A Midsummer – Night’s Dream

Act I

As Theseus prepares to marry the Amazon Queen Hippolyta, he is disturbed by his courtier Egeus. Egeus asks the duke to intervene in the quarrel. Her daughter Hermia loves a lord named Lysander, so she disagrees with marrying Demetrius (Egeus chose for her). The duke asks Hermia to obey her father. He offers her one of two options: she must die or accept her bachelor life as a nun at the Temple of Diana.

Naturally angry at this proposal, Lysander and Hermia plan to run away and share a secret with Hermia’s friend Helena. Elena is desperately in love with Demetrius, who seems to have abandoned her for the sake of her Hermia. During the night, Lysander and Hermia run away from Athens. But soon they get lost in the forest. Elena informs him of her intentions to break the law, and Demetrius decides to follow her lovers into the forest. In turn, Helena follows Demetrius, hoping that Demetrius will abandon Hermia and choose her in Hermia’s place. 

Meanwhile, a group of workers are preparing a play about the tragic love story of Pyramus and Thisbe for the wedding of Duke Theseus. Nick Bottom, the weaver, takes on the role of Pyramus’ lover, and the noble flute reluctantly takes on the role of Thisbe.

Act II

Nearby, Oberon, king of the fairies, recently fought his queen, Titania. She obtained a magical child from one of her future wives and now refuses to hand it over to Oberon to use as a sheet of paper. Oberon began plotting to seek revenge on Titania for her disobedience. He sends his fairy minion, Puck, to retrieve a purple flower with juice that makes everyone fall in love with the next creature they see. 

 Next, Oberon overhears Helena and Demetrius arguing in the woods and overhears Demetrius’s mistreating Helena and tells Puck to anoint the “Athenians”, then Demetrius will fall in love with the first person he sees. Puck confused the Athenians and put perfume on the sleeping Lysander’s eyes. When he was awakened by Helena, he immediately fell in love with her and rejected Hermia. While Demetrius was resting, Oberon applied magical water to his eyes, which also caused him to fall in love with Helena.

Act III

Workers’ rehearsals in the woods are heard by packs that prank them by punching the bottom with the donkey’s head. After scaring others, Bottom is invited to sleeping Titania. Titania is anointing Oberon with a pack of magical flower juice. Upon awakening, the Fairy Queen falls in love with the donkey and entertains him with her fairy.

Meanwhile, Demitrias and Lysander, still under the sap spell, chase Helena. Hermia is jealous and confused by her lack of attention. Oberon and Puck monitor the turmoil, and Oberon orders Puck to fix it. The quarrel between lovers tired them all while chasing each other in the woods. Puck finally distracts the two men from Helena’s pursuit by imitating her voice, and they get lost in the woods. The four lovers are exhausted and fall asleep. The pack puts the fortified juice in Lysander’s eyes.

Act IV

After being spoiled by a Titania fairy in the afternoon, Bottom falls asleep next to her. Oberon restores her sight in Titania and awakens her (thanks God). After seeing the bottom and expressing her disappointment, she reconciled with Oberon and eventually gave him a small Indian prince. The bottom butt head is removed and he returns to town to prepare for play with his friends. The lovers are awakened by the Theseus and Hippolyta hunters. Lysander sees Hermia and falls in love with her again.

Fortunately, they meet again (Lysander to Hermia, Demetrius to Helena) and they agree to share the duke’s wedding anniversary. The play “Pyramus and Thissbe” will be performed in front of the wedding guests. When the three couples retire to bed, Puck and the fairies return to congratulate the palace and its inhabitants.

Summary 

The Duke of Athens, Theseus, is getting ready to marry Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons. A courtier approaches the duke for help since his daughter, Hermia, will not agree to marry Demetrius because she is in love with Lysander. Hermia is told by the Duke that she must obey her father or die or choose a life as a nun at Diana’s shrine. Lysander and Hermia decide to elope, and they inform Helena, who is in love with Demetrius, but he despises her and prefers Hermia. The couple flee Athens but become disoriented in the woods. Demetrius follows them, followed by Helena, who has informed him of their plans.

Oberon, the fairy king who lives in the forest, argued with Queen Titania over an Indian boy who did not want to give. Oberon listens to Helena and Demetrius’ claims and sends a mischievous servant pack to regain the flowers that have the power to fall in love with the first creatures they see when the sap falls on their sleeping eyelids. He tells Puck to put a drop in Demetrius’s eyes. Puck mistakes the Athenian looking for and pours the juice into the eyes of the sleeping Lysander, so as soon as Helena wakes her up, she falls in love with her and rejects Hermia.  

Some craftsmen have rehearsed a play about the tragic love story of Pyramos and Sisbe and presented it to Theseus on their wedding day. The lower weaver plays his lover Pyramos, and the flute bellows plays Sisbe. Others play the role of moon, wall, lion and are overseen by carpenter Quince. Puck listens to their rehearsals in the woods and pranks them by giving the bottom a donkey’s head. And it scares others. The bottom is seduced by Sleeping Titania treated with flower juice by Oberon. When she wakes up, she falls in love with a donkey and entertains him with a fairy, but when Bottom falls asleep next to her, Oberon restores Titania’s sight and awakens her. She is frightened to see what she loved and she reunites with Oberon. 

End of a midsummer night’s dream

The fairies bestow a benediction on the three sleeping couples after the craftsmen finish their version of Pyramus and Thisbe and Theseus ask for all of the lovers to retire to their beds. “Never mole, harelip, nor scar / Nor mark gigantic, such as are / Despised in nativity / Shall be upon these children,” Oberon says. Oberon’s remarks are intended to avoid abnormalities in any children born to the Athenian lovers. Most notably, Titania’s fear of deformity mirrors the play’s previous passionate union between Titania and Nick Bottom. Titania and Bottom’s pairing is unsettling for its implication of bestiality, in addition to its ridiculousness. Bottom is no longer truly human, as his head has been “transformed” into that of a donkey. Given the indication in the play that Titania and Bottom sleep together, Shakespeare’s contemporary audience would have imagined that this near-bestial union could produce some type of hybrid monster, horribly deformed as a result of their parents’ guilt. 

Oberon’s attempt to ward off deformities is also deeply connected to the play’s mythical backstory, particularly to stories about Theseus. The Minotaur, a monster with a man’s body and a bull’s head, is one of the most well-known myths about Theseus. Pasipha, who mated with the bull most treasured by her husband, King Minos of Crete, produced the Minotaur. Minos, horrified by the outcome of this union, commissioned architect Daedalus to construct a labyrinth in which to imprison the Minotaur. The Minotaur’s terrible nature stemmed from his reliance on human flesh, which necessitated a constant supply of human sacrifices. Minos decreed that every nine years, seven Athenian boys and seven Athenian girls be sacrificed to the Minotaur after defeating Athens in battle. When it came time for the third round of sacrifices, Theseus volunteered to be sacrificed. He decapitated the Minotaur after arriving in Crete and navigating to the centre of the labyrinth. Oberon’s blessing may thus be seen as a reflection of Theseus’ efforts in the human realm to rid the world of horrific deformities and maintain peace.