Titania (mythology)

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Titania is a character in William Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream. She is based on the queen of the fairies in medieval folklore. She is the wife of Oberon.

In traditional folklore, the fairy queen has no name. Shakespeare took the name 'Titania' from Ovid's Metamorphoses, where it is an appellation given to the daughters of Titans. ^{[#endnote_Holland]}

In the Shakespeare play, Titania is a very proud creature and as much of a force to contend with as her husband Oberon. The marital quarrel she and her husband are engaged in over which of them should have the keeping of a changeling page is the engine that drives the mix ups and confusion of the other characters in the play. Due to an enchantment cast by Oberon's henchman Puck, Titania magically falls in love with a rude mechanical that has been given the head of an ass.

Subsequently, Titania has appeared in many other paintings, poems, plays and even graphic novels; she has occasional cameo roles in Neil Gaiman's Sandman comic series, and is a major supporting character in The Books of Magic. In the mythology of those comic series, she is a mortal woman, who has lived and ruled in fairy land so long that no one remembers she once looked (and still is, under her magical seeming) human.

Modern References

In the middle-grade novel The Revenge of the Shadow King, by Derek Benz and J.S. Lewis, Titania appears as the all-powerful and benevolent Queen of the Land of Faerie.
In Disney's Gargoyles, Titania was a character voiced by Kate Mulgrew, who was the queen of the fairies, but exiled from Avalon at the will of her Lord and Husband, Oberon. It is possible that she manipulated Oberon into that action though, as she was shown to make several such clever feints and ploys during her appearances in the series.
In the Gamecube game "Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance," she appears as a member of the main character's party
In the Game Boy Advance game "Mega Man Zero 4", one of the Ragnarok Agents is called "Sol Titanian"

↑ Holland, Peter, ed. A Midsummer Night's Dream (OUP, 1994)

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