Midsummer Night's Dream, A

Comedy by William Shakespeare, first performed in 1595-96. Hermia, Lysander, Demetrius, and Helena in their various romantic endeavours are subjected to the playful manipulations of the fairies Puck and Oberon in a wood near Athens. Titania, queen of the fairies, is similarly bewitched and falls in love with Bottom, a stupid weaver, whose head has been replaced with that of an ass.

Midsummer Night's Dream, A

Incidental music by Mendelssohn to Shakespeare's play. Overture composed in the summer of 1826 first performed in Stettin in February 1827; the rest of the music was composed in 1842 and used for a stage production at Potsdam on 14 October 1843.

Opera by Britten (libretto from Shakespeare), produced at the Jubilee Hall, Aldeburgh, on 11 June 1960. Lovers, fairies, and rustics intermingle in enchanted forest.