🎧 Emma's Library Audiobook cover: A Midsummer Night's Dream

A Midsummer Night's Dream

Classic Fiction · No. 2 — One enchanted night in a wood where love loses its way.

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About this audiobook

Hermia loves Lysander but is ordered to marry Demetrius, so the two flee into the wood — followed by Demetrius, and by Helena, who loves him hopelessly. In that same wood the fairy king Oberon quarrels with his queen Titania, and sends the trickster Puck out with a flower whose juice makes the sleeper love the first creature they see. Puck charms the wrong eyes; both young men wake up in love with the astonished Helena; Titania falls for a weaver wearing a donkey's head; and by morning the magic must untangle everything it tangled — leaving everyone wondering whether it was all a dream.

Why it's worth a listen

Four young lovers, a fairy king's quarrel, and a mischief-maker with a magic flower turn one summer night in the woods into glorious, tangled chaos. It is Shakespeare at his most playful — moon-silvered and laugh-out-loud funny, with a weaver who wakes up wearing a donkey's head and takes it entirely in stride. And when morning sorts everyone out, it leaves you wondering: if your own eyes can be fooled, how do you ever know what's real?

A question to keep

If your own eyes can be fooled, how do you know what is real?

Based on the book by Retold from William Shakespeare, published by Emma's Library original retelling

Chapters

  1. The Law of Athens
  2. The King and Queen of Shadows
  3. The Untangling of Eyes
  4. The Weaver with the Donkey’s Head
  5. The Tangle at its Worst
  6. The Morning Horns
  7. A Question to Keep