Shakespeare\u2019s Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream Commentary A. J. Drake<\/title><meta name= \"description\" content= \"A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream commentary addresses major themes, major characters such as Oberon, Titania, Helen, Lysander, literary analysis, drama theory.\"><\/head><\/p>\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\">Commentaries on Shakespeare’s Comedies<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-btn__default-btn uagb-btn-tablet__default-btn uagb-btn-mobile__default-btn uagb-block-4f6cdd05 uag-hide-mob\"><div class=\"uagb-buttons__wrap uagb-buttons-layout-wrap \">\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-dcba7b2a wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">HOME<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-9ae5aeea wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/my-olli-courses-at-unlv\/\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">OLLI<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-2368e1c6 wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/shakespeare-questions\/\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">QUESTIONS<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-040dd0bb wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/shakespeare-commentaries\/\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">COMMENTARIES<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-57f86fdb wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/shakespeare-audio\/\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">AUDIO<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-1b812369 wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/shakespeare-guides\/\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">GUIDES<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-d5da63d7 wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/shakespeare-links\/\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">LINKS<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-btn__default-btn uagb-btn-tablet__default-btn uagb-btn-mobile__default-btn uagb-block-19d28286\"><div class=\"uagb-buttons__wrap uagb-buttons-layout-wrap \">\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-69502be5 wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"#act1\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">ACT 1<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-0ec42142 wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"#act2\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">ACT 2<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-6ac70dcb wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"#act3\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">ACT 3<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-bfd6ecc9 wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"#act4\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">ACT 4<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-55716ff6 wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"#act5\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">ACT 5<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-uagb-buttons-child uagb-buttons__outer-wrap uagb-block-0246bad9 wp-block-button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__wrapper\"><a class=\"uagb-buttons-repeater wp-block-button__link\" aria-label=\"\" href=\"#endnotes\" rel=\"follow noopener\" target=\"_self\" role=\"button\"><div class=\"uagb-button__link\">ENDNOTES<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\nShakespeare. A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream.<\/em> Quarto. (The Norton Shakespeare: Comedies,<\/em> 3rd ed. 406-53).<\/p>\n\n\n\nOf Interest: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rsc.org.uk\/a-midsummer-nights-dream\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">RSC Resources<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/internetshakespeare.uvic.ca\/Library\/Texts\/MND\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">ISE Resources<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.shakespeare-online.com\/sources\/mssources.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">S-O Sources<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.folger.edu\/explore\/shakespeare-in-print\/first-folio\/bookreader-68\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">1623 Folio 165-82 (Folger)<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/chaucer.fas.harvard.edu\/pages\/knights-tale-0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Chaucer\u2019s Knight\u2019s Tale<\/em><\/a> <\/em>| <a href=\"https:\/\/babel.hathitrust.org\/cgi\/pt?id=uc1.b3827689&seq=45\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Plutarch\u2019s Life of Theseus, 45-99 (trans. North)<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/quod.lib.umich.edu\/e\/eebo\/A03886.0001.001\/1:4.21?rgn=div2;view=fulltext\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Huon of Bourdeaux, Chs. XXI-XXIII<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/quod.lib.umich.edu\/cgi\/t\/text\/text-idx?c=eebo;idno=A62397.0001.001\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Scott\u2019s The Discoverie of Witchcraft,<\/em> IV.X, VII.II, VII.XV; V.III, XIII.XIX (1584)<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gutenberg.org\/files\/1666\/1666-h\/1666-h.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Apuleius\u2019s The Golden Asse, <\/em>Bk. III.XVII,(trans. W. Adlington 1566\/1639)<\/a> | <a href=\"https:\/\/quod.lib.umich.edu\/e\/eebo\/A08649.0001.001\/1:7?rgn=div1;view=fulltext\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ovid\u2019s Metamorphoses, <\/em>Bk. IV \u201cPyramus and Thisbe\u201d (trans. Golding, 1567)<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"act1\">ACT 1<\/h3>\n\n\n\nAct 1, Scene 1 (406-11, Theseus, Duke of Athens and Hippolyta the Amazon Queen await their wedding; Egeus shows up with his daughter Hermia and her two suitors, Lysander and Egeus\u2019s pick Demetrius; Egeus calls upon Theseus to apply the harsh Athenian law that would condemn her if she won\u2019t marry Demetrius; Theseus tells Hermia that she must marry Demetrius, die, or remain a virgin; Lysander and Hermia decide to leave Athens together; they confide in Hermia\u2019s friend Helena, whose affection for Demetrius is unrequited; Helena will betray their elopement plan to Demetrius and thereby win his affection.)<\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nThe play opens with a conversation between Theseus, Duke of Athens and the Amazon Queen he has conquered and is now set to marry. <a href=\"#_edn1\" id=\"_ednref1\">[1]<\/a> Theseus\u2019s desires seem to outpace the time that nature keeps: he says of the moon\u2019s progress, \u201cShe lingers my desires \/ Like to a stepdame or a dowager \/ Long withering out a young man\u2019s revenue\u201d (406, 1.1.4-6). Hippolyta prefers to let nature follow its pace, and allies herself with that pace: \u201cthe moon\u2014like to a silver bow \/ Now bent in heaven\u2014shall behold the night \/ Of our solemnities\u201d (406, 1.1.9-11).<\/p>\n\n\n\nBe that as it may, the archetypal \u201cwar between the sexes\u201d of this Athenian duke and Amazonian queen has given way to a traditional wedding ceremony. Theseus, though himself impatient, promises Hippolyta that violence and chaos will be transformed to marital decorum and an orderly society: he will marry the female warrior \u201cin another key,\u201d as he says, and all will be done \u201cWith pomp, with triumph, and with reveling\u201d (407, 1.1.18-19).<\/p>\n\n\n\nBut as Lysander will soon say to Hermia, \u201cThe course of true love never did run smooth\u201d (409, 1.1.134), and Egeus comes onto the scene to stir up trouble (407, 1.1.22-23). His daughter Hermia has refused Demetrius, the suitor he has chosen for her, and now the father begs the Duke to uphold the harsh law of Athens (407, 1.1.41-42). Hermia must assent to a life with Demetrius, or she will either forfeit her life or remain a virgin for the rest of her days.<\/p>\n\n\n\nSuch outlandishly cruel laws are useful in comedies and romances since they allow the playwright to deal with primal issues of life and death, to depict universal struggles in the starkest manner. The Angry Father, or senex iratus <\/em>derived from Greek and Roman comedy, <a href=\"#_edn2\" id=\"_ednref2\">[2]<\/a> is a handy device in Shakespeare\u2019s bag of drama-tricks, and here Egeus serves as an obstacle in the path of the lovers Hermia and Lysander.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe father is perhaps jealous of his daughter\u2019s affection, and he accuses Lysander of offenses just short of warlock status. Lysander, says Egeus, has \u201cbewitched the bosom of my child\u201d (407, 1.1.27). He has \u201cinterchanged love tokens\u201d (407, 1.1.29) with the young lady; he has sung facetious or \u201cfeigning\u201d songs of love to her; and given her alluring gifts to steal her fancy away from her father and transfer it to himself. None of this sounds like anything but normal courtship, but to Egeus it\u2019s a mortal threat.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe old man aligns himself with the symbolic power of absolute interdiction. He envisions a rival order to the one Theseus has staked out, one that allows no room for his daughter Hermia to pursue natural desire. The result of this will be the confusion, chaos, and vexation at the center of Shakespeare\u2019s play.<\/p>\n\n\n\nTheseus has used force to win his own lover, and even though he now intends to fold this violent force into a life within the civic order with Hippolyta, he apparently feels constrained to accede to Egeus\u2019s demand that his daughter should obey him or die. <a href=\"#_edn3\" id=\"_ednref3\">[3]<\/a> Theseus denies Hermia any agency, any livable choice, in the matter of marriage. He insists that to her, Egeus should be \u201cas a god\u201d (407, 1.1.47), and describes her as \u201cbut as a form in wax \/ By him imprinted \u2026\u201d (407, 1.1.49-50), to preserve, alter, or destroy as he sees fit.<\/p>\n\n\n\nTheseus asks Hermia directly whether she can \u201cendure the livery of a nun \u2026\u201d (408, 1.1.70) just to escape marriage to a man she doesn\u2019t love. Hermia\u2019s answer is defiance: she will not submit.<\/p>\n\n\n\nAs for Lysander, he mocks Egeus and Theseus\u2019s promotion of civic \u201cright\u201d over true love. He does not agree with the practice of forcibly enlisting a couple\u2019s erotic energy to satisfy collective, society-building imperatives. He points out to Theseus that Demetrius has himself behaved like a cad toward Nedar\u2019s daughter Helena, first encouraging her and then cruelly dropping her for his new and financially promising interest in Hermia. All the same, Theseus stands by Athenian law, so if she won\u2019t submit, Hermia will have to choose between \u201cdeath or \u2026 a vow of single life\u201d (409, 1.1.121).<\/p>\n\n\n\nIn conversation with Hermia, Lysander tries to calm her anxieties with a recitation of the agency- and life-denying bars and catastrophes that ensure the truth of his maxim, \u201cThe course of true love never did run smooth \u2026\u201d (409, 1.1.134).<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe young man describes the experience of true love in a way that might elicit admiration from the great Jewish scholar Moses Maimonides, who described the experience of deep learning as a kind of \u201cflash\u201d followed by utter darkness. <a href=\"#_edn4\" id=\"_ednref4\">[4]<\/a> So Lysander on love as being \u201cBrief as the lightning in the collied night \/ That in a spleen unfolds both heaven and earth \/ And ere a man hath power to say \u2018Behold!\u2019 \/ The jaws of darkness do devour it up\u201d (409, 1.1.344-47).<\/p>\n\n\n\nLysander\u2019s plan, as he details it to Hermia, involves taking refuge in the woods not far from Athens, and then traveling to his dowager aunt\u2019s home, where Athenian law does not apply (409-10, 1.1.156-68). This plan will take the main couples off to one of Shakespeare\u2019s most beloved green worlds, the fairy kingdom of Oberon and Titania.<\/p>\n\n\n\nLysander\u2019s condition for the trip, \u201cIf thou lovest me\u201d (410, 1.1.163), seems to inspire a bit of ire in Hermia, or at least it prompts her to swear (among other things) by \u201call the vows that ever men have broke, \/ In number more than ever women spoke \u2026\u201d (410, 1.1.175-76) that she will gladly make the journey and marry him, leaving behind the golden city of Athens that seemed to her \u201ca paradise\u201d (411, 1.1.205).<\/p>\n\n\n\nHelena now enters. She is Hermia\u2019s childhood friend, and has problems of her own to deal with. She is in love with her former suitor Demetrius, who now cares only for Helena and, presumably, her father\u2019s wealth. When Lysander tells her of his plan to steal away with Hermia into the forest, Helena decides to reveal this information to Demetrius for her own benefit. A strain of jealousy and competitiveness is evident in Helena\u2019s complaint after her friend departs with Lysander: \u201cThrough Athens I am thought as fair as she\u201d (411, 1.1.227).<\/p>\n\n\n\nIn spite of her disappointment, Helena puts much faith in the power of love even as she says this profound feeling involves neither judgment nor clarity of vision: \u201cThings base and vile, holding no quantity, \/ Love can transpose to form and dignity\u201d (411, 1.1.232-33). Perhaps, then, it is not quality in<\/em> the lover that we love, but rather what we ourselves project onto or into the beloved. Love is a thing of fantasy, and is scarcely amenable to reason.<\/p>\n\n\n\nTo what extent, then, can we guide desire so that it guarantees order, social harmony and decorum? As is the case with most of Shakespeare\u2019s comedies, that will be a question to consider as the play goes on. In any event, Helena\u2019s determination to tattle on her old friend to Demetrius ensures that two human couples, not one, will join the already feuding Oberon and Titania.<\/p>\n\n\n\nAct 1, Scene 2 (412-14, Theseus and Hippolyta\u2019s wedding will include a play as entertainment, and six tradesmen in Athens decide to compete for the prize money; director Peter Quince assigns acting roles and hands out scripts; they all plan to rehearse in the woods beyond Athens.)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nThis comic scene continues the theme of transformation introduced by the first scene\u2019s conversation between Theseus and Hippolyta and Hermia\u2019s statement about love\u2019s projective power. Several workingmen have determined to compete for the honor of putting on a play in the presence of the Duke and Hippolyta. These \u201cmechanicals\u201d are men whom we would not ordinarily consider significant in the world of art, but at least indirectly, their discussions give us some of Shakespeare\u2019s most notable commentary on his chosen profession.<\/p>\n\n\n\nPeter Quince is the director of The Most Lamentable Comedy and Most Cruel Death of Pyramus and Thisbe,<\/em> a tragic play about star-crossed lovers that is nonetheless also a \u201ccomedy,\u201d according to the title. <a href=\"#_edn5\" id=\"_ednref5\">[5]<\/a> It doesn\u2019t matter much to Quince and his fellows how their play is classified. All they want is that it should be moving and entertaining.<\/p>\n\n\n\nBottom the Weaver is informed that he is to play the hero Pyramus (412, 1.2.16), and he demonstrates his skill in declamatory versifying from some old instance of the character Hercules, but he can\u2019t imagine confining himself to just one role, even if it is a starring one. As the roles are handed out, Bottom tries to usurp them all: \u201clet me play Thisbe too\u201d (413, 1.2.43), he pleads, and \u201cLet me play the lion too\u201d (413, 1.2.58).<\/p>\n\n\n\nBottom is a delightful, childlike fellow (some might call him a narcissist, though that\u2019s probably too harsh) who wants to project himself into everything around him, and he seems excited about the prospect of using art to escape everyday reality. That escape (or at least vicarious adventure) is indeed one of the things that art can provide.<\/p>\n\n\n\nMeanwhile, Flute, who will play the female lead Thisbe, worries that he is too near to an adult male to play such a role, while Snug the Joiner is blessed with the exciting role of the Lion. He worries that he is \u201cslow of study,\u201d so he will need an advance copy of his lines. Quince assures him that he\u2019ll do fine\u2014the \u201clines\u201d are \u201cnothing but roaring\u201d (413, 1.2.56-57).<\/p>\n\n\n\nBottom\u2019s pitch for usurping the lion\u2019s role is hilarious, and it brings up an interesting representational concern. \u201cI will roar that I will do any \/ man\u2019s heart good to hear me\u201d (413, 1.2.58-59), he boasts, but Peter Quince observes that roaring too wildly would frighten the refined, noble ladies in the audience, and thereby cost all the actors their necks: \u201cThat would hang us, every mother\u2019s son\u201d (413, 1.2.64), they all say in unison.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThis concern for the risks of excessive realism in dramatic representation sounds silly coming from working-class artisans trying to put on a foolish play, but it was a serious concern going back even to Greek drama. <a href=\"#_edn6\" id=\"_ednref6\">[6]<\/a> Audiences\u2019 emotional reaction, according to some critics, was heavily dependent on the playwright\u2019s ability to induce them to take what they saw onstage as all but real, or at least \u201clifelike\u201d (verisimilar). The workingmen, then, offer a logical extension of such a view when they worry about their lion-representation frightening theatergoers out of their real-life wits.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe lion\u2019s part\u2014no pun intended\u2014goes to Snug after all, and Quince need only put out some sensible instructions for the rehearsal: he gives the actors only their own lines, and prays them \u201cto con them by tomorrow night\u201d (413, 1.2.83) They are to meet Quince in the woods about a mile from Athens, there to rehearse by the moon\u2019s light. The reason the director gives is that if they rehearse outside of town, they will avoid workaday distractions and nosy competitors. Other than the privacy-based concerns, these sound like realistic instructions for actors in Shakespeare\u2019s time. <a href=\"#_edn7\" id=\"_ednref7\">[7]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"act2\">ACT 2<\/h3>\n\n\n\nAct 2, Scene 1 (414-20, Oberon and Titania, the Faerie King and Queen, argue over who will get to raise an Indian boy; to wrest control of the boy, Oberon commands Robin Goodfellow or \u201cPuck\u201d to bring him a pansy flower so he can sprinkle its juice in Titania\u2019s eyes and make her fall in love with the first creature she sees upon waking. \n\t\t\tDemetrius enters the forest with Helena following right behind him, and he tries to shoo her away; Robin returns; Oberon, sympathizing with Helena, tells Robin to locate the Athenian man Demetrius and sprinkle in his eyes the same juice he means to use on Titania.)<\/span>\n\t\t<\/span><span title='' data-less-title='' data-more-title='' class='yrm-toggle-expand yrm-toggle-expand-1' data-rel='yrm-V2MaQ' data-more='(SYNOPSIS CONTINUES \u2026)' data-less='READ LESS' style='border: none; width: 100%;'>(SYNOPSIS CONTINUES \u2026)<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nOur introduction to the enchanted forest is to hear the dialogue of Robin Goodfellow (\u201cPuck\u201d) and a fairy who has come to prepare the way for the coming of the imposing Faerie Queen, Titania. The fairy has a job to do, flitting everywhere in the vicinity and being careful to \u201cdew her orbs upon the green\u201d and \u201chang a pearl [dewdrop] in every cowslip\u2019s ear\u201d (414, 2.1.9, 15) before the Queen and her retinue arrives. <a href=\"#_edn8\" id=\"_ednref8\">[8]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nRobin reminds the fairy that the Fairy King, Oberon, is due to \u201ckeep his revels here tonight\u201d (414, 2.1.18). He says the king is \u201cpassing fell and wrath\u201d because Titania \u201cas her attendant hath \/ A lovely boy stolen from an Indian king\u2014 \/ And jealous Oberon would have the child \/ Knight of his train, to trace the forests wild\u201d (414, 2.1.21-22, 24-25).<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe king and queen are presently separated over the custodianship of this little boy, each preferring to bring him up in their own gender-specific ways. Perhaps we are to understand that Titania would keep the boy just as he is, while Oberon would initiate him into maturity in the masculine style.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIf the female fairy attendant to Titania evokes the more delicate micro-effects of the natural world and its processes, Robin should remind us of nature\u2019s rougher qualities: he acknowledges with apparent pride to his fairy companion that he is exactly \u201cthat merry wanderer of the night\u201d (415, 2.1.43) she suspects he is: the one who causes no end of mess, chagrin, and trouble for the careless or foolish humans who become subject to his mischievous efforts.<\/p>\n\n\n\nWe may think of Gerard Manley Hopkins\u2019s poem, \u201cPied Beauty,\u201d with its love for \u201cAll things counter, original, spare, strange; \/ Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)\u201d <a href=\"#_edn9\" id=\"_ednref9\">[9]<\/a> and add to that fine description the impish, troublemaking gleam in Puck\u2019s eye: he is all things unpredictable in nature, things and phenomena that double back and make fools of us when, in our carelessness and determination just to live our lives, we least expect it. Let\u2019s call him \u201cShakespeare\u2019s uncertainty principle,\u201d at least for this play.<\/p>\n\n\n\nNone of this is to say that Puck is a malign spirit. As Oberon\u2019s helper, he is mischief in its lighter aspects\u2014not the murderous Mischief invoked by Marc Antony in Julius Caesar<\/em>. <a href=\"#_edn10\" id=\"_ednref10\">[10]<\/a> Perhaps we can best understand Robin Goodfellow to be the obverse of the chaste power that overlooks Shakespeare\u2019s play\u2014namely, Diana, <a href=\"#_edn11\" id=\"_ednref11\">[11]<\/a> virgin goddess of the moon, whose significance is signaled by the impatient Theseus at the play\u2019s outset when he says that the moon (and goddess) impedes his desires. <a href=\"#_edn12\" id=\"_ednref12\">[12]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nWe now meet the fairy king and queen, Oberon and Titania. <a href=\"#_edn13\" id=\"_ednref13\">[13]<\/a> Along with Prospero\u2019s Island in The Tempest <\/em>and the Forest of Arden in As You Like It, <\/em><a href=\"#_edn14\" id=\"_ednref14\">[14]<\/a> the forest outside Athens, inhabited by the immortal members of the Fairy World, is one of Shakespeare\u2019s most beloved Green Worlds\u2014a place for what Oberon will later call \u201cfierce vexation,\u201d <a href=\"#_edn15\" id=\"_ednref15\">[15]<\/a> but also a verdant charmed circle for the sorting out of the discords and misunderstandings that beset human and divine lovers.<\/p>\n\n\n\nMagical transformations happen in this \u201cpalace wood,\u201d but Oberon and Titania are beset by the same jealousies and grudges as the play\u2019s mortals. Control of a changeling Indian boy\u2019s future is only part of what separates this immortal power couple: Titania, it seems, is quite jealous of what she\u2019s certain are Oberon\u2019s erotic adventurism and dalliances. She accuses him of inhabiting the spirit of classical pastoral poetry, \u201cin the shape of Corin,\u201d she says, has he \u201csat all day \/ Playing on pipes of corn and versing love \/ To amorous Phillida\u201d (415, 2.1.66-68). <a href=\"#_edn16\" id=\"_ednref16\">[16]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nAlso in question, as far as Titania is concerned, is Oberon\u2019s possibly sexual connection with Theseus\u2019s soon-to-be bride Hippolyta, whom she calls Oberon\u2019s \u201cbuskined mistress\u201d and \u201cwarrior love\u201d (415, 2.1.71). The suspicion is mutual since Oberon thinks Titania has a connection with Theseus, too. It sounds as if these two really need a fairy-capable marriage counselor, but in any case, Oberon is minded to inform Titania of the troubles their recent history together have caused for the human world over which they partly preside.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe effects Oberon catalogs with regard to the weather sound severe\u2014\u201ccontagious fogs\u201d (416, 2.1.90) that cause riverbanks to overflow, with consequent failures in the crop-growing cycle, and so forth. These problems or glitches, says Oberon, have wrought misery and havoc with the human beings who are, for all their otherworldly pretensions, deeply affined with and dependent upon the workings of the natural world both great and sweeping, granular and small.<\/p>\n\n\n\nWhen even in little things nature is out of kilter, the rhythms of human life become contorted, confused, and everything is less intelligible, less bearable: \u201cNo night is now,\u201d says Oberon, \u201cwith hymn or carol blessed\u201d (416, 2.1.102), and we are to understand that that is no small thing. Oberon and Titania are the powers who together are supposed to sustain and bless the mortals in their care, beings who are far more subject to the natural world than they are. \u201cThey have one job,\u201d as we would say, and their wrangling is preventing them from doing it.<\/p>\n\n\n\nOberon thinks the solution is simple: Titania just needs to deliver that Indian child into his custody: \u201cI do but beg a little changeling boy \/ To be my henchman\u201d (416, 2.1.120-21). Unfortunately, this supposedly reasonable request is greeted coldly by the Fairie Queen, who has something of Queen Elizabeth I about her. Titania is particularly attached to this boy since his mother, a votary of hers, died while giving birth to him. <a href=\"#_edn17\" id=\"_ednref17\">[17]<\/a> Her answer to Oberon, then, is \u201cfor her sake do I rear up her boy, \/ And for her sake I will not part with him\u201d (417, 2.1.136-37).<\/p>\n\n\n\nIn a broader sense, Titania also seems concerned to maintain her sphere of authority by withholding from Oberon something he dearly covets. If that\u2019s so, the fairy monarchs have their own elfin \u201cwar between the sexes\u201d going on.<\/p>\n\n\n\nOberon decides on the spot to punish Titania for her obstinacy, but he knows better than to confront the powerful demigoddess directly, so he summons Robin, or \u201cPuck,\u201d <a href=\"#_edn18\" id=\"_ednref18\">[18]<\/a> to help him cast a spell on her. The flower they need is the pansy, which acquired its great property of inspiring love from a miscast arrow of Cupid that landed on the flower (417-18, 2.1.165-74). <a href=\"#_edn19\" id=\"_ednref19\">[19]<\/a> So now this flower, also referred to as \u201clove-in-idleness\u201d (417, 2.1.165), causes instant affection, regardless of the object\u2019s worthiness or unworthiness. <a href=\"#_edn20\" id=\"_ednref20\">[20]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nThe pansy, then, serves as an emblem of the power that Helena invested in love itself when she said, \u201cThings base and vile, holding no quantity, \/ Love can transpose to form and dignity.\u201d <a href=\"#_edn21\" id=\"_ednref21\">[21]<\/a> It has an apparently unrestricted power to kindle and shift libidinal energy; it is Eros stripped of the restraint of cultural norms and limitations. Oberon hopes by this botanical device to extort the Indian boy from Titania in exchange for releasing her from whatever unpleasant love relation the flower causes her to forge.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThis plan duly hatched, Oberon has time to observe the goings-on between Demetrius and Helena, which at present are distressing to see. Demetrius continues to scorn the fair Athenian maid, who would gladly sacrifice much of her dignity to somehow undo his indifference. As she admits to him, she adores him all the more for his disdain: \u201cI am your spaniel, and, Demetrius, \/ The more you beat me I will fawn on you\u201d (418, 2.1.203-04).<\/p>\n\n\n\nHelena is so determined that she would reverse the usual course of the Ovidian love-chase: \u201cApollo flies, and Daphne holds the chase\u201d (419, 2.1.241), <a href=\"#_edn22\" id=\"_ednref22\">[22]<\/a> she says to Demetrius, even though she herself considers this inappropriate for a woman. As she laments, \u201cWe cannot fight for love as men may do; \/ We should be wooed and were not made to woo\u201d (419, 2.1.241-42).<\/p>\n\n\n\nSeeing all this, Oberon takes pity on Helena, and decides to help her. It is not up to Demetrius, says the Fairy King: \u201cEre he do leave this grove \/ Thou shalt fly him, and he shall seek thy love\u201d (419, 2.1.245-46). Just then, Robin arrives with the magical flower Theseus needs. He himself will use it to bewitch Titania, while Robin\u2019s orders are to fix the issue between Demetrius and Helena. Theseus\u2019s vague command, however, will cause some trouble: \u201cThou shalt know the man,\u201d he tells Robin, \u201cBy the Athenian garments he hath on\u201d (420, 2.1.263-64).<\/p>\n\n\n\nAct 2, Scene 2 (420-23, Oberon sprinkles pansy-juice in sleeping Titania\u2019s eyes; Robin mistakenly bewitches Lysander, who is sleeping next to Hermia, and departs; Demetrius and Helena make their entrance, and he abandons her in the forest; Lysander, upon awaking, at once falls in love with Helena; Helena is convinced that she is being mocked and runs away from Lysander; Hermia wakes up from an unpleasant sleep and searches for Lysander.)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nTitania enters, gives some nature-related orders, and calls for a fairy song to lull her to sleep. Even though the fairies around her sing a song of protection for their queen, once she is asleep the fairy king Oberon has no trouble gaining access to her side. Drop goes the pansy juice into Titania\u2019s eyes, along with a little prayer that ends, \u201cWhen thou wak\u2019st, it is thy dear. \/ Wake when some vile thing is near\u201d (420, 2.2.33-34). And so he unleashes on his queen the indecorous, even degrading element of Eros, the power of love.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIn come Hermia and Lysander, both tired half to death, and they make their sleeping arrangements. Lysander is all for \u201cone bed\u201d in the forest, but Hermia firmly favors chastity as a key element of decorum, fitness of attitude and conduct. \u201cNay, good Lysander,\u201d she says, \u201cfor my sake, my dear, \/ Lie further off yet; do not lie so near\u201d (421, 2.2.44). Soon enough, though, both are fast asleep after pledging their lifelong loyalty.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe transformations enjoined by Oberon are supposed to yield predictable results, but it\u2019s hard to control such a magical power. Robin enters, a bit frustrated that so far he has been unable to find the Athenian youth that his master wants him to \u201cmedicate,\u201d but at least he comes upon Lysander sleeping separately from Hermia. Robin mistakenly sprinkles Lysander\u2019s eyes with the pansy juice that should have been sprinkled over the eyes of Demetrius (421, 2.2.76-81).<\/p>\n\n\n\nRobin, a member of the \u201csprite\u201d world, makes this big mistake because he can\u2019t process the fact that Lysander and Hermia are sleeping apart only because they respect the human custom of chastity before marriage, not because they are upset with each other. \u201cPuck\u201d is a natural creature, and cares nothing for customs of that sort, or concepts like \u201cchastity.\u201d <a href=\"#_edn23\" id=\"_ednref23\">[23]<\/a> To him, Lysander seems like a \u201clack-love\u201d and a \u201ckill-courtesy\u201d (421, 2.2.77), not a proper man.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIn rush Helena and Demetrius, still wrangling over his disdain for her, which has shattered her confidence in her attractiveness. That is no surprise since here, love is figured as a zero-sum game in which there must be winners and losers, and a species of often cruel exclusivity reigns. Consonantly, the pansy flower transfers <\/em>love from one object to another. Its magic is not of the aggregative sort: for humans, even in the forest, there is to be no hippie-like \u201cpolyamory\u201d or \u201cfree love.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nHelena stands directly above the sleeping Lysander. No sooner does the young man wake up than he falls in love with Helena and, therefore, out<\/em> of love with his beloved of a few minutes back, Hermia. Way to go, Robin Goodfellow! Comically, Lysander claims that his newfound love is entirely grounded in humankind\u2019s highest faculty: he says to Helena, \u201cReason becomes the marshal to my will \/ And leads me to your eyes \u2026\u201d (422, 2.2.120-21). <a href=\"#_edn24\" id=\"_ednref24\">[24]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nA downcast Helena can hardly believe that Lysander would mock her so meanly , knowing of her troubles with Demetrius. \u201cWhen at your hands did I deserve this scorn?\u201d (422, 2.2.124) she demands of Lysander, and in return he is able only to cast himself as a chivalrous knight even as he trashes his now-loathed \u201cex,\u201d Hermia.<\/p>\n\n\n\nLysander bids still-sleeping Hermia stay far from him, saying that he hates her as \u201ca surfeit of the sweetest things \/ The deepest loathing to the stomach brings \u2026\u201d (423, 2.2.137-38). How similar a pronouncement, and yet how different a sentiment,<\/em> that is from Duke Orsino\u2019s lyrical observation at the beginning of Twelfth Night: <\/em>\u201cIf music be the food of love, play on, \/ Give me excess of it that, surfeiting, \/ The appetite may sicken and so die.\u201d <a href=\"#_edn25\" id=\"_ednref25\">[25]<\/a> While Lysander is in earnest in his present loathing of Hermia, Orsino is in love with love itself\u2014he is not rejecting his love object, Countess Olivia.<\/p>\n\n\n\nHermia now awakes, and can scarcely believe Lysander isn\u2019t near her side so she can recount to him her bad dream: \u201cMethought a serpent ate my heart away\u201d (423, 2.2.149), she begins, and decides to go off in search of her Lysander.<\/p>\n\n\n\nWell, at least Oberon carried out his part of the plan properly\u2014he began the scene by squeezing pansy juice onto Titania\u2019s eyelids (420, 2.2.27-34). She remains asleep at the end of the second act, but not for long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"act3\">ACT 3<\/h3>\n\n\n\nAct 3, Scene 1 (423-27, the tradesmen meet in the woods to begin their rehearsals; Peter Quince and the others voice some concerns about certain representations; Robin observes them and decides to turn Bottom the Weaver into an ass; terrified, the other actors run away; Bottom sings and awakens the bewitched Titania, who immediately falls in love with him, and takes him to bed.)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nOur lowly actors are hard at work, rehearsing in the forest for the nobility\u2019s future viewing pleasure. Bottom continues to worry about excessive realism. \u201cThere are things in this comedy of Pyramus and \/ Thisbe that will never please\u201d (423, 3.1.8-9), he says, and one of those things is that \u201cPyramus must draw a \/ sword to kill himself, which the ladies cannot abide\u201d (423, 3.1.9-10). While the inexperienced critics Snout and Starveling want to get rid of the play\u2019s violence altogether, Bottom finds a better solution.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe eighteenth-century French author and critic Denis Diderot is generally credited with naming the \u201cfourth wall\u201d in drama, but the habit of maintaining or erasing the imaginary stage-front barrier between audiences and actors has been around since the beginning of drama. <a href=\"#_edn26\" id=\"_ednref26\">[26]<\/a> What Bottom proposes to do is to step outside his role temporarily and, in a prologue, directly tell the audience not to be afraid of the sword since, after all, it\u2019s only a play they\u2019re watching. We might call it a Renaissance drama trigger warning for \u201cscenes of violence, catastrophic misunderstanding, and tragically frustrated love pursuits.\u201d We\u2019ve been warned!<\/p>\n\n\n\nSnout worries about the lion, so Bottom decrees that he must show his human features through his suit: \u201chalf his face \/ must be seen through the lion\u2019s neck \u2026\u201d (424, 3.1.32-33), and he must address the audience and \u201ctell \/ them plainly he is Snug the joiner\u201d (424, 3.1.39-40). The workmen-theorists, then, think the audience will be traumatized by the sight of a whimsical man in a lion-suit, which tends to imply that the audience is not capable of distinguishing between dramatic or fictive representations and everyday reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe issue of representing moonlight must also be worked out, and here the matter concerns not excessive realism but an insufficient amount of it (424, 3.1.51-55). Aside from reproducing moonlight, the second, similar difficulty is how to represent a wall, but Bottom has an ingenious strategy to deal with this: an actor will stand onstage and either be dressed to look like a wall, or he will create a crack with his hands, which will signify the fissure through which Pyramus and Thisbe speak (424, 3.1.57-60).<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe language Bottom uses is significant: \u201cSome man or other must present Wall; and let him \/ have some plaster, or some loam, or some roughcast about \/ him to signify \u2018wall\u2019; or let him hold his fingers thus, and \/ through that cranny shall Pyramus and Thisbe whisper\u201d (424, 3.1.57-60). Is this an attempt to supply the realistic detail considered necessary to the representation\u2019s success, or\u2014if we attend to Bottom\u2019s final \u201cor\u201d above\u2014is he asserting that the audience will, in fact, be able to process a purely conventional representation of something real, like a cracked wall?<\/p>\n\n\n\nA similar ambiguity attaches to the \u201cmoonshine\u201d problem. Bottom supposes that natural moonlight can simply be let in through a casement in the theater-chamber\u2019s window, while Quince proposes something different: \u201cor else one must come in with a bush of thorns \/ and a lantern and say he comes to disfigure, or to present, \/ the person of Moonshine\u201d (424, 3.1.51-53).<\/p>\n\n\n\nIn both instances, there seems to be a little confusion here between the neoclassical precept that the dramatic representation must deceive the audience into taking something (or some event) on the stage for the real thing and the perhaps more generous assertion that audiences have little or no trouble a) distinguishing between make-believe and reality and b) accepting a purely symbolical or conventional presentation on the stage without sacrificing their ability to respond emotionally to what they see onstage.<\/p>\n\n\n\nEven though Peter Quince betrays his ignorance of the finer points in this debate over dramatic realism vs. conventionalism or symbolism when he mistakes the word \u201cdisfigure\u201d for \u201cfigure,\u201d Shakespeare may be marking off the whole affair as another tendentious \u201ceither\/or\u201d debate of the sort criticism so often generates, to little purpose. It seems reasonable to assert that audiences can deal with either approach, or both\u2014the director will determine which kind of representation suits the particular scene. In the case of the workmen\u2019s Pyramus and Thisbe, <\/em>we will be enjoying both strategies.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIt may be that Bottom and the others\u2019 concerns about excessive and deficient realism indicates more about them than it does about their noble audience. Do they themselves have trouble negotiating between reality and fantasy, so that they think their so-called betters have the same problem? In the enthusiastic Bottom\u2019s case, at least, that could be a consideration. Still, these clumsy actors are wrestling with an important neoclassical concern: what is the moral impact of fictional representations? Can mere fantasies cause distress or even actual harm in the world beyond art and literature? <a href=\"#_edn27\" id=\"_ednref27\">[27]<\/a> Anything worthwhile is probably capable of causing difficulties when mishandled or misunderstood. <a href=\"#_edn28\" id=\"_ednref28\">[28]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\nBy chance, Robin lights upon the rehearsal scene, and decides to try his brand of mischief on the workmen-actors. Evidently, saying \u201cI\u2019ll be an auditor\u2014 \/ An actor too perhaps, if I see cause\u201d (425, 3.1.67-68), he determines that partially transforming Bottom into an ass will be his contribution to the rehearsal, along with chasing the frightened actors around until they flee in terror.<\/p>\n\n\n\nBottom, now with an ass\u2019s head, is shocked at the way he is treated, and puts a brave face on his predicament: \u201cThis is to make an ass of me, to \/ fright me, if they could. But I will not stir from this place, \/ do what they can\u201d (426, 3.1.106-08). He decides to sing a lovely song featuring observations on songbirds as a balm to his soul: mentioned are the \u201couzel cock,\u201d the thrush, and the wren; the finch, sparrow, lark, and cuckoo (426, 3.1.110-13, 115-18).<\/p>\n\n\n\nWhy does Robin pick Bottom to transform and not another among the actors? Since the human character Bottom is somewhat of an ass in the pejorative sense, it seems appropriate that Bottom should be \u201ctranslated\u201d (426, 3.1.105), as the terrified Peter Quince terms the change, into a stubborn, obtuse donkey. To be translated<\/em> is literally, etymologically to be \u201cbrought over.\u201d Here, presumably, the change is from one realm and one species to a different realm, and a different species. Bottom becomes strangely connected and affined with the natural world, transformed from a man into an animal.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIf a more theoretical reason is desired, we could suggest that when the actors\u2019 roles were handed out, Bottom wanted to play all of them\u2014he imagined throwing himself into each of them with great success and impressing everyone. Now he is privileged (if that\u2019s the right word) to experience something that none of his fellow workmen is likely ever to experience: turning from a human being into an animal.<\/p>\n\n\n\nTitania awakens to the sight of the translated Bottom, and the magic pansy-juice does its work: the Queen of the Fairies declares, \u201cthy fair virtue\u2019s force perforce doth move me \/ On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee\u201d (426, 3.1.124-25). When Bottom tries to back away from this ardent woman, saying, \u201cMethinks, mistress, you should have little reason \/ for that\u201d (426, 3.1.126-27), she makes him an offer he can\u2019t refuse, considering her powers and high state: \u201cThou shalt remain here, whether thou wilt or no\u201d (426, 3.1.135).<\/p>\n\n\n\nBottom is soon accorded all sorts of attention to sweeten the deal. No less dignitaries than \u201cPeaseblossom, Cobweb, Moth, and Mustardseed\u201d (426, 3.1.144) are commanded to wait upon him, and he is pleased to be able to converse with them one by one.<\/p>\n\n\n\nPerhaps Bottom has got himself into this fix because of his obstreperous, overly enthusiastic personality, but that\u2019s no reason to be ungenerous in our understanding of him. He may have trouble managing his narcissistic tendencies and fantasy projections, but he is by no means alone in the play in not being able to do that. Narcissism and projection are part of love, too, and Bottom is gifted with a most remarkable, and even unique, set of experiences in A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\nAct 3, Scene 2 (427-438, Robin informs Oberon about the bewitching he has done, but when Demetrius arrives panting after Hermia, Oberon realizes that Robin bewitched the wrong Athenian; Oberon then charms Demetrius, and Robin goes to find Helena, who enters followed by a doting Lysander; Demetrius wakes up and falls in love with Helena; Helena is sure both suitors are making fun of her; when Hermia discovers that Lysander is pursuing Helena instead of her, she menaces Helena. \n\t\t\tLysander and Demetrius wrangle over Helena and agree to fight a duel; Oberon makes Robin impersonate both men, leading them farther into the woods until they fall asleep; Helena and Hermia sleep, too; Robin fixes his mistake by un-bewitching Lysander with an antidote flower.)<\/span>\n\t\t<\/span><span title='' data-less-title='' data-more-title='' class='yrm-toggle-expand yrm-toggle-expand-1' data-rel='yrm-HlFK2' data-more='(SYNOPSIS CONTINUES \u2026)' data-less='READ LESS' style='border: none; width: 100%;'>(SYNOPSIS CONTINUES \u2026)<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nPuck relates to Oberon how he transformed Bottom (427-28, 3.2.6-34), and then in Oberon\u2019s presence he discovers his error in having sprinkled pansy juice on Lysander rather than Demetrius: \u201cThis is the woman, but not this the man,\u201d (428, 3.2.42), says Robin, and then he and the Fairy King stand and behold the knock-down argument that Hermia and Demetrius have over his possessiveness towards her.<\/p>\n\n\n\nOberon is pleased that Titania has fallen in love with the transformed Bottom, but he is not pleased about Lysander\u2019s situation, and sets about making things right. Robin\u2019s mistake has sundered that rarest of things\u2014a couple grounded in true and faithful love, and it has left Hermia wondering where in the world Lysander has gone (429, 3.2.88-91). Oberon now bewitches Demetrius (430, 3.2.102-09) to turn his affections towards Helena and away from his less-than-pure, un-magical appreciation for Hermia.<\/p>\n\n\n\nRobin sees good sport in the coming fireworks amongst the couples: \u201cLord, what fools these mortals be!\u201d (430, 3.2.115) And he isn\u2019t wrong since, once again, he and Oberon, realizing what\u2019s about to happen\u2014namely, that when Demtrius wakes up newly enraptured with Helena, he and Lysander will vie for Helena\u2019s affections\u2014get to observe a human argument, first between Lysander and Helena, who believes herself to be the butt of a cruel joke, and then adding Demetrius and Lysander\u2019s bitter quarrel over her attentions: \u201cYou both are rivals and love Hermia, \/ And now both rivals to mock Helena\u201d (431, 3.2.155-56).<\/p>\n\n\n\nHelena laments to Hermia, \u201c[I]s all forgot? \/ All schooldays\u2019 friendship, childhood innocence?\u201d (432, 3.2.201-02) Hermia protests her innocence truthfully, but things soon turn ugly when her weak point is found: she fears being mocked for her short stature: Helena \u201chath made compare \/ Between our statures; she hath urged her height . . .\u201d (434, 3.2.290-91). Attraction and rejection touch the very heart of a person\u2019s identity, so Hermia\u2019s reaction is understandable.<\/p>\n\n\n\nDemetrius and Lysander go off into the woods to fight a duel over Helena (435, 3.2.335-37), and Helena, in spite of her taller stature, flees the wrath of Hermia. With the men and the women alike quarreling, we have reached the height of chaos in this play.<\/p>\n\n\n\nOberon suspects that Robin is responsible for all this discord, and as it turns out, he is correct. Robin says, \u201cthis their jangling I esteem a sport\u201d (435, 3.2.353). The King orders the impish \u201cPuck\u201d to follow the warring males and keep anything untoward from happening by leading them on and tiring them out until they sleep. He is also told to fix his mistake with Lysander (435, 3.2.354-68) by undoing the charm that he had laid upon him with the pansy, also known as Cupid\u2019s flower.<\/p>\n\n\n\nOberon himself will soon extort the Indian boy from Titania in exchange for releasing her from her love match with an ass. What Oberon, a king in the comic mode, seeks above all is harmony: of the soon-to-be-sleeping human lovers, he says, \u201cWhen they next awake, all this derision \/ Shall seem a dream and fruitless vision, \/ And back to Athens shall the lovers wend \/ With league whose date till death shall never end\u201d (435-36, 3.2.370-73). As for Titania, Oberon explains, \u201cI will her charm\u00e8d eye release \/ From monster\u2019s view, and all things shall be peace\u201d (436, 3.2.375-77).<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe men soon grow weary, and Helena and Hermia also tire and lie down to sleep. While all four humans sleep, Robin is able to correct his earlier mistake with Lysander. As he sums up the repair, \u201cJack shall have Jill, \/ Naught shall go ill, \/ the man shall have his mare again, and all shall be well\u201d (438, 3.2.461-63). Robin doesn\u2019t sharply differentiate one human couple from another: to him, what matters is the act of coupling itself, the simple fact of union. He doesn\u2019t trouble himself with the choice of object. <a href=\"#_edn29\" id=\"_ednref29\">[29]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"act4\">ACT 4<\/h3>\n\n\n\nAct 4, Scene 1 (438-43, Titania and her assistant faeries treat Bottom royally, and he falls asleep next to her; Oberon reveals to Robin that Titania has relented about possession of the Indian boy, so now it\u2019s fair to un-bewitch her and Bottom; Titania and Oberon charm Bottom along with Hermia and Lysander, Demetrius and Helen into a profound slumber, and depart; back in Athens, Theseus and Hippolyta make conversation; in the forest, Bottom wakes up and waxes philosophical about his strange experience as an ass.)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nBottom satisfies his nonhuman desires with some delicious hay, and then gives in to sleep while Titania lies next to him (439, 4.1.30-43). Oberon has succeeded in his plan to extort the Indian boy from Titania, whom he now pities, conceding, \u201cI will undo \/ This hateful imperfection of her eyes\u201d (439, 4.1.60-61).<\/p>\n\n\n\nAfter Titania has been returned to normal, it will be Robin\u2019s task to turn Bottom back into a man. Oberon explains that Robin should remove the ass\u2019s head from Bottom, \u201cThat he, awaking when the other do, \/ May all to Athens back again repair \/ And think no more of this night\u2019s accidents \/ But as the fierce vexation of a dream\u201d (439, 4.1.64-67).<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe First Folio\u2019s punctuation of the first two lines may help us understand Oberon\u2019s meaning: \u201cThat he awaking when the other doe, \/ May all to Athens <\/em>back againe repaire\u2026.\u201d <a href=\"#_edn30\" id=\"_ednref30\">[30]<\/a> A modern Englishing of the entire four-line passage could run, \u201cSo that when Bottom awakes at the same time the others do, \/ They may all return to Athens, \/ And think that this night\u2019s events \/ Have been no more than the intense disturbance arising from a bad dream.\u201d More on this later, when the lovers wake up and try to explain to Theseus what has happened.<\/p>\n\n\n\nOberon now sprinkles a counter-herb or antidote, Dian\u2019s bud, <a href=\"#_edn31\" id=\"_ednref31\">[31]<\/a> in Titania\u2019s eyes and thereby undoes the spell he had earlier cast upon her with the pansy flower, or \u201clove-in-idleness.\u201d Titania awakes, and says confusedly, \u201cMy Oberon, what visions have I seen! \/ Methought I was enamored of an ass\u201d (441, 4.1.74-75). At that point, Robin undoes Bottom\u2019s transformation, and then Titania and Oberon dance near the spot where the human lovers still sleep. Apparently Oberon will tell Titania later how exactly all these strange things have come to pass. Or at least that\u2019s what she asks him to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\nWhat we have been witnessing is a species of \u201cvexation\u201d in which nothing holds true about even those things in which humans put the greatest stock. Everything is subject to whimsical magic and is beyond mortal control. Still, just as no lasting harm comes to Titania, none will come of this \u201cvexation\u201d or fitful state of agitation that overtook Bottom (through his \u201ctranslation\u201d) as well as Lysander and Demetrius (through herbal enchantment) and even Hermia and Helena by their participation in the night\u2019s strange, confused happenings.<\/p>\n\n\n\nBeyond the palace as the hunt is getting started, Hippolyta shows some of her old fighting spirit, reminding Theseus that she has kept better company than him\u2014his hounds may be very fine, just as he boasts, but she has heard the dogs of Hercules and Cadmus, and is dubious about Theseus\u2019 claims of supreme tuneableness between the dogs and the horns (440-41, 4.1.110-16): \u201cI never heard \/ So musical a discord, such sweet thunder\u201d (441, 4.1.115-16), she needles Theseus, who is driven to brag still more about his hounds.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe tenor of this conversation is civil\u2014a far cry from the violence that forged the union of Theseus and Hippolyta. When the hunting party happens upon the sleeping lovers, Egeus importunes Theseus to practice severity, shouting, \u201cI beg the law, the law upon his head!\u201d (441, 4.1.152) But Demetrius, Egeus\u2019 favorite, robs him of the opportunity by declaring his renewed interest in Helena, which leaves Hermia free to marry Lysander. The Duke offers a triple wedding at the temple nearby, and the happy couples, still adjusting to the waking world, follow Theseus and recount what they can of their forest dreams (442, 4.1.196-97).<\/p>\n\n\n\nTo end the scene, Bottom waxes philosophical about his strange vision: \u201cMan is but an ass if he \/ go about to expound this dream\u201d (442-43, 4.1.203-04), he says, and continues in a remarkably garbled way to misquote from 1 Corinthians<\/em> 2:9: \u201cThe eye of man hath not heard, the \/ ear of man hath not seen, man\u2019s hand is not able to taste, his \/ tongue to conceive, nor his heart to report what my dream \/ was\u201d (443, 4.1.207-10; see endnote for accurate citation). <a href=\"#_edn32\" id=\"_ednref32\">[32]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\nSt. Paul goes on to say at 1 Corinthians<\/em> 2:15, \u201cBut he that is spirituall, discerneth all thynges, yet he hym selfe is iudged of no man.\u201d Perhaps Bottom asserts a special insight into the nature of his vision, even if he can\u2019t fully expound it. As many critics have noted, Bottom alone among the characters in A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream <\/em>is privileged to see and talk with the inhabitants of Oberon and Titania\u2019s fairy realm. Even when transformed into a demi-donkey, he doesn\u2019t change: somehow, he is at home in this dream-world, this place of strong desire.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIn any event, Bottom\u2019s hope seems to be that with Peter Quince\u2019s help, he can get this vision turned into a ballad and have it sung at the end of a play (443, 4.1.210-14). Like his fellow \u201cmechanicals,\u201d Bottom shows respect for his dramatic art. But like them as well, he shows a healthy regard for its practical, material benefits: it\u2019s possible to print and peddle a dream that one can\u2019t fully understand or expound, and still turn a profit.<\/p>\n\n\n\nBottom\u2019s reaction to his experience differsfrom the couples\u2019 response to theirs. They are just trying to reacclimate themselves to the everyday world and make sense of what happened. The weaver, however, is not \u201cvexed\u201d in quite the same way that the other characters are. Most of us live fitfully trying to negotiate the gap between waking and sleep, reality and fantasy, what is and what might be, but not Bottom. <\/p>\n\n\n\nThen, too, Bottom\u2014perhaps because his vision involves a transformation from human into animal, not merely a sorting-out of love objects\u2014seems to feel a strong sense of wonder in the aftermath of his vision, even as he quickly moves to consider practical ways of squeezing profit from it. Is Shakespeare\u2014a working artist not infinitely removed from the status of the laborers he good-naturedly mocks in this play\u2014hinting that his own response to his art is similarly twofold: a matter of both wonder and utility?<\/p>\n\n\n\nAct 4, Scene 2 (443-44, just as the tradesmen are sure their hopes of putting on their play are lost, Bottom arrives and tells them that their play is \u201cpreferred\u201d for tonight.)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nThe other actors are waiting for Bottom to make his appearance, lest they lose their chance at courtly patronage suitable to their humble rank. It seems that the play\u2019s marriages have just taken place, as Snug tells the others, \u201cMasters, the Duke is coming from the temple, and \/ there is two or three lords and ladies more married\u201d (443, 4.2.15-16).<\/p>\n\n\n\nAlthough the workmen are worried that their moment of dramatic glory has passed, Bottom shows up and receives a hero\u2019s welcome. Still, he keeps largely mum about his great adventure with Titania and her attendants, preferring to relate something more comprehensible: their play is \u201cpreferred\u201d (444, 4.2.34). It has been recommended, which seems to mean not that it is certain to be performed but that it will be one of the options set before Theseus for the evening\u2019s entertainment. The actors must all be ready to roll should they be chosen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"act5\">ACT 5<\/h3>\n\n\n\nAct 5, Scene 1 (444-53, while not crediting the two young couples\u2019 accounts of their recent strange experiences, Theseus chooses Pyramus and Thisbe <\/em>for the evening\u2019s entertainment; the play is silly, and the sophisticated audience mocks it; Theseus, however, respects the tradesmen\u2019s sincere efforts and is moved by them; when the couples have all gone to bed, the Fairy King and Queen and their helpers bless their marriages; Robin Goodfellow asks the audience to be generous towards Shakespeare\u2019s play, or at least to think of it as a dream.)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nAt the palace after the wedding feast, Theseus tells Hippolyta and his lords (the lovers will arrive after he speaks these words) that he will have none of this day\u2019s talk about fairyland-based \u201cantique fables\u201d (444, 5.1.2) <a href=\"#_edn33\" id=\"_ednref33\">[33]<\/a> such as the now-happy couples Hermia and Lysander, and Helena and Demetrius, have related to him about their strange time in the woods outside Athens. He comes across as a gentle but firm skeptic: \u201cLovers and madmen have such seething brains, \/ Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend more \/ Than cool reason ever comprehends\u201d (444, 5.1.4-6).<\/p>\n\n\n\nIn his view, \u201cThe lunatic, the lover, and the poet \/ Are of imagination all compact\u201d (444, 5.1.7-8), and he expounds further that the poet\u2019s \u201cimagination bodies forth \/ The forms of things unknown\u201d and then his \u201cpen \/ Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing \/ A local habitation and a name\u201d (444, 5.1.14-17). What has been imagined in the Classical poetic frenzy or furor poeticus, <\/em><a href=\"#_edn34\" id=\"_ednref34\">[34]<\/a> that is, will be given shape, definiteness, and order during the process of composition. <a href=\"#_edn35\" id=\"_ednref35\">[35]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\nImagination, Theseus continues, is bound to provide causal agents for anything it treats: \u201cin the night, imagining some fear, \/ How easy is a bush supposed a bear!\u201d (444, 5.1.21-22) Art, then, is one way people make sense of what our experiences and feelings give us to process.<\/p>\n\n\n\nHippolyta is somewhat less willing to downplay what she has heard from the lovers about their wild night in the forest. The collective story they have told, she thinks, \u201cMore witnesseth than fancy\u2019s images \/ And grows to something of great constancy\u201d (444, 5.1.25-26). As we would say in the wake of Scully and Mulder and the X-Files, <\/em>\u201cThe truth is out there.\u201d <a href=\"#_edn36\" id=\"_ednref36\">[36]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nWhile Theseus may sound rather dismissive of the arts, he finds in them entertainment sufficient to \u201cease the anguish of a torturing hour\u201d (445, 5.1.37). That is no small thing in the present circumstances, as he, Hippolyta, and the other couples must endure a three-hour waiting period before they retire to bed on their wedding night.<\/p>\n\n\n\nSo what\u2019s on the menu for tonight, asks Theseus? Philostrate rattles the items off: a couple of Classically themed pieces, but as a mythic figure himself, Theseus doesn\u2019t need to hear that stuff <\/em>again, and the satirical disquisition on \u201cThe thrice-three muses mourning for the death \/ Of learning \u2026\u201d (445, 5.1.52-53). That sort of thing isn\u2019t what\u2019s needed either, says Theseus. <a href=\"#_edn37\" id=\"_ednref37\">[37]<\/a> As luck would have it, that leaves what Philostrate pans as a silly play summarized as \u201cA tedious brief scene of young Pyramus \/ And his love Thisbe \u2026\u201d (445, 5.1.56-57).<\/p>\n\n\n\nThis play sounds unpromising, but the illogical and whimsical PR-blurb only piques the Duke\u2019s interest, as does the cynical Philostrate\u2019s admission that in rehearsal, the suicide of Pyramus affected him more than he thought possible, though not in the usual way: this act, he says, \u201cMade mine eyes water; but more merry tears \/ The passion of loud laughter never shed\u201d (445, 5.1.69-70).<\/p>\n\n\n\nWhat finally sells Theseus on this particular play, though, is Philostrate\u2019s description of the men who would be acting it. These are \u201cHard-handed men that work in Athens here, \/ Which never labored in their minds till now \u2026\u201d (446, 5.1.72-73). Theseus\u2019s response to this is admirable: \u201cI will hear that play. \/ For never anything can be amiss \/ When simpleness and duty tender it\u201d (446, 5.1.81-83). The players are honest, and they earnestly want to entertain, so that should be good enough for even the elite audience that awaits the performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\nHippolyta is not convinced by this logic, and worries that the workmen-players will be humiliated. Not a whit, Theseus reassures her: we never get perfection in art, only effort with varying degrees of success. \u201cOur sport,\u201d he says, \u201cshall be to take what they mistake. \/ And what poor duty cannot do, noble respect \/ Takes it in might, not merit\u201d (446, 5.1.90-92). A spectator should be more than a mean-spirited fanny in a seat: Theseus promotes a kind and gracious critical standard, of a sort that has seldom prevailed from Classical times to the present. Honest effort is to be rewarded, not hissed and dismissed. <a href=\"#_edn38\" id=\"_ednref38\">[38]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nIn spite of Theseus\u2019s kind words, things get off to a rocky start when Peter Quince butchers the punctuation of a courtly prologue, which turns what he says into a near-nonsensical patter. Theseus, Lysander, and Hippolyta trade barbs at Quince\u2019s expense. In honor of Theseus\u2019s advance generosity, though, it\u2019s probably best to set the speakers\u2019 tone to \u201camused\u201d rather than viciously critical. Apparently nonplussed (if he even hears any of this tittering in the audience), Quince goes on to spill the entire plot, leaving no suspense for the presentation itself. <a href=\"#_edn39\" id=\"_ednref39\">[39]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nThe critical talk pipes down for a while as the play proceeds, <a href=\"#_edn40\" id=\"_ednref40\">[40]<\/a> with Snout as \u201cWall,\u201d Bottom as Pyramus, and Flute as Thisbe all gamely going about their business. Finally, Hippolyta can\u2019t hold silent, and says, \u201cThis is the silliest stuff that ever I heard,\u201d while in return, Theseus says, \u201cThe best in this kind are but shadows, and the \/ worst are no worse if imagination amend them\u201d (449, 5.1.207-09). As a statement of critical principle, this sounds like what many of us will take for Shakespeare\u2019s own wonderful combination of boldness and humility.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThat is, a stage representation will always pale in comparison with \u201cthe real thing,\u201d but it\u2019s sufficient to accomplish its ends if the audience roots for the players to succeed. The audience\u2019s generous imagination is the closest any artist can get to the Prologue\u2019s famous \u201cmuse of fire\u201d in Henry V. <\/em><a href=\"#_edn41\" id=\"_ednref41\">[41]<\/a> What are drama\u2019s \u201cends,\u201d then? Most likely, Shakespeare would have approved of the standard set forth by the Roman poet Horace: to be both utile <\/em>(useful) and dulce <\/em>(sweet, pleasant, entertaining), <\/em><a href=\"#_edn42\" id=\"_ednref42\">[42]<\/a> or, as Sir Philip Sidney puts it in \u201cAn Apology for Poetry,\u201d the poet should \u201cteach and delight.\u201d <a href=\"#_edn43\" id=\"_ednref43\">[43]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nNext, in comes Snug as \u201cLion.\u201d Just as the workmen had previously planned, Snug takes pains to ensure that the ladies will not be frightened: <a href=\"#_edn44\" id=\"_ednref44\">[44]<\/a> \u201cThen know that I as Snug the joiner am \/ A lion fell, nor else no lion\u2019s dam\u201d (449, 5.1.218-219). His phrasing here is interesting in that the actor both steps forth as <\/em>himself, Snug, and at the same time he is a ferocious lion\u2014or, if you please and as the Norton editors aptly note\u2014\u201ca lion fell,\u201d which may mean either \u201cferocious\u201d or \u201ca man in a lion\u2019s-skin,<\/em>\u201d for \u201cfell\u201d can be interpreted as \u201cfleece,\u201d too. <a href=\"#_edn45\" id=\"_ednref45\">[45]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nStarveling enters as the Man in the Moon, with his lantern representing the moon, and then \u2026 the noble audience cuts him off in gentle mockery so many times that he can only blurt out in exasperation, \u201cAll that I have to say is to tell you that the lan- \/ tern is the moon, I the man i\u2019th\u2019 moon, this thornbush my \/ thornbush, and this dog my dog\u201d (450, 5.1.247-49). <a href=\"#_edn46\" id=\"_ednref46\">[46]<\/a> So that\u2019s that.<\/p>\n\n\n\nBottom next acts the leadup to Pyramus\u2019s suicide based on the misrecognized mantle that Thisbe dropped in her flight from the raging lion. Theseus finds this scene far from affecting, and says, \u201cThis passion, and the death of a dear friend, would \/ go near to make a man look sad\u201d (450, 5.1.277-78). But Hippolyta disagrees, saying instead, \u201cBeshrew my heart, but I pity the man\u201d (450, 5.1.279).<\/p>\n\n\n\nHere, it is Hippolyta who seems closer to the generous critical precept that Theseus set forth before the beginning of Pyramus and Thisbe: <\/em>her inflection of that principle may remind us of Samuel Johnson\u2019s excellent observation in his \u201cPreface to Shakespeare<\/em>\u201d that we are moved by actions on the stage not because we are fooled into taking them for real, but because they remind<\/em> us of something real: \u201cImitations produce pain or pleasure, not because they are mistaken for realities, but because they bring realities to mind.\u201d <a href=\"#_edn47\" id=\"_ednref47\">[47]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\nAlthough the legends surrounding Theseus and Hippolyta are complex and varied, some of them say she suffered many losses during the Amazonian war, one of whom was her sister Antiope. It may be that we are witnessing a difference in the sensibilities of these two strong-minded partners concerning the war and the deaths that overtook key participants. <a href=\"#_edn48\" id=\"_ednref48\">[48]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nIn any case, Pyramus bids the world goodbye with his trusty sword, wailing \u201cTongue, lose thy light; \/ Moon, take thy flight. \/ Now die, die, die, die, die\u201d (451, 5.1.293-95). In short order, Thisbe does the same in similarly dreadful, choppy verses. In spite of the poetry\u2019s wretchedness, it isn\u2019t hard to see the appeal: around the same time (circa 1595), Shakespeare authored Romeo and Juliet, <\/em>another play that tells the story of young lovers whose destruction turns on tragic accidents and misrecognitions.<\/p>\n\n\n\nTheseus lauds the players and tells them diplomatically that no epilogue will be needed, but a Bergomask dance would be very welcome. <a href=\"#_edn49\" id=\"_ednref49\">[49]<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\nRobin Goodfellow, aka \u201cPuck,\u201d offers a thrilling characterization of the faeries who serve Oberon and Titania as little creatures who live to the fullest at night: \u201cAnd we fairies that do run \/ By the triple Hecate\u2019s team \/ From the presence of the sun, \/ Following darkness like a dream, \/ Now are frolic\u201d (452, 5.1.369-73). It is Robin\u2019s present task to take his broom and \u201csweep the dust behind the door\u201d (452, 5.1.376).<\/p>\n\n\n\nOberon and Titania deliver their instructions to their fairy underlings, with orders to dance and to sing exactly what he will go on to say: all that they do in Theseus, Hippolyta and the other couples\u2019 chambers will be designed to sanctify the unions of the mortals within them and render the offspring flowing from their acts of generation beautiful. Happy futurity is the theme in all things.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe fairies all go to spend the night fulfilling these obligations, which leaves Robin alone on the stage, to speak an epilogue. In it, he invites the audience either to think of the play (if they don\u2019t care for it) as \u201cno more yielding but a dream\u201d (453, 5.1.414), or, if they like it, as an earnest promise of more fine performances to come. With that, Robin calls for applause, and the play is done.<\/p>\n\n\n\nFinal Reflections on A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nTo some degree like love itself, the theater (\u201cmake-believe\u201d) is a power in the world and one to be treated with due regard. At the end of A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream,<\/em> therefore, Robin Goodfellow begs indulgence for its excellent mockery of romantic desire as an irrational, chaos-inducing force that nonetheless seems conducive to individual happiness and good social order.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe epilogue is effective, as Robin leaves matters to the audience\u2019s imagination: it is their prerogative to judge what they have seen, and their burden to perpetuate the play in their own minds or let it pass away. Shakespeare\u2019s conception of an ideal audience involves a certain active <\/em>quality: they themselves must flesh out the representation and determine its value.<\/p>\n\n\n\nOn the whole, A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream <\/em>is a romantic comedy with a fairy-guided twist. This play may owe much of its success over the centuries to its way of dealing with passion in a curiously dispassionate, bemused, moonstruck manner. This fairy-land perspective has already been captured by the time Robin says to Oberon in Act 3, Scene 2, \u201cShall we their fond pageant see? \/ Lord, what fools these mortals be!\u201d (430, 3.2.114-15)<\/p>\n\n\n\nShakespeare and his creations generously proceed to let us in on that divine, lordly perspective. We know that the chaste moon-goddess Diana is looking over the whole affair from her distant perch. In the end, as Theseus himself predicts midway into the play \u201cthe fierce vexation of a \u00a0dream,\u201d the strife and confusion, will give way to blessings and decorum (440, 4.1.83-90).<\/p>\n\n\n\nEdition.<\/strong>\u00a0Greenblatt, Stephen et al., editors.\u00a0The Norton Shakespeare: Comedies + Digital Edition. <\/em>3rd ed. W. W. Norton, 2016. ISBN-13:\u00a0978-0-393-93861-6.<\/p>\n\n\n\nCopyright \u00a9 2012, revised 2025 Alfred J. Drake<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nDocument Timestamp: 8\/3\/2025 6:44 PM<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"endnotes\">ENDNOTES<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n*To return to exact part of the text referenced by the endnotes below, left-click on the endnote’s numbered link. By contrast, the blue scroll-up button at the bottom right of the page returns to the top of the document.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref1\" id=\"_edn1\">[1]<\/a> See Plutarch\u2019s \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/penelope.uchicago.edu\/Thayer\/E\/Roman\/Texts\/Plutarch\/Lives\/Theseus*.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Life of Theseus<\/a>,\u201d Chs. 25-26. penelope.uchicago.edu. Accessed 10\/20\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref2\" id=\"_edn2\">[2]<\/a> The senex iratus<\/em> is one of several stock characters in Greek and Roman comedy; his role is generally to impose obstacles and make a fool of himself. The miles gloriosus <\/em>or braggart soldier is another such foolish character\u2014his vanity and ego get him into trouble every time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref3\" id=\"_edn3\">[3]<\/a> We might connect Theseus\u2019s stance as a lover to the position of a chivalric lover during the European Middle Ages. The chivalric code in love and war amounts to a containment strategy over against the primal instincts and impulses towards selfishness and violence, lest they break out in their purest form, and civilization lose the protective shield of certain codes that constrain kings, warriors, and lovers from behaving in chaotic, unsustainable ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref4\" id=\"_edn4\">[4]<\/a> See Maimonides, Moses (or Rabbi Moses ben Maimon). <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gutenberg.org\/cache\/epub\/73584\/pg73584-images.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The Guide for the Perplexed<\/em><\/a>. <\/em>Trans. M. Friedl\u00e4nder. London: Routledge, 1910. Gutenberg e-text. Accessed 9\/4\/2024. In his Introduction\u2019s \u201cPrefatory Remarks,\u201d Maimonides writes, \u201cAt times the truth shines so brilliantly that we perceive it as clear as day. Our nature and habit then draw a veil over our perception, and we return to a darkness almost as dense as before. We are like those who, though beholding frequent flashes of lightning, still find themselves in the thickest darkness of the night.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref5\" id=\"_edn5\">[5]<\/a> Norton footnote 4 for pg. 412 of the current play suggests that this mixed-up title is a sendup of the titles of early plays, such as one stages by Thomas Preston, Cambyses: A Lamentable Tragedy Mixed Full of Pleasant Mirth. <\/em>Shakespeare\u2019s own propensity to mix genres in much the same way probably derives from his knowledge of his predecessors\u2019 work. He does not observe strict generic rules or restraints in either his comedies or tragedies. On the topic of Pyramus and Thisbe, see Ovid\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theoi.com\/Text\/OvidMetamorphoses4.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Metamorphoses<\/em><\/a>. Book 4.55ff. Trans. Brookes More. theoi.com. Accessed 10\/16\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref6\" id=\"_edn6\">[6]<\/a> Readers of ancient Greek tragedy will easily recall that in plays such as Oedipus Rex, <\/em>just to name the most famous example, violence was generally kept offstage in favor of simply recounting it. Apparently, the Greek playwrights thought that direct representation of violence would only distract their audiences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref7\" id=\"_edn7\">[7]<\/a> See Norton footnote #4 for pg. 413 of the current play. As the note suggests, actors did not generally receive a copy of the entire play\u2014all they got was a strip containing their own lines and cues. See \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bard.org\/study-guides\/actors-in-shakespeares-day\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Actors in Shakespeare\u2019s Day<\/a>\u201d by the Utah Shakespeare Festival and \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/orlandoshakes.org\/the-acting-profession-of-shakespeares-time\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The Acting Profession of Shakespeare\u2019s Time<\/a>\u201d by Orlando Shakes. Accessed 10\/16\/2024. Also of great interest: \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/hensloweasablog.blogspot.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Henslowe\u2019s Diary as a Blog<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref8\" id=\"_edn8\">[8]<\/a> The descriptions of the fairies\u2019 actions sometimes seem as if designed to evoke the small-scale transformations and natural processes of the forest, which can indeed seem magical to those who observe them closely. Early mythologies and religions often reveal this sense of human connection to natural processes and events. The myths and lore of the Greeks and Romans are redolent of such sensibilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref9\" id=\"_edn9\">[9]<\/a> Hopkins, Gerard Manley. \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.poetryfoundation.org\/poems\/44399\/pied-beauty\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Pied Beauty<\/a>.\u201d poetryfoundation.org. Accessed 10\/20\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref10\" id=\"_edn10\">[10]<\/a> Antony\u2019s \u201cMischief\u201d accords well with \u201chavoc\u201d and \u201cthe dogs of war\u201d; see Norton Tragedies 318, 3.1.275.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref11\" id=\"_edn11\">[11]<\/a> Diana is the Roman name for the Greek goddess of the hunt, Artemis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref12\" id=\"_edn12\">[12]<\/a> See the present play at 406, 1.1.3-6.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref13\" id=\"_edn13\">[13]<\/a> With regard to the character Oberon, see <a href=\"https:\/\/quod.lib.umich.edu\/e\/eebo\/A03886.0001.001\/1:4.21?rgn=div2;view=fulltext\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Huon of Bourdeaux,<\/em> Chs. XXI-XXIII<\/a>. See also the Encyclopedia Britannica entry \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.britannica.com\/topic\/Oberon-legendary-figure\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Oberon<\/a>.\u201d Also of interest: \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/medium.com\/@jdziubekmacdonald\/who-is-the-king-of-the-faeries-6127d9f87acf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Oberon<\/a>.\u201d 2018, JD MacDonald. On Titania, Wiktionary offers that this is <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/Titania\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">another name for the goddess Artemis (Roman: Diana)<\/a>, and that the name is also etymologically close to the Greek word for the <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/titanides\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Titanesses<\/a>, daughter of Ouranos and Gaia. All accessed 10\/16\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref14\" id=\"_edn14\">[14]<\/a> Shakespeare, William. As You Like It.<\/em> In The Norton Shakespeare: Comedies,<\/em> 3rd ed. 673-731. See also The Tempest.<\/em> In The Norton Shakespeare: Romances and Poems,<\/em> 3rd ed. 397-448.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref15\" id=\"_edn15\">[15]<\/a> Current play, Norton 439, 4.1.67.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref16\" id=\"_edn16\">[16]<\/a> \u201cCorin\u201d is the name of the kindly old shepherd in As You Like It. <\/em>In The Norton Shakespeare: Comedies,<\/em> 3rd ed. 673-731.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref17\" id=\"_edn17\">[17]<\/a> As Norton footnote #6 to pg. 414 points out, a changeling is either a fairy child put in place of a stolen human child or, as in this case, the human child that has been taken.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref18\" id=\"_edn18\">[18]<\/a> On the history of the fairy character \u201cPuck,\u201d see \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.boldoutlaw.com\/puckrobin\/puckages.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Puck: That Shrewd and Knavish Sprite Called Robin Goodfellow<\/a>.\u201d boldoutlaw.com. Accessed 10\/16\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref19\" id=\"_edn19\">[19]<\/a> The Norton footnote #7 for pg. 417 of the current play mentions this lore about the pansy flower, or \u201clove-in-idleness\u201d or \u201cCupid\u2019s flower.\u201d See <a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Pansy_flower.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">image of pansy flower<\/a>. Wikimedia Commons. Accessed 10\/21\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref20\" id=\"_edn20\">[20]<\/a> The name \u201clove-in-idleness\u201d may imply that just as Helena\u2019s words suggest, love involves a narcissistic projection of qualities into a beloved object to bind it to us. Another thing to note about the magic of this \u201cCupid\u2019s flower\u201d is that it is pure, stripped of complications such as concern for social status, money, and so forth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref21\" id=\"_edn21\">[21]<\/a> Current play, Norton 411, 1.1.232-33.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref22\" id=\"_edn22\">[22]<\/a> See Ovid\u2019s \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.perseus.tufts.edu\/hopper\/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.02.0074\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Apollo and Daphne<\/a>\u201d in the middle of Book 1 of Metamorphoses.<\/em> Trans. Golding, 1567. perseus.tufts.edu. Accessed 10\/21\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref23\" id=\"_edn23\">[23]<\/a> The term \u201cchastity\u201d often refers to the preservation of a woman\u2019s virginity before marriage, but it is also used to describe the preservation of monogamy within a marriage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref24\" id=\"_edn24\">[24]<\/a> See Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy\u2019s article \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/plato.stanford.edu\/entries\/emotions-17th18th\/LD1Background.html#:~:text=The%20appropriate%20emotional%20dispositions%20may,might%20seem%20to%20oppose%20reason.\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ancient, Medieval, and Renaissance Theories of the Emotions<\/a>.\u201d The section on Aristotle is especially valuable on the relationship between the will, emotions, and the faculty of reason. plato.stanford.edu. Accessed 10\/21\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref25\" id=\"_edn25\">[25]<\/a> Shakespeare, William. Twelfth Night, or What You Will.<\/em> In The Norton Shakespeare: Comedies,<\/em> 3rd ed. 743-97. See 743, 1.1.1-3.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref26\" id=\"_edn26\">[26]<\/a> See \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.backstage.com\/magazine\/article\/breaking-the-fourth-wall-explained-movies-tv-74915\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Breaking the Fourth Wall Explained<\/a>.\u201d backstage.com. Accessed 10\/16\/2024. The fourth wall takes several forms by extension: the front of a stage, a camera lens, perhaps even the narrative of a book. Basically, while the audience can see and hear the actors, the actors behave as if they can\u2019t see or hear the audience. A soliloquy\u2014lines spoken by an actor alone on the stage at some point other than a prologue or epilogue\u2014only breaks the fourth wall if that\u2019s the actor\u2019s intention.<\/p>\n\n\n\nUsually, the goal is instead to have the actor talking things out for himself or herself. Diderot\u2019s advice to actors runs, \u00abImaginez sur le bord du th\u00e9\u00e2tre un grand mur qui vous s\u00e9pare du parterre. Jouez comme si la toile ne se levoit pas.\u00bb (Commentary author\u2019s translation: \u201cImagine that at the very front of the stage a giant wall separates you from the audience. Carry on with your acting as if the curtain had never been raised.\u201d). See <a href=\"https:\/\/babel.hathitrust.org\/cgi\/pt?id=inu.30000115388948&seq=289&q1=mur\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">this page (French)<\/a> in \u0152uvres de Th\u00e9\u00e2tre de M. Diderot, avec un Discours sur la Po\u00e8sie Dramatique, Tome Premier. <\/em>Amsterdam, 1771. HathiTrust. Accessed 10\/17\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\nSometimes, a soliloquy may hover between self-address and audience address, but in any case, soliloquy speakers reveal what they are thinking, which makes for a certain intimacy in a hushed theater. In Hamlet, <\/em>Shakespeare makes the prince criticize actors who \u201cham it up\u201d for the audience\u2014that, thinks Hamlet, is a sloppy, undisciplined way of breaking the fourth wall, and it\u2019s bound to degrade the integrity of the performance.<\/p>\n\n\n<a id=\"_edn27\" href=\"#_ednref27\">[27]<\/a> Some critics may consider this a crude topic, sliding over into \u201cmoral panic\u201d territory. But that need not be so. If one wants to claim benefits for engaging with the arts, it is fair to consider also that they might, at least potentially, cause harm. In \u201cThe Decay of Lying,\u201d Oscar Wilde\u2014certainly no proponent of censorship\u2014notably makes his dialogic character Vivian say, \u201cParadox though it may seem\u2014and paradoxes are always dangerous things\u2014it is none the less true that Life imitates art far more than Art imitates life.\u201d See “<a href=\"https:\/\/www.gutenberg.org\/files\/887\/887-0.txt\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The Decay of Lying<\/a>.” Gutenberg e-text. Accessed 10\/21\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref28\" id=\"_edn28\">[28]<\/a> With regard to representation\u2019s basic limits (how realistic can a play be?), today we take for granted a host of cinematic special effects when we watch a film adaptation of a Shakespeare play. When we view a play in the theater, however, we are closer to the limitations of Shakespeare\u2019s own day. One can only do so much by way of illusion on the stage, so Shakespeare often asks his audience to use their own imaginations. What he calls for is essentially a Coleridgean \u201cwilling suspension of disbelief.\u201d See <a href=\"https:\/\/catalog.hathitrust.org\/Record\/006057690\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Biographia Literaria<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>and in particular, <a href=\"https:\/\/babel.hathitrust.org\/cgi\/pt?id=inu.32000007431051&seq=213&q1=suspension+of+disbelief\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">pg. 191\/213<\/a>. HathiTrust. Accessed 10\/18\/2024. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref29\" id=\"_edn29\">[29]<\/a> Robin is part of nature\u2019s grand perspective, so to speak, on the needs of individual humans and mating couples. He does not enter into their emotions, expectations, or customs in a granular way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref30\" id=\"_edn30\">[30]<\/a> See the Folger Shakespeare Library\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.folger.edu\/explore\/shakespeare-in-print\/first-folio\/bookreader-68\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">1623 Folio<\/a>, electronic pg. 177 col. 2. Accessed 10\/20\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref31\" id=\"_edn31\">[31]<\/a> Flower lore: Diana\u2019s bud, artemisia absinthium (common wormwood). See \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.gutenberg.org\/cache\/epub\/61325\/pg61325-images.html#Page_246\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Dian\u2019s Bud and Monk\u2019s-hood Blue<\/a>\u201d in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gutenberg.org\/cache\/epub\/61325\/pg61325-images.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The Shakespeare Garden<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>Esther Singleton, 1922. Gutenberg e-text. Accessed 10\/21\/2024. See also \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/forestofhearts.com\/blog\/a-midsummer-nights-garden\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">A Midsummer Night\u2019s Garden<\/a>\u201d in forestofhearts.com blog. Dec. 2023 by Rachel Stevenson of the Shakespeare Institute. Accessed 10\/21\/2024. An image of <a href=\"https:\/\/commons.wikimedia.org\/wiki\/File:Artemisia_absinthium_sl2.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">artemisia absinthium<\/a>. Wikimedia Commons. Accessed 10\/21\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref32\" id=\"_edn32\">[32]<\/a> The Norton editors refer to this allusion as well, citing the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.studylight.org\/bible\/eng\/bis\/1-corinthians\/2.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Bishop\u2019s Bible for 1 Corinthians<\/em> 2:9<\/a>. 9 <\/sup>But as it is written: The eye hath not seen, & the eare hath not heard, neither haue entred into the heart of man, the thynges which God hath prepared for them that loue hym.\u201d StudyLight.org. Accessed 10\/20\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref33\" id=\"_edn33\">[33]<\/a> The Norton Shakespeare\u2019s marginal gloss of \u201cantique\u201d as \u201cantic\u201d (as in madcap<\/em> or grotesque<\/em>) helps us to interpret this passage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref34\" id=\"_edn34\">[34]<\/a> By the Roman critic and poet Horace\u2019s time, this notion of the furor poeticus<\/em> was already ancient\u2014Plato\u2019s Socrates, after all, describes the reciters of Homeric epic in precisely this way. See his dialogue <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gutenberg.org\/files\/1635\/1635-h\/1635-h.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ion<\/a>. <\/em>Gutenberg e-text. Accessed 10\/21\/2024. Horace, an urbane writer, says that the mad poet is \u201cLike one whom an odious plague or jaundice, fanatic frenzy or lunacy, distresses; those who are wise avoid a mad poet, and are afraid to touch him; the boys jostle him, and the incautious pursue him.\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.poetryfoundation.org\/articles\/69381\/ars-poetica\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ars Poetica<\/a>. poetryfoundation.org. Accessed 10\/21\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref35\" id=\"_edn35\">[35]<\/a> Here we are using the word \u201ccomposition\u201d to indicate the process of writing, but sometimes, as in Romantic-Era treatises, it may refer to what happens in the artist\u2019s mind before <\/em>a poem is written down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref36\" id=\"_edn36\">[36]<\/a> One of the sci-fi fictive investigatory series\u2019 catchwords was \u201cThe truth is out there.\u201d It competed with \u201cI want to believe.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref37\" id=\"_edn37\">[37]<\/a> The Norton Footnote 3 for pg. 445 of the current play says this satirical title may be topical, referring to the death of certain of Shakespeare\u2019s fellow playwrights in difficult circumstances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref38\" id=\"_edn38\">[38]<\/a> In concluding his thought (and anachronism aside), Theseus might almost be leveling a shot at angry old King Lear, who clearly failed to appreciate in his daughter Cordelia what Theseus so respects in his fearful ministers and entertainers: \u201cLove, therefore, and tongue-tied simplicity \/ In least speak most, to my capacity\u201d (446, 5.1.104-05).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref39\" id=\"_edn39\">[39]<\/a> It\u2019s fair to point out that most likely, everyone in the noble audience already knew the story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref40\" id=\"_edn40\">[40]<\/a> The Globe opened in 1599, and after 1609 or so, he also staged some plays at the more intimate Blackfriars. See Harbage, Alfred. Shakespeare\u2019s Audience. <\/em>Columbia UP, 1969. One thing to enjoy about Shakespeare\u2019s staging of the Pyramus and Thisbe <\/em>play is how the aristocratic audience seems both genuinely engaged and yet capable of conversing amongst themselves, making jokes, and passing critical judgments. Shakespeare must have noticed this sort of behavior at the theaters where he put on his own plays. A Shakespeare play in a big theater would have been spellbinding and yet quite a social affair.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref41\" id=\"_edn41\">[41]<\/a> See Shakespeare, William. The Life of Henry the Fifth.<\/em> Folio. In The Norton Shakespeare: Histories,<\/em> 3rd ed. 790-857. The famous prologue begins, \u201cOh, for a muse of fire that would ascend \/ The brightest heaven of invention, \/ A kingdom for a stage, princes to act, \/ And monarchs to behold the swelling scene\u201d (791, 1.0.1-4).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref42\" id=\"_edn42\">[42]<\/a> See Horace. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.poetryfoundation.org\/articles\/69381\/ars-poetica\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ars Poetica<\/em><\/a>. poetryfoundation.org. Accessed 10\/21\/2024. The lines in question run, \u201cOmne tulit punctum qui miscuit utile dulci, \/ lectorem delectando pariterque monendo; hic meret aera liber Sosiis, hic et mare transit \/ 345 et longum noto scriptori prorogat aeuum.\u201d (Commentator\u2019s translation: \u201cHe carries the day who mixes together the useful with the pleasant, \/ in equal measure delighting and advising the reader; \/ This book makes the booksellers money\u2014this book crosses the ocean, \/ And ensures the well-known writer a lasting reputation.\u201d) \u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thelatinlibrary.com\/horace\/arspoet.shtml\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ars Poetica<\/a> <\/em>in thelatinlibrary.org. Accessed 10\/21\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref43\" id=\"_edn43\">[43]<\/a> See Sir Philip Sidney\u2019s \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.gutenberg.org\/cache\/epub\/1962\/pg1962-images.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Defence of Poesy<\/a>.\u201d Gutenberg e-text. Accessed 10\/21\/2024. The relevant passage is \u201cPoesy, therefore, is an art of imitation; for so Aristotle termeth it in the word \u03bc\u03af\u03bc\u03b7\u03c3\u03b9\u03c2 [m\u00edmesis<\/em>]; that is to say, a representing, counterfeiting, or figuring forth: to speak metaphorically, a speaking picture, with this end, to teach and delight.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref44\" id=\"_edn44\">[44]<\/a> Hippolyta the fierce Amazon Queen may be amused by this silly assumption about the play\u2019s women.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref45\" id=\"_edn45\">[45]<\/a> See Footnote 3 for current play, Norton pg. 449.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref46\" id=\"_edn46\">[46]<\/a> Why does the Man in the Moon need a thornbush bundle and a dog? See The Yale Historical Review\u2019s article \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/yalehistoricalreview.ghost.io\/the-hatch-and-brood-of-time-22\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The Hatch and Brood of Time 22: Followers of the Man in the Moon<\/a>.\u201d Accessed 10\/20\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref47\" id=\"_edn47\">[47]<\/a> See Johnson, Samuel. \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.gutenberg.org\/cache\/epub\/5429\/pg5429-images.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Preface to Shakespeare<\/em><\/a>.<\/em>\u201d Another excellent observation in the same preface is, \u201cThe reflection that strikes the heart is not, that the evils before us are real evils, but that they are evils to which we ourselves may be exposed. If there be any fallacy, it is not that we fancy the players, but that we fancy ourselves unhappy for a moment; but we rather lament the possibility than suppose the presence of misery, as a mother weeps over her babe, when she remembers that death may take it from her.\u201d Gutenberg e-text. Accessed 10\/20\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref48\" id=\"_edn48\">[48]<\/a> See Plutarch\u2019s \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/penelope.uchicago.edu\/Thayer\/E\/Roman\/Texts\/Plutarch\/Lives\/Theseus*.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Life of Theseus<\/a>,\u201d Chs. 25-26. penelope.uchicago.edu. Accessed 10\/20\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"#_ednref49\" id=\"_edn49\">[49]<\/a> Shakespeare\u2019s plays ended with dancing and sometimes other forms of entertainment. See Veronica Horwell\u2019s article \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/stage\/2014\/oct\/01\/shakespeare-jig-music-choreography-globe-theatre\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">The jig is up\u2014Shakespeare\u2019s Globe sends them out dancing<\/a>.\u201d The Guardian Newspaper, Oct. 1, 2014. Accessed 10\/20\/2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shakespeare\u2019s Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream Commentary A. J. Drake Shakespeare. A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream. Quarto. (The Norton Shakespeare: Comedies, 3rd ed. 406-53). Of Interest: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"iawp_total_views":22,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[143,36,144,147,141,140,129,146,145,142],"wf_page_folders":[6],"class_list":["post-209","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","category-comic-plays","tag-bottom-the-weaver","tag-elizabethan-drama","tag-gothic-faeries","tag-lord-what-fools-these-mortals-be","tag-oberon","tag-puck","tag-shakespearean-comedy","tag-the-fierce-vexation-of-a-dream","tag-this-is-to-make-an-ass-of-me","tag-titania"],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"ajd_shxpr","author_link":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/author\/ajd_shxpr\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Shakespeare\u2019s Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream Commentary A. 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{"id":209,"date":"2024-04-13T21:15:19","date_gmt":"2024-04-14T04:15:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/?page_id=209"},"modified":"2026-02-12T07:11:33","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T15:11:33","slug":"a-midsummer-nights-dream-2","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/a-midsummer-nights-dream-2\/","title":{"rendered":"A Midsummer Night’s Dream"},"content":{"rendered":"