One important point of significance of The Mechanicals in
Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream is that they compound the
underlying irony that forms the foundation for the entire
play, irony and festive foolishness as is befitting of the Midsummer festival the play
is named after. Shakespeare introduces their significance soon after he introduces them
into the play.
They are about to undertake to perform
Pyramus and Thisby for Theseus the Duke of Athens and his betrothed
Hippolyta. Quince calls the play a "lamentable
comedy":
QUINCE
Marry, our play is, The most
lamentable comedy, and
most cruel death of Pyramus and
Thisby.
In truth, the story
from ancient Greek mythology tells a tragic tale of lost love that is very similar to
Romeo and Juliet: young lovers separated by their families elope,
have a failed rendezvous and take their own lives one after the other. This is a
tragedy, it is most certainly not a comedy, lamentable or
otherwise.
By bringing The Mechanicals into the play this
way in Act I, scene ii, Shakespeare establishes the ironical foolishness that is to come
as Helena chases Demetrius but gets caught by Lysander who is eloping with Hermia and as
Demitrius chases Hermia who has run away with Lysander, and Puck applies magical nectar
to the wrong eyes. Thus one significance of The Mechanicals is that they undergird the
irony and humorous structure of the play.
Excerpt from
Pyramus and Thisby:
While she hesitated she saw the form of one
struggling in the agonies of death. She started back, a shudder ran through her frame as
a ripple on the face of the still water when a sudden breeze sweeps over it. But as soon
as she recognized her lover, she screamed and beat her breast; embracing the lifeless
body, pouring tears into its wounds, and imprinting kisses on the cold lips. "Oh,
Pyramus," she cried, "what has done this? Answer me, Pyramus; it is your own Thisbe that
speaks. Hear me, dearest, and lift that
drooping head!" At the name of Thisbe,
Pyramus opened his eyes, then closed them again. She saw her veil stained with blood and
the scabbard empty of its sword. "Thy own hand has slain thee, and for my sake," she
said. "I too can be brave for once, and my love is as strong as thine. I will follow
thee in death, for I have been the cause; and death, which alone could part us, shall
not prevent my joining thee. And ye, unhappy parents of us both, deny us not our united
request. As love and death have joined us, let one tomb contain
us.
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