Offbook
A Midsummer Night’s Dream

How many lines does Bottom have in A Midsummer Night’s Dream?

The size of the part, every scene it speaks in, its longest speeches, and how long it takes to learn.

The Offbook team

Oct 8, 2026

Bottom has about 255 lines in A Midsummer Night’s Dream: 2,031 words in 59 speeches, 12.7% of the play, and the largest part. The role speaks in 5 of the 9 scenes, and its longest wait is 2 scenes in a row without a line.

Counted with his Pyramus lines, Bottom is the largest role in the play. Much of it is comic prose with the other mechanicals, plus the verse of the play within the play, so cue pickup is the real work.

Lines
255
Words
2,031
Share of play
12.7%
Speech time
15 min

18% of the words are verse. 59 speeches means about 59 cues to learn.

Scene by scene

SceneWordsMinutes
Act 1, Scene 23682.6
Act 3, Scene 17055.0
Act 4, Scene 13962.8
Act 4, Scene 21571.1
Act 5, Scene 14052.9

The longest speeches

SpeechSceneWords
“When my cue comes, call me, and I will answer: my …”Act 4, Scene 1191
“Not a word of me. All that I will tell you is, tha…”Act 4, Scene 2118
“That will ask some tears in the true performing of…”Act 1, Scene 2109
“Nay, you must name his name, and half his face mus…”Act 3, Scene 1104
“O grim-look’d night! O night with hue so black!”Act 5, Scene 1103
“O, wherefore, Nature, didst thou lions frame?”Act 5, Scene 187
“Sweet Moon, I thank thee for thy sunny beams;”Act 5, Scene 183
“I see their knavery: this is to make an ass of me;…”Act 3, Scene 171

How many lines a day to learn

New lines a day to be off book in time, learning five days a week. Review what you already know on the other days.

Time until off bookNew lines a day
2 weeks26
3 weeks17
4 weeks13
6 weeks9

More from A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Questions actors ask

How many lines does Bottom have in A Midsummer Night’s Dream?

About 255 lines: 61 lines of verse and 1,666 words of prose. That is 2,031 words in 59 speeches, 12.7% of the play and the largest part.

How long is Bottom’s longest speech?

191 words, in Act 4, Scene 1, beginning “When my cue comes, call me, and I will answer: my next is, “Most fair Pyramus.” Heigh-ho! Peter Quince! Flute, the bellows-mender! Snout, the tinker! Starveling! God’s my life, stolen hence, and left me asleep! I have had a most rare vision. I have had a dream, past the wit of man to say what dream it was: man is but an ass, if he go about to expound this dream. Methought I was—there is no man can tell what. Methought I was—and methought I had—but man is but a patched fool, if he will offer to say what methought I had. The eye of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not seen, man’s hand is not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his heart to report, what my dream was. I will get Peter Quince to write a ballad of this dream: it shall be called Bottom’s Dream, because it hath no bottom; and I will sing it in the latter end of a play, before the duke: peradventure, to make it the more gracious, I shall sing it at her death.” At 140 words a minute it runs about 1.4 minutes.

How long does it take to learn Bottom?

To be off book in three weeks, learning five days a week, plan on about 17 new lines a day, plus time to review what you already know. Start with your longest speeches and the scenes with the most cues.

Keep reading