1.1
Theseus, Duke of Athens, will marry Hippolyta in four days. Their marriage might or might not be consensual on her part. “I woo'd thee with my sword,” Theseus explains ominously and ambiguously, “And won thy love doing thee injuries; but I will wed thee in another key” (16-8). It seems their relationship has had a problematic past, yet an optimistic future. This will tie in to the secondary plot of the four lovers.

Meanwhile, Egeus is furious with Hermia (his daughter), who refuses to marry Demetrius (the man Egeus wants her to marry), instead preferring Lysander. Egeus accuses Lysander of “bewitch[ing] the bosom of my child. … With cunning hast thou filch'd my daughter's heart, / Turn'd her obedeience (which is due to me) / To stubborn harshness.” (27, 36-8) He calls upon “the ancient privilege of Athens” that “she is mine, I may dispose of her; / Which shall be either to this gentleman, / Or to her death” (41-4). Egeus' motivation (why would he prefer his daughter's death over her marrying the man of her choice?) is not clear. “I would my father look'd but with my eyes” (56), Hermia complains, foreshadowing Oberon's elixir that will has power to do just that. But Theseus sides with Egeus. “Rather your eyes must with his judgment look”, he insists. “[P]repare to die / For disobedience to your father's will, / Or else to wed Demetrius” (57, 86-88)

After all but Lysander and Hermia exit, he tries to comfort her with one of the most famous lines of the play: “The course of true love never did run smooth” (134). But no amount of consoling can mitigate her pain. “Oh hell, to choose love by another's eyes” (140), she moans, again foreshadowing Oberon's magic potion.

Facing either their loss of love or her loss of life, Lysander proposes they runaway together. He talks of his wealthy widowed aunt, who lives about 25 miles away. “There, gentle Hermia, may I marry thee”, he plans. “And to that place the sharp Athenian law / Cannot pursue us.” (161-3) This quote helps us understand why Shakespeare set Midsummer in Athens – because Athens has a long and storied history of intellectual thought and process of law. Plato's The Laws (ca. 350 BC), for example, remains a classic read on political philosophy, more than two millennia after its writing. But it's precisely that history and process that impinges upon the young lovers, thus they flee Athens to get away from its impositions. They hatch a plan to “Steal forth thy father's house to-morrow night, / And in the wood … There will I stay for thee. (164-8) In this play (and many other Shakespeare plays, including As You Like It and The Merchant of Venice), the rural provides a much-needed emotional counterbalance to urban rationality.

As Hermia and Lysander finalize their escape plan, Helena (Hermia's childhood friend) enters. Helena is in love with Demetrius (who despises her), and begs Hermia to “teach me how you look, and with what art / You sway the motion of Demetrius' heart.” (192-3) Their rapid fire couplets reveal the arbitrary (to outsiders) ardor that afflicts many young lovers:
     Hermia: I frown upon him; yet he loves me still.
     Helena: O that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill.
     Hermia: I give him curses; yet he gives me love.
     Helena: O that my prayers could such affection move!
     Hermia: The more I hate, the more he follows me.
     Helena: The more I love, the more he hateth me.
     Hermia: His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine.
     Helena: None by your beauty; would that fault were mine! (194-201)

In a moment of feminine confidentiality, Hermia informs Helena of her plan to elope with Lysander. During a scene-concluding monologue, Helena hatches her own plan: She will tell Demetrius of Hermia's escape in an effort to attract Demetrius' amorous attention.

1.2
In a tertiary plot commonly called “the rude mechanicals” (as Shakespeare calls them in 3.3.9), Peter Quince leads his friends Snug, Bottom, Flute, Snout, and Starveling in a discussion as they brainstorm ideas “to play in our enterlude before the Duek and the Duchess, on his wedding-day” (5-7). In one of many “plays within the play” to be found in Shakespeare, they agree to perform The most lamentable comedy and most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisby for the occasion, and assign the roles: Bottom will play Pyramus, Flute will play Thisby, Starveling will play Thisby's mother, Snout will act Pyramus' father, Quince takes Thisby's father, and Snug will play a lion. They all agree to convene “in the palace wood, a mile without the town, by moonlight; there will we rehearse; for if we meet in the city, we shall be dogg'd with company” (101-4). Just as Hermia and Lysander wished to avoid the city, so, too, do these amateur actors. Their paths, of course, will soon cross.

2.1
The quaternary and final plot line introduces the fairies of the woods. The first to appear is Robin Goodfellow, nicknamed Puck. He speaks with an unnamed fairy colleague, explaining that fairy king Oberon and fairy queen Titania are fighting over possession of “A lovely boy stolen from an Indian king” (22).

King and queen soon enter, and continue their bickering on stage. “I do but beg a little changeling boy, / To be my henchman” (121-2), bellows Oberon. Titania explains the child is an orphan, and she has adopted him. “I will not part with him”, she replies, infuriating Oberon, “Not for thy fairy kingdom.” (137, 144)

It is never explained why Oberon wants such a boy to be his henchman. He has, after all, far more capable servants in his fairy underlings, including Puck. In any case, Oberon now seeks revenge on his wife for refusing his demands, and he commands Puck to fetch a magic flower, “The juice of it on sleeping eyelids laid / Will make or man or woman madly dote / Upon the next live creature that it sees.” (170-2) Oberon plans to paint Titania's eyes with the potion while she sleeps, causing her to fall hopelessly in love with whatever she sees upon waking, “Be it on lion, bear, or wolf, or bull, / On meddling monkey, or on busy ape” (180-1). While she's distracted, he can steal the child.

Suddenly, Demetrius enters, followed closely by Helena. She has followed her plan to tell him about Hermia and Lysander's flee from Athens, and, just as she predicted, Demetrius is now searching for his betrothed. But her plan to be alone with him as they wander through the forest backfires. “[G]et thee gone, and follow me no more”, he says in no uncertain terms. “I do not nor I cannot love you” (194, 201). In one of the most complicated and uncomfortable passages of the play, Helena reveals masochistic proclivities:
     And even for that do I love you the more:
     I am your spaniel; and, Demetrius,
     The more you beat me, I will fawn on you.
     Use me but as your spaniel; spurn me, strike me,
     Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave,
     Unworthy as I am, to follow you. …
     I'll follow thee and make a heaven of hell,
     To die upon the hand I love so well. (202-7, 243-4)
How are we to make sense of these words? One novel interpretation is found in Jillian Keenan's 2016 memoir Sex with Shakespeare. Keenan wonders if Helena is sexually kinky, while Demetrius is vanilla – and that's why they are incompatible. “What if this portion of Helena's dialogue isn't silly self-debasement?” Keenan writes in her opening chapter. “What if it is instead the most explicit and brave declaration of sexual consent in the Shakespearean canon?” (p. 19).

Oberon, overhearing their confidential conversation, decides to use some of his potion to help. “[A]noint his [Demetrius'] eyes,” he instructs Pucks, “But do it when the next thing he espies / May be the lady [Helena].” (261-3) What could possibly go wrong?

2.2
In another part of the forest, Titania's fairy servants sing her to sleep, and Oberon applies the potion to her eyelids, with the words “Wake when some vile thing is near.” (34)

Just then, Lysander and Hermia enter, exhausted, and prepare to sleep. After they drift off, Puck applies potion to Lysander's eyelids, mistaking him for Demetrius. Then Helena and Demetrius enter and find Lysander and Hermia still snoozing. Worried Lysander might be dead, Helena wakes him, whereupon the potion takes effect, and Lysander falls in love with Helena. “[N]ature shows art,” he serenades Helena, “That through thy bosom makes me see thy heart. … Not Hermia, but Helena I love. / Who would not change a raven for a dove?” (104-5, 113-4) Unaware of the magic at play, Helena is offended that Lysander would so betray Hermia. “[I]s't not enough, young man,” she scolds him, “That I did never, no, nor never can, / Deserve a sweet look from Demetrius' eye, / But you must flout my insufficiency?” (125-9)

3.1
Meanwhile, the rude mechanicals debate how to best present their performance. Puck stumbles upon them and decides to have some fun by turning Bottom's human head into that of an ass. Unaware of his new donkey noggin, he can't understand why his friends all run away from him in terror. Left alone, he sings to himself and wanders through the forest, where he stumbles upon the sleeping Titania, and rouses her. “What angel wakes me from my flow'ry bed?”, she asks, as the potion does its job.
     I pray thee, gentle mortal, sing again,
     Mine ear is much enamored of thy note;
     So is mine eye enthralled to thy shape;
     And thy fair virtue's force (perforce) doth move me
     On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee. (129, 137-41).
At first, Bottom is confused by this amorous attention. “Methinks, mistress, you should have little reason for that”, he admits. “And yet, to say the truth, reason and love keep little company” (142-4) And so, not one to refuse the romantic advances of a beautiful woman, he plays along.

3.2
Oberon wonders aloud what happened to Titania, and with what creature she has fallen in love. Puck arrives, telling him, “My mistress with a monster is in love. … Titania wak'd, and straightway lov'd an ass.” (6, 34) And when Oberon asks about Demetrius, Puck claims, “I took him sleeping (that is finish'd too)” (38), neither yet realizing Puck's error. But the truth comes out when Demetrius and Helena enter. “This is the woman”, Puck confirms, “but not this the man.” (42) Lysander and Helena arrive a moment later, and the four bicker back and forth at some length, while the two fairies, hidden from view, observe their banter. Oberon resolves to use the potion again to restore order. “When they next wake,” he says, “all this derision / Shall seem a dream”. (370-1).

4.1
At some point between acts 3 and 4, Oberon asks Titania for the changeling boy off stage, whom she readily gives up. On stage, Titania, still governed by the potion, continues doting on Bottom, whose head is still that of a donkey's. “Her dotage now I do begin to pity”, Oberon admits, as he watches from a distance. “Now I have the boy, I will undo / This hateful imperfection of her eyes.” (62-3) He also instructs Puck to restore Bottom's human head.

A moment later, Theseus, Hippolyta, and Egeus appear and spot the four young lovers still asleep on the ground. “[I]s not this the day”, Theseus addresses Egeus, “That Hermia should give answer of her choice?” (135-6) They wake them, and Theseus demands Hermia's decision, but Demetrius (who was just potioned) intervenes. “[M]y love to Hermia / Melted as the snow”, he concedes, potion taking effect. “The object and the pleasure of mine eye, / Is only Helena.” (165-6, 170-1) Pleasantly surprised at his sudden change of heart, Theseus invites both young couples to join his own wedding celebration: “[I]n the temple, by and by, with / These couples shall eternally be knit.” (180-1)

Everybody exits except the still-sleeping and now human-headed Bottom. He wakes, uncertain of how he got here, and wonders if the fantastical events he remembers were real or imagined. He assumes the latter, and that nobody could make sense of it. “Man is but an ass,” he concludes, “if he go about t' expound this dream.” (206-7) He gives it no more thought, and exits in search of his friends.

4.2
Meanwhile, in Quince's house, the other rude mechanicals worry about Bottom, since nobody has seen him since their rehearsal in 3.1. They will not be able to perform Pyramus and Thisby without him. When he shows up safe and sound, everybody is overjoyed, and they all agree to perform as originally planned.

5.1
In the aftermath of the three off-stage weddings, Theseus calls for entertainment. “What revels are in hand?”, he asks. “Is there no play / To ease the anguish of a torturing hour?” (36-7) Why Theseus considers his own wedding torturous is unclear. He selects the rude mechanicals' Pyramus and Thisby from a list of options, and the lengthy “play within the play” commences. “This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard” (210), Hippolyta comments as she watches – a phrase that could just as easily describe A Midsummer Night's Dream. Play complete, everybody engages in a celebratory dance.

After the human characters exit, the fairies enter one last time and launch into their own song and dance, and Puck offers a concluding soliloquy: “You have but slumber'd here / While these visions did appear. / And this weak and idle theme, / No more yielding but a dream” (5.1.425-9).

It's this scene – and this passage specifically – that precludes a completely comedic or thoroughly villainous interpretation of his character.

Fellow Jew Tubal (who, you'll recall, Shylock mentioned in 1.3) arrives with news of Jessica. “Your daughter spent in Genoa, as I hard, one night fourscore ducats,” he relates, as Shylock cringes. “One of them show'd me a ring that he had of your daughter for a monkey” (108-9, 118-9). It's unclear if the term “monkey” refers to a literal animal, for which she exchanged the ring, or if that is a metaphor – perhaps Elizabethan slang, the significance of which is lost on modern audiences. In any case, the only comforting news Tubal bears to Shylock is confirming that Antonio's ships have indeed sunk, and thus “Antonio is certainly undone.” (124)

3.2
Having witnessed the Prince of Morocco choose the gold casket in 2.7, and the Prince of Arragon select silver in 2.9, we the audience know the correct casket must be the lead one. But Bassanio doesn't know that, as he prepares to make his decision.

As he deliberates, Portia orders, “Let music sound while he doth make his choice” (43). Curiously, the song sung while Bassanio deliberates opens with three lines, all of which rhyme with the correct answer:
     Tell me where the fancy bred,
     Or in the heart of in the head?
     How begot, how nourished? (63-6)
Portia made no such command for either of the previous suitors, and she clearly wishes to marry Bassanio, so might this be her way of tilting the odds in her favor? Whether or not Bassanio heeds her hint, he correctly selects the lead casket, and thus wins Portia's hand in marriage. Ecstatic, Portia gives Bassanio a ring, “Which when you part from, lose, or give away, / Let it presage the ruin of your love” (172-3).

Gratiano, meanwhile, has developed a parallel affection for Nerissa. “My eyes, my lord, can look as swift as yours”, he asserts. “You saw the mistress, I beheld the maid.” (197-8) Nerissa happily reciprocates his ardor, and at some point gives him a ring, too (it comes up in 4.2), though apparently off stage.

But their celebration is cut short when a telegram arrives notifying Bassanio that Antonio has failed to pay back their loan. “Here are a few of the unpleasant'st words / That ever blotted paper!” (251-2), he bemoans to Portia. When she realizes the amount is only three thousand ducats, she's shocked that it's so low. “What, no more?”, she asks. “Pay him six thousand, and deface the bond. … First go with me to church and call me wife, / And then away to Venice to your friend” (298-9, 303-4).

3.3
Meanwhile, back in Venice, Antonio attempts to reason with Shylock to avoid the harsh penalty for failing to pay back the loan. But Shylock will have none of it. “I'll have my bond”, he insists, “I will not hear thee speak.” (12) And Antonio realizes that Shylock's friendly face from 1.3 was just a facade.

3.4
Portia gets the zany and legally dicey idea to impersonate the judge adjudicating between Shylock and Antonio, thereby saving Antonio's life. She sets her plan in motion by lying to Lorenzo:
     I have toward heaven breath'd a secret vow
     To live in prayer and contemplation,
     Only attended by Nerissa here,
     Until her husband and my lord's return.
     There is a monast'ry two miles off,
     And there we will abide. (27-32)
She also instructs her servant Balthazar to deliver a letter she has written to one Doctor Bellario in Padua.

3.5
​In perhaps the most unnecessary scene of the play, Launcelot warns Jessica that she might have trouble getting into heaven because “the sins of the father are to be laid upon the children” (1-2), despite her conversion to Christianity. Lorenzo arrives and tells Launcelot to back off, rebuking him for impregnating a black woman out of wedlock. After Launcelot exits, Jessica speaks of her deep admiration for Portia, though they have only met once (in the previous scene).

4.1
In a Venetian courtroom, the Duke encourages Shylock to “show thy mercy” (20), yet he refuses. When Bassanio also encourages mercy, Shylock answers, “I am not bound to please thee with my answers.” (65) And when Bassanio offers six thousand ducats – double the original amount – Shylock still declines. “How shalt thou hope for mercy, rend'ring none?” (88), asks the Duke, foreshadowing that the tables will soon turn on Shylock. But again he refuses. “What judgment shall I dread,” Shylock responds, “doing no wrong? … If you deny me, fie upon your law!” (89, 101)

Meanwhile, Nerissa, disguised as a lawyer's clerk, brings a letter from Doctor Bellario “commend[ing] / A young and learned doctor to our court. … His name is Balthazar.” (143-4, 154). But Balthazar (not to be confused with Portia's servant of the same name) is actually Portia impersonating a legitimate lawyer. She, too, first attempts to talk Shylock into mercy, then into accepting several times the loan amount. But Shylock refuses every offer. “There is no power in the tongue of man / To alter me” (241-2), he maintains.

Quickly realizing that any such attempts to talk sense into Shylock will fail, Portia changes tactics, instead adopting a paralyzing hyper-literal interpretation of the contract: Since the bond makes no mention of blood, she says, should Antonio bleed “one drop” during the flesh-ectomy, “thy lands and goods / Are by the laws of Venice confiscate” (310-1) on the grounds that Shylock has failed to follow the contract. Furthermore, she continues, since the contract explicitly states “a pound of flesh”, should Shylock should remove any more or less than exactly one pound, “Thou diest, and all thy goods are confiscate.” (332)

Realizing his sticky situation, Shylock reluctantly agrees to accept the reimbursement of the original three thousand ducats. But Portia shoots him down again. “He shall have merely justice and his bond.” (339), she declares.

Shylock, defeated and dejected, prepares to leave. But Portia intervenes yet again.
     If it be proved against an alien,
     That by direct or indirect attempts
     He seek the life of any citizen,
     The party 'gainst the which he doth contrive
     Shall seize one half his goods; the other half
     Comes to the privy coffer of the state.
     And the offender's life lies in the mercy
     Of the Duke only. ...
     Thou hast contrived against the very life
     Of the defendant. …
     Down therefore, and beg mercy of the Duke. (347-63)
In an ironic twist, Portia forces Shylock to do precisely what she begged of him only moments earlier.

Shylock is stunned at the sudden and severe change of events. “You take my house when you do take the prop / That doth sustain my house”, he complains. “[Y]ou take my life / When you do take the means whereby I live.” (375-8) But the back-breaking blow comes a moment later, when Antonio adds “He [must] presently become a Christian” (387). Having lost his daughter, his valuables, and his loan, he now looses his religion, too. He loses everything dear to him. In short, he loses his integrity and reasons for living.

It appears that Shakespeare intended this scene (indeed, the whole play) to be funny. After all, it was listed as a comedy when published in the First Folio in 1623. Moreover, Judaism was illegal in England at the time this play was written (ca. 1596-97), and had been since King Edward I's Edict of Expulsion in 1290 – one reason why the play is not set in England. There are reports of Jews living (or at least practicing) secretly in England at this time, but it seems unlikely that Shakespeare ever met any Jewish people, much less sympathized with their struggles, though no concrete evidence exists to either confirm or deny that.

Courtroom drama over, Antonio and Bassanio meet with Balthazar (whom they still don't realize is actually Portia) to thank him (her), and offer gifts in thanks (nevermind the obvious conflict of interest). At first he (she) refuses any gifts, saying, “He is well paid that is well satisfied” (415). But after reconsidering, he (she) requests Antonio's gloves, and Bassanio's wedding ring. At first, Bassanio refuses to part with the ring, and Balthazar (Portia) exits. But Antonio coerces him into changing his mind. “Let his [Balthazar's] deservings and my love withal”, he coaxes, “Be valued 'gainst your wive's commandement.” (450-1) And so Bassanio gives the ring to Gatiano, with instructions to deliver it to Balthazar (Portia).

4.2
Gratiano catches up with Balthazar (Portia) and hands over the ring. Seeing Portia's manipulative power, Nerissa wonders if she can pull off the same stunt. “I'll see if I can get my husband's ring,” she confides to Portia, “Which I did make him swear to keep for ever.” (12-13) We find out in the next and final scene that she was indeed successful, albeit off stage (as was her giving of the ring in the first place).

5.1
Back in Belmont once last time, Lorenzo and Jessica sit together in the moonlight, comparing their love to famous couples throughout history. (Oddly, all the lovers mentioned end in tragedy!) Lorenzo calls for music, and declares, “The man that hath no music in himself / Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, / Is fit for treasons[.] … Let no such man be trusted” (83-5, 88). This is a clear reference to Shylock's diatribe against music in 2.5.29-36.

Portia and Nerissa (no longer in disguise) enter and comment favorably on the music. When Bassanio, Gratiano, and Antonio arrive a moment later, Nerissa pranks her husband by asking what happened to the ring she gave him. “I gave it to a youth,” Gratiano stammers, still not realizing the joke. “No higher than thyself, the judge's clerk, / A prating boy, that begg'd it as a fee. / I could not for my heart deny it him.” (161-5) Portia joins the ironic marital fun by saying that her man would never part with his ring. To which Bassanio sheepishly confesses, also not realizing the joke. Portia and Nerissa give “new” rings to Bassanio and Gratiano, who are shocked to find they are the same rings in question. In one final joke, the two women claim that they obtained back the rings by having sex with the doctor and his clerk, rendering both men cuckolds. But enough is enough, and they finally reveal the truth: That Portia was the doctor, and Nerissa the clerk. Finally recognizing the gag, Gratiano takes the play's final lines: “[W]hile I live I'll fear no other thing”, meaning another man, “as keeping safe Nerissa's ring.” (306-7)