Act III

I really enjoyed reading this act; characterized by such playful use of puns and dramatic irony, Shakespeare really drew me into the tension of his masterfully tangled love parallelogram (I hypothesize would be the appropriate geometric shape to describe these poor, love-struck Athenians' dilemma) that is plagued by the disillusionment of a funny, mischievious fellow named Robin Goodfellow (AKA Puck) who drops the love potion that Oberon, King of the Fairies, gave him into the wrong Athenian's eyes. Thus the drama commences when Lysander awakes after Puck poisons him and he averts his love from Hermia and confesses his newfound devotion to Helena. Unconvinced of his honesty and unsure of his motives, Helena reprimands Lysander for his mockery and emplores that he follow her no more. Oberon later identifies Puck's mistake and demmands Puck correct his fault. So Puck sets out to repair his wrongdoings and doses Demitrius with a hefty hit of love juice. BAM! He wakes, he sees Helena, he is in love. However, Helena is only further unamused by what she percieves as a jest against her unrequitted love. Hermia enters the scene and beseeches that Lysander explain his sly flight from her during the middle of the night and his new affection for Helena, who is in disbelief for she believes her childhood-friend is the culprit behind these mean men's cruel joke. They all challenge to deul, except for Helena who still thinks this is all just trickery, but are misled into different areas of the woods by Puck so that he may mend the mess he made. Exhausted from pursuing and evading, the Athenians slip into a sound slumber.