Read A Midsummer Night's Dream Online
Authors: William Shakespeare
And art alive still while thy book doth live
And we have wits to read and praise to giveâ
â¦
He was not of an age, but for all time!
| 1589â91 | ? Arden of Faversham (possible part authorship) |
| 1589â92 | The Taming of the Shrew |
| 1589â92 | ? Edward the Third (possible part authorship) |
| 1591 | The Second Part of Henry the Sixth , originally called Theprobable ) |
| 1591â92 | TheTwo Gentlemen of Verona |
| 1591â92; perhaps revised 1594 | The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus (probably cowritten with, or revising an earlier version by, George Peele) |
| 1592 | The First Part of Henry the Sixth , probably with Thomas Nashe and others |
| 1592 / 1594 | King Richard the Third |
| 1593 | Venus and Adonis (poem) |
| 1593â94 | The Rape of Lucrece (poem) |
| 1593â1608 | Sonnets (154 poems, published 1609 with A Lover's Complaint , a poem of disputed authorship) |
| 1592â94 or 1600â03 | Sir Thomas More (a single scene for a play originally by Anthony Munday, with other revisions by Henry Chettle, Thomas Dekker, and Thomas Heywood) |
| 1594 | The Comedy of Errors |
| 1595 | Love's Labour's Lost |
| 1595â97 | Love's Labour's Won (a lost play, unless the original title for another comedy) |
| 1595â96 | A Midsummer Night's Dream |
| 1595â96 | The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet |
| 1595â96 | King Richard the Second |
| 1595â97 | The Life and Death of King John (possibly earlier) |
| 1596â97 | The Merchant of Venice |
| 1596â97 | The First Part of Henry the Fourth |
| 1597â98 | The Second Part of Henry the Fourth |
| 1598 | Much Ado About Nothing |
| 1598â99 | The Passionate Pilgrim (20 poems, some not by Shakespeare) |
| 1599 | The Life of Henry the Fifth |
| 1599 | “To the Queen” (epilogue for a court performance) |
| 1599 | As You Like It |
| 1599 | The Tragedy of Julius Caesar |
| 1600â01 | The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (perhaps revising an earlier version) |
| 1600â01 | The Merry Wives of Windsor (perhaps revising version of 1597â99) |
| 1601 | “Let the Bird of Loudest Lay” (poem, known since 1807 as “The Phoenix and Turtle”[turtledove]) |
| 1601 | Twelfth Night, or What You Will |
| 1601â02 | The Tragedy of Troilus and Cressida |
| 1604 | The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice |
| 1604 | Measure for Measure |
| 1605 | All's Well That Ends Well |
| 1605 | The Life of Timon of Athens , with Thomas Middleton |
| 1605â06 | The Tragedy of King Lear |
| 1605â08 | ? contribution to The Four Plays in One (lost, except for A Yorkshire Tragedy , mostly by Thomas Middleton) |
| 1606 | The Tragedy of Macbeth (surviving text has additional scenes by Thomas Middleton) |
| 1606â07 | The Tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra |
| 1608 | The Tragedy of Coriolanus |
| 1608 | Pericles, Prince of Tyre , with George Wilkins |
| 1610 | The Tragedy of Cymbeline |
| 1611 | The Winter's Tale |
| 1611 | The Tempest |
| 1612â13 | Cardenio , with John Fletcher (survives only in later adaptation called Double Falsehood by Lewis Theobald) |
| 1613 | Henry VIII (All Is True) , with John Fletcher |
| 1613â14 | The Two Noble Kinsmen , with John Fletcher |
Barber, C. L.,
Shakespeare's Festive Comedy: A Study of Dramatic Form and Its Relation to Social Custom
(1959). Half a century after publication, still the best book on Shakespearean comedy.
Calderwood, James L.,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
(1992). Good on “metadrama,” theatrical self-awareness.
Frye, Northrop,
A Natural Perspective: The Development of Shakespearean Comedy and Romance
(1967). Luminous study of Shakespearean comedy that develops “The Argument of Comedy” (discussed in “Introduction,” p. xi).
Kehler, Dorothea, ed.,
A Midsummer Night's Dream: Critical Essays
(2001). Wide selection of approaches.
Kermode, Frank, “The Mature Comedies,” in
Early Shakespeare
, ed. John Russell Brown and Bernard Harris (1961), pp. 214â20. Characteristically sensitive reading by a great critic.
Kott, Jan, “Titania and the Ass's Head,” in his
Shakespeare Our Contemporary
(1964). Highly influential “dark” and sexual reading.
Laroque, François,
Shakespeare's Festive World: Elizabethan Seasonal Entertainment and the Professional Stage
(1991). Useful extension of Barber's work.
Levine, Laura, “Rape, Repetition, and the Politics of Closure in
A Midsummer Night's Dream
,” in
Feminist Readings of Early Modern Culture: Emerging Subjects
, ed. Valerie Traub, M. Lindsay Kaplan, and Dympna Callaghan (1996), pp. 210â28. An example of a feminist approach.
Montrose, Louis Adrian,
The Purpose of Playing: Shakespeare and the Cultural Politics of the Elizabethan Theatre
(1996), pp. 109â205. Influential “new historicist” reading.
Patterson, Annabel, “Bottom's Up: Festive Theory,” in
Shakespeare and the Popular Voice
(1989), pp. 52â70. Politically engaged.
Young, David P.,
Something of Great Constancy: The Art of “A Midsummer Night's Dream”
(1966). Thoughtful and detailed.
Brooke, Michael,
“A Midsummer Night's Dream
on Screen,”
www.screenonline.org.uk/tv/id/564758/index.html
. Pithy overview. Registered schools, colleges, universities, and libraries have access to video clips, including the complete twelve minutes of the silent 1908 version.
Griffiths, Trevor R., ed.,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, Shakespeare in Production (1996). Much helpful detail.
Halio, Jay L.,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, Shakespeare in Performance (1994). Good survey.
Jacobs, Sally, “Designing the Dream,” in
Peter Brook's Production of William Shakespeare's “A Midsummer Night's Dream” for the Royal Shakespeare Company: The Complete and Authorised Acting Edition
, ed. Glen Loney (1974). Insider's voice.
McArdle, Aidan, “Puck (and Philostrate),” in
Players of Shakespeare 5
, ed. Robert Smallwood (2003). Perceptive actor's view.
RSC “Exploring Shakespeare:
A Midsummer Night's Dream,”
www.rsc.org.uk/explore/plays/dream.htm. Particular focus on the multilingual Dash Arts production directed by Tim Supple.
Selbourne, David,
The Making of A Midsummer Night's Dream: An Eye-Witness Account of Peter Brook's Production from First Rehearsal to First Night
(1982). Invaluable record of the seminal production.
Styan, J. L.,
The Shakespeare Revolution: Criticism and Performance in the Twentieth Century
(1977). Good on changing production styles and relationship between criticism and theater.
Warren, Roger,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, Text and Performance (1983). Useful.
Williams, Gary Jay,
Our Moonlight Revels: A Midsummer Night's Dream in the Theatre
(1997). Overview of stage history.
For a more detailed Shakespeare bibliography and selections from a wide range of critical accounts of the play, with linking commentary, visit the edition website,
www.therscshakespeare.com
.
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, directed by Charles Kent and J. Stuart Blackton (1909, on DVD
Silent Shakespeare
, 2004). Short silent version, nicely exploiting the technological “magic” of the new medium of film.
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, directed by William Dieterle and Max Reinhardt (1935, DVD 2007). One of the all-time classic Shakespeare films, with James Cagney as Bottom and Mickey Rooney as Puck.
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, directed by Peter Hall (1968, DVD 2005). Television broadcast of an exemplary RSC production, with Ian Richardson (Oberon), Judi Dench (Titania), David Warner (Lysander), Diana Rigg (Helena), Helen Mirren (Hermia), and Ian Holm (Puck).
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, directed by Elijah Moshinsky (1981, DVD 2004). Despite Helen Mirren's presence as Titania, a weak made-for-television production in the BBC complete Shakespeare series.
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, directed by Adrian Noble (1996, DVD 2001). Film adaptation of RSC stage production.
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, directed by Michael Hoffman (1999, DVD 2002). Patchy, despite (or because of) strong Hollywood cast, including Kevin Kline as Bottom and Michelle Pfeiffer as Titania.
The Children's Midsummer Night's Dream
, directed by Christine Edzard (2001, DVD 2006). Is what it says it is: acted (with varying degrees of success) by children.
1.
E. K. Chambers,
The Elizabethan Stage
(4 vols., 1924), vol. 3, p. 279.
2.
William A. Ringler, Jr., “The Number of Actors in Shakespeare's Early Plays,” in
The Seventeenth-Century Stage
, ed. G. E. Bentley (1968), p. 134.
3.
Bottom the Weaver
(1661, facsimile repr. 1970), sig. a2v.
4.
The Diary of Samuel Pepys
, ed. Robert Latham and William Matthews (11 vols., 1970â82), vol. 3, p. 208 (29 September 1662).
5.
William Hazlitt,
Characters of Shakespear's Plays
(1817), pp. 126â34.
6.
Playbills,
Theatre Museum, London
.
7.
Jay
Halio,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, Shakespeare in Performance (1994), pp. 30â1.
8.
Ellen Terry,
Memoirs
(1933), p. 149.
9.
The Times
, review of
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, 11 January 1900.
10.
Harley Granville-Barker,
Prefaces to Shakespeare
(2 vols., 1946â47), vol. 2, p. 346.
11.
François Laroque,
Shakespeare's Festive World
(1991), p. 122.
12.
Peter Brook, interview with Peter Ansorge,
Plays and Players
, October 1970.
13.
Brook, interview with Ansorge.
14.
Halio,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, p. 31.
15.
Trevor R. Griffiths,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, Shakespeare in Production (1996), p. 72.
16.
Halio,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, p. 59.
17.
Edgar Allan Poe, “A Dream Within a Dream” (1827).
18.
J. C. Trewin,
Illustrated London News
, 12 September 1970.
19.
Sally Jacobs, “Designing the Dream,” in
Peter Brook's Production of William Shakespeare's “A Midsummer Night's Dream” for the Royal Shakespeare Company: The Complete and Authorised Acting Edition
(1974).
20.
J. L. Styan,
The Shakespeare Revolution: Criticism and Performance in the Twentieth Century
(1977), p. 167.
21.
Peter Brook, interview with Ronald Hayman,
The Times
, 29 August 1970.
22.
Irving Wardle,
The Times
, 28 August 1970.
23.
Styan,
The Shakespeare Revolution
, p. 169.
24.
Adrian Noble,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, RSC Education Pack (1994).
25.
Charles Spencer,
Daily Telegraph
, 5 August 1994.
26.
Anthony Ward,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, RSC Education Pack (1994).
27.
Michael Billington,
Guardian
, 5 August 1994.
28.
Benedict Nightingale,
The Times
, 5 August 1994.
29.
Chris Parry,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, RSC Education Pack (1994).
30.
D. H. Lawrence,
Autumn Sunshine
(1916).
31.
Gavin Millar,
Listener
, 3 September 1970.
32.
Michael Billington,
Guardian
, 21 February 2002.
33.
Patrick Carnegy,
Spectator, 2
March 2002.
34.
Benedict Nightingale,
The Times
, 21 February 2002.
35.
Michael Billington,
Guardian
, 21 February 2002.
36.
Susannah Clapp,
Observer
, 24 February 2002.
37.
Halio,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, p. 66.
38.
Gary Jay Williams,
Theatre
, SummerâFall, 1982.
39.
Benedict Nightingale,
New Statesman
, 24 July 1981.
40.
Charles Spencer,
Daily Telegraph
, 16 April 2005.
41.
Nicholas de Jongh,
Evening Standard
, 18 April 2005.
42.
Patrick Carnegy,
Spectator
, 23 April 2005.
43.
Stanley Wells, note for
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, RSC program, 1970.
44.
Peter Brook, interview with Peter Ansorge,
Plays and Players
, October 1970.
45.
Eric Shorter,
Daily Telegraph
, 9 July 1986.
46.
Michael Coveney,
Financial Times
, 9 July 1986.
47.
Lyn Gardner,
City Limits
, 17 July 1986.
48.
Jim Hiley,
Listener
, 17 July 1986.
49.
Halio,
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, p. 97.
50.
Benedict Nightingale,
The Times
, 29 March 1999.
51.
Aidan McArdle, “Puck (and Philostrate),” in
Players of Shakespeare 5
, ed. Robert Smallwood (2003), p. 49.
52.
McArdle, “Puck (and Philostrate),” p. 51.
53.
McArdle, “Puck (and Philostrate),” p. 52.
54.
Stubbes, quoted in C. L. Barber's brilliant account of
Shakespeare's Festive Comedy
(1959), pp. 21â22.
55.
James Sully, note for
A Midsummer Night's Dream
, RSC program, 1984.
56.
Helen Dawson,
Observer
, 30 August 1970.
57.
Mary Z. Maher,
“A Midsummer Night's Dream:
Nightmare or Gentle Snooze?,
”
in
A Midsummer Night's Dream: Critical Essays
, ed. Dorothea Kehler (1998), p. 364.
58.
Michael Boyd, interview with Rex Gibson,
Times Education Supplement, 22
March 1999.
59.
Benedict Nightingale,
The Times
, 29 March 1999.