No wonder the wood to which the lovers escape is so associated with powerful women – from the fairy queen herself, Titania, to an apparent allusion to Queen Elizabeth as ‘a fair vestal’ (2.1.158) or ‘imperial vot’ress ... / In maiden meditation’ (2.1.163–4). But neither are women’s desires endorsed and corroborated, as they usually are in Shakespearean comedy, where women typically know what they want and how to get it (think of Rosalind, or Viola, or Helena in All’s Well That Ends Well).
