known by people of all nations and all languages.
Just like the thousands of catchphrases, sayings and bon mots that most of us use in our daily lives, usually unwittingly. These words have become a commonplace of everyday speech today. So, if an argument you’ ve got into is all Greek to me, and you refuse to budge an inch because the other side is playing fast and loose with the facts, you’ re quoting Shakespeare.
And if you’ ve ever felt tongue-tied or hoodwinked and not slept a wink worrying about your lost purse which seems to have vanished into thin air, you’ re quoting Shakespeare.
Or if you suspect foul play and believe it’ s high time these people stopped living in a fool’ s paradise, and that if the truth were known they’ ve become a laughing stock, you’ re calling on the Bard’ s verbal dexterity to convince them the truth will out.
What the Dickens! you might exclaim, but you’ d be a blinking idiot to attribute your expletive outburst to Charlie of Great Expectations fame.
You have to give the devil his due, it’ s the Bard again, no less, and you’ d be the devil incarnate to dance attendance on the wrong author without rhyme or reason.
So, it’ s a foregone conclusion I would have given my English teacher short shrift as he murdered Macbeth and set my teeth on edge as he emasculated Juliet’ s paramour, leaving her with cold comfort. But, of course, we pupils are forever tongue-tied and our schoolmaster is such a tower of strength.
To this day, it saddens me that so many dismiss Shakespeare in their adult life
Shakespeare in Ten Acts the British Library’ s anniversary exhibition runs until 6th September. It features a pivotal array of early editions, manuscripts, costumes, props, photographs and playbills. For full details go to bl. uk / events
To be or not to be, that is the question
because the way the Bard was taught at school made us kids long for the bell at the end of class. But now the game’ s afoot and the truth will out.
There is much more to Shakespeare than his badly-taught plays and sonnets, that are not the be-all and end-all. Like the personal details about a man of flesh blood that our bloody-minded teachers neglected to tell us.
So, here, at one fell swoop, are seven fascinating facts about William Shakespeare that could have made a virtue of necessity if our schoolmasters had had the wit and flashes of merriment that were won’ t to set the table on a’ roar. 1. Shakespeare is credited with introducing around 3,000 words into the English Language. The evidence of his literary canon speaks for itself: Shakespeare clearly loved words. His own vocabulary is estimated to have ranged from 17,000 words to more than 29,000. That’ s double the number used by the average academic. Not bad for someone who was working with a language that was in a state of flux. The seminal King James Bible, considered the first transformative literary work in modern English wasn’ t published until 1611 – and used only about 10,000 words.
Existentialism unchained... in Hamlet
2. Shakespeare started out in somewhat inauspicious circumstances. He arrived in London around 1691, as an“ raggle-taggle” jobbing actor with uncertain prospects. He was mocked for having no Oxbridge pedigree, just another hick up from the sticks out to chance his arm in Boom City. Contemporary playwright and university wit Richard Greene dubbed him“ an upstart crow”. What’ s more he’ d left his wife Anne Hathaway back in Stratford-upon-Avon three months pregnant. He was 18 and she 26 when they wed at a time when it was unusual for a man to marry an older woman.
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