HERMIA Help me, Lysander, help me: do thy best
To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast.
Ay me, for pity! What a dream was here!
Lysander, look how I do quake with fear.
Methought a serpent ate my heart away,
And you sat smiling at his cruel prey.
Lysander – what, removed? Lysander, lord –
What, out of hearing, gone? No sound, no word?
Alack, where are you? Speak, and if you hear;
Speak, of all loves! I swoon almost with fear.
No, then I well perceive you are not nigh.
Either death or you I’ll find immediately. (Exit.) (2.2.149-160)
This is, I think, the only ‘real’ dream in the play, Hermia waking from a nightmare, help me, Lysander, help me: do thy best to pluck this crawling serpent from my breast. Paging Dr Freud, obviously, the phallic snake, but also perhaps remembering that Helena has betrayed her friend by tipping off Demetrius, another snake in the grass, and now Lysander himself has similarly betrayed her, albeit under the influence. Hermia seems to get a grip quite quickly, perhaps even laughing at herself: ay me, for pity! What a dream was here! Goodness, that seemed so real, methought a serpent ate my heart away, and you sat smiling at his cruel prey. Lysander as both treacherous, vicious serpent and cruelly uninvolved observer, but then she notices—he’s not there. Lysander—she calls—what, removed? Have you gone off somewhere? I mean, I know I told you to lie further off, but how far did you go? Lysander, lord—she calls louder, more querulously—what, out of hearing, gone? can’t you even hear me? no sound, no word? Alack, where are you? what’s happened, where have you gone? Speak, and if you hear—if you can hear me, say something—and she pauses, perhaps, to listen—no, nothing—speak, of all loves! SAY SOMETHING! I swoon almost with fear, I’m so frightened to wake up from my terrifying dream and find that you’ve gone. Another pause. Nothing. No, then I well perceive you are not nigh, because if you were near enough to hear me sounding so scared, then you’d have come straight away, you’d be here. For some reason, then, you’ve left me alone, in the middle of the night, lost, in the woods. So either death or you I’ll find immediately: I’m going after you, no matter how dangerous, no matter what it costs!
Titania is probably still there on stage, asleep in her bower, as this tumultuous scene, and the play’s second act, end: Titania’s been enchanted but has not yet woken up to allow the drugs to take effect; Lysander is enchanted and is now passionately declaring his love for Helena, chasing her through the forest, and she in turn seems still to be chasing Demetrius. What a MESS! What will happen next??
