(A Midsummer Night's Dream: The Oxford Shakespeare (Oxford World's Classics)) [By: Shakespeare, William] [Apr, 2008]

by William Shakespeare

Excellent Book

Genres: Classics, Plays, School

Unknown Binding

About the author

William Shakespeare was an English playwright, poet, and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon" (or simply "the Bard"). His extant works, including collaborations, consist of some 39 plays, 154 sonnets, three long narrative poems, and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. Shakespeare remains arguably the most influential writer in the English language, and his works continue to be studied and reinterpreted.
Shakespeare was born and raised in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire. At the age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children: Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith. Sometime between 1585 and 1592, he began a successful career in London as an actor, writer, and part-owner ("sharer") of a playing company called the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as the King's Men after the ascension of King James VI and I of Scotland to the English throne. At age 49 (around 1613), he appears to have retired to Stratford, where he died three years later. Few records of Shakespeare's private life survive; this has stimulated considerable speculation about such matters as his physical appearance, his sexuality, his religious beliefs, and even certain fringe theories as to whether the works attributed to him were written by others.
Shakespeare produced most of his known works between 1589 and 1613. His early plays were primarily comedies and histories and are regarded as some of the best works produced in these genres. He then wrote mainly tragedies until 1608, among them Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth, all considered to be among the finest works in the English language. In the last phase of his life, he wrote tragicomedies (also known as romances) and collaborated with other playwrights.
Many of Shakespeare's plays were published in editions of varying quality and accuracy during his lifetime. However, in 1623, John Heminge and Henry Condell, two fellow actors and friends of Shakespeare's, published a more definitive text known as the First Folio, a posthumous collected edition of Shakespeare's dramatic works that includes 36 of his plays. Its Preface was a prescient poem by Ben Jonson, a former rival of Shakespeare, that hailed Shakespeare with the now famous epithet: "not of an age, but for all time".

Reviews

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my first time reading one of Shakespeare’s plays, and I must confess that I have seriously been missing out on this stuff. I absolutely love the story and the characters in this one, but the insults are on a whole other level. “How low am I, thou painted maypole??” Shakespeare was a freaking genius.

[Astrid · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it. I can finally say that I've read Shakespeare 😼

[Maja · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5

[Ana · Rating 3 out of 5]

Until 5th act, the book was quite good. After, I dont know what happened, but it became very chaotic and confusing. 3 stars at best.

[kami · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helena is actually just a girl

[Rina Suzuki · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Midsummer Night's Dream
By William Shakespeare
PENGUIN READERS
Level-3
140minutes
7words
Couples, misunderstanding, mischief, laughter, love, animal, fantasy

Questions
1. In this play, two men fall in love with lovely princess, Hermia. Then Hermia tries to escape with one of two men whom she really loves. Why do you think she escapes from her country?
I guess she really loves the man and her father will give her punish if she doesn't follow her father's order. Her father, the king of the country ordered her to marry the other man. But probably she doesn't want to marry the man. So she tries to escape her father and the man.

2. In this play, the king's messenger used special medicine which has a special power to change person's mind. Can you imagine how this medicine is like?
Actually I don't imagine what is this medicine like, but I guess this medicine is made by great ingredients because this medicine changes person's mind dramatically many times in the play. That scene was interesting!

Midsummer Night's Dream is the play which was a lot of fun to read. I think this play is kind of imaginary and funny story. Moreover, this story is far as real life because some people use a kind of juice which has a special power to change person's mind. At first, I couldn't believe the magical juice to change person's mind, but I really had fun to read this play.

[Jess · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read it years ago but had to read it recently again for my course. I love it.

[Phil Webster · Rating 5 out of 5]

This review relates specifically to the Oxford edition.

These Oxford editions of Shakespeare's plays in my opinion have one good point and one bad point. On the positive side, the explanatory notes are very good, and they are placed at the foot of each page for easy reference. On the negative side, I find the introductions to be over-academic for the general reader. For example, I'm not convinced that we need to know what Freud, Jung and Wittgenstein said about dreams in order to enjoy, appreciate and understand this play. The five stars I am giving are for Shakespeare: I would give Oxford four.

As for this wonderful play itself, I obviously cannot come up with anything new to say that has not already been said. But I can summarise what I think are the main points that have been made by various commentators.

Shakespeare cleverly weaves together three separate sets of characters whose paths cross: the aristocrats, the workers and the fairies. He also shows us two distinct but overlapping worlds: the normal world of the city and the magical world represented by the fairies, the wood, the moon, dreams, confusion, and reality turned upside-down. (Apparently in Shakespeare's time "wood" could also mean "mad".)

A central theme of the play is summed up in the famous line: "The course of true love never did run smooth." There is the conflict between marriage for love and marriage according to the wishes of parents. But there is also the fickleness of lovers themselves.

Another theme involves the conflict and confusion, including the disruption of nature, which arises from the quarrels of both the fairy king and queen and of the humans. These conflicts and confusions are resolved in the end, with harmony being achieved:

Jack shall have Jill,
Naught shall go ill,
The man shall have his mare again,
And all shall be well.

For me, the only problem with the play is that the "mechanicals" (workers), although funny, are treated as simple folk in a rather patronising and condescending way. Similarly, in "Julius Caesar", Shakespeare portrays the Roman masses as a fickle mob, easily swayed by demagogues.

But overall this is a marvellous play which takes us into a magical world, and which contains some memorable lines and some beautiful poetry.

[Chris Griglack · Rating 4 out of 5]

In addition to a complete copy of the actual text, this book has a glossary and tons of reading, writing, and drama activities for students to try on every page. Some of them seem more about just getting students to engage with the text in a more fun way while others are geared towards building a deeper understanding. There are breaks after each act with a couple of pages of summary and some additional look back or prediction activities, and the book is full of photos of how different productions have done their staging and costume design, which should be really helpful in getting students to picture the play as they read.

My only gripe with the way all of this is set up is that discussions of motifs, themes, context, language, and deeper character analysis is all just shoved into a section at the back of the book after the play. It would have been nice to work those into the main pages so you don't have to flip back and forth between the page you're reading and the appendices, or get all the way through the play just to find additional information that would have been helpful.

[Esther · Rating 4 out of 5]

this is the first shakespeare play I ever read (and the only one I've performed in! Shout out sixth grade me in the role of Titania), so it has a special place in my heart.
It's very easy to understand, and I think a great entry point for Shakespeare-- but there is still so much to dig into and better understand each consecutive read.

[Priyanka Patil · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Midsummer Night's Dream is Shakespeare's most well-known play and is performed frequently...

This is a romantic comedy where four young lovers and a group of amateur actors wander into an enchanted forest , get tangled in fairy magic, and wake to find everything happily resolved as if it were a dream...

[Liberosis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This comedy is really funny and chaotic but philosophic at the same time. I recommend reading it with the audiobook (on Audible (not free) or Spotify (free)) if you struggle to understand the book (the vocabulary is kind of difficult to understand sometimes).

[Greg · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Dream is close to my favourite Shakespeare play; I have fond memories of seeing the 198 centimetres tall Bruce Spence playing Puck at the Melbourne Theatre Company. And Heath Robinson is likely the perfect illustrator to bring out the magic and strangeness of the events in the wood on the night in question. This is a very handsome edition from Folio, that adds a great deal to what is already a hugely enjoyable classic.

[Aki Aki · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm reading stories of Shakespeare recently. This story include love, comedy and fantasy. I like it very much.

[Madison Tumas · Rating 4 out of 5]

Parts of this would be a great introduction to traditional plays and writing styles for middle school students.