The original meaning of the eye’s apple was purely anatomical. Shakespeare is using ‘apple of his eye’ quite literally here. The fairy king, Oberon, instructs his servant, the fairy, Puck, to drop a love potion in Demetrius’ eye: ‘Flower of this purple dye, Shakespeare used the phrase only once – in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Shakespeare uses the term ‘the apple of his eye’ but not in the idiomatic sense that the Old Testament writers did. The apple of my eye Shakespeare’s use of ‘the apple of his eye’ The idiom is very much alive in our everyday speech today and widely used among English speaking countries and instantly understood by everyone. ‘For thus saith the Lord of hosts After the glory hath he sent me unto the nations which spoiled you: for he that toucheth you toucheth the apple of his eye.’ Proverbs 7:2 ‘Their heart cried unto the Lord, O wall of the daughter of Zion, let tears run down like a river day and night: give thyself no rest let not the apple of thine eye cease.’ ‘Keep my commandments, and live and my law as the apple of thine eye.’ David was asking God to regard him as one would a cherished child, the object of great affection. In this one, when the psalmist (David) asks God to keep him as the apple of His eye he is asking God to keep an eye on him and not lose sight of him. The phrase can be found in several Old Testament books of the King James Bible: Biblical usage of ‘the apple of my eye’: ‘He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye’ĭeuteronomy 32:10 ‘Keep me as the apple of the eye, hide me under the shadow of thy wings.’ They are two completely different usages of the phrase. This biblical meaning of ‘the apple of your eye’ comes to us quite independently of Shakespeare’s use of the term. Your very image is central in the eyes of that person! To be the apple of someone’s eye clearly means that you are being focused on and watched closely by that person. The phrase comes from a Hebrew expression that literally means ‘little man of the eye.’ It refers to the tiny reflection of yourself that you can see in other people’s pupils. The apple of the eye was a favourite idiom of the Old Testament writers to indicate something, and particularly a person, that one values above all other things. It is in the Bible that phrase ‘apple of my eye’ is first used figuratively. However, Shakespeare was using this phrase literally (simply referring to the pupil of an eye), rather than the figurative way it is used today. ‘The apple of my eye’ is an idiom that Shakespeare used in his A Midsummer Night’s Dream play.

Each Shakespeare’s play name links to a range of resources about each play: Character summaries, plot outlines, example essays and famous quotes, soliloquies and monologues: All’s Well That Ends Well Antony and Cleopatra As You Like It The Comedy of Errors Coriolanus Cymbeline Hamlet Henry IV Part 1 Henry IV Part 2 Henry VIII Henry VI Part 1 Henry VI Part 2 Henry VI Part 3 Henry V Julius Caesar King John King Lear Loves Labour’s Lost Macbeth Measure for Measure The Merchant of Venice The Merry Wives of Windsor A Midsummer Night’s Dream Much Ado About Nothing Othello Pericles Richard II Richard III Romeo & Juliet The Taming of the Shrew The Tempest Timon of Athens Titus Andronicus Troilus & Cressida Twelfth Night The Two Gentlemen of Verona The Winter’s Tale

This list of Shakespeare plays brings together all 38 plays in alphabetical order. Plays It is believed that Shakespeare wrote 38 plays in total between 15.

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