Peter Quince is a fictional character in William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. He is one of the six mechanicals who perform the play which Quince himself authored, "The Most Lamentable Comedy and Most Cruel Death of Pyramus and Thisbe" for the Duke Theseus and his wife Hippolyta at their wedding.
Oberon's Fairies also watch from the distance: Moth, Peaseblossom, Cobweb and Mustardseed.
Peter Quince meets Nick Bottom the weaver, Francis Flute the bellows-mender, Tom Snout the tinker, Starveling the tailor, and Snug the joiner in the woods to rehearse the play. In the rehearsals he is seen in a managerial role even though he struggles to assert himself over the more charismatic Nick Bottom. When Bottom reappears as himself after his temporary acquisition of an ass's head, Bottom promises to write a ballad about his "dream" of transformation.
His name is derived from "quines" or "quoins", which are wooden wedges used by carpenters.
Read more about Peter Quince: Playwriting, Characterisation, Cultural References
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