Book 10 of 100 – A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare

Just like a previous post of mine that you can find here about Titus Andronicus, I read this play for my Shakespeare class. However, I have already read this before. In fact, I performed this play in High School. I played the very interested character of Helena, and had a great time with it. Because the two characters of Helena and Hermia are supposed to have a very pronounced height difference, they cast me (5’6” at the time) as Helena and a small friend of mine (5’1” at the time) as Hermia. However, they did the casting for the fall play at the beginning of the summer and when we got back to school in the fall, Hermia had grown a few inches after a wonderful summer growth spurt. So to help create the physical height difference that was now not quite as pronounced, I had to wear a pair of very tall heels. Unfortunately, heels and paper mache hills don’t always go so well together. Long story short, I fell a lot and lost all of the trust I had for chicken wire, glue, and strips of paper.

As much as this play hurt me, I still love it. There are so many ways to approach this play. You can enjoy it for its comedic surface, its political statements, its large amount of imagination, or even its semi-feminist character. It is a fun one to read and play around with. I would highly suggest this play to anyone who wants to dabble in some of good ‘ol Shakesy’s work and have a good time doing it.