2,311 Famous Quotes by William Shakespeare
4/23/1564 - 4/23/1616
Also Known As:
Shakespeare
The Bard
Shaxper
Professions:
Information:
About William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon". His extant works, including some collaborations, consist of about 38 plays, 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, two epitaphs on a man named John Combe, one epitaph on Elias James, and several other poems. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright.
Shakespeare was born and brought up in Stratford-upon-Avon. At the age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children: Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith. Between 1585 and 1592, he began a successful career in London as an actor, writer, and part owner of a playing company called the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as the King's Men. He appears to have retired to Stratford around 1613 at age 49, where he died three years later. Few records of Shakespeare's private life survive, and there has been considerable speculation about such matters as his physical appearance, sexuality, religious beliefs, and whether the works attributed to him were written by others.
That is the way to lay the city flat,
To bring the roof to the foundation,
And bury all, which yet distinctly ranges,
In heaps and piles of ruin.
Cities
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: Coriolanus (Cominius at III, i)
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Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school.
Students
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: As You Like It (Jaques at II, vii)
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From his cradle
He was a scholar, and a ripe and good one,
Exceeding wise, fair-spoken, and persuading;
Lofty and sour to them that loved him not,
But to those men that sought him, sweet as summer.
Students
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: The Life of King Henry the Eighth (Griffith at IV, ii)
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You undergo too strict a paradox,
Striving to make an ugly deed look fair.
Paradoxes
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: The Life of Timon of Athens (First Senator at III, v)
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So we grew together,
Like to a double cherry, seeming parted,
But yet an union in partition--
Two lovely berries moulded on one stem;
So, with two seeming bodies, but one heart;
Two of the first, like coats in heraldry,
Due but to one, and crowned with one crest.
Unity
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: A Midsummer Night's Dream (Helena at III, ii)
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Of all complexions the culled sovereignty
Do meet, as at a fair, in her fair cheek,
Where several worthies make one dignity,
Where nothing wants that want itself doth seek.
Wishes
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: Love's Labor's Lost (Berowne at IV, iii)
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I am an ass indeed; you may prove it by my long ears. I have
served him from the hour of my nativity to this instant, and have
nothing at his hands for my service but blows. When I am cold,
he heats me with beating; when I am warm, he cools me with
beating.
Service
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: The Comedy of Errors (Dromio of Ephesus at IV, iv)
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O Cromwell, Cromwell,
Had I but served my God with half the zeal
I served my king, he would not in mine age
Have left me naked to mine enemies.
Service
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: The Life of King Henry the Eighth (Wolsey at IV, i)
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The swallow follows not summer more willing than we your
lordship.
Service
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: The Life of Timon of Athens (Second Friend at III, vi)
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Ay, gentle Thurio, for you know that love
Wilt creep in service where it cannot go.
Service
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: The Two Gentlemen of Verona (Proteus at IV, ii)
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And, may I say to thee, this pride of hers,
Upon advice, hath drawn my love from her;
And, where I thought the remnant of mine age
Should have been cherished by her childlike duty,
I now am full resolved to take a wife
And turn her out to who will take her in.
Duty
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: The Two Gentlemen of Verona (Duke of Milan at III, i)
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But ere we could arrive the point proposed,
Caesar cried, 'Help me, Cassius, or I sink!'
Help
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: Julius Caesar (Cassius at I, ii)
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Now, ye familiar spirits that are culled
Out of the powerful legions under earth,
Help me this once, that France may get the field.
Help
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: King Henry the Sixth, Part I (Pucelle at V, iii)
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A sceptre snatched with an unruly hand
Must be as boisterously maintained as gained,
And he that stands upon a slippery place
Makes nice of no vile hold to stay him up.
Help
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: The Life and Death of King John (Pandulph at III, iv)
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If it be honor in your wars to seem
The same you are not,--which, for your best ends,
You adopt your policy--how is it less or worse,
That it shall hold companionship in peace
With honour, as in war: since that to both
It stands in like request?
Companionship
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: Coriolanus (Volumnia at III, ii)
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Have you the heart? When your head did but ache,
I knit my handkercher about your brows--
The best I had, a princess wrought it me--
And I did never ask it you again;
And with my hand at midnight held your head,
And like the watchful minutes to the hour,
Still and anon cheered up the heavy time,
Saying, 'What lack you?' and 'Where lies your grief?'
Kindness
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: The Life and Death of King John (Arthur at IV, i)
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Yet do I fear thy nature.
It is too full o' th' milk of human kindness
To catch the nearest way.
Kindness
Quotes, by William Shakespeare , Source: Macbeth (Lady Macbeth at I, v)
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