A Midsummer Night's Dream is one of Shakespeare's most widely studied comedies. This guide offers students an introduction to its critical and performance history, including notable stage productions, TV, and film versions as well as opera and ballet. It includes a keynote chapter outlining major areas of current research on the play and four new critical essays. Finally, a guide to critical, web-based and production-related resources and an annotated bibliography provide a basis for further individual research. Table of ContentsSeries IntroductionTimelineIntroduction, Regina Buccola (Roosevelt University, USA) 1. The Critical Backstory, Dorothea Kehler (San Diego State University, USA) 2. Performance History, Jeremy Lopez (University of Toronto, CA)3. The State of the Art - Current Critical Research, Tripthi Pillai (Loyola University, USA)4. New Directions: Soundings in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Tom Clayton (University of Minnesota, USA)5. New Directions: The Weaver's Dream - Mnemonic scripts and Memorial texts, Paul Menzer (Mary Baldwin College, USA)6. New Directions: Spirits of Another Sort: Constructing Shakespeare's Fairies in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Matthew Woodcock (UEA, UK) 7. New Directions: Shakespeare and the Fairy King: Re-viewing the Cultural and Political Contexts of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Annaliese Connolly (Sheffield Hallam University, UK)Resources, Adrienne L. Eastwood (San Jose State University, USA)Notes on ContributorsIndex