Faculty of English

[Exit an Attendant.] Shout within. Wind horns. The lovers all start up. THESEUS        Good morrow, friends. Saint Valentine is past. Begin these wood-birds but to couple now? LYSANDER     Pardon, my lord.      [The lovers kneel.] THESEUS        I pray you all, stand up. I know you two are rival enemies. How comes this gentle concord in the world, That hatred is so far from jealousy To sleep by hate, […]

EGEUS My lord, this my daughter here asleep, And this Lysander, this Demetrius is, This Helena, old Nedar’s Helena. I wonder of their being here together. THESEUS        No doubt they rose up early, to observe The rite of May; and hearing our intent, Came here in grace of our solemnity. But speak, Egeus, is not this the day That Hermia should give answer of her […]

THESEUS        My hounds are bred out of the Spartan kind: So flewed, so sanded, and their heads are hung With ears that sweep away the morning dew; Crook-kneed, and dewlapped like Thessalian bulls, Slow in pursuit, but matched in mouth like bells, Each under each. A cry more tunable Was never holloed to nor cheered with horn In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly. Judge when you hear. But soft: what nymphs are these?   […]

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.  (4.1.111-117) This is SUCH a power move from Hippolyta: I was with Hercules and […]

Wind horns. Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, EGEUS and [the Duke’s] train. THESEUS        Go one of you, find out the forester; For now our observation is performed, And since we have the vaward 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 an Attendant.] We will, fair queen, up […]

PUCK  Fairy king, attend and mark: I do hear the morning lark. OBERON         Then, my queen, in silence sad, Trip we after night’s shade. We the globe can compass soon, Swifter than the wandering moon. TITANIA         Come, my lord, and in our flight, Tell me how it came this night That I sleeping here was found With these mortals on the […]

OBERON         Silence a while. 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.    (Music still.) PUCK  [to Bottom] Now, when thou wak’st, with thine own fool’s eyes peep. OBERON         Sound music. Come, my queen, take hands with me, And rock the ground whereon these sleepers be. [They dance.] […]

OBERON         Be as thou wast wont to be. See as thou wast wont to see. Dian’s bud o’er Cupid’s flower Hath such force and blessed power. Now, my Titania, wake you, my sweet queen. TITANIA         [Wakes.] My Oberon, what visions have I seen! Methought I was enamoured of an ass. OBERON         There lies your love. TITANIA         How came these things to pass? O, […]

OBERON         And gentle puck, take this transformed scalp From off the head of this Athenian swain, That he, awaking when the other do, May all to Athens back again repair, And think no more of this night’s accidents But as the fierce vexation of a dream. But first I will release the Fairy Queen.       (4.1.63-69) And gentle puck, take this transformed scalp from off the […]

OBERON         When I had at my pleasure taunted her, And she, in mild terms, begged my patience, I then did ask of her her changeling child, Which straight she gave me, and her fairy sent To bear him to my bower in fairy land. And now I have the boy, I will undo This hateful imperfection of her […]