Drumroll please…and, it’s another comedy by William Shakespeare. This one’s full of magic, mischievous fairies, and lovers who fall in and out of love, for real reasons and sorcery-related ones. And there’s also a play-within-the-play and plenty of animal body parts.
How does this play engage with and represent patriarchy? Do you agree with Louis Adrian Montrose, who says that the emphasis on patriarchy in A Midsummer Night’s Dream reflects men’s anxiety during this period about being ruled over by a woman (Queen Elizabeth)?
And chew on this: how does the play-within-the-play (Pyramus and Thisbe) reflect on, and relate to, theatrical conventions of the time?