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Theseus and Philostrate, Lines 32-85
Performance Videos
Act 5,
Scene 1
Lines 32-85

A performance of lines 32-85 by Theseus and Philostrate in Act 5, Scene 1 of myShakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream.

myShakespeare | Midsummer Night's Dream 5.1 Performance: Theseus and Philostrate Lines 32-85

Theseus

Come now, what masques, what dances shall we have
To wear away this long age of three hours
Between our after-supper and bedtime?
Where is our usual manager of mirth?
What revels are in hand? Is there no play
To ease the anguish of a torturing hour?
Call Philostrate.

Philostrate

Here, mighty Theseus.

Theseus

Say, what abridgement have you for this evening?
What masque, what music? How shall we beguile
The lazy time if not with some delight?

Philostrate

There is a brief how many sports are ripe.
Make choice of which your highness will see first.
[Reads] “The battle with the Centaurs, to be sung
By an Athenian eunuch to the harp.”

Theseus

We'll none of that. That have I told my love
In glory of my kinsman Hercules.

Philostrate

“The riot of the tipsy bacchanals 
Tearing the Thracian singer in their rage.”

Theseus

That is an old device, and it was played
When I from Thebes came last a conqueror.

Philostrate

“The thrice-three muses mourning for the death
Of Learning, late deceased in beggary.”

Theseus

That is some satire, keen and critical,
Not sorting with a nuptial ceremony.

Philostrate

“A tedious, brief scene of young Pyramus
And his love Thisbe – very tragical mirth.”

Theseus

“Merry” and “tragical”? “Tedious” and “brief”?
That is hot ice, and wondrous strange black snow.
How shall we find the concord of this discord?

Philostrate

A play there is, my lord, some ten words long,
Which is as “brief” as I have known a play.
But by ten words, my lord, it is too long,
Which makes it “tedious” for in all the play
There is not one word apt, one player fitted.
And “tragical,” my noble lord, it is,
For Pyramus therein doth kill himself,
Which, when I saw rehearsed, I must confess,
Made mine eyes water; but more merry tears,
The passion of loud laughter never shed.

Theseus

What are they that do play it?

Philostrate

Hard-handed men that work in Athens here
Which never labored in their minds till now,
And now have toiled their unbreathed memories
With this same play against your nuptial.

Theseus

And we will hear it.

Philostrate

                                  No, my noble lord,
It is not for you. I have heard it over,
And it is nothing, nothing in the world,
Unless you can find sport in their intents,
Extremely stretched and conned with cruel pain,
To do you service.

Theseus

                                 I will hear that play,
For never anything can be amiss
When simpleness and duty tender it.
Go, bring them in, and take your places, ladies.