Dream - Priscilla Costello
GENERAL INTRODUCTION: DID SHAKESPEARE
REALLY USE ASTROLOGICAL SYMBOLS?
"It is the stars,/ The stars above us, govern our conditions . . ."
(King Lear)
"Methinks it should be now a huge eclipse/ Of sun and moon . . ."
(Othello)
"I know thy constellation is right apt for this affair."
(Twelfth Night)
Shakespeare's works are filled with references like these to heavenly bodies and stellar events. This isn't surprising since people of his time were more aware of the skies and the stars than we are: with no electric lights and few clocks, farmers, mariners, and the average Elizabethan looked to the sky to determine time and weather. Since personalities were classified in relation to specific planets (an early form of psychology) and medical practice was based on planetary types (or temperaments
), the meanings of the astrological symbols were familiar to them.
For the illiterate (the majority) oral traditions passed down for generations made the astrological language familiar. The literate read yearly almanacs in English listing astrological omens. Educated Elizabethans grasped astrology's more profound implications since astrological language appeared frequently in religious writings. Steeped in the classical literature of ancient Greece and Rome, they knew that astrology is an integral part of an elegant, sophisticated, and intelligently-thought-out spiritual philosophy whose language and symbolism had been transmitted through the centuries and were part of lively discussion well into the 17th century (and still are today).
Like the members of Shakespeare's audience, his characters are also familiar with astrology.
His dramatis personae speak of stars, planets, comets, meteors, eclipses, planetary aspects, predominance, conjunction, opposition, retrogradation, and all sorts of astro-meteorology. They know that the Dragon's Tail exerts an evil influence, that Mercury governs lying and thievery, that Luna [the Moon] rules vagabonds and idle fellows, that Saturn is malignant and Jupiter benevolent, that the signs of the zodiac rule the limbs and organs of the body, that planets influence cities and nations . . . Although they do not go into details regarding the technical workings of the science, his characters on the whole seem to possess a general knowledge of stellar influence on human destiny.
—Johnstone Parr¹
We don't catch many of the astrological allusions in Shakespeare's plays and understand their significance because we're no longer steeped in the grand worldview that was fundamental to Elizabethan thinking. We're conditioned in our time by the dominant beliefs of conventional materialistic science: that only physical things are real and that the only way to acquire knowledge is through five-sense perception. But for hundreds of years before Shakespeare's time the dominant paradigm was of a universe unfolding from Divinity in an orderly progression of hierarchical levels, down through the realm of the fixed stars, through the crystalline spheres
of the seven classical planets, and ultimately into the physical world of human beings, animals, plants, and minerals. The fact that the planets are an integral part of this worldview justifies looking at Shakespeare's plays through the lens of astrology.
Each level is linked with all the levels above and below it, so that references to the planets trigger a host of associations on all the other levels. In a worldview in which the heavens are reflected on Earth and the realm of Earth mirrors the heavens, it is natural to see a connection between the glorious Sun that dominates the skies and the King who is the focus of court and country. Shimmering moonlight is symbolically reflected in the sheen of silver. Because this worldview allows for sympathetic resonances between all levels of creation, Shakespeare can write of tempests both external to King Lear and within his mind, of eclipses that portend the fall of kings, and of horses that eat each other after Macbeth murders King Duncan. Events on one level of being can reflect events on another.
Since Shakespeare's works reflect this generally accepted worldview, the vast majority of his characters' statements are overwhelmingly in line with the Renaissance astrological worldview familiar to his audience. Shakespeare naturally draws on familiar astrological symbolism as creative inspiration for his art, in both obvious and subtle ways. He uses it for various purposes: to establish time and its passage; to create characters in line with planetary associations; and to allude