A Midsummer Night's Dream

Bottom:

"That will ask some tears in the true performing of

it: if I do it, let the audience look to their

eyes; I will move storms, I will condole in some

measure. To the rest: yet my chief humour is for a

tyrant: I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to

tear a cat in, to make all split.

The raging rocksAnd shivering shocks

Shall break the locks

Of prison gates;

And Phibbus' car

Shall shine from far

And make and mar

The foolish Fates.

This was lofty! Now name the rest of the players.

This is Ercles' vein, a tyrant's vein; a lover is

more condoling.

Quince:
Flute, you must take Thisby on you.

Flute:
What is Thisby? A wandering knight?

Quince:
It is the lady that Pyramus must love.

Flute:

Nay, faith, let me not play a woman; I have a beard coming.

Quince:

That's all one: you shall play it in a mask, and

you may speak as small as you will.

Bottom:

An I may hide my face, let me play Thisby too, I'll

speak in a monstrous little voice. 'Thisne,

Thisne;' 'Ah, Pyramus, lover dear! thy Thisby dear,

and lady dear!'

Quince:
No, no; you must play Pyramus: and, Flute, you Thisby."

This excerpt is from one of the early scenes and gives the audience one of the first glimpses of the comic characters putting on a play for the wedding. Nick Bottom is featured as the self-loving and self-worshiping outspoken member of the troupe. He lacks the knowledge of knowing what it means to be humble. His confidence practically oozes from every pore in his body. Bottom's arrogance assists in providing the comedy in every scene he is in. This quote portrays Bottom's belief that he has the capibility and the talent to play multiple characters in their drama. Quince hands out parts to everyone and for the most part there is little comment from the recipients, other than Bottom of course. He recieves his assignment and proceeds to describe and act out how he must perform and how his performence with be so remarkable that it will make the audience cry with him. Of course Bottom does not stop here as he relates his yearning to play a tyrant to the others. His final claim is that he should not only play Pyramus, but Thisby too. Bottom's conceitedness is supposed to be blatantly obvious to the audience and is used to lighten the mood being that the play is a comedy. It is easy for readers to find this scene along with others humerous just because of how wrapped up in himself Bottom is.

In Shakespeare's plays, the ones that were comedies usually had a happy ending. There would be ficticious plots where the characters experienced difficulties, but once they were overcome they learned a valuable lesson. The basic lesson in this play was to just be true to yourself as was demonstrated by the actions of the two couples. Shakespeare's comedies often provided instances of humor to keep the mood light throughout the plays, even when the main characters were having trouble. Bottom served as the chief comic in A Midsummer Night's Dream, but there were also numerous other characters adding to the comedy. The humor and laughs in Shakespeare's works are quite different than what we think of when comedy comes to mind today. Shakespeare had a subtle way of portraying the humor. His humor came from the naiveness of characters, from actions, or from the way he wrote and what he made the characters say. Today, we often think of humor as a joke that makes us crack up laughing. When you read a play like this, you will not be rolling on the floor in hysteria, but instead will appreciate the humor in a deeper sense that will just bring a smile to your face because you understand what is going on underneath the surface of the writing that makes it humorous.

At first I had difficulty understanding the humor in this comedy. I was trapped inside the idea that if it was a comedy I should be finding things very funny and laughing. Whenever we discussed humorous passages in class I had trouble seeing what was so funny about them, but I began to see that it wasn't a laughing fit that Shakespeare was trying to induce on his audience. He wrote comedies to try to teach a good natured lesson. Once I got through my mental road block I enjoyed the silliness and unrealisticness of the play. Even though there is nothing hysterical about the scene when Bottom is turned into an ass, the concept of what was going on to drive home a point made the scene thoroughly enjoyable. Overall, A Midsummer Night's Dream was a very good comedy.