UW Theatre & Performance
SHAKESPEARE'S (GREEN) WORLD
BY BELLA ORTIZ
Climate contexts: Shakespeare’s Green World and the Little Ice Age in A Midsummer Night's Dream
THE LITTLE ICE AGE
The modern world is experiencing climate change in the form of severe storms, catastrophic droughts, uncontrollable wildfires, and flash floods. We might think that this phenomenon is unique to our time; however, similar events were recorded between 1300 and 1850, and this phenomenon is known as the Little Ice Age. During this period, global temperatures dropped significantly. There is no definitive or exact cause for these temperature shifts. Scientists and analysts have offered various interpretations and explanations for what occurred during the Little Ice Age, but there is no conclusive understanding of this meteorological event. Suffice it to say, the weather was bizarre and was a major topic during Shakespeare’s lifetime. (Prasher, 2024) The winter was so severe and extended that the River Thames in central London was entirely covered in thick ice; even so, there were occasional 'frost fairs' - "carnival[s] on the water."
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It was in this period of devastating and harsh weather that Shakespeare wrote A Midsummer Night’s Dream. This period was devastating for everyone, and these effects were not ignored by Shakespeare. For example, Titania’s monologue in Act II, Scene 1, describes the effects of her quarrel with Oberon on the natural world, and in this text, she addresses the changes in the weather and how these affect animals, humans, and the land itself.
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These are the forgeries of jealousy;
And never, since the middle summer’s spring,
Met we on hill, in dale, forest, or mead,
By pavèd fountain or by rushy brook,
Or in the beachèd margent of the sea,
To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,
But with thy brawls thou hast disturbed our sport.
Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
As in revenge have sucked up from the sea
Contagious fogs, which, falling in the land,
Hath every pelting river made so proud
That they have overborne their continents.
The ox hath therefore stretched his yoke in vain,
The plowman lost his sweat, and the green corn
Hath rotted ere his youth attained a beard.
The fold stands empty in the drownèd field,
And crows are fatted with the murrain flock.
The nine-men’s-morris is filled up with mud,
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green,
For lack of tread, are undistinguishable.
The human mortals want their winter here.
No night is now with hymn or carol blessed.
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound.
And thorough this distemperature we see
The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems’ thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set. The spring, the summer,
The childing autumn, angry winter, change
Their wonted liveries, and the mazèd world
By their increase now knows not which is which.
And this same progeny of evils comes
From our debate, from our dissension;
We are their parents and original. (2.1.84-120)
While this monologue reminds us of the terrible weather that caused the Little Ice Age, with failed harvests and a lack of food in the mid-1590s, it also prompts present audiences to consider the effects of climate change on weather and the living beings of the Earth. An important aspect of the monologue is when Titania concludes by affirming that the source of the changes to the natural world stems from the quarrel between her and Oberon; Shakespeare, writing in a time when understanding of climate patterns was minimal, chose to attribute these mysterious and awesome changes to supernatural forces out of his (or anyone's) control.
THE GREEN WORLD
The Green World is a literary concept defined by Northrop Frye, a Canadian literary critic and literary theorist, in his 1957 book Anatomy of Criticism. Frye explains the term by utilizing Shakespeare’s romantic comedies, such as A Midsummer Night's Dream. He describes the Green World as “the archetypal function of literature in visualizing the world of desire, not as an escape from 'reality' but as the genuine form of the world that human life tries to imitate.” (Frye 184)
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Frye argues that the plots in comedy, like Shakespeare's romantic comedies, are built upon the "medieval tradition of the seasonal ritual-play", the plots of which follow the "ritual theme of the triumph of life and love over the waste land." (Frye 182) Thus, the concept of the Green World is intended to compare the refined world of humanity with the usually rough, bitter natural world; creating a narrative structure whereby "the action of the comedy begins in a world represented as a normal world, moves into the green world, goes into a metamorphosis there in which the comic resolution is achieved, and returns to the normal world." (Frye 182)
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This narrative structure fits A Midsummer Night's Dream almost perfectly. The play's forest, where much of the plot unfolds, is the Green World. Here, social order is inverted and limits are dismissed; it is a setting distinguished by nonsense, where chaos and confusion prevail. The forest is a realm of dreams, straight from our wildest imaginations and deepest desires; this Green World of dreams serves to provide a contrasting way of being to the “stumbling and blinded follies of the world of experience [such as] Theseus' Athens with its idiotic marriage law” (Frye 183-4).
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The Green World in A Midsummer Night's Dream thus offers contemporary audiences an understanding and awareness of the strength of nature, imagination, and dreams. It connects the power of creativity and dreams to resolve conflicts not only on a personal level but also in an ecological and contemporary approach to address current environmental and social issues. The forest serves as a realm where chaos and imagination can guide civilization toward harmony between humans and the natural world.
Images
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Header: Paton, Joseph Noel. The Quarrel of Oberon and Titania, 1849. Public Domain. https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=20330886
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Little Ice Age (1): Wyke, Thomas. Thames Frost Fair, 1683-84. Public Domain. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Thomas_Wyke-_Thames_frost_fair.JPG
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Little Ice Age (2): Bruegel the Elder, Pieter. The Gloomy Day, 1565. Public Domain. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Gloomy_Day_(Bruegel).jpg
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Green World: Landseer, Edwin. Scene from A Midsummer Night's Dream. Titania and Bottom, 1851. Public Domain. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Edwin_Landseer_-_Scene_from_A_Midsummer_Night%27s_Dream._Titania_and_Bottom_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg
Works Cited
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Frye, Northrop. Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays. Princeton University Press, 2000.
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Prasher, H. W. Weather history: Frost Fairs in the Little Ice Age. BBC Weather, 18 January 2024. https://www.bbc.com/weather/features/67964531