A Midsummer Night's Dream

What's inside (8 sections)

1. Athens and a Hard Law
2. The Forest Wakes Up
3. The Love Potion Mixes Everything
4. Bottom, the Ass, and the Rehearsal in the Woods
5. Pyramus and Thisbe at the Weddings
6. What Works and What Drags
7. Key takeaways
8. FAQ

I picked up A Midsummer Night's Dream expecting a light comedy I could finish in an evening. I knew about Bottom and the donkey head, and I knew the line about the course of true love never running smooth. I did not expect how much of the play happens at night in the woods, or how sharp it feels under the jokes. Reading it straight through felt like watching three groups blunder into the same forest and then agree at dawn to call it all a dream.

The play is one of Shakespeare's early comedies, likely written around 1595 or 1596 and first printed in 1600 in quarto by Thomas Fisher in London. Modern reading copies often run about 144 pages for the play text with notes around it. A duke prepares for marriage, four young Athenians flee a harsh law, the king and queen of the fairies quarrel, and six working men rehearse a tragedy for a wedding feast. They all meet in the forest outside Athens.

Athens and a Hard Law

Theseus, Duke of Athens, opens the play four days from his wedding to Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons, whom he defeated in battle and then courted. He tells Philostrate, his master of revels, to stir up merriment for the waiting days. Hippolyta answers with calm pride. Their exchange sets much of the tone. Love in this play is tied to conquest, bargains, and public ceremony, even when people speak gently.

Egeus then enters with a complaint that breaks the festive mood. His daughter Hermia refuses to marry Demetrius, the man Egeus favors. Hermia loves Lysander, and Lysander loves her back. Egeus accuses Lysander of winning her with songs and gifts. He calls on Theseus to enforce Athenian law. Theseus states the choice plainly. Hermia must wed Demetrius, or face death, or live single as a nun, chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon. Hermia asks which is worse, and Theseus tells her to decide by the new moon, his wedding day.

The young knot tightens with Helena. Demetrius once courted Helena and won her, then left her to chase Hermia. Helena still loves Demetrius. Hermia loves Lysander. Lysander loves Hermia. Demetrius wants Hermia. Helena and Hermia grew up close, schooled together like sisters. Now one man's change of heart has split them. Lysander proposes flight to his widowed aunt beyond Athenian reach, seven leagues off through the wood, where they can marry. Hermia agrees to meet him in the wood the next night. She confides in Helena, and Helena, hoping to win thanks from Demetrius, tells him of the plan. She follows him while he follows Hermia. All four are now bound for the forest.

The workmen enter around the same time. Peter Quince the carpenter has an interlude called Pyramus and Thisbe for the Duke's wedding night. His troupe holds Nick Bottom the weaver, Francis Flute the bellows mender, Tom Snout the tinker, Snug the joiner, and Robin Starveling the tailor. Bottom is loud and eager, ready to play every part, and worried his roaring as a lion might frighten the ladies. Quince casts Flute as Thisbe, Snout as the Wall, Starveling as Moonshine, Snug as the Lion, and Bottom as Pyramus. They agree to rehearse in the wood for privacy.

The Forest Wakes Up

The wood belongs to Oberon, King of the Fairies, and Titania, his Queen, and they are quarreling when we meet them. Titania keeps a changeling boy whose mother, one of her followers, died in childbirth. Titania holds the child from loyalty to the dead mother. Oberon wants the boy as a page for his train. Titania refuses. They bicker, avoid each other's beds and dances, and their followers take sides. Their discord, they say, has rotted the seasons, bred fogs, drowned corn, and confused the calendar for mortals.

Puck, also called Robin Goodfellow, serves Oberon as jester and errand runner. He skims milk, frightens maids, trips gossips, and laughs, yet he does Oberon's bidding fast and well. He can take shapes and cross distances in a trice.

Oberon sees Demetrius reject Helena in the wood and takes her part in his own way. Demetrius tells Helena he does not love her and leaves her to beasts. Helena says she will follow anyway. Oberon pities her and sends Puck for the flower called love in idleness. Cupid's missed shaft fell on the flower and turned its white juice purple. Juice from it, laid on sleeping lids, makes the sleeper dote on the next live creature seen on waking. Oberon means to anoint Titania as she sleeps, so she will dote on some beast while he takes the boy. He also bids Puck anoint the Athenian youth in Athenian dress who scorns the girl with him. He means Demetrius and Helena, but he names them loosely, and the loose naming causes the main tangle.

Titania beds down with song. Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Moth, and Mustardseed sing her to rest. She sleeps. Oberon lays the juice on her eyes, wishing she will wake to lion, bear, boar, leopard, or ape. He wants the boy, and he will shame his queen to get him. The workmen then come to rehearse Pyramus and Thisbe nearby, and Puck finds them and decides to add fear to their sport.

The Love Potion Mixes Everything

Hermia and Lysander tire on their flight and lie down apart, since Lysander honors her wish to keep distance until marriage. Puck finds them, sees Athenian dress, and takes them for Oberon's pair. He lays juice on Lysander's eyes and goes. Helena then runs past, still chasing Demetrius, and wakes Lysander by chance. Lysander opens his eyes, sees Helena first, and dotes at once. He calls her a dove and Hermia a raven. Helena thinks it is mockery. She has been laughed at for loving Demetrius, and this sounds like more of the same. She leaves in anger. Lysander follows, leaving Hermia asleep and alone.

Hermia wakes from a bad dream in which a serpent ate her heart while Lysander smiled by. She finds Lysander gone and roams the wood calling his name.

Oberon learns Puck dosed the wrong man. Demetrius still scorns Helena, so Oberon lays juice on Demetrius himself while Puck fetches Helena with fog and false voices. Puck tires both young men with mimicry until each drops apart. Demetrius wakes to Helena's voice, sees her first, and now he too dotes on Helena. Both men love Helena. Neither loves Hermia. Helena believes both have joined to bait her. Lysander answers coldly that reason now shows him Helena is best. Demetrius vows the same. Helena turns on Hermia when Hermia enters, calling her part of the plot. Hermia is lost. She only wants Lysander, and Lysander tells her he hates her and loves Helena.

Old friendship cracks under the strain. Helena recalls school days and shared songs and asks how Hermia could join such scorn. Hermia swears she did not. The men move off to settle the matter with swords. Helena fears blows and runs. At Oberon's word, Puck keeps the men apart with borrowed voices until both sleep on the ground. Puck lays a cure on Lysander's eyes so waking will bring back his first love for Hermia. Demetrius stays charmed toward Helena, which suits Oberon's new plan to pair the four neatly. Puck draws all four sleepers near each other and waits for dawn.

Bottom, the Ass, and the Rehearsal in the Woods

While the lovers rail, Bottom meets his own fate. Puck sets an ass head on him during rehearsal. Bottom misses the change and thinks his friends flee from a jest. Quince cries monster. Flute, Snout, Starveling, and Snug run. Bottom stays to sing loud and prove he is not afeared. His song wakes Titania. With juice on her eyes, she sees Bottom first and falls wholly in love.

Titania calls him angel and gentle mortal. She sets Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Moth, and Mustardseed to serve him and lead him to her bower. Bottom takes it all with plain calm. He asks for hay and oats, tells the fairies to be civil, and lets them scratch his head. He treats fairy state as backstage help.

Oberon watches at first with pleasure, then with pity. While Titania dotes on Bottom, Oberon gains the changeling boy. Yet the jest has run far enough. After the lovers are guided to rest, he lays another herb, Dian's bud, on her eyes to cancel the first juice. Titania wakes as from sleep, sees Bottom crowned with long ears, and shudders at what she loved. Oberon tells her what passed, and they make peace.

Bottom sleeps through the cure and wakes alone with his own head back. He half recalls music, strange food, and a queen. His waking speech is famed. He calls it a most rare vision, past the wit of man to say what dream it was. He vows to have Quince write a ballad of the dream to sing at the end of their play. He hastens back to Athens, fearing his friends have dropped the wedding play for lack of Pyramus.

The Bottom matter is often the crowd pleaser, for it gives the play its broadest physical jests. Yet it can also feel slow when rehearsals stretch. Quince's rule, Bottom's pleas to play all parts, Flute's pipe as Thisbe, Snout's fingers as wall, Starveling with lantern for moon, all need pace. On the page they read brisk. Some readers still skim the first rehearsal to return to the lovers, then miss Bottom when Titania starts to pet his ears.

Pyramus and Thisbe at the Weddings

Dawn brings Theseus, Hippolyta, Egeus, and huntsmen into the wood. They find the four lovers asleep. The four wake dazed, half sure the night was dream. Theseus hears their tale and overbears Egeus. He joins all three pairs in the temple that day, himself with Hippolyta, Lysander with Hermia, Demetrius with Helena. Demetrius says the night melted his love for Hermia like snow and fixed his heart on Helena. None probe whether charm still holds him.

In Athens Bottom reaches his mates just in time. They feared Pyramus lost and the play with him. Theseus must pick sport for the hours to bed. Philostrate lists choices, and among them the workmen's short and tedious brief scene of Pyramus and Thisbe, very tragical mirth. Theseus takes it for the goodwill behind it. Hippolyta doubts such simple hands can carry a night, but Theseus answers that kindly meaning covers faults.

The show is bad by design and joyful for it. Quince speaks a prologue whose stops slip, so sense turns. Snout stands as Wall and lets the lovers whisper through his chink. Flute as Thisbe pipes through the fingers. Snug as Lion roars, then quits character to tell the ladies he is Snug the joiner and no lion. Starveling as Moonshine holds lantern, thorn bush, and stone to show the moon. Pyramus finds Thisbe's stained mantle at Ninus' tomb and kills himself with long speech. Thisbe finds him and kills herself too. The court cuts in with jests throughout.

When the weddings are done, the fairies bless the house. Oberon, Titania, and Puck pass through the palace after lights out. They bless each bed so issue will be sweet and free from harms feared in that age. Puck stays last to sweep dust from behind the door and to speak to the house. He begs pardon if shadows offended, bids all take the play as dream, and asks for applause to mend his ways.

The triple rite answers the first law with show. Theseus weds Hippolyta with pomp. Hermia weds Lysander without death or cloister. Helena weds Demetrius, who now vows firm love. The workmen win their hour before the Duke. The fairies settle the boy and their marriage. All dance to one close, though by far apart roads. The neatness pleases, and it asks a query too. How much peace flows from changed hearts, and how much from juice, ducal sway, and tired folk content to call night a dream.

What Works and What Drags

Two fair knocks recur against this comedy, and I felt both. The first is that Lysander and Demetrius blur, above all mid play. Shakespeare loans them like verse, like pleas, like vows. Helena and Hermia stand clearer, since Helena dwells on height and old school ties while Hermia dwells on law and troth. Still, in swift quarrels their lines chase so fast that a first time reader may lose who loves whom. The jest is that fancy makes folk swap faces. Yet the long middle brawl can read as one dispute with four mouths rather than four souls. A cure that helps is to track the juice. Lysander took it by error. Demetrius took it by will. Lysander is later eased. Demetrius stays charmed.

The second knock is that the workmen can drag when their humor misses. Their casting, their wood rehearsal, Bottom's return, and the full Pyramus at the close take much room. Those keen for the main love chase may find Quince's stops and Snout's lime and Starveling's lantern a long loop. I laughed at the Wall on the page and at Bottom's orders to fairies, but I skimmed some Thisbe wails at first and had to turn back for story points hid in jokes. A brisk staging cures this with pace. On the page you must lend that pace yourself.

These faults do not sink the whole because verse and frame bear it up. Court talk runs smooth and public. Lovers plead in quick pairs when hot and in long blank lines when hurt. Fairies charm in short songs with dear names. Bottom plods in prose that thumps against verse round him. Puck ties scenes with couplets that sweep the mess and beg a hand. Athens starts with law, the wood scrambles law, Athens ends with weddings that soften law. Oberon shifts from jealous plotter to blessing lord who undoes his own spell. Helena moves from beggar to bride. Hermia moves from threat to vow with ducal leave.

Keep the print facts firm, since new copies bury age under notes. Shakespeare likely wrote the play around 1595 or 1596 for his company. It first reached print in 1600 in quarto, printed for Thomas Fisher and sold at his shop in Fleet Street. A later quarto dated 1619 but falsely marked 1600 followed, and the text then stood in the Folio of 1623. That is why lists give the year as 1600 though stage life began sooner. Most modern reading texts with gloss and notes run near 144 pages, which fits the copy cited here.

I shut the book less fond of Theseus and more fond of Puck than I had looked to be. Theseus is free handed at the close, yet he opens by backing a hard sire law and weds a queen won by sword. Puck breeds most of the woe, yet he names it, mends much of it, and begs leave with a wink. Titania and Oberon stay strange in a good sense, less like wedded folk than like weather that breaks and clears. Hermia and Helena hold the heart for me. Their old tie frays under two men and one wild night, then holds into day and wedding. The wood teaches no high rule. It tires them, swaps their wants, and lets morn sort the pairs, while plain men in poor garb show dukes that sad tales can pass with laughter when the night ends fair.

FAQ

When was A Midsummer Night's Dream first published?

It was first printed in 1600 in quarto by Thomas Fisher in London. Scholars think Shakespeare wrote it around 1595 or 1596 for performance before that print date.

Why do Lysander and Demetrius both suddenly love Helena?

Puck puts juice from the love-in-idleness flower on their eyes by mistake and then by order. The juice makes the sleeper fall for the first person seen on waking, so both men wake and see Helena first.

What is the play inside the play?

A group of Athenian workmen rehearse Pyramus and Thisbe, a sad tale of two separated lovers, and perform it as rough comedy at the weddings of Theseus, Lysander, and Demetrius.