Your FAVORITE quote from Shakespeare!

[dramasnot6]

What is your all time favorite quote(or quotes, if you're like me and could almost never decide on just one) from any work by William Shakespeare?

[mila_24]

That's difficult.
I wiould say my favourite quote is:

"What need one." From King Lear.

[Lioness_Heart]

Too hard!!!!!!! Um..... probably
"Are you like the painting of a sorrow, A face without a heart?" (Hamlet)

Not really sure why I like that one so much, but it just has some kind of satisfactory finality at the end of it.

[dramasnot6]

I like that,Lioness!

[asilef73]

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

-Macbeth Act 5, scene 5

[Walter]

"There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt in your philosophy."

Hamlet, of course. Act 1, Scene 5.

[naomi moon]

"Stars, hide your fires;
Let not light see my black and deep desires:
The eye wink at the hand; yet let that be,
Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see."
From Macbeth act 1, scene 4.

[AdoreroDio]

"O that he were here to write me down an ***!
But masters, remember that I am an ***."

Act IV Scene ii

[LadyW]

"There 's daggers in men's smiles".
Macbeth
(Act II, Scene III).

[Lioness_Heart]

Oooh I thought of another one from Hamlet:

"Too much of water hast thou, poor Ophelia, And therefore I forbid my tears"

I tend to look on that one in a more cynical way: that Laertes is merely using the death of his sister to further his own ends; he cannot even bring himself to cry for her.

The hypocrisy of the brother who claims to care about you, but couldn't actually care less, is resonating quite strongly with me at the moment :mad:

[SnipSnap]

Tough one. I think it's a tie between:

"We are oft to blame in this, 'tis too much prov'd,
That with devotion's visage and pious
Action, we do sugar o'er the devil himself."

-Hamlet. Act 3, Scene 1. Polonius.

And ...

"But then I sigh, and with a piece of scripture,
Tell them God bids us do good for evil.
And thus I clothe my naked villainy
With odd old ends stol'n from holy writ
And seem a saint when most I play the dev'l."

-Richard III. Act 1, Scene 3. Gloucester/Richard III.

[dramasnot6]

"But then I sigh, and with a piece of scripture,
Tell them God bids us do good for evil.
And thus I clothe my naked villainy
With odd old ends stol'n from holy writ
And seem a saint when most I play the dev'l."

-Richard III. Act 1, Scene 3. Gloucester/Richard III.

That one is extremely interesting...

[Tournesol]

"How far that little candle throws its beams,
So shines a good deed in a naughty world..."

Portia, in 'The Merchant of Venice'

[Venusjd]

"Frailty Thy name is Woman"

[isaac_wang_chn]

"Frailty Thy name is Woman"

It is said that Queen Elizabeth watched the play. But I wonder was she angry when she heard "frailty thy name is woman"?

Frankly speaking, if i were a woman, I would jump to the stage and argue with the actor...:flare:

[JBI]

Cry havoc! Let slip the dogs of war. - Julius Caesar.

[Charles Darnay]

favourite quote for comical reasons:

"What, you egg!" - Macbeth IV.ii

Favourite quote for poetical reasons:

Now, my co-mates and brothers in exile,
Hath not old custom made this life more sweet
Than that of painted pomp? Are not these woods
More free from peril than the envious court?
Here feel we but the penalty of Adam,
The seasons' difference, as the icy fang
And churlish chiding of the winter's wind,
Which, when it bites and blows upon my body,
Even till I shrink with cold, I smile and say
'This is no flattery: these are counsellors
That feelingly persuade me what I am.'
Sweet are the uses of adversity,
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head;
And this our life exempt from public haunt
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones and good in every thing.
I would not change it.
-As You Like It - II.i

[Trystan]

"I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands,
organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with the same
food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases,
heal'd by the same means, warm'd and cool'd by the same winter
and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If
you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?
And if you wrong us, do we not revenge? If we are like you in the
rest, we will resemble you in that." - Shylock, Merchant of Venice

I loved how Al Pacino performed this in the 2004 movie, he was awesome.

[chasestalling]

Thou whoreson zed! Thou unnecessary letter!

[SnipSnap]

Two short ones from Macbeth I always enjoy:

Oh, how full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife.

and:

It will have blood, they say. Blood will have blood.

Both spoken by Macbeth. Both ominous.

[superhero99]

"As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport."
-King Lear

[dramasnot6]

"What, you egg!" - Macbeth IV.ii

:lol: Classic.

[djy78usa]

... These wounds I had on Crispin's Day...

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day

Henry V, Act IV, Scene 3

[Lioness_Heart]

What is Saint Crispin's day? As in, who is st Crispin and why is his day significant?

Sorry if I'm being woefully ignorant :blush:

[shakespeare87]

My favourite quote is:

A little more than kin, and less than kind.

Hamlet, Hamlet, Act 1, Scene 2.

[djy78usa]

What is Saint Crispin's day? As in, who is st Crispin and why is his day significant?

Sorry if I'm being woefully ignorant :blush:

Saint Crispin's day actually celebrated two people, Crispin and Crispian (hense the two spellings in the speech). They are the patron saints of cobblers, tanners, and leather workers. The holiday used to be celebrated on October 25th, the day on which The Battle of Agincourt (the battle Henry V is speaking about) was fought in 1415.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Crispin

Incidently, The Battle of Leyte Gulf (1944) and The Charge of the Light Brigade (1854) also occured on October 25th.

[Lioness_Heart]

Saint Crispin's day actually celebrated two people, Crispin and Crispian (hense the two spellings in the speech). They are the patron saints of cobblers, tanners, and leather workers. The holiday used to be celebrated on October 25th, the day on which The Battle of Agincourt (the battle Henry V is speaking about) was fought in 1415.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Crispin

Incidently, The Battle of Leyte Gulf (1944) and The Charge of the Light Brigade (1854) also occured on October 25th.

Ah... thank-you! Is it just a coiincidence that Agincourt is on that day, or is there some significance? I probably mean more in a Shakespearian way, as in, do you think there was a particular reason for its mention in the speech (other than that the battle was on the day)? Perhaps Henry V is trying to draw the troops together, making everyone feel equal and valued by calling on two of the saints of working-class industry?

Just a thought... sorry, Drama, if I'm deviating from the topic, I'll find another postworthy quote soon...

[RobinHood3000]

"O that he were here to write me down an ***!
But masters, remember that I am an ***."

Act IV Scene iiYou took the words right out of my mouth before I even thought of speaking them.

[Abdiel]

Wow! These quotes are all so wonderful. My question is: is there such a thing as a bad Shakespeare quote? I mean, every line he wrote was stunning, so you can't exactly find anything bad (unless you cut a line off part way: To be or not to....)

[bazarov]

Hamlet:
Why then 'tis none to you; for there is nothing either good or
bad, but thinking makes it so. To me it is a prison.

Othello:
Our bodies are our gardens, to the which
our wills are gardeners: so that if we will plant
nettles, or sow lettuce, set hyssop and weed up
thyme, supply it with one gender of herbs, or
distract it with many, either to have it sterile
with idleness, or manured with industry, why, the
power and corrigible authority of this lies in our
wills.

[Amlóði]

Here's my attempt to narrow it down to five:

i. Not a whit, we defy augury. There is special providence in
the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be not to
come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come—the
readiness is all. Since no man, of aught he leaves, knows what is't
to leave betimes, let be. (Hamlet to Horatio)

ii. Ha, ha! keep time: how sour sweet music is,
When time is broke and no proportion kept!
So is it in the music of men's lives.
And here have I the daintiness of ear
To cheque time broke in a disorder'd string;
But for the concord of my state and time
Had not an ear to hear my true time broke.
I wasted time, and now doth time waste me; ... (Richard in prison)

iii. Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits and
Are melted into air, into thin air:
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep. (Prospero after the feast)

iv. When we are born, we cry that we are come
To this great stage of fools: ... (Mad Lear to Gloucester) or
'Tis the times' plague, when madmen lead the blind. (Gloucester to Old Man)

v. I'll so offend, to make offence a skill;
Redeeming time when men think least I will. (Prince Hal to his audience)

[Jeremiah Jazzz]

'Love's not time's fool'
-Sonnet #116

'A knavish speech sleeps in a foolish ear'
-Hamlet. Act 4, Scene 2

[Janine]

This is my favorite too from Hamlet....I always cry in that scene. Amodli, glad that you posted this one; it saved me looking it up. I have some more Shakespeare favorites but will have to look those up online and then post later on. One is "Henry V's" famous soliquey in the night camp. That one goes right to my heart. I also love one by Byron in "Love's Labours Lost." I will have to go hunt for these online...too much typging.

Not a whit, we defy augury. There is special providence in
the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be not to
come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come—the
readiness is all. Since no man, of aught he leaves, knows what is't
to leave betimes, let be. (Hamlet to Horatio)

[xman]

Good one, Janine. Also from Hamlet this always strikes me:

I haue of late, but wherefore I knowe not, lost all my mirth,
forgon all custome of exercises: and indeede it goes so heauily with
my disposition, that this goodly frame the earth, seemes to mee a
sterill promontorie, this most excellent Canopie the ayre, looke
you, this braue orehanging firmament, this maiesticall roofe fret-
ted with golden fire, why it appeareth nothing to me but a foule
and pestilent congregation of vapoures. What peece of worke is a
man, how noble in reason, how infinit in faculties, in forme and
moouing, how expresse and admirable in action, how like an An-
gell in apprehension, how like a God: the beautie of the world; the
paragon of Annimales; and yet to me, what is this Quintessence of
dust: man delights not me

X

[prendrelemick]

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the gap up with our English dead. (Henry V)


This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise;
This fortress, built by nature for herself,
Against infection, and the hand of war;
This happy breed of men, this little world;
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall,
Or as a moat defensive to a house,
Against the envy of less happier lands;
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England, (Richard II)

I must be feeling a bit patriotic tonight!

[Thespian1975]

Wow! These quotes are all so wonderful. My question is: is there such a thing as a bad Shakespeare quote? I mean, every line he wrote was stunning, so you can't exactly find anything bad (unless you cut a line off part way: To be or not to....)

Have you read Henry VI part One? Overall a poor play with a few good bits in it.

[bree]

Caliban to Prospero

You taught me language, and my profit on't
Is I know how to curse. The red plague rid you
For learning me your language!

The Tempest

[amalia1985]

From "Macbeth", 5.5:

"Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
to the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle.
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing."

[kelby_lake]

'The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars. It is in ourselves that we are underlings' (Julius Caeser)
'It is a tale told by an idiot/Full of sound and fury/Signifying nothing' (Macbeth)

And probably many more.

[Janine]

i. Not a whit, we defy augury. There is special providence in
the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be not to
come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come—the
readiness is all. Since no man, of aught he leaves, knows what is't
to leave betimes, let be. (Hamlet to Horatio)

This is my favorite, too!...


hahah...I see I posted it twice now; well you know how much I love this line since I didn't realise I had done so just now; I had to edit this entry.

[DanielBenoit]

"There 's daggers in men's smiles".
Macbeth
(Act II, Scene III).

Wow, I missed that one.

"To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing."

Macbeth Act V Scene V


"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: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action."

Hamlet Act III Scene I
(yeah I know, but somebody had to quote what must be quoted)


"Why, e'en so: and now my Lady Worm's; chapless, and knocked about the mazzard with a sexton's spade: here's fine revolution, an we had the trick to
see't. Did these bones cost no more the breeding, but to play at loggats with 'em? mine ache to think on't."

Hamlet Act V Scene I


"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, howabhorred 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?
Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell her, let her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must come; make her laugh at that."

Hamlet Act V Scene I


The rest is silence

Hamlet Act V Scene II


"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 honor 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 that word, honour? air. A trim reckoning!—Who hath it? he that died o' Wednesday. Doth he feel it? no. Doth be hear it? no. Is it 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."
-Falstaff

Henry IV, Part I Act V Scene I


"Give me life."
-Falstaff
Henry IV, Part I Act V Scene II


Here's a Shakespeare's heartbreaking Sonnet 66

Tired with all these, for restful death I cry,
As, to behold desert a beggar born,
And needy nothing trimm'd in jollity,
And purest faith unhappily forsworn,
And guilded honour shamefully misplaced,
And maiden virtue rudely strumpeted,
And right perfection wrongfully disgraced,
And strength by limping sway disabled,
And art made tongue-tied by authority,
And folly doctor-like controlling skill,
And simple truth miscall'd simplicity,
And captive good attending captain ill:
Tired with all these, from these would I be gone,
Save that, to die, I leave my love alone.


Also, check out the quote in my signature.

[Aoife]

''There was good sport in his making, and the whoreson must be acknowleged''

owch!

[Abdiel]

That's it! No one's standing up for Cymbeline, one of Shakespeare's most underrated plays.

So, just to show you what you're missing if you haven't read it yet, I'll post these awesome quotes in the hopes that people will give it a chance.

Arviragus: Are we not brothers?
Imogen: So man and man should be;
But clay and clay differs in dignity,
Whose dust is both alike.
(Cymbeline 4.2, 2318-2322)

Imogen: I am ill, but your being by me
Cannot amend me; society is no comfort
To one not sociable:
(Cymbeline 4.2, 2328-2330)

Cloten. Thou art a robber,
A law-breaker, a villain: yield thee, thief.
Guiderius. To who? to thee? What art thou? Have not I
An arm as big as thine? a heart as big?
Thy words, I grant, are bigger, for I wear not
My dagger in my mouth.
(Cymbeline 4.2, 2415-2422)


In one of the most touching scenes in all Shakespeare, the protagonist Leonatus thinks that his wife Imogen is cheating on him and orders that his servant, Pisanio, take Imogen somewhere secluded and kill her.

He writes his instructions in a letter which he gives to Pisanio, except Pisanio doesn't believe that Imogen would ever be unfaithful to his master. So, instead of killing Imogen, Pisanio gives her the letter in which is written the accusation of infidelity and the order to kill her. Imogen is reading the letter by herself as Pisanio watches her expression, and he says:

Pisanio. What shall I need to draw my sword? the paper
Hath cut her throat already.
(Cymbeline 3.4, 1753-1754)

That gets me every time.

[Lokasenna]

Richard III seems a popular choice, and this (I feel) is one of the more overlooked passages. The Duke of Clarence, soon to be murdered, has just suffered a prophetic and halucinatory nightmare:

CLARENCE

Methoughts that I had broken from the Tower,
And was embark'd to cross to Burgundy;
And, in my company, my brother Gloster;
Who from my cabin tempted me to walk
Upon the hatches: thence we look'd toward England,
And cited up a thousand heavy times,
During the wars of York and Lancaster,
That had befall'n us. As we pac'd along
Upon the giddy footing of the hatches,
Methought that Gloster stumbled; and, in falling,
Struck me, that thought to stay him, overboard
Into the tumbling billows of the main.
O Lord, methought what pain it was to drown!
What dreadful noise of waters in my ears!
What sights of ugly death within my eyes!
Methoughts I saw a thousand fearful wrecks;
A thousand men that fishes gnaw'd upon;
Wedges of gold, great anchors, heaps of pearl,
Inestimable stones, unvalued jewels,
All scatt'red in the bottom of the sea:
Some lay in dead men's skulls; and in the holes
Where eyes did once inhabit there were crept,—
As 'twere in scorn of eyes,—reflecting gems,
That woo'd the slimy bottom of the deep,
And mock'd the dead bones that lay scatter'd by.

BRAKENBURY.

Had you such leisure in the time of death
To gaze upon these secrets of the deep?

CLARENCE.

Methought I had; and often did I strive
To yield the ghost: but still the envious flood
Stopp'd in my soul, and would not let it forth
To find the empty, vast, and wandering air;
But smother'd it within my panting bulk,
Who almost burst to belch it in the sea.

BRAKENBURY.

Awak'd you not in this sore agony?

CLARENCE.

No, no, my dream was lengthen'd after life;
O, then began the tempest to my soul!
I pass'd, methought, the melancholy flood
With that grim ferryman which poets write of,
Unto the kingdom of perpetual night.
The first that there did greet my stranger soul
Was my great father-in-law, renowned Warwick;
Who spake aloud, "What scourge for perjury
Can this dark monarchy afford false Clarence?"
And so he vanish'd: then came wandering by
A shadow like an Angel, with bright hair
Dabbled in blood; and he shriek'd out aloud
"Clarence is come,—false, fleeting, perjur'd Clarence,—
That stabb'd me in the field by Tewksbury;—
Seize on him, Furies, take him to your torments!"
With that, methoughts, a legion of foul fiends
Environ'd me, and howled in mine ears
Such hideous cries that, with the very noise,
I trembling wak'd, and for a season after
Could not believe but that I was in hell,—
Such terrible impression made my dream.

The vividness of the imagery is magnificent; as I read it for the first time (and later saw it performed brilliantly by the late Nigel Hawthorne), it drew me powerfully into it, and cemented itself as one of my favourite passages in Shakespeare. I'm particularly attached to the "shadow like an Angel, with bright hair/ Dabbled in blood."

[MorpheusSandman]

This sends chills up my spine every time I read it or hear it spoken:

Hamlet 3.1, 132-140:

why wouldst thou be a
breeder of sinners? I am myself indifferent honest;
but yet I could accuse me of such things that it
were better my mother had not borne me: I am very
proud, revengeful, ambitious, with more offences at
my beck than I have thoughts to put them in,
imagination to give them shape, or time to act them
in. What should such fellows as I do crawling
between earth and heaven? We are arrant knaves,
all; believe none of us.

There are lots from A Midsummer Night's Dream that I haven't seen mentioned:

Lovers and madmen have such seething brains,
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
The lunatic, the lover and the poet
Are of imagination all compact:
One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,
That is, the madman: the lover, all as frantic,
Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt:
The poet's eye, in fine frenzy rolling,
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;
And as imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name.
Such tricks hath strong imagination,
That if it would but apprehend some joy,
It comprehends some bringer of that joy;
Or in the night, imagining some fear,
How easy is a bush supposed a bear! (5.1, 6-24)

The best in this kind are but shadows; and the worst
are no worse, if imagination amend them. (5.1, 211-212)

[raggedtrousered]

There are many quotes from Hamlet that I love. For example:

"Why, look you now, how unworthy a thing you make of
me! You would play upon me; you would seem to know
my stops; you would pluck out the heart of my
mystery; you would sound me from my lowest note to
the top of my compass: and there is much music,
excellent voice, in this little organ; yet cannot
you make it speak. 'Sblood, do you think I am
easier to be played on than a pipe? Call me what
instrument you will, though you can fret me, yet you
cannot play upon me."

Also, my favorite of Hamlet's soliloquies:

"How all occasions do inform against me,
And spur my dull revenge! What is a man,
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more.
Sure, he that made us with such large discourse,
Looking before and after, gave us not
That capability and god-like reason
To fust in us unused. Now, whether it be
Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple
Of thinking too precisely on the event,
A thought which, quarter'd, hath but one part wisdom
And ever three parts coward, I do not know
Why yet I live to say 'This thing's to do;'
Sith I have cause and will and strength and means
To do't. Examples gross as earth exhort me:
Witness this army of such mass and charge
Led by a delicate and tender prince,
Whose spirit with divine ambition puff'd
Makes mouths at the invisible event,
Exposing what is mortal and unsure
To all that fortune, death and danger dare,
Even for an egg-shell. Rightly to be great
Is not to stir without great argument,
But greatly to find quarrel in a straw
When honour's at the stake. How stand I then,
That have a father kill'd, a mother stain'd,
Excitements of my reason and my blood,
And let all sleep? while, to my shame, I see
The imminent death of twenty thousand men,
That, for a fantasy and trick of fame,
Go to their graves like beds, fight for a plot
Whereon the numbers cannot try the cause,
Which is not tomb enough and continent
To hide the slain? O, from this time forth,
My thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!"

[jocky]

' Screw your courage to the sticking place, and we shall not fail ' MacBeth.

[Christopher Sly]

“O monstrous beast! how like a swine he lies!
Grim death, how foul and loathsome is thine image!
Sirs, I will practise on this drunken man.”

The Lord trying to justify what he is about to do to Christopher Sly in Taming of the Shrew. This has personal meaning because I was about to put on the role of Christopher Sly. Not the first time I've been set up by a pirate lord, but the most educational. The Lord's Bedchamber deserves a lot more attention as a mechanism for "inducing" character movement. From the "Gates of Hell", to the Yo "Ho Ho", the pirate lords use the lord's bedchamber to strip the people of their free roles, and drive them into roles the lord controls. But I don't think I was supposed to notice that. It's a comedy, right? And Sly deserves it, after all.

Monstrous, loathsome, drunk.

"I see one. I see two. I see you all..."

[kelby_lake]

From Julius Caesar:

'There is a tide in the affairs of men
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat;
And we must take the current when it serves,
Or lose our ventures'

And:
Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.

And from Hamlet:
'The rest is silence' and of course the 'To be or not to be...' soliloquy.

[prendrelemick]

This is one of my favourites.

Grief fills the room up of my absent child,
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me,
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words,
Remembers me of all his gracious parts,
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form;
Then, have I reason to be fond of grief?

Was he thinking of young Hamnet ? If so, it is about the only place in all his works where the author speaks as himself.

I have many more favorite quotes, I'll have a bit of a think

[Pryderi Agni]

Ahh, Shakespeare:

Here's Romeo:
"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet."

And Jaques:
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages.

And Hamlet:
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—there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life.
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
Th'oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of dispriz'd love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of th'unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscovere'd country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pitch and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry
And lose the name of action.

Again Hamlet:
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

Caesar:
"Cowards die many times before their deaths,
The valiant never taste of death but once."

Marcus Antonius:
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears!
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them,
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar.

Mercutio:
I am hurt.
A plague a' both your houses! I am sped.
Is he gone and hath nothing?

King Richard:
A horse, a horse! My kingdom for a horse!

Calpurnia:
"When beggars die there are no comets seen;
The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes."

2nd Witch:
By the pricking of my thumbs,
Something wicked this way comes.

[JuniperWoolf]

These violent delights have violent ends, and in their triumph die, like fire and powder, which as they kiss, consume.

[Lucille Padua]

"Perjury, perjury, in the highest degree;
Murder, stern murder, in the direct degree;
All several sins, all us'd in each degree"

"Action is eloquence."

"Thus doth He force the swords of wicked men/ To turn their own points in their master's bosom."

[MANICHAEAN]

"I found you as a morsel, cold upon dead Caesar's trencher"
Antony & Cleopatra.

"Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin, unhouseled, disappointed, unaneled."
Hamlet.

"Lay not that flattering unction to your soul."
Hamlet.

[kelby_lake]

"Perjury, perjury, in the highest degree;
Murder, stern murder, in the direct degree;
All several sins, all us'd in each degree"

"Action is eloquence."

"Thus doth He force the swords of wicked men/ To turn their own points in their master's bosom."

Where are they from?

[xman]

Where are they from?
I believe:
R III V iii
Cor II ii
R III V i
respectively

[kelby_lake]

I thought I recognised the first and third :)

[wessexgirl]

Ooh there are so many.....but one I really love is the whole scene where Henry V is wooing Kate, and is telling her how he is not someone who can say pretty things to court her, but how he is just a plain soldier, (and king.....:)). His speech is wonderful.

KING HENRY V: Marry, if you would put me to verses or to dance for
your sake, Kate, why you undid me: for the one, I
have neither words nor measure, and for the other, I
have no strength in measure, yet a reasonable
measure in strength. If I could win a lady at
leap-frog, or by vaulting into my saddle with my
armour on my back, under the correction of bragging
be it spoken. I should quickly leap into a wife.
Or if I might buffet for my love, or bound my horse
for her favours, I could lay on like a butcher and
sit like a jack-an-apes, never off. But, before God,
Kate, I cannot look greenly nor gasp out my
eloquence, nor I have no cunning in protestation;
only downright oaths, which I never use till urged,
nor never break for urging. If thou canst love a
fellow of this temper, Kate, whose face is not worth
sun-burning, that never looks in his glass for love
of any thing he sees there, let thine eye be thy
cook. I speak to thee plain soldier: If thou canst
love me for this, take me: if not, to say to thee
that I shall die, is true; but for thy love, by the
Lord, no; yet I love thee too. And while thou
livest, dear Kate, take a fellow of plain and
uncoined constancy; for he perforce must do thee
right, because he hath not the gift to woo in other
places: for these fellows of infinite tongue, that
can rhyme themselves into ladies' favours, they do
always reason themselves out again. What! a
speaker is but a prater; a rhyme is but a ballad. A
good leg will fall; a straight back will stoop; a
black beard will turn white; a curled pate will grow
bald; a fair face will wither; a full eye will wax
hollow: but a good heart, Kate, is the sun and the
moon; or, rather, the sun, and not the moon; for it
shines bright and never changes, but keeps his
course truly. If thou would have such a one, take
me; and take me, take a soldier; take a soldier,
take a king. And what sayest thou then to my love?
speak, my fair, and fairly, I pray thee.

KATHARINE: Is it possible dat I sould love de enemy of France?

KING HENRY V: No; it is not possible you should love the enemy of
France, Kate: but, in loving me, you should love
the friend of France; for I love France so well that
I will not part with a village of it; I will have it
all mine: and, Kate, when France is mine and I am
yours, then yours is France and you are mine.

and later

KING HENRY V: It is not a fashion for the maids in France to kiss
before they are married, would she say?

ALICE: Oui, vraiment.

KING HENRY V: O Kate, nice customs curtsy to great kings. Dear
Kate, you and I cannot be confined within the weak
list of a country's fashion: we are the makers of
manners, Kate; and the liberty that follows our
places stops the mouth of all find-faults; as I will
do yours, for upholding the nice fashion of your
country in denying me a kiss: therefore, patiently
and yielding.

[Kissing her]

You have witchcraft in your lips, Kate: there is
more eloquence in a sugar touch of them than in the
tongues of the French council; and they should
sooner persuade Harry of England than a general
petition of monarchs. Here comes your father.

I think he is a lot smoother than he's portraying. He'd convinced me right at the start, but then again, I have just watched Ken and Em again in the film. :brow: (sigh). I have Michael Williams reciting this section on audio, and he's so wonderful. It's such a charming speech, and I love the little joke in there about loving France so much he won't give up a village of it.

I also love Henry 1V, where we see him with Falstaff and his cronies, showing how he is going to transform himself, leading to the heartbreaking scene where he disowns him.

I know you all, and will awhile uphold
The unyoked humour of your idleness.
Yet herein will I imitate the sun,
Who doth permit the base contagious clouds
To smother up his beauty from the world,
That when he please again to be himself,
Being wanted, he may be more wondered at
By breaking through the foul and ugly mists
Of vapours that did seem to strangle him.
If all the year were playing holidays,
To sport would be as tedious as to work;
But when they seldom come, they wished-for come,
And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents.
So, when this loose behaviour I throw off
And pay the debt I never promisèd,
By how much better than my word I am,
By so much shall I falsify men’s hopes;
And like bright metal on a sullen ground,
My reformation, glitt’ring o’er my fault,
Shall show more goodly and attract more eyes
Than that which hath no foil to set it off.
I’ll so offend to make offence a skill,
Redeeming time when men think least I will.
(I.ii.173–195)


Falstaff: But to say I know more harm in him than in myself were to say more than I know. That he is old, the more the pity, his white hairs do witness it. But that he is, saving your reverence, a whoremaster, that I utterly deny. If sack and sugar be a fault, God help the wicked. If to be old and merry be a sin, then many an old host that I know is damned. If to be fat be to be hated, then Pharaoh’s lean kine are to be loved. No, my good lord, banish Peto, banish Bardolph, banish Poins, but for sweet Jack Falstaff, kind Jack Falstaff, true Jack Falstaff, valiant Jack Falstaff, and therefore more valiant being, as he is, old Jack Falstaff,
Banish not him thy Harry’s company,
Banish not him thy Harry’s company.
Banish plump Jack, and banish all the world.
Prince: I do; I will.
(II.v.425–439)


I know thee not, old man: fall to thy prayers;
How ill white hairs become a fool and jester!
I have long dreamed of such a kind of man,
So surfeit-swelled, so old, and so profane. (5.5.52)

Make less thy body hence, and more thy grace;
Leave gourmandising; know the grave doth gape
For thee thrice wider than for other men. (5.5.60)

Presume not that I am the thing I was. (5.5.62)

Brilliant stuff. Cold, clinical and chilling in its planning, (as I have seen done), or someone who really does love the old reprobate, but knows that he has to do what he does and does so with a heavy heart, to use Shakey's own words, only being cruel to be kind, (also seen done)?

[Beewulf]

Some wonderful choices have been posted. Here's mine. It comes from Act III of Hamlet, shortly before the play-within-a-play. Hamlet says to Horatio:

Dost thou hear?
Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice
And could of men distinguish, her election
Hath seal'd thee for herself; for thou hast been
As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing,
A man that fortune's buffets and rewards
Hast ta'en with equal thanks: and blest are those
Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled,
That they are not a pipe for fortune's finger
To sound what stop she please. Give me that man
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him
In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of hearts,
As I do thee.

It's hard to explain why I find this passage so moving, but I can't read it without bringing tears to my eyes. I guess it has to do with its remarkable beauty and restrained passion. It comes at a point when everything in Hamlet's life has fallen apart . . . has been proven false and ephemeral--except for Horatio's loyalty and resoluteness. For a moment, Hamlet frees himself from anguish, anger, and self-loathing to grace his friend with an eloquence that only the genius of Shakespeare can provide.

[LoveofmyLear]

Wasn't Shakespear the fist one to intoduce the phrase "I have nigh a hundred hardships but my whence is not among them"? I read that Jay-Z was just a copycat!

[janesmith]

"Hath not a Jew eyes?" - The Merchant of Venice. I love that entire speech.

[applepie]

I love Shakespeare, but this is one of my favorites


Captain of our fairy band,
Helena is here at hand;
And the youth, mistook by me,
Pleading for a lover's fee.
Shall we their fond pageant see?
Lord, what fools these mortals be!

The character of Puck has always been a favorite of mine.

[kelby_lake]

"Hath not a Jew eyes?" - The Merchant of Venice. I love that entire speech.

Same :)

[RosyRosalind]

I love Shakespeare! One of my favorites is from Shakespeare's As You Like It:

"The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool."

Obviously I love that quote, since it shows as my signature. :)

[prendrelemick]

Sometimes I need to remember-

Come what may, time and the hour run through the roughest day.

[MANICHAEAN]

Lay not that flattering unction to your soul.

[Thespian1975]

This is one of my favourites.

Grief fills the room up of my absent child,
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me,
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words,
Remembers me of all his gracious parts,
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form;
Then, have I reason to be fond of grief?

Was he thinking of young Hamnet ? If so, it is about the only place in all his works where the author speaks as himself.

I have many more favorite quotes, I'll have a bit of a think

That whole scene made me cry.

Also from King John

"Be great in act, as you have been in thought"

[Emil Miller]

England, bound in with the triumphant sea, whose rocky shore beats back the envious siege of watery Neptune, is now bound in with shame, with inky blots, and rotten parchment bonds: That England, that was wont to conquer others, hath made a shameful conquest of itself.

To which I can only add - plus ça change...

[Jassy Melson]

My all-time favorite line (I think The Fool says it to Lear): Be of good cheer, sir. Our revels are ended.

[mevitts]

My favorite is from Hamlet. "This all above: Thin own self be true." (Act I, Scene II).

[Pompey Bum]

Ophelia's mad truth: They say the owl was a baker's daughter. Lord, we know what we are, but know not what we may be.

[YesNo]

If we shadows have offended,
Know but this and all is mended.
That you have but slumbered here,
While these visions did appear,
And this weak and idle theme,
No more yielding, but a dream.

Midsummer Night's Dream

[Markj]

My favorite one :
“ Doubt thou the stars are fire;
Doubt that the sun doth move;
Doubt truth to be a liar;
But never doubt I love. ”

[Sherry_Edwards]

Hi,
Thank you for sharing such nice quotes!
My favorite one is “It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves.” It inspires me to achieve the goal and do not give up, even when I`m disappointed.
I found this one list with Shakespeare`s quotes that can change our life as very motivated ones, but his others expressions are also very excited!