Love Triangle(s)

A Midsummer Night's Dream is my favorite of the comedies written by William Shakespeare. Following the inter wining stories between a group of four young lovers and marriages between humans and fairies alike, it is one of Shakespeare's best works. Hermia, a young beauty of Athens, is courted by both Demetrius and Lysander, of whom the latter she only has eyes for, but her father has other ideas. Being forced to a decision she rather not make she proclaims "I would my father looked but with my eyes". I feel throughout this play a lot of the conflicts arise when certain people cannot see through the eyes of those around them. Egeus clearly cannot see why his daughter would rather marry Lysander over Demetrius because Demetrius is friendly with Egeus, where Lysander only cares what Hermia thinks. A with the fairies, obviously Oberon only wishes Titania's little Indian boy for his own personal use, whereas Titania wishes to protect and nurture him as his mother would have.
Both of these love triangles contain different forms of love, treachery and jealousy. The introduction of Helena, formerly Demetrius' lover, expands their entanglement into a square. While Helena is a good friend to Hermia, she is all the while particularly jealous of her; "Call you me fair? That fair again unsay. Demetrius loves you fair. O happy fair! Your eyes lodestars, and your tongue's sweet air More tunable than lark to shepherd's ear,". As Hemria and Lysander plan on escaping Athens to remove away from everyone else they allow Helena in on the secret, which she tells Demetrius in hopes of him coming to his senses and realizing that it is her, not Hermia, that he loves.
With the fairies, Oberon, on spite of Titania's stubborn refusal, comes up with the scheme of obtaining the magical juice from a certain flower which will cause Titania to fall in love with the first sight she sees upon waking, thus causing her attention upon the Indian boy to falter. For this he selects Puck to perform. Upon overhearing the quarrels between Demetrius and Helena in the forest, he wishes to help the two young lovers and orders Puck to drip liquid over the young mans eyes, but Puck mistakes a sleeping Lysander for Demetrius, and of course when he awakes he discovers Helena and falls in love with her, causing him to forget all about his love for Hermia.
The idea of trying to posses something instead of loving and caring for is where the conflicts arise in these first two acts. The love of Hermia and Lysander being impeded for her father's desire to keep control over her and Oberon's greediness for the young page are the two driving forces here. Throw in the magical juice and one is surely to be entertained for a couple more acts.