Note: the plot of The Fairy Queen is nonsensical. The librettist, possibly actor Thomas Burton, simply excerpted his favorite bits from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and added as much singing and dancing as possible, without concern for narrative coherence.

Act One

Enter Titania, Queen of the Fairies, with the Indian boy and attendant fairies. She gathers the fairies round, suggesting they leave the town and live idyllically "where crowds and noise were never known." Enter more fairies, bringing with them three drunken poets whom they begin to torment for sport, pinching and wrenching and prodding them for a confession of their sins. One of the poets finally steps forth to confess his uselessness as a poet, his drunkenness, and his poverty. Finally the fairies drive them away.

Act Two

The scene is a moonlit wood. Titania enters with her entourage. She quarrels with Oberon and afterwards transforms the scene into a fairyland of picturesque grottoes and flowering trees. The fairies dance in an attempt to soothe the distressed Titania, and she requests that they sing a lullaby. The allegorical figures of Night, Mystery, Secresie, and Sleep step forth to sing for Titania each in turn, until she falls asleep. Oberon approaches and squeezes the juices from a magic flower into her slumbering eyes.

Act Three

Enter Titania with her fairies and the ass-headed Bottom, with whom she has fallen in love. She uses her magic to make the scene change to a lush forest grove with a river, a bridge formed by a pair of dragons, and swimming swans. The Fauns, Dryades, and Naides arrive to dance and sing for all. Some savages interrupt the merrymaking with a raucous dance that scares the fairies away, causing the dragon bridge to vanish and the gracefully arching trees to right themselves. Enter Coridon and Mopsa. Coridon is trying to convince Mopsa to kiss him and she is patiently resisting, "till I kiss you for good and all." A Nymph arrives, singing of the battle of desire versus good sense, and proclaims her strategy of being as false and inconstant as men in order to have as much pleasure as they. The act concludes with the merry dance of the Haymakers.

Act Four

Titania and Bottom are asleep. A pair of couples, Hermia and Lysander and Helena and Demetrius, get embroiled in a terrible confusion, as in Shakespeare's play, until they both fall asleep as well. Titania and Bottom are awakened by Oberon, and he asks Titania for music to celebrate his birthday. Happy to meet his request, she changes the scene to the sumptuous Garden of Fountains at sunrise. The clouds part and Pheobus appears in his glorious chariot. Allegorical figures of each of the four seasons sing for Oberon, each in turn, starting with Spring.

Act Five

Theseus grants consent for the marriages of Hermia to Lysander. Demetrius is skeptical when told of the previous night's magical adventures, upon which the most spectacular of all the scenes begins to appear. Oberon summons Juno, who descends from the heavens in a peacock-drawn chariot, and a spectacular Chinese garden appears. A Chinese man enters and sings, followed by a Chinese woman, who also sings, followed by dancing monkeys. The fairies sing, and Hymen appears, lamenting the flameless torch he carries. The Chinese women instruct him how to light it—"Turn then thine eyes upon the glories there"—and all ends with a gigantic song and dance.

© All Music Guide

Portions of Content Provided by All Music Guide.
© 2008 All Media Guide, LLC. All Music Guide is a registered trademark of All Media Guide, LLC.