Midsummer Night's Dream: Act 3

Scene 1

This portion of the play is quite amusing as Puck or Robin turns Bottom's head into a donkey's head. Of course his fellow actors are surprised and terrified. Soon after the actors hurry away, Bottom is stationary and comes across the sleeping fairy queen, Titania, who's eyes had been blinded by the juice of the magic flower, in fact the same one that was used on Lysander. As a result, Titania falls madly in love with the donkey-headed Bottom who is confused at her strange behavior. The scene ends with Bottom being tended to by Titania's servant fairies.


Scene 2

The scene begins with Robin telling Oberon of Titania's false love to the donkey-headed Bottom. Then, Demetrius enters and tries to persuade Hermia that he did not kill Lysander as she had suspected after Lysander disappeared in the woods the night they were going to escape from the palace. Robin and Oberon are mindful of this conversation and Oberon is furious at Robin for anointing the wrong person. Both are now aware they must set things right and begin with anointing Demetrius' eyes so he will then fall in love with Helena and not Hermia. Their plan works and they have partially solved the problem at hand. The only thing left to do then is make Lysander fall back in love with Hermia once again. Meanwhile in the mortal world, Hermia, Lysander, Demetrius, and Helena finally meet face to face. Each is angry at another either for stealing the one they love or flustered and angry at the actions of the other three. All these feelings result in a cat fight between Hermia and Helena, Hermia being angry at Helena for taking Lysander away from her and Helena being angry because she believes she is still being fooled by all of them. As both of them storm off in a fuss, the two men are left to battle it out. At last, Robin steps in and disguises his voice as Lysander and Demitrius to lure them away from each other and keep them on the run until each is too tired to carry out the pursuit. The act comes to a close with Robin fulfilling his goal and anoints Lysander's eyes with an herb to undo what was previously done.