Consent and Animation in A Midsummer Night’s Dream: The Korean Madang as a New Green World

This chapter explores a Korean adaptation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream that takes on directly an issue that has troubled scholars and practitioners for generations: the patriarchal foundations of the play’s romantic arc. I argue that the Korean adaptation’s dramaturgical strategy tackles this issue by setting the play in a space that is associated with ritual and participatory play: a madang or yard. Drawing parallels to the medieval platea and amphitheater spaces of Shakespeare’s England, the chapter outlines the historical and contemporary importance of the madang in Korea: its history of serving as the venue for everything from marketplace activities and seasonal celebrations to shamanistic rituals, folk festivities, folk dramas, and, during the military dictatorship of the twentieth century, protest street theatre. From here, I highlight especially the element of gender reversal in the adaptation that has the Titania figure ruling the forest and relate the magic of the forest to shamanistic animation and the egalitarian celebration associated with the madang.