Title:
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Author:
William Shakespeare
Read
by: Full Cast Recording
Publisher:
Naxos Audio
Length:
Approximately 2 hours and 18 minutes
Source:
From the Kewaunee Public Library through the Overdrive System
Shakespeare was meant to be read aloud. Even when I took Shakespeare classes in high
school and college, I would read the plays out loud to myself. As plays, they are meant to be spoken word. That is why I always enjoy audiobook
productions of Shakespeare’s plays.
This production was wonderful. They had a full cast play all the parts and
they acted them with their all. I
especially love hearing this play spoken with British accents. I also loved the classical music that was
played between scenes of the play in this audiobook. It was very fitting with the play and
enjoyable.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream is one of Shakespeare’s
comedies. Theseus, Duke of Athens is
marrying Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons in a wooded area that is also
inhabited by Fairy folk. As events unfold,
various couples are caught up in various misunderstandings and hilarity ensues.
I love that this play focuses on both love and on
comedy. Nick Bottom and Puck are two of
my favorite comedy characters in any of Shakespeare’s plays and they both
appear in this play. I also love how
misunderstandings form a lot of the comedy in a Shakespeare play. In this play there is a love potion that causes
a lot of misunderstandings. I also love
plays within a play. This one has a play
that is so terribly performed that everyone thinks it is a comedy which is
quite hilarious. The bad acting comes
through in the audiobook version of this play within a play.
I saw a wonderful outdoor production way back in 2000
put on by the American Player’s Theatre in Spring Green, Wisconsin. It was an outdoor theatre and the play was
magical. I was in Wisconsin with my best
friend Jenn visiting her Aunt and Uncle in Madison, a couple of years before I
moved to Wisconsin. It was so nice of
her Aunt and Uncle to take us to this production – and it is something that I
will never forget. Seeing Shakespeare on
stage is always wonderful, but this production was especially wonderful as the
setting was the woods and having the actual play outdoors fit so well. The audiobook version of this play is
fantastic – but seeing the actual production, even better.
I revisited A Midsummer Night’s as part of the Facebook
Literary Classics group for May readings.
Favorite Quotes
“The course of true love never did run smooth.”
“And yet, to say the truth, reason and love keep
little company together nowadays.”
“Though she be but little, she is fierce!”
Overall, A Midsummer’s Night Dream is a wonderful class
comic play and audiobook.
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