“I pray thee gentle mortal, sing again...”

Before we start to analyse each scene in detail (step 2) we need to read for overall understanding and context.

This will allow you to:• add to your notes from your film viewing on structure and effect (AO1: ‘informed response’)• add to your AO4 notes and begin to apply them more specifically to the text (AO4: ‘significance and influence of contexts’)• create a foundation to build on with your in-depth AO2 analysis (AO1: ‘informed response’)

Reading the text

After each scene...

1. Make notes on the characters, setting and events of the scene + any immediately obvious AO4

2. Add to your timeline for each of the four plots, noting where they overlap and/or meet

3. Answer the questions on your sheet

4. Research your given reference or topic and prepare to share your findings with the class

Act 1 Scene 1:

1. Ancient Greece and Athens 2. Theseus3. Hippolyta and the Amazons4. Marriage in Shakespeare’s time5. Diana, goddess of the moon and hunting 6. Cupid and his arrows (esp. lead arrows) + “painted blind”7. Venus’ doves8. “the Carthage queen” (Dido) and “false Troyan” (Aeneas)9. Phoebe

Act 1 Scene 2

1. The names of the ‘mechanicals’ – • Bottom• Quince• Snug• Flute• Snout• Starveling

2. Pyramus and Thisbe3. ‘Ercles’ = Hercules4. ‘Phibbus’ = Phoebus, the sun god5. The three Fates6. ‘French crowns have no hair at all’ – the ‘French disease’ and baldness

Act 2 Scene 1 1. Robin Goodfellow/Puck 2. Elizabethan ideas of fairies and spirits3. Changelings 4. Corin and Phillida (pastoral poetry)5. Theseus’ women: Perigenia, Aegles, Ariadne and Antiopa6. Hiems7. Neptune8. ‘the imperial votress’ (Queen Elizabeth I)9. Apollo and Daphne

Act 2 Scene 2 1. Philomel2. Symbolism of the serpent

Act 3 Scene 1 1. ‘eight and six’ as a ballad form2. The ‘man in the moon’, his lantern and bush of thorns3. Ninus’ tomb (Ninah, the founder of Nineveh)4. Symbolism of an ass head5. Cuckold6. Elizabethan use of peaseblossom/peasecod, mustardseed,

moth and cobweb

Act 3 Scene 2 1. Elizabethan beliefs about sighs and love2. Tartar’s bow3. Acheron4. ‘Aurora’s harbinger’ and Aurora the goddess

Act 4 Scene 1 1. ‘the tongs and the bones’2. Hercules and Cadmus3. ‘hounds of Sparta’4. ‘Thessalian bulls’5. 1 Corinthians 2: 9-10

Act 4 Scene 2 1. ‘sixpence’ in Shakespeare’s time

Act 5 Scene 1 1. Helen of Troy2. The Lapiths and the Centaurs3. Orpheus and the Bacchae4. Spenser’s ‘The Tears of the Muses’5. ‘Limander’ = Leander and ‘Helen’ = Hero6. ‘Shafalus to Procrus’ = Cephalus and Procris7. Bergamesque dance (Bergamo, Italy)8. Hecate – in ‘triple’ form (Luna/Cynthia; Diana; Proserpina)