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whats the significance of the play's title


Whats the significance of the play's title, "A Midsummer Night's Dream"?

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At the very end of the play Puck says
"If we shadows have offended,
Think but this-and all is mended-
That you have but slumber'd here
While these visions did appear.
And this weak and idle theme,
No more yielding than a dream"


So it's the middle of Summer and most of this happened at night and it was all weird and crazy and no one what was going one so it seemed like a dream. So there ya go A Mid Summer Night's Dream.

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just to expand... Midsummer is the 21st of July (the solstice) when, according to some old religions, the spirit world is at it's strongest, so to have a play that features magical creature set on midsummer's night was just logical, you know, back in the day.

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To Clarify:
Midsummer Night is meant to mean a night when fairies or sprites were the most powerful. People also thought that flowers gathered on that night would bring magic and was a time when people would dream of true loves and would be insane.
that's something if it helps.

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No idea. I'm reading the book now in school. I hate the book. I was like 'Oh' when I found out there was a movie to it. Then I spazzed when I found out Christian Bale is in it. And he's Demetrius, one of the more main characters.

<33

Shall we have a footrace?

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Good explanations on the meaning of "Midsummer Night"...the Dream part should be apparent. There are several refernces to dreams in this play. There is: Bottom's Dream, Titani'as dream, the experience of the lovers in the woods as a "Dream", and as is quoted abouve, Puck refers to the whole thing as a dream...to illustrate:

{The whole play [The night in the woods (Bottom's/Titania's Dream) The night in the woods] The whole play}

Does that make sense?

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Also, Hippolyta says something about the lovers perhaps being in the woods to observe the "rites of May", which allude to May Day (another Pagan Holiday) but Midsummer night was probably the time of the summer soltice, when the sun is highest in the sky, therefor, midsummer. One other interesting detail is Titania's "not since the middle-summer-spring" suggests that it may have been the name of a season within a season (ie; early summer, middle-early summer, middle summer, late-middle summer, late summer, etc.)

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Actually the play seems to take place in late March. The 'Midsummer' of the title most likely has to do with the occasion of the play's first performance.

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A lot of Shakespearian comedies have names which reduce the play to levels of triviality.

All's Well That Ends Well
Much Ado About Nothing
As You Like It
Twelfth Night was also called What You Will
Love's Labours Lost was originally followed up with and balanced out by Love's Labours Won, but that play is now lost.

A Midsummer Night's Dream is, therefore, just a trivial illusion. At the end, nothing is changed from the start of the play, other than that the couples have resolved themselves into what we could see were the propper pairings from the start.

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The title does not trivialize the play at all. One poster has cited Puck's speech saying that it was weird, like a dream and citing references to dreams in the play. But, all of the characters wake up the next morning thinking that the events of the night were just a dream. This concept is turned right back on the audience at the end where Puck says, "If you didn't like the play, don't worry... you dreamed the whole thing!" Therefor the play is all a midsummer night's dream, literally.

As to nothing changing, that's not quite true. The fairy world goes from one of chaos to one of order, therefor righting the other mishaps in the world. At the top of the play Titania and Oberon are fighting rather than tending to their duties as king and queen of the magic realm and the world is in squalor as a result. By the end they have reconciled and the world is righted.

Also, the recent NYSF production in Central Park (which was very well staged, though parts fell flat) gave a wonderful arc to the usually ignored characters of Theseus and Hyppolita. It was actually a highlight for me in a production that offered little else besides gag comedy.

And there's a much more in depth analysis of Much Ado About Nothing that I could give... but that's a discussion for another day.

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Midsummer's Night, or Midsummer's Eve, was a holiday created to offset the Paegan celebration of the Summer Solstice, which we still identify as the first day of summer, near June 21st. Midsummer's Eve was basically the opportunity for Christians in England to parade in costumes, eat, drink, and be merry. There was also a theatre festival, with fantastical plays performed. However, this tradition was in the process of being abandoned in the 1590s, and by 1599, it was banned all together. Shakespeare wrote this play during the 1590s, and as is the case in many of his other plays, it appears to poke fun at the political climate by recreating a Midsummer's Night full of all the vices that Midsummer's Eve catered to. The play is also overtly Paegan, with faries and elves and love potions. The fact that the play's title informs us that it took place on Midsummer's Eve leads us to realize that it was meant to be taken as the drunken dreams of a Midsummer's Eve reveller. If you want more information, check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midsummer. I know it's on wikipedia, but it is very similar to a lecture on the subject that I heard during one of my Shakespeare classes in college. I hope this helps!

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The idea is that it all takes place during one night in midsummer, and is considered a dream, or Oberon makes it seem that way when he provides the antidote to the flower's spell.

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In late 16th century England the pagan ceremonies around the summer soltice had ceased to be practised, but the folk memory most certainly lingered on. The good spirits still lingered in sacred woods; it was a period of high festivity in the countryside.
On Salisbury Plain the massive stone circle of Stonehenge was there to be seen, as were others at Avebury and elsewhere. How different things are today. There are huge annual turnouts at Stonehenge of not just hippies, but practising Druids as well which have to be controlled by the Police as well as the Department of the Environment!
But without doubt there was a spirit of magic about in Shakespeare's day which made perfect sense to his audience, and how eloquently he portrays it - as does the film. It is a very clever and sympathetic interpretation.

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