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All Site ContentMidsummer Night's DreamAct 5Scene 1
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"This lion is a very fox"
Wordplay
Act 5,
Scene 1
Lines 217-234

An explanation of the animal-related wordplay in Act 5, Scene 1 of myShakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Snug (as Lion)

You, ladies, you whose gentle hearts do fear
The smallest monstrous mouse that creeps on floor,
May now perchance both quake and tremble here
When lion, rough in wildest rage, doth roar.
Then know that I, as Snug the joiner, am
A lion fell, nor else no lion's dam;
For if I should as Lion come in strife
Into this place, 'twere pity on my life.

Theseus

A very gentle beast, and of a good conscience.

Demetrius

The very best at a beast, my lord, that e'er I
saw.

Lysander

This lion is a very fox for his valor.

Theseus

True, and a goose for his discretion.

Demetrius

Not so, my lord, for his valor cannot carry
his discretion, and the fox carries the goose.

Theseus

His discretion, I am sure, cannot carry his valor,
for the goose carries not the fox; it is well. Leave
it to his discretion, and let us listen to the moon.

Lysander, Theseus and Demetrius now engage in a clever game of wits, but the wordplay is so obscure that the Oxford World’s Classics edition of this play describes these lines as "complicated, confusing and labored." Follow along with our series of notes, starting here.

Snug, who’s playing the role of the lion, has just informed the women in the audience that he’s not a real lion, and that he’s not going to roar because he doesn’t want to frighten them. Lysander comments that when it comes to displaying his valor (his courage and fierceness) this lion is more like a fox, he’s being cleverly discreet.