A Midsummer Night's Dream

A Midsummer Night's Dream is a romantic comedy by William Shakespeare written in the mid-1590s.

Synopsis

The play features three interlocking plots, all of which are connected by a celebration of the wedding of Duke Theseus of Athens and the Amazonian Hippolyta. Two young Athenian men, Lysander and Demetrius, are both in love with the same woman, Hermia; Hermia herself loves Lysander, but her friend, Helena, is in love with Demetrius. When the father of Hermia forbids her to marry Lysander, the four pursue each other into the woods around the city, losing themselves in the dark and in the maze of their romantic entanglements. As usual with Shakespeare, the comedy has a bitter-sweet note, when Hermia's two lovers both, temporarily, turn against her in favour of Helena.

Related Topics:
Theseus - Athens - Amazonian - Hippolyta - Helena

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Meanwhile, Oberon, king of the fairies, and his estranged wife, Titania, arrive in the same woods to attend the upcoming nuptials. Titania refuses to lend her Indian page-boy to Oberon for use as his 'henchman', and Oberon seeks to punish her for her disobedience.

Related Topics:
Oberon - Titania

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At the same time, a band of 'mechanicals' (lower-class artisans) have arranged to perform a crude pageant on the theme of Pyramus and Thisbe to stage for the wedding festivities, and venture into the forest for their rehearsal. Most notable among them is Nick Bottom the Weaver, one of Shakespeare's most admired comic creations.

Related Topics:
Pyramus - Thisbe - Nick Bottom

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Oberon recruits the mischievous Puck (also called Hobgoblin and Robin Goodfellow) to help him regain Titania's devotion, but his simultaneous attempt to help the young lovers goes wrong, resulting in confusion. Bottom finds his head transformed into that of an ass, and the fairy queen is made to fall in love with him.

Related Topics:
Puck - Hobgoblin - Robin Goodfellow

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