Questions tagged [william-shakespeare]
Questions about the workes of William Shakspeare, who writ many a famous plaie and poem. For questions about his plaies, may it please you to add a tag for the plaie (e.g. [hamlet]); for questions about his sonnets, may it please you to add the tag [poetry].
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Was it traditional to omit the prologue from Shakespeare's plays in the First Folio?
In an older question about the purpose of the prologue in Romeo and Juliet, Cory Howell asked in a now deleted answer:
For what it's worth, the Prologue is not included in the First Folio version of ...
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Why does the murderer call Macduff's son "egg"?
When Macduff's son defends his father's honor when the murderers sent by Macbeth call Macduff a traitor in Macbeth, they wind up stabbing the son:
Enter Murderers.
FIRST MURDERER: Where is your ...
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Who introduced the sonnet to English literature? Wyatt or Shakespeare?
Who brought sonnet to English literature? Thomas Wyatt or William Shakespeare?
Their contributions to English literature: Shakespeare wrote a book that contains 154 sonnets, but I couldn't find ...
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How do scholars estimate the original number of copies of the Shakespeare First Folio of 1623?
The first collected edition of Shakespeare's plays was printed in 1623, several years after the author's death, and is known is the First Folio. (Later editions are known as the Second Folio, etc., ...
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What does "invention comes from my pate as birdlime does from frize" mean in "Othello"?
From Othello II.1.125–130:
Iago: ... my invention
Comes from my pate as birdlime does from frize,
It plucks out brains and all. But my muse labours,
And thus she is deliver'd:
If she be fair and wise,...
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The Winter's Tale, Act 2 scene 3, lines 104-108. What do these lines mean?
Paulina, a wife of one of the aristocrats, speaks these lines to Leontes in The Winter's Tale:
And thou, good goddess Nature, which hast made it So like to him
that got it, if thou hast The ...
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Shakespeare's voice
It is often stated that it is nearly impossible to tell Shakespeare's point of view or to hear his personal voice behind his characters. While I accept this premise, as one reads more of Shakespeare, ...
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In The Winters Tale what does "Nine changes of the Watery-Star" mean? Does it mean nine nights or nine months?
I have a question about the opening lines of the second scene in The Winter's Tale.
From Act 1, scene 2:
Pol. Nine Changes of the Watry-Starre hath been The Sheppards Note since we have left ...
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Is Othello being deceptive when he says, “This only is the witchcraft I have used” (Act 1.3.184)
When Othello is brought before an “ad hoc” court of law for surreptitiously marring Desdemona, Brabantio essentially accuses him of using “witchcraft” as a means of seducing his daughter suggesting,
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Any inspiration for the statue revival scene in Shakespeare's "The Winter's Tale"?
Shakespeare's "problem play" The Winter's Tale is largely inspired by Robert Greene's Pandosto written a few decades earlier. One of the major differences between Pandosto and The Winter's Tale is in ...
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Why is the scene in which Leontes recognises his daughter merely reported?
One of the most striking moments in Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale is the scene in which Leontes's wife Hermione, whom both he and the audience thought dead, turns out to be alive (Act V, scene 3). ...
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At what point did Leontes become jealous?
The Winter's Tale, one of Shakespeare's last plays, depicts the character of Leontes, King of Sicily, as someone who suddenly becomes jealous. Scholars and readers have often criticised the play ...
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Why the name "The Winter's Tale" for Shakespeare's play?
The Shakespeare play The Winter's Tale does not actually take place entirely in winter (unlike, say, A Midsummer Night's Dream where almost all the action does indeed take place on midsummer night). ...
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What evidence is there that Shakespeare revised The Winter's Tale after 1611?
Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale was probably written in the years 1610-1611, making it one of the author's last plays. The play's text was first published in the "First Folio" of 1623, seven years ...
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Meaning of "look about you: know you any here?" in "All's Well That Ends Well"
Shakespeare's All's Well That Ends Well, Act IV, Scene 3, contains the following line (Online Shakespeare, line 2390):
so, look about you: know you any here?
What is the meaning of these words?
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In "A Midsummer Night's Dream", do opposites attract?
In Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream, do opposites attract? or do similars attract? What evidence is there either way?
I thought about how the characters are opposites in many ways, ...
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How can we reconcile the bareness of Shakespearean stages with the complex stage directions of The Tempest?
I learned recently that in Shakespeare's day, stage dressing was often minimal. This makes sense given that there was a wide variety of theatre styles, the stages were often uncovered and surrounded ...
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How did Shakespeare get away with staging witchcraft in his plays such as Othello, Macbeth, or The Tempest?
The themes of witchcraft and magic loom large over Shakespeare’s later plays. While there is no overt use of magic and spells in Othello, per se, as compared to the witches in Macbeth conjuring on ...
user10067
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How can a "desk" be considered a secret keeper?
I was reading Hamlet, Act II, scene 2, when I encountered the following lines:
.....what might you,
Or my dear majesty your queen here, think,
If I had play'd the desk or table-book,
Or given my ...
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How might Shakespeare have become familiar with Dante's work?
A recent question on our site asked whether Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing contained a reference to Dante's Divine Comedy. In his answer, Matt Thrower mentions Beatrice, the name of both a ...
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Dante's Inferno reference in Much Ado About Nothing
My professor asked me this for an assignment. It was to identify a Dante's Inferno reference in Much Ado About Nothing. I don't know what he meant by this. Where is this reference? Does not have to be ...
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What kind of language features appear in Lady Macbeth's line "too full o' the milk of human kindness"?
In Macbeth Act I Scene 5, Lady Macbeth says the following:
Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be
What thou art promised: yet do I fear thy nature;
It is too full o' the milk of human ...
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What does Lady Macbeth mean by "what thou art promised"?
In Macbeth Act I Scene 5, Lady Macbeth says the following:
Glamis thou art, and Cawdor; and shalt be
What thou art promised: yet do I fear thy nature;
It is too full o' the milk of human ...
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Who was the first scholar who used the term Henriad to refer to a subset of Shakespeare's history plays?
A recent chatroom discussion about how to tag the question Portrayal of Henry Bolingbroke through different Shakespeare plays led to the question what "Henriad" actually means.
According to ...
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Meaning of "glimpses of the moon" in "Hamlet"
I read this in Hamlet act I scene IV:
What may this mean,
That thou, dead corpse, again in complete steel
Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon...
I'm unable ...
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Portrayal of Henry Bolingbroke through different Shakespeare plays
King Henry IV of England, also known as Henry Bolingbroke, appears in three Shakespeare plays, with two of them being named after him. In Richard II, he can be seen as the main antagonist of the play, ...
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1 Henry IV Act 5, Scene 3: "God keep the lead out of me"
Henry IV Part 1, Act 5, Scene 3:
Falstaff says
...God keep the lead out of me, I need no more weight than my own
bowels.
Is this referring to lead bullets? I was under the impression these ...
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Why does Dogberry use malapropisms in Much Ado About Nothing?
In Shakespeare's play, Much Ado About Nothing, Dogberry consistently uses malapropisms.
What are the creative ideas behind giving him this style of speech? Does he use it on purpose? What's his ...
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How does the quote from Shakespeare's Two Gentlemen of Verona connect with Hardy's Tess of the d'Urbervilles?
Thomas Hardy's novel Tess of the d'Urbervilles begins with the epigraph
... Poor wounded name! My bosom as a bed
Shall lodge thee.—W. Shakespeare.
The source of this quote is one of Shakespeare'...
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What does this verse said by Portia in Julius Caesar mean?
In Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar when Brutus had planned everything and the night before the assassination he was in his room he had a little conversation with his wife Portia. During the ...
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Why do we get some explicit references in Shakespearean plays that are meant for something else?
First of all, by “explicit contents” I really mean the that thing.
In Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar when Brutus had planned everything and the night before the assassination he was in his room ...
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What was Shakespeare's inspiration for the several cross-dressing episodes in his plays?
I've heard that Shakespeare borrowed ideas from the events and other literary works from the time. He uses cross-dressing as a major plot device in several plays. Where did this come from?
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Shakespeare's vasty deep: was "vasty" a recognised variant of "vast" at the time?
From Shakespeare's Henry IV Part 1, Act III Scene 1:
GLENDOWER: I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
HOTSPUR: Why, so can I, or so can any man;
But will they come when you do call for them?
...
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Why does Shakespeare sometimes use "do" with the verbs in his plays?
Sometimes Shakespeare uses "do" with a verb even though it isn't necessary. For example, in Macbeth, Act One, Scene 2, line 10, the captain states, "As two spent swimmers that do cling together". Why ...
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The Unity of Action in Shakespeare's "The Tempest"
Many critics claim that Shakespeare's play The Tempest follows all three classical unities. For example:
The play observes the three Unities: the action is confined to parts of the same location, the ...
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Do the witches in Macbeth ever mention "eye of bat and tongue of frog"?
For a high school course in English literature, I'm reading Macbeth.
On a basic multiple choice question about Act IV, scene I, I am given the following:
The Witches threw into the cauldron
...
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How is it possible for Antonio to go bankrupt?
In The Merchant Of Venice by William Shakespeare, Act I Scene I
Antonio : Believe me, no: I thank my fortune for it, My ventures are ...
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What does Cassius mean when he refers to his mother?
CASSIUS: Have not you love enough to bear with me,
When that rash humor which my mother gave me
Makes me forgetful?
W. Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, ACT 4 SCENE 3
What is Cassius ...
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What is meant by 'patient' in Hamlet's famous soliloquy?
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?
Is there a veracious etymological basis for the ...
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What's the technique in 'To be thus is nothing, but to be safely thus.' from Macbeth?
What's the technique in these (half-)lines from Macbeth?
To be thus is nothing,
but to be safely thus.
They are from Act 3 Scene 1. Macbeth is insecure because of ...
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What's the meaning of the last two sentences in Macbeth, Act 4, Scene 3?
Here, Malcolm is talking to Macduff as they are now determined to overthrow Macbeth. Generally speaking, I know what is going on but I'm not sure what Malcolm means by "cheer" and "...
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Why would Hamlet fear suicide if he knew of life after death?
Prince Hamlet describes his fear of death in poetic phrases.
To be or not to be, that is the question: ...
To die, to sleep;
To sleep, perchance to dream—aye, there's the rub:
For in ...
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What is the source of "You can achieve a lot with hate, but even more with love" (Shakespeare?)
I have seen a postcard with a quote "You can achieve a lot with hate, but even more with love", signed "Shakespeare", in a French bookshop.
The quote is not exact, because I have translated it back ...
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What's the meaning of "give someone the lie" in Macbeth?
As I have noticed there are multiple interpretations of the following lines from William Shakespeare 's Macbeth. For example, "drink gave thee the lie" has been interpreted as diversely as "deceived ...
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Context of "swifter than arrow from the Tartar's bow"?
I go, I go; look how I go,
Swifter than arrow from the Tartar's bow.
-- Puck, Act III Scene II, A Midsummer Night's Dream
This is a well-known line from a Shakespeare play, but did Shakespeare ...
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The meaning of "Lovers' Food"
This question is regarding a dialogue of Hermia in Scene 1 of Act 1 of 'The Midsummer Night's Dream' by William Shakespeare where she mentions, "From lovers' food till morrow deep midnight." Please ...
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What effect did the knocking at the gate in "Macbeth" have on Thomas De Quincey?
In Thomas De Quincey's 1823 essay "On the Knocking at the Gate in Macbeth", he describes the effect of the knocking at the gate (Macbeth, Act II, Scene 3) on him when he was a boy: "it [...
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Any textual evidence from Shakespeare's Macbeth regarding Macbeth's oath to kill the king?
In act 1, scene 7, Lady Macbeth encourages Macbeth to keep his promise and kill king Duncan, but is there any textual evidence from the play regarding his earlier oath to kill the king?
Here, for ...
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If Hamlet, being a prince, outranked Horatio, why did he address him as "sir"?
Hamlet Act 5 Scene 2:
HAMLET:
So much for this, sir. Now shall you see the other.
You do remember all the circumstance?
HORATIO: Remember it, my lord!
Horatio replies to Hamlet calling ...
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Was Edmund in the Narnia series loosely inspired by Edmund in King Lear?
In King Lear, Edmund, resentful of his inferior status to his older brother, betrays his family and frames his brother as a traitor. This strikes me as being quite a bit like what Edmund does in The ...
