William Shakespeare's
A Midsummer Night's Dream. Act IV, scene 2.
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SCENE II. Athens. A Room in QUINCE'S House.
[Enter QUINCE, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING.]
- QUINCE
- Have you sent to Bottom's house? is he come home yet?
- STARVELING
- He cannot be heard of. Out of doubt, he is transported.
- FLUTE
- If he come not, then the play is marred; it goes not
- forward, doth it?
- QUINCE
- It is not possible: you have not a man in all Athens
- able to discharge Pyramus but he.
- FLUTE
- No; he hath simply the best wit of any handicraft man in
- Athens.
- QUINCE
- Yea, and the best person too: and he is a very paramour
- for a sweet voice.
- FLUTE
- You must say paragon: a paramour is, God bless us, a thing of
- naught.
[Enter SNUG.]
- SNUG
- Masters, the duke is coming from the temple; and there is
- two or three lords and ladies more married: if our sport had gone
- forward, we had all been made men.
- FLUTE
- O sweet bully Bottom! Thus hath he lost sixpence a day
- during his life; he could not have 'scaped sixpence a-day; an
- the duke had not given him sixpence a-day for playing Pyramus,
- I'll be hanged; he would have deserved it: sixpence a-day in
- Pyramus, or nothing.
[Enter BOTTOM.]
- BOTTOM
- Where are these lads? where are these hearts?
- QUINCE
- Bottom!--O most courageous day! O most happy hour!
- BOTTOM
- Masters, I am to discourse wonders: but ask me not
- what; for if I tell you, I am not true Athenian. I will tell you
- everything, right as it fell out.
- QUINCE
- Let us hear, sweet Bottom.
- BOTTOM
- Not a word of me. All that I will tell you is, that the
- duke hath dined. Get your apparel together; good strings to
- your beards, new ribbons to your pumps; meet presently at the
- palace; every man look over his part; for the short and the long
- is, our play is preferred. In any case, let Thisby have clean
- linen; and let not him that plays the lion pare his nails, for
- they shall hang out for the lion's claws. And, most dear actors,
- eat no onions nor garlick, for we are to utter sweet breath; and
- I do not doubt but to hear them say it is a sweet comedy. No more
- words: away! go; away!
[Exeunt.]
William Shakespeare's
A Midsummer Night's Dream. Act IV, scene 2.
(
previous scene next scene)
This text is in the public domain. Although I got it from Project Gutenberg, I'm
not allowed to say so unless I also include their seventy-two pages of
disclaimers and whatnot, so I'll take the other option they offer, and remove all reference to them,
except as needed to reduce down-votes.