Brush up your Shakespeare

[thermalsatsuma]

Henry IV, pt. 1, Act 5,scene i

Falstaff: Hal, if thou see me down in the battle and bestride me, so!
'Tis a point of friendship.
Prince: Nothing but a colossus can do thee that friendship. Say thy
prayers, and farewell.
Falstaff: I would 'twere bedtime, Hal, and all well.
Prince: Why, thou owest God a death. [Prince exits]
Falstaff: 'Tis not due yet: I would be loath to pay him before his day.
What need I be so forward with him that calls not on me? Well, 'tis
no matter; honour pricks me on. Yea, but how if honour prick me off
when I come on? How then? Can honour set to a leg? No. Or an arm?
No. Or take away the grief of a wound? No. Honour hath no skill in
surgery then? No. What is honour? A word. What is in that word
honour? What is that honour? Air - a trim reckoning! Who hath it? He
that died a Wednesday. Doth he feel it? No. Doth he hear it? No. 'Tis
insensible then? Yea, to the dead. But will it not live with the living?
No. Why? Detraction will not suffer it. Therefore I'll none of it. Honour
is a mere scutcheon - and so ends my catechism


Anybody else want to quote their favourite bit of Shakespeare? I particularly like this speech from the arch rogue Jack Falstaff for its brash honesty and pragmatism. He struggles with his loyalty to his friend Prince Hal compared to the horror of the battle to come. To quote from Wilfred Owen, Falstaff is certainly not desperate for some ardent glory and knows that is most certainly not sweet and fitting to die a brutal death for a point of principle.

From nadiajane

Comments

[amberb-uk.livejournal.com]

Though it is sometimes dismissed as cliched and a sign of the dull regularity of the life led by Laertes compared to Hamlet, I do rather like the quote below. It is from Hamlet act 1, scene iii and is part of Polonius' fatherly advice to Laertes about being honest with himself so he can be honest with the world around him.

If you look at this passage while bearing in mind the tenets expressed by Castiglione in Il Cortegiano about the role of a nobleman in society, I don't think it is cliched.

(Polonius to Laertes)
This above all: to thine own self be true
And it must follow, as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any man

[thermalsatsuma.livejournal.com]

I think that Shakespeare wrote most of the cliches in the first place. If they are cliches, it is because they still resonate with truth.

[amberb-uk.livejournal.com]

Indeedy :-)))

[hooloovoo_42]

Henry V Act 1 (Scene 2 or 3, I think)

Tennis balls, my liege.

[thermalsatsuma.livejournal.com]

Oh yes - our Will was a fine one for the veiled insult ... :-)

To be or not to be ...?

[conphie.livejournal.com]

It has to be this one for me, simply because I remember learning it by heart for A Level English Literature and being so gutted that there wasn't a question in the paper referring to it, that I wrote it out anyway ;o) LOL

To be or not to be, that is the question;
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing, end them. To die, to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to — 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
To sleep, perchance to dream. Ay, there's the rub,
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause.

Re: To be or not to be ...?

[thermalsatsuma.livejournal.com]

A fantastic soliloquy - every line has entered the English language in one form or another, and such a pivotal moment in the play as well.

Re: To be or not to be ...?

[conphie.livejournal.com]

I thoroughly enjoyed studying this play! (only others I studied were Macbeth and Twelfth Night!)

I have been known to use the phrase "shuffle off this mortal coil" once or twice too ;o) And I loved the movie "What Dreams May Come"

Another favourite is the oft mis-quoted

Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow
of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath
borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how
abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rims at
it. Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know
not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your
gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment,
that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one
now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen?

[conphie.livejournal.com]

And oh my word - what a blast from the past, to be reminded of the works of Wilfred Owen ... Anthem for Doomed Youth and Dulce Et Decorum Est come flooding back to me now!!!

[swanofkennet.livejournal.com]

Lots I could choose, but how could I resist As You Like It III.ii?

[Enter ROSALIND, with a paper, reading]
ROSALIND
From the east to western Ind,
No jewel is like Rosalind,
Her worth, being mounted on the wind,
Through all the world bears Rosalind.
All the pictures fairest lin'd
Are but black to Rosalind.
Let no fair be kept in mind
But the fair of Rosalind.

TOUCHSTONE
I'll rhyme you so eight years together, dinners and suppers and sleeping-hours excepted: it is the right butter-women's rank to market.

ROSALIND
Out, fool!

TOUCHSTONE
For a taste:
If a hart do lack a hind,
Let him seek out Rosalind.
If the cat will after kind,
So be sure will Rosalind.
Winter garments must be lin'd,
So must slender Rosalind.
They that reap must sheaf and bind;
Then to cart with Rosalind.
Sweetest nut hath sourest rind,
Such a nut is Rosalind.
He that sweetest rose will find
Must find love's prick and Rosalind.

This is the very false gallop of verses: why do you infect yourself with them?

ROSALIND
Peace, you dull fool! I found them on a tree.

TOUCHSTONE
Truly, the tree yields bad fruit.

ROSALIND
I'll graff it with you, and then I shall graff it with a medlar: then it will be the earliest fruit i' the country; for you'll be rotten ere you be half ripe, and that's the right virtue of the medlar.

TOUCHSTONE
You have said; but whether wisely or no, let the forest judge.

[thermalsatsuma.livejournal.com]

I can just imagine you in that role!

[shullie.livejournal.com]

I studied The merchant of Venice for 'O'level aand always found this amusing... and well before Monthy Python ;) init!

Scene V

LORENZO

How every fool can play upon the word! I think the
best grace of wit will shortly turn into silence,
and discourse grow commendable in none only but
parrots. Go in, sirrah; bid them prepare for dinner.