Titania and Bottom (Shakespeare, Midsummer Night's Dream, Act 3, Scene 1) 1825 - 1840

This engraving by Charles Heath the elder illustrates a scene from Shakespeare’s "Midsummer Night’s Dream," capturing Titania, the queen of the fairies, enchanted and in love with Bottom, who has been transformed with the head of a donkey. Here, the donkey head becomes a powerful symbol of the irrational, the animalistic side of human nature taking control. We see echoes of such transformations in Ovid, and Apuleius' "The Golden Ass", where men are turned into beasts, often as a punishment or a test. This motif, laden with psychological weight, speaks to the precarious balance between reason and primal instinct. Consider how the image of the donkey can be traced from ancient fables, often linked to the Dionysian cult of ecstatic abandon, to its resurgence in the Renaissance. The emotional tension—the irrational love of Titania—engages viewers on a deep, subconscious level. This cyclical progression of symbols, how they resurface, evolve, and take on new meanings in different historical contexts, reflects our collective memory.