Queen Mab, is a fairy referred to in William Shakespeare's play "Romeo and Juliet", where "she is the fairies' midwife", in her play, her activity is described in a famous speech by which fictional character in William Shakespeare's 1597 tragedy, a close friend to Romeo and a blood relative to Prince Escalus and Count Paris?
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Queen Mab Queen Mab (pronunciation: "M/ă/v") is a fairy referred to in William Shakespeare's play "Romeo and Juliet", where "she is the fairies' midwife." Later, she appears in other poetry and literature, and in various guises in drama and cinema. In the play, her activity is described in a famous speech by Mercutio written originally in prose and often adapted into iambic pentameter, in which she is described as a miniature creature who performs midnight pranks upon sleepers. Being driven by a team of atomies, she rides her chariot over their noses and "delivers the fancies of sleeping men." Additionally, while driving "O'er ladies' lips, who straight on kisses dream," she was known to change her mind and instead "plague" "ladies' lips" "with blisters" if she smelled "sweetmeats" or candied fruit eaten to sweeten their breath. Along with this interpretation, others believe the blisters were a reference to the plague or to herpes simplex. She is also described as a midwife to help sleepers 'give birth' to their dreams. She may be a figure borrowed from folklore, and though she is often associated with the Irish Medb in popular culture, and has been suggested by historian Thomas Keightley to be from "Habundia", a more likely origin for her name would be from Mabel and the Middle English derivative "Mabily" (as used by Chaucer) all from the Latin "amabilis" ("lovable").
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Mercutio Mercutio ( ) is a fictional character in William Shakespeare's 1597 tragedy, "Romeo and Juliet". He is a close friend to Romeo and a blood relative to Prince Escalus and Count Paris. As such, being neither a Montague nor a Capulet, Mercutio is one of the few in Verona with the ability to mingle around those of both houses. The invitation to Capulet's party states that he has a brother named Valentine.
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Snug (A Midsummer Night's Dream) Snug is a minor character from William Shakespeare's play "A Midsummer Night's Dream". He is a joiner who comes from Athens who is hired by Peter Quince to play the part of the lion in Pyramus and Thisbe. When he is first assigned the part, he is afraid it may take him a while to finally remember his lines (even though the lion's role was nothing but roaring originally). Bottom offers to play the part of the lion (as he offers to play all other parts), but he is rejected by Quince, who worries (as do the other characters) that his loud and ferocious roar in the play will frighten the ladies of power in the audience and get Quince and all his actors hanged. In the end, the lion's part is revised to explain that he is in fact not a lion and means the audience no harm. This is a subtle reminder by Shakespeare that the mechanicals are not learned men.
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Bel-imperia Bel-imperia is a character in Thomas Kyd’s "The Spanish Tragedy". She is the daughter of the Duke of Castile, the sister of Lorenzo, and the lover of the dead Don Andrea. Throughout the play, Bel-imperia attempts to avenge the death of Don Andrea. She begins by feigning a relationship with Horatio to “spite the prince that wrought his end”, then joins forces with Hieronimo to eventually murder Balthazar and complete her revenge mission. However, critics view Bel-imperia in various roles based on her actions throughout the play.
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Mistress Quickly Mistress Nell Quickly is a fictional character who appears in several plays by William Shakespeare. She is an inn-keeper, who runs the Boar's Head Tavern, at which Sir John Falstaff and his disreputable cronies congregate.
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Juliet (disambiguation) Juliet is a character in Shakespeare's play "Romeo and Juliet".
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Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford ( ; 12 April 155024 June 1604) was an English peer and courtier of the Elizabethan era. Oxford was heir to the second oldest earldom in the kingdom, a court favourite for a time, a sought-after patron of the arts, and noted by his contemporaries as a lyric poet and court playwright, but his reckless and volatile temperament precluded him from attaining any courtly or governmental responsibility and contributed to the dissipation of his estate. Since the 1920s he has been among the most popular alternative candidates proposed for the authorship of Shakespeare's works.
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Richard II (play) King Richard the Second is a history play by William Shakespeare believed to have been written in approximately 1595. It is based on the life of King Richard II of England (ruled 1377–1399) and is the first part of a tetralogy, referred to by some scholars as the Henriad, followed by three plays concerning Richard's successors: "Henry IV, Part 1"; "Henry IV, Part 2"; and "Henry V".
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Oedipus (Voltaire play) Oedipus (French: "Œdipe" ) is a tragedy by the French dramatist and philosopher Voltaire that was first performed in 1718. It was his first play and the first literary work for which he used the pen-name Voltaire (his real name was François-Marie Arouet). In adapting Sophocles' Athenian tragedy "Oedipus Rex", Voltaire attempted to rationalise the plot and motivation of its characters. In a letter of 1719 he indicated that he found it improbable that the murder of Laius had not been investigated earlier and that Oedipus should take so long to understand the oracle's clear pronouncement. Voltaire adds a subplot concerning the love of Philoctète for Jocaste. He also reduces the prominence of the theme of incest.
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Prince Charming Prince Charming is a fairy tale character who comes to the rescue of a damsel in distress and must engage in a quest to liberate her from an evil spell. This classification suits most heroes of a number of traditional folk tales, including "Snow White", "Sleeping Beauty", and "Cinderella", even if in the original story they were given another name, or no name at all.
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Juliet Juliet Capulet (Italian: "Giulietta Capuleti" ) is the female protagonist in William Shakespeare's romantic tragedy "Romeo and Juliet". Juliet is the only daughter of the patriarch of the House of Capulet and falls in love with Romeo, a member of the House of Montague (with which the Capulets have a blood feud). The story has a long history that precedes Shakespeare himself.
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Cymbeline Cymbeline , also known as Cymbeline, King of Britain, is a play by William Shakespeare set in Ancient Britain and based on legends that formed part of the Matter of Britain concerning the early Celtic British King Cunobeline. Although listed as a tragedy in the First Folio, modern critics often classify "Cymbeline" as a romance or even a comedy. Like "Othello" and "The Winter's Tale", it deals with the themes of innocence and jealousy. While the precise date of composition remains unknown, the play was certainly produced as early as 1611.
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Dogberry Dogberry is a character created by William Shakespeare for his play, "Much Ado About Nothing". He is described by The Nuttall Encyclopædia as a "self-satisfied night constable" with an inflated view of his own importance as the leader of a group of comically bumbling police watchmen. Dogberry is notable for his numerous malapropisms, which sometimes are referred to as "dogberryisms" after him. The Dogberry character was created for William Kempe, who played comic roles in Shakespeare's theatre company the Lord Chamberlain's Men.
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All the world's a stage "All the world's a stage" is the phrase that begins a monologue from William Shakespeare's "As You Like It", spoken by the melancholy Jaques in Act II Scene VII. The speech compares the world to a stage and life to a play, and catalogues the seven stages of a man's life, sometimes referred to as the seven ages of man: infant, schoolboy, lover, soldier, justice, Pantalone and old age, facing imminent death. It is one of Shakespeare's most frequently quoted passages.
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A Yorkshire Tragedy A Yorkshire Tragedy is an early Jacobean era stage play, a domestic tragedy printed in 1608. The play was originally assigned to William Shakespeare, though the modern critical consensus rejects this attribution, favouring Thomas Middleton.
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The Scottish Play The Scottish Play and The Bard's Play are euphemisms for William Shakespeare's "Macbeth". The first is a reference to the play's Scottish setting, the second a reference to Shakespeare's popular nickname. According to a theatrical superstition, called the "Scottish curse", speaking the name "Macbeth" inside a theatre will cause disaster. A variation of the superstition also forbids quoting it within a theatre except as part of an actual rehearsal or performance of the play.
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Fairy A fairy (also "fata", "fay", "fae", "fair folk"; from "faery", "faerie", "realm of the "fays"") is a type of mythical being or legendary creature in European folklore, a form of spirit, often described as metaphysical, supernatural, or preternatural.
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The Merchant of Venice The Merchant of Venice is a 16th-century play by William Shakespeare in which a merchant in Venice must default on a large loan provided by an abused Jewish moneylender. It is believed to have been written between 1596 and 1599. Though classified as a comedy in the First Folio and sharing certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps most remembered for its dramatic scenes, and it is best known for Shylock and the famous "Hath not a Jew eyes?" speech. Also notable is Portia's speech about "the quality of mercy". Critic Harold Bloom listed it among Shakespeare's great comedies.
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Vénus et Adonis Vénus et Adonis is an opera ("tragédie en musique") in a prologue and 5 acts composed by Henri Desmarets to a libretto by Jean-Baptiste Rousseau. Based on the story of Venus and Adonis in Book X of Ovid's "Metamorphoses", it was first performed by the Académie Royale de Musique at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal in Paris on 28 July 1697 with Marie Le Rochois and Louis Gaulard Dumesny in the title roles. Desmarets staged a major revival of the work with a new prologue at the court of Leopold, Duke of Lorraine in 1707. During the composer's lifetime, it was performed in Germany, Belgium, and France, but then fell into obscurity. Its first staging in modern times took place at the Opéra de Nancy on 28 April 2006.
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Macbeth Macbeth ( ; full title The Tragedy of Macbeth) is a tragedy by William Shakespeare; it is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those who seek power for its own sake. Of all the plays that Shakespeare wrote during the reign of James I, who was patron of Shakespeare's acting company, "Macbeth" most clearly reflects the playwright's relationship with his sovereign. It was first published in the Folio of 1623, possibly from a prompt book, and is Shakespeare's shortest tragedy.
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Troilus and Cressida Troilus and Cressida ( ) is a tragedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1602. It was described by Frederick S. Boas as one of Shakespeare's problem plays. The play ends on a very bleak note with the death of the noble Trojan Hector and destruction of the love between Troilus and Cressida. The work has in recent years "stimulated exceptionally lively critical debate". Throughout the play, the tone lurches wildly between bawdy comedy and tragic gloom, and readers and theatre-goers have frequently found it difficult to understand how one is meant to respond to the characters. However, several characteristic elements of the play (the most notable being its constant questioning of intrinsic values such as hierarchy, honour and love) have often been viewed as distinctly "modern," as in the following remarks on the play by author and literary scholar Joyce Carol Oates:
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King's Men (playing company) The King's Men was the acting company to which William Shakespeare (1564–1616) belonged for most of his career. Formerly known as The Lord Chamberlain's Men during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, they became The King's Men in 1603 when King James I ascended the throne and became the company's patron.