Midsummer Night's Dream

[Enter Theseus, Hippolyta, Philostrate, and other lords. The religious ceremonies for the three couples have concluded, but the other nuptial festivities are ongoing.]

Hippolyta

'Tis strange, my Theseus, that these lovers speak of.

Theseus

More strange than true; I never may believe
These antique fables, nor these fairy toys.
Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
The lunatic, the lover, and the poet
Are, of imagination, all compact.
One sees more devils than vast hell can hold –
That is, the madman. The lover all as frantic,
Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt.
The poet's eye, in fine frenzy rolling,
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven.
And as imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name.
Such tricks hath strong imagination,
That if it would but apprehend some joy,
It comprehends some bringer of that joy;
Or in the night, imagining some fear,
How easy is a bush supposed a bear.

Bottom

had a most rare vision. I have had a dream past the wit
of man to say what dream it was. Man is but an ass if he
go about to expound this dream. Methought I was —
there is no man can tell what methought I was and
methought I had — but man is but a patched fool if he
will offer to say what methought I had. The eye of man
hath not heard, the ear of man hath not seen, man's
hand is not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his
heart to report what my dream was. I will get Peter
Quince to write a ballad of this dream. It shall be called
“Bottom's Dream,” because it hath no bottom, and I will
sing it in the latter end of a play, before the Duke.
Peradventure, to make it the more gracious, I shall sing
it at her death.
[Exit Bottom]

Theseus

Go, one of you, find out the forester.
For now our observation is performed,
And since we have the vanguard of the day,
My love shall hear the music of my hounds.
Uncouple in the western valley; let them go.
Dispatch, I say, and find the forester.
[Exit servant]
We will, fair Queen, up to the mountain's top,
And mark the musical confusion
Of hounds and echo in conjunction.

Hippolyta

I was with Hercules and Cadmus once
When in a wood of Crete they bayed the bear
With hounds of Sparta. Never did I hear
Such gallant chiding, for besides, the groves,
The skies, the fountains, every region near
Seemed all one mutual cry. I never heard
So musical a discord, such sweet thunder.

Titania

                                    How came these things to pass?
O, how mine eyes do loathe his visage now!

Oberon

Silence awile – Robin, take off this head –
Titania, music call, and strike more dead
Than common sleep, of all these five, the sense.

Titania

Music, ho, music such as charmeth sleep.
[Soothing music]

Robin 

[Removing the ass's head from Bottom]
Now, when thou wak’st, with thine own fool's eyes peep.

Oberon

Sound, music.
[The music changes; it's still soothing but something to which they can dance.]
[Oberon and Titania dance]

Robin

Oberon

Titania

[Exit Oberon, Titania, and Robin. The two Athenians couples and Bottom remin asleep on the stage. Horns sound off stage. Enter Duke Theseus, his soon to be Queen, Hippolyta, the nobleman Egeus, and their attendants.]

Theseus

[Exit servant]

Hippolyta

Theseus

[Seeing the four lovers and Bottom asleep]

Egeus

Theseus

Egeus

Theseus

[Exit servant. Shout off stage: “Horns.” The horns sound, and the lovers wake, startled to find themselves lying next to each other, and to find themselves in the presence of the Duke.]

Lysander

[The lovers kneel before the Duke]

Theseus

[The lovers stand]

Lysander

Egeus

Demetrius

Theseus

[Exit Duke Theseus, Hippolyta, Egeus, and the Duke’s attendants. The lovers are disoriented from having been up most of the night, especially Lysander and Demetrius who are suffering the after-effects of the magic potions.]

Demetrius

Hermia

Helena

Demetrius

Hermia

Helena

Lysander

Demetrius

[Exit the lovers. Bottom wakes]

Bottom

[Exit Bottom]

Bottom

But I pray you, let none of your people stir me. I have an
exposition of sleep come upon me.

Titania

Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms.
Fairies, begone, and be always away.
[Exit fairies]
So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle
Gently entwist; the female ivy so
Enrings the barky fingers of the elm.
O how I love thee, how I dote on thee!

Bottom

But I pray you, let none of your people stir me. I have an
exposition of sleep come upon me.

Titania

Sleep thou, and I will wind thee in my arms.
Fairies, begone, and be always away.
[Exit fairies]
So doth the woodbine the sweet honeysuckle
Gently entwist; the female ivy so
Enrings the barky fingers of the elm.
O how I love thee, how I dote on thee!

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