Lysander
Midsummer's Night Dream
Notes on Lysander
Video: Lo! She is one of this confederacy
Read the NoteFrom Peter Hall’s film (January 30, 1968) of A Midsummer Night’s Dream featuring Michael Jayston, Helen Mirren, Diana Rigg, and David Warner.
Quotes spoken by the character Lysander
Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour Draws on apace
Read the QuoteTheseus
Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour
Draws on apace. Four happy days bring in
Another moon. But, O, methinks how slow
This old moon wanes! She lingers my desires
Like to a stepdame or a dowager
Long withering out a young man’s revenue.
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How now, my love? Why is your cheek so pale?
Read the QuoteLysander
How now, my love? Why is your cheek so pale?
How chance the roses there do fade so fast?
Hermia
Belike for want of rain, which I could well
Beteem them from the tempest of my eyes.
Ay me! For aught that I could ever read,
Could ever hear by tale or history,
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O, I am out of breath in this fond chase
Read the QuoteHelena
O, I am out of breath in this fond chase.
The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace.
Happy is Hermia, wheresoe’er she lies,
For she hath blessèd and attractive eyes.
How came her eyes so bright? Not with salt tears.
If so, my eyes are oftener washed than hers.
Reason becomes the marshal to my will
And leads me to your eyes,
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Why should you think that I should woo in scorn?
Read the QuoteLysander
Why should you think that I should woo in scorn?
Scorn and derision never come in tears.
Look when I vow, I weep; and vows so born,
In their nativity all truth appears.
How can these things in me seem scorn to you,
Bearing the badge of faith to prove them true?
Weigh oath with oath and you will nothing weigh.
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Dark night, that from the eye his function takes
Read the QuoteHermia, to Lysander
Dark night, that from the eye his function takes,
The ear more quick of apprehension makes;
Wherein it doth impair the seeing sense,
It pays the hearing double recompense.
Thou art not by mine eye, Lysander, found;
Mine ear, I thank it, brought me to thy sound.
But why unkindly didst thou leave me so?
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Have you not set Lysander, as in scorn
Read the QuoteHelena
Have you not set Lysander, as in scorn,
To follow me and praise my eyes and face,
And made your other love, Demetrius,
Who even but now did spurn me with his foot,
To call me goddess, nymph, divine and rare,
Precious, celestial? Wherefore speaks he this
To her he hates? And wherefore doth Lysander
Deny your love (so rich within his soul)
And tender me,
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What? Should I hurt her, strike her, kill her dead?
Read the QuoteLysander
What? Should I hurt her, strike her, kill her dead?
Although I hate her, I’ll not harm her so.
Hermia
What, can you do me greater harm than hate?
Hate me? Wherefore? O me, what news, my love?
Am not I Hermia? Are not you Lysander?
I am as fair now as I was erewhile.
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My lord, fair Helen told meof their stealth
Read the QuoteDemetrius
My lord, fair Helen told me of their stealth,
Of this their purpose hither to this wood,
And I in fury hither followed them,
Fair Helena in fancy following me.
And I have found Demetrius like a jewel,
Mine own and not mine own.
But, my good lord, I wot not by what power
(But by some power it is) my love to Hermia,
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So please your Grace, the Prologue is addressed
Read the QuotePhilostrate
So please your Grace, the Prologue is addressed.
Theseus
Let him approach.
His speech was like a tangled chain—nothing
impaired, but all disordered.
Enter the Prologue.
Prologue
If we offend, it is with our goodwill.
That you should think we come not to offend,
But with goodwill.
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You ladies, you whose gentle hearts do fear
Read the QuoteSnug, as Lion
You ladies, you whose gentle hearts do fear
The smallest monstrous mouse that creeps on floor,
May now perchance both quake and tremble here,
When lion rough in wildest rage doth roar.
Then know that I, as Snug the joiner, am
A lion fell, nor else no lion’s dam;
For if I should as lion come in strife
Into this place,
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