A Midsummer-Night's Dream - Illustrated by Arthur Rackham: llustrated by Arthur Rackham

By William Shakespeare and Arthur Rackham

Arthur Rackham’s ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, is one of his finest, and most sought after works of illustration. Originally published in 1908, his Shakespearean fairies are some of his best-known work, with his ‘gnarled trees and droves of fairies, representing the visual reality of the Dream for thousands of readers… here, he excelled especially in landscape, and in reconciling dream and reality, giving himself to the luxury of rich detail with a rare generosity.’ ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ is a comedy play – one of Shakespeare’s lighter works, believed to have been written between 1590 and 1597. Both in text, and on stage, it is one of Shakespeare’s most popular narratives, and remains widely performed across the world.

Arthur Rackham (1867-1939), was one of the most celebrated painters of the British Golden Age of Illustration (which encompassed the years from 1850 until the start of the First World War), Rackham’s artistry is quite simply, unparalleled. Throughout his career, he developed a unique style, combining haunting humour with dream-like romance. Presented alongside the text, his illustrations further refine this classic work.

Pook Press celebrates the great ‘Golden Age of Illustration‘ in children’s literature – a period of unparalleled excellence in book illustration. We publish rare and vintage Golden Age illustrated books, in high-quality colour editions, so that the masterful artwork and story-telling can continue to delight both young and old.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Read Books Ltd.
• Release date: Apr 16, 2013
• ISBN: 9781473391673

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare (1564–1616) is arguably the most famous playwright to ever live. Born in England, he attended grammar school but did not study at a university. In the 1590s, Shakespeare worked as partner and performer at the London-based acting company, the King’s Men. His earliest plays were Henry VI and Richard III, both based on the historical figures. During his career, Shakespeare produced nearly 40 plays that reached multiple countries and cultures. Some of his most notable titles include Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet and Julius Caesar. His acclaimed catalog earned him the title of the world’s greatest dramatist.

Book preview

A MIDSUMMER-

NIGHT’S

DREAM.

ACT I.

SCENE I.

Athens. The palace of THESEUS.

Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, PHILOSTRATE,

and Attendants.

THESEUS.

Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour

Draws on apace; four happy days bring in

Another moon: but, O, methinks, how slow

This old moon wanes! she lingers my desires.

Like to a step-dame or a dowager

Long withering out a young man’s revenue.

HIPPOLYTA.

Four days will quickly steep themselves in night;

Four nights will quickly dream away the time;

And then the moon, like to a silver bow

New-bent in heaven, shall behold the night

Of our solemnities.

THESEUS.

      Go, Philostrate,

Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments;

Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth:

Turn melancholy forth to funerals;

The pale companion is not for our pomp.

[Exit PHILOSTRATE.

Hippolyta, I woo’d thee with my sword,

And won thy love, doing thee injuries;

But I will wed thee in another key,

With pomp, with triumph and with revelling.

Enter EGEUS, HERMIA, LYSANDER, and DEMETRIUS.

EGEUS.

Happy be Theseus, our renowned duke!

THESEUS.

Thanks, good Egeus: what’s the news with thee?

EGEUS.

Full of vexation come I, with complaint

Against my child, my daughter Hermia.

Stand forth, Demetrius. My noble lord,

This man hath my consent to marry her.

Stand forth, Lysander: and, my gracious duke,

This man hath bewitch’d the bosom of my child:

Thou, thou, Lysander, thou hast given her rhymes

And interchanged love-tokens with my child:

Thou hast by moonlight at her window sung

With feigning voice verses of feigning love,

And stolen the impression of her fantasy

With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gawds, conceits,

Knacks, trifles, nosegays, sweetmeats, messengers

Of strong prevailment in unharden’d youth:

With cunning hast thou filch’d my daughter’s heart,

Turn’d her obedience, which is due to me,

To stubborn harshness: and, my gracious duke,

Be it so she will not here before your grace

Consent to marry with Demetrius,

I beg the ancient privilege of Athens,

As she is mine, I may dispose of her:

Which shall be either to this gentleman

Or to her death, according to our law

Immediately provided in that case.

THESEUS.

What say you, Hermia? be advised, fair maid:

To you your father should be as a god;

One that composed your beauties, yea, and one

To whom you are but as a form in wax

By him imprinted and within his power

To leave the figure or disfigure it.

Demetrius is a worthy gentleman.

HERMIA.

So is Lysander.

THESEUS.

In himself he is;

But in this kind, wanting your father’s voice,

The other must be held the worthier.

HERMIA.

I would my father look’d but with my eyes.

THESEUS.

Rather your eyes must with his judgement look.

HERMIA.

I do entreat your grace to pardon me.

I know not by what power I am made bold,

Nor how it may concern my modesty,

In such a presence here to plead my thoughts;

But I beseech your grace that I may know

The worst that may befall me in this case,

If I refuse to wed Demetrius.

THESEUS.

Either to die the death or to abjure

For ever the society of men.

Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires;

Know of your youth, examine well your blood

Whether, if you yield not to your father’s choice,

You can endure the livery of a nun,

For aye to be in shady cloister mew’d,

To live a barren sister all your life,

Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon.

Thrice-blessed they that master so their blood,

To undergo such maiden pilgrimage;

But earthlier happy is the rose distill’d,

Than that which withering on the virgin thorn

Grows, lives and dies in single blessedness.

HERMIA.

So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord,

Ere I will yield my virgin patent up

Unto his lordship, whose unwished yoke

My soul consents not to give sovereignty.

THESEUS.

Take time to pause; and, by the next new moon—

The sealing-day betwixt my love and me,

For everlasting bond of fellowship—

Upon that day either prepare to die

For disobedience to your father’s will,

Or else to wed Demetrius, as he would;

Or on Diana’s altar to protest

For aye austerity and single life.

DEMETRIUS.

Relent, sweet Hermia: and, Lysander, yield

Thy crazed title to my certain right.

LYSANDER.

You have her father’s love, Demetrius;

Let me have Hermia’s: do you marry him.

EGEUS.

Scornful Lysander! true, he hath my love,

And what is mine my love shall render him.

And she is mine, and all my right of her

I do estate unto Demetrius.

LYSANDER.

I am, my lord, as well derived as he,

As well possess’d; my love is more than his;

My fortunes every way as fairly rank’d,

If not with vantage, as Demetrius’;

And, which is more than all these boasts can be,

I am beloved of beauteous Hermia:

Why should not I then prosecute my right?

Demetrius, I’ll avouch it to his head,

Made love to Nedar’s daughter, Helena,

And won her soul; and she, sweet lady, dotes,

Devoutly dotes, dotes in idolatry,

Upon this spotted and inconstant man.

THESEUS.

I must confess that I have heard so much,

And with Demetrius thought to have spoke thereof

But, being over-full of self-affairs,

My mind did lose it. But, Demetrius, come;

Reviews for A Midsummer-Night's Dream - Illustrated by Arthur Rackham

[kennethwdavis_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

My favorite Shakespearean comedy, a miracle.

[pilgrimjess · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

" The course of true love never did run smooth."This is one of Shakespeare's most performed comedies and as such probably one of his best known. Consequently I'm not going to going to say anything about the plot. I personally studied this whilst at school as part of an English Literature course and despite my callow years I remember enjoying. However, I haven't read it since.Now, far too many decades later, I read Bernard Cornwell's novel 'Fools and Mortals' which centres around a speculative and fictional première of the play. Having really enjoyed reading that book decided to revisit the original. Once again I found it a highly enjoyable read which made me smile and a piece of true genius.

[jfoster_sf · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great romantic comedy.

[haruka3h · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Some decades ago we couldn't marry fleely.Sometimes we forced to marry who didn't want to marry.I think it is very sad.This book has many characters.So it's story is little complicated.But I felt happy to be all the people became happy at the end of the story.

[brianinbuffalo · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

As hard as I've tried, I could never quite get into this one. I've read it once and seen it performed twice. Both productions were classy. Still, I found the play tedious.

[aliceanna-1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Far too contrived for my reading enjoyment. I'm certain that it is charming when performed on stage, but the premise wore thin upon reading. I really had no feel for the characters and cared little for their fate.

[bexaplex · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A Midsummer Night's Deam is the story of four couples. Theseus and Hippolyta are about to get married, after Theseus captures the Queen of the Amazons (and presumably some sort of courtship, since she seems to be amenable to getting married). Hermia wants to marry Lysander, despite her father's objections. Helena wants to marry Demetrius, if only he weren't in love with Hermia. And Oberon and Titania, king and queen of the fairies, are having a tiff about household help. After an evening wandering around the woods, with a little enchantment, humor and chaos, they get it all sorted out.The only happy ending I dislike is Oberon and Titania. Oberon gets his way by making his wife ridiculous, about which she doesn't seem the slightest bit upset. I doubt Queen Elizabeth would have put up with that kind of treatment.

[norabelle414 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

It's no Twelfth Night (my favorite comedy), but it's still one of Shakespeare's better plays. I especially laughed at the 4 lovers' tendencies to follow each other around like puppydogs. I was interested to notice a difference in the speech between the mechanicals and everyone else (fairies, noblemen/women). In their everyday speech, the mechanicals did not use pentameter, while everyone else did.

[grytajme · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I was a stagehand for this. Incredibly fun.

[glenline · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A hilarious masterpiece. A great romp in the woods. Having the characters stage a play seems unique to me.

[dfitzgerald_50 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I know as an educator and librarian, it is assumed by most that I am a lover of Shakespeare. However, I must come clean. I am not. I actually truly dislike reading the 16th century language and I have trouble getting past that to try and enjoy the story. That being said however, I chose to read this because the majority of English teachers at my school teach this classic and I wanted to be able to have conversations with the students about it. I will say, A Midsummer Night's Dream is my favorite Shakespeare play so far and I feel like I accomplished something by reading it.

[ncgraham_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I honestly feel as though I’ve ruined this play for myself. When I first read it during my last year of middle school, I was immediately taken with nearly everything about it—the quarrelling lovers, the comedy, the supernatural element—so taken that I tried to film a shortened version of it with some of my friends. Obviously, what with reading my own bowdlerized imaginings of the lines over and over again, not to mention listening to all of us trying to recite the Bard, my estimation of it was sullied somewhat.Reading it again, I find that I still enjoy it, and can respect it as a finely-crafted piece of comedy, but I don’t think it will ever again number among my very favorites from Shakespeare. And that is my fault, not his.As for the play itself, what is there to say? The language is wonderful, of course. Every word, every phrase, every sentence is perfectly judged. No one has ever equaled Shakespeare when it comes to using literary devices to bring about specific dramatic effects. The same features that make Oberon’s speeches so lyrically beautiful—alliteration, rhyme, assonance—Shakespeare uses to highlight the ridiculousness of the mechanical’s entertainment. Has there ever been alliteration as funny as this?Whereat with blade, with bloody blameful blade,He bravely broached his broiling blood breastThe whole of the Pyramus and Thisbe play-within-a-play is inspired; I don’t know whether Midsummer came before or after Romeo and Juliet in Shakespeare’s oeuvre, but it’s wonderful to see him touch on the same themes in a comic context. I had to stage that scene with zombies and werewolves for a class this past semester (you see? … this play just won’t let me alone!), and let me tell you, anything that can survive that treatment is pure gold.Some things surprised me while I was rereading this. One was the maturity of the content; Demetrius basically tells Helena that, if she does not stop following him, he will rape her! Shakespeare ain’t for the kiddies, folks.Helena is, I think, my favorite character, after Bottom and Puck. The latter’s closing speech is one of my favorites from Shakespeare, and probably the best of his epilogues, with the possible exception of Prospero’s from The Tempest.In spite of my erratic history with the play, I would recommend it. You can’t go wrong with the Bard.

[writercity · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

One of my favorite Shakespeare tales that give me a new laugh every time. I've re-read it and love the characters of Helena and Hermia more every time.

[laphenix · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Fast and fun. I liked the characters and comedy alike.

[amaraduende · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

*gasp* Can I put Shakespeare in my fantasy shelf? :)

This is just such a delicious treat to read. Do yourself a favor and read it outloud - at least parts of it. It's just so fun.

[leslie398 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

While I liked the overall plot, I found this to be one of the plays in which Shakespeare's language is hard for me. I have seen some of the film versions (most notably the 1935 movie with Olivia de Havilland & Jimmy Cagney and the BBC Production with Helen Mirren as Titania) & seeing the action does help (especially in the 'humorous' parts!).One thing that I noticed in reading this was how unpleasant I found Oberon to be.

[clq_2 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I've been meaning to catch up on various Shakespeare plays that "everyone" has read, and after finishing a book and having no immediate plans for what to read next, A Midsummer Night's Dream was conveniently waiting for me on my Kindle.In short, I didn't really like reading it much. I can see how it would probably work much better on stage, but read as a book it didn't really do much for me.If I ever get the opportunity to see it on stage I probably will, and I'll be prepared to be pleasantly surprised at how well it can work as a play.That said, I do enjoy poems, and I found the lyrical nature of the dialogue, the rhythm and the rhyme, to be quite fun. But as a story I just didn't really appreciate it as much as I had expected.

[aarondesk · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A comedy by Shakespeare on love and marriage. The way he mixes English culture with ancient mythology is brilliant.

[elmyra_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Was promted to re-read this by reading Neil Gaiman's eponymous Sandman short story. Learned:That my English has gotten a hell of a lot better in the last 11 years. This was the first Shakespeare play I tried to read, and I read it by myself at the time, so I didn't really get it.That I still don't really get the "brilliance" of this particular Sandman story.That I should probably read more Shakespeare.That some of the notes to this edition are utterly useless, and that Reclam can't quite decide what level of audience they're aiming their notes and translations at.

[rbeene-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

It's Shakespeare. Wonderful story but I prefer his tragedies.

[librarylou · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

One of my favourite Shakespeare plays, very witty and funny.

[fredacochran · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Read it in high school. Loved it, it was funny

[paradox98_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

One of my favorite comedies. Significant to me because I've actually been in a love rhombus, as it were; therefore, I can relate some of the characters.

[dmtcer-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I was on a Shkespeare kick!

[cathywoolbright · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Every read of this classic reveals another tongue in cheek pun. This humorous comedy of errors deals with love, romance, fairies in an enchanted forest, a traveling actors' troupe that passes itself as professional, but offers comic relief, mistaken identity, and of course parents at the crux who will not let true love have its way. Just a simple, straightforward Shakespearean tale. Enjoy!

[jennaelf · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Nothing is funnier than the reversal of social degrees, is it?

C'mon, the mighty Titania falls in love with a working class sod who has the head of an ass! AND his name is Bottom!

Shakespeare, you cheeky bastard.

[therebelprince · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A reasonably mild edition of a great play, but one that will be eminently suitable for highschool students and actors.

[soulflower1981 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

While I am not a huge Shakespeare fan I did find this particular play to be pretty darn good. I enjoyed the fact that there was this mix of fantasy with ideas that we can all relate to with unrequited love. It was fascinating to see how Shakespeare made fun of his own play "Romeo and Juliet" within the story as well. There is such a great woven story here that anyone that enjoys reading plays should read this. This was another book that I had to read for my Theatre course.

[jljaina · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Lyrical and mesmerizing! I got a dramatized audio copy of this book. It really brings this story to life!

A very different love story for the ages. Couplings, love triangles, love quads, and love chases. It is all here. Thank you fantasy forest for all this wonderful chaos. Some parts a whimsical, others near tragic, some comedy. You never know what the next scene will hold.

When just listening to this, it can take a bit to follow the story at first. I had no idea who anyone was and names are not mentioned enough to quickly catch on. The only indication to the setting is the sounds you here. It really is just like listening to a play. They even have a full cast for the audio so each character is voiced by someone new. While it makes it far more enjoyable it just made things take a little longer.

I finally got to learn where several famous quotes and expressions came from. Hearing certain lines brought a smile to my face. Now I just need to read the print version of this book so I can be sure I didn't miss anything. I now have a mental soundtrack to go with it.

[mrsdanaalbasha · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I have read this book twice and I really like it, it even might be my favorite among Shakespear books, for some reason the song "Strange And Beautiful (I'll Put A Spell On You)" Lyrics by Aqualung always reminds me of this book:

I've been watching your world from afar
I've been trying to be where you are
And I've been secretly falling apart... Unseen
To me, you're strange and you're beautiful
You'd be so perfect with me
But you just can't see
You turn every head but you don't see me

I'll put a spell on you
You'll fall asleep
When I put a spell on you
And when I wake you I'll be the first thing you see
And you'll realize that you love me

Sometimes the last thing you want comes in first
Sometimes the first thing you want never comes
But I know that waiting is all you can do
Sometimes

I'll put a spell on you
You'll fall asleep
When I put a spell on you
And when I wake you I'll be the first thing you see
And you'll realise that you love me

I'll put a spell on you
You'll fall asleep
Cause I put a spell on you
And when I wake you I'll be the first thing you see
And you'll realize that you love me