Peter Quince Quotes

QUINCE: Is all our company here?
BOTTOM: You were best to call them generally, man by man, according to the scrip.
QUINCE: Here is the scroll of every man’s name which is thought fit, through all Athens, to play in our interlude before the Duke and the Duchess on his wedding-day at night.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 1, Scene 2. Carpenter Peter Quince is writer and director of the play that the six Mechanicals (craftsmen) of Athens will perform for Duke Theseus’ wedding. He has called them to a meeting in his house to discuss the play-within-a-play. If Quince is the bumbling ringmaster in their delightfully silly circus of a production, then weaver Nick Bottom is the star attraction. In his first sentence in the play we are introduced to the first of his many malapropisms and language slip-ups. He says "scrip" instead of "script" and when he suggests calling the players "generally" he means "individually."

QUINCE: Marry, our play is, the most lamentable comedy, and most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisbe.
BOTTOM: A very good piece of work, I assure you, and a merry. Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your actors by the scroll. Masters, spread yourselves.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 1, Scene 2. Nick Bottom calls the Mechanicals’ play a very good piece of work and a happy one for a wedding night. The self-important and ridiculous weaver is full of it and doesn’t know what he is talking about much of the time. Far from being "merry," the play is a tragedy about the death of two lovers. Bottom has a tendency to take over and act like he is the expert, note how he cannot help but give directions to the director, who will have his hands full trying to keep Bottom in line. The play’s director Peter Quince for his part is guilty of butchering the language, calling the play a "lamentable comedy." He presumably meant to say it was a lamentable tragedy. But he turns out to be ironically right without knowing it. For the version of the Pyramus and Thisbe story we get to see turns out to be lamentably bad, poorly acted and hilariously comic. It is also ironic that the craftsmen choose a play about a pair of ill-fated lovers for such a happy occasion as a wedding.

BOTTOM: What is Pyramus – a lover or a tyrant?
QUINCE: A lover that kills himself most gallant for love.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 1, Scene 2. As Quince assigns the role of Pyramus to Bottom, he explains that Pyramus is a lover who kills himself for love. It is ironic that a lover should take his life for love. Pyramus actually kills himself out of grief for his "dead" love Thisbe. But the irony is that Thisbe is not actually dead, and when she finds Pyramus dead she kills herself. There is also irony in the Mechanicals’ choice of such a tragic play for Duke Theseus’ marriage.

QUINCE: Flute, you must take Thisbe on you.
FLUTE: What is Thisbe? – a wand’ring knight?
QUINCE: It is the lady that Pyramus must love.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 1, Scene 2. In the play that the Athenian craftsmen are to perform in celebration of Duke Theseus’ wedding, director Quince gives the part of Thisbe to bellows-maker Francis Flute. Flute is happy to play such a manly role when he thinks Thisbe is a wandering knight. But he is disappointed and unhappy when he discovers that Thisebe is instead a woman in love.

I have a device to make all well. Write me a prologue and let the prologue seem to say we will do no harm with our swords, and that Pyramus is not killed indeed. And for the more better assurance, tell them that I, Pyramus, am not Pyramus, but Bottom the weaver. This will put them out of fear.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 3, Scene 1. Nick Bottom comes up with the solution to the ladies being frightened by the killing in the play. It is for Quince to write a prologue to explain that nobody is actually killed on stage. Bottom is clearly very over-confident in the acting abilities of the amateur troupe. Quince stamps his authority at their rehearsal in the woods and agrees to Bottom’s suggestion: "Well, we will have such a prologue, and it shall be written in eight and six" – meaning alternating lines of eight and six syllables.

QUINCE: Well, it shall be so. But there is two hard things: that is, to bring the moonlight into a chamber, for you know Pyramus and Thisbe meet by moonlight.
SNOUT: Doth the moon shine that night we play our play?
BOTTOM: A calendar, a calendar! Look in the almanac. Find out moonshine, find out moonshine.
QUINCE: Yes, it doth shine that night.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 3, Scene 1. Shakespeare’s theater of the absurd continues, as Quince says that moonlight is required because Pyramus and Thisbe meet by moonlight. Snout worries about how to provide moonlight indoors and wonders if the moon shines on the night of their play. The players consult the almanac to discover that there is indeed moonshine that night.

QUINCE: We must have a wall in the great chamber, for Pyramus and Thisbe, says the story, did talk through the chink of a wall.
SNOUT: You can never bring in a wall. What say you, Bottom?
BOTTOM: Some man or other must present Wall, and let him have some plaster, or some loam, or some roughcast about him to signify wall.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 3, Scene 1. Director Quince insists that the play must have a wall, as Pyramus and Thisbe spoke to each other through a hole in a wall. The players have a ludicrous discussion on whether a wall can be brought onto the stage with Bottom suggesting that one of them must play the part of Wall. Snout is selected for the important role.

BOTTOM (as Pyramus): If I were fair, Thisbe, I were only thine.
QUINCE: O monstrous! O strange! We are haunted! Pray, masters, fly, masters! Help!

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 3, Scene 1. There is irony as Pyramus (played by Bottom) tells Thisbe (Flute) that if he were handsome, he would still be entirely hers. Bottom doesn’t realize that he now wears the head of an ass, making his line extra-comical. At the sight of Bottom’s transformation, a terrified Quince lets out a yell and runs off with Flute, Snout, Snug and Starveling. The prankster Puck has played a trick on Bottom by planting an ass’s head on him because of his ass-like behavior.

QUINCE: Bless thee, Bottom! bless thee! thou art translated.
BOTTOM: I see their knavery. This is to make an ass of me, to fright me, if they could.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 3, Scene 1. Quince cries out in horror as he sees Bottom transformed into an ass-headed figure. Bottom thinks that the others are trying to make him look foolish as they run off saying that he is "changed" and "translated." He doesn’t know that his head has changed into an ass. But the audience does, making this a good example of dramatic irony.

If we offend, it is with our good will.
That you should think, we come not to offend,
But with goodwill. To show our simple skill,
That is the true beginning of our end.
Consider then, we come but in despite.
We do not come, as minding to content you,
Our true intent is. All for your delight
We are not here. That you should here repent you,
The actors are at hand, and, by their show,
You shall know all that you are like to know.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 5, Scene 1. Quince recites his totally ludicrous Prologue to Pyramus and Thisbe. It is full of incorrect punctuation, misuse of the English language, and sentence fragments that say the opposite of what he means. While he wishes to tell the palace audience that the players don’t wish to offend, he ends up saying the very opposite.

THESEUS: This fellow does not stand upon points.
LYSANDER: He hath rid his prologue like a rough colt. He knows not the stop. A good moral, my lord: it is not enough to speak, but to speak true.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 5, Scene 1. Theseus and Lysander comment on Quince’s dreadful Prologue speech. Theseus says that he doesn’t adhere to proper punctuation. Lysander uses a simile to compare Quince’s performance to riding a wild colt, he didn’t know how to stop. It’s not enough to speak, but you need to speak correctly, Lysander says.

This man, with lanthorn, dog, and bush of thorn,
Presenteth "Moonshine;" for, if you will know,
By moonshine did these lovers think no scorn
To meet at Ninus’ tomb, there, there to woo.

– William Shakespeare

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act 5, Scene 1. Quince, as Prologue, introduces Robin Starveling, the tailor playing the role of Moonshine in the play about Pyramus and Thisbe. He comes complete with dog, thorn bush and lantern – meant to represent the moon. Quince explains to the audience that the lovers met by moonlight at Ninus’ tomb to woo each other.
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