Quotes and Sayings about Shakespeare

"It's amazing how, age after age, in country after country, and in all languages, Shakespeare emerges as incomparable."
- M. H. Abrams
(Related: Age, Country, Shakespeare)

"This was Shakespeare's form; who walked in every path of human life, felt every passion; and to all mankind doth now, will ever, that experience yield which his own genius only could acquire."
- Mark Akenside
(Related: Experience, Life, Genius, Mankind, Now, Passion, Shakespeare, Will, Yield)

"Shakespeare, Dickens, Mark Twain, and so many others were my dearest friends and greatest teachers."
- Lloyd Alexander
(Related: Friends, Shakespeare, Teachers)

"I've never done anything for money. My first love is things of limited commercial appeal. I could be happy doing Shakespeare for the rest of my life."
- Karen Allen
(Related: Life, Love, Money, First, First love, Rest, Shakespeare)

"My dream as a youngster was to be like Olivier. To be a great stage actor. To be a great Shakespearean actor. To me that is the Olympics of acting."
- Armand Assante
(Related: Dream, Acting, Actor)

"I read Shakespeare and the Bible, and I can shoot dice. That's what I call a liberal education."
- Tallulah Bankhead
(Related: Education, Bible, Liberal, Shakespeare)

"I am so far as I am aware not at all influenced by dramatists, expect for Shakespeare, who I have to say, it is impossible not to be influenced by if you hold language to be the major element of theatre."
- Howard Barker
(Related: Language, Shakespeare, Theatre)

"I know not, sir, whether Bacon wrote the works of Shakespeare, but if he did not, it seems to me that he missed the opportunity of his life."
- James M. Barrie
(Related: Life, Opportunity, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare said pretty well everything and what he left out, James Joyce, with a judge from meself, put in."
- Brendan Behan
(Related: Pretty, Shakespeare)

"In fact, it is Shakespeare who gives us the map of the mind. It is Shakespeare who invents Freudian Psychology. Freud finds ways of translating it into supposedly analytical vocabulary."
- Harold Bloom
(Related: Fact, Mind, Psychology, Shakespeare, Vocabulary)

"No poem, not even Shakespeare or Milton or Chaucer, is ever strong enough to totally exclude every crucial precursor text or poem."
- Harold Bloom
(Related: Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare is the true multicultural author. He exists in all languages. He is put on the stage everywhere. Everyone feels that they are represented by him on the stage."
- Harold Bloom
(Related: Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare will not make us better, and he will not make us worse, but he may teach us how to overhear ourselves when we talk to ourselves... he may teach us how to accept change in ourselves as in others, and perhaps even the final form of change."
- Harold Bloom
(Related: Change, May, Shakespeare, Talk, Will)

"Shakespeare is universal."
- Harold Bloom
(Related: Shakespeare)

"I think Freud is about contamination, but I think that is something he learned from Shakespeare, because Shakespeare is about nothing but contamination, you might say."
- Harold Bloom
(Related: Nothing, Shakespeare)

"I had the training at drama school where I studied Shakespeare and Brecht and Chekov and all these period historical playwrights and I think that I responded to the material."
- Orlando Bloom
(Related: Drama, School, Shakespeare, Training)

"What Shakespeare and the Greeks were able to do was radically question what it meant to be a human being."
- Edward Bond
(Related: Being, Question, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare has no answers for us at all."
- Edward Bond
(Related: Answers, Shakespeare)

"I acknowledge Shakespeare to be the world's greatest dramatic poet, but regret that no parent could place the uncorrected book in the hands of his daughter, and therefore I have prepared the Family Shakespeare."
- Thomas Bowdler
(Related: Family, Daughter, Regret, Shakespeare, World)

"Shakespeare also introduces the supernatural into some of his tragedies; he introduces ghosts, and witches who have supernatural knowledge."
- Andrew Coyle Bradley
(Related: Knowledge, Shakespeare, Supernatural, Witches)

"When Shakespeare begins his exposition thus he generally at first makes people talk about the hero, but keeps the hero himself for some time out of sight, so that we await his entrance with curiosity, and sometimes with anxiety."
- Andrew Coyle Bradley
(Related: Time, People, Anxiety, Curiosity, First, Shakespeare, Sight, Talk)

"We cannot arrive at Shakespeare's whole dramatic way of looking at the world from his tragedies alone, as we can arrive at Milton's way of regarding things, or at Wordsworth's or at Shelley's, by examining almost any one of their important works."
- Andrew Coyle Bradley
(Related: Shakespeare, World)

"A Shakespearean tragedy as so far considered may be called a story of exceptional calamity leading to the death of a man in high estate. But it is clearly much more than this, and we have now to regard it from another side."
- Andrew Coyle Bradley
(Related: Death, Calamity, Leading, Man, May, Now, Tragedy)

"Shakespeare very rarely makes the least attempt to surprise by his catastrophes. They are felt to be inevitable, though the precise way in which they will be brought about is not, of course, foreseen."
- Andrew Coyle Bradley
(Related: Catastrophes, Shakespeare, Will)

"Most people, even among those who know Shakespeare well and come into real contact with his mind, are inclined to isolate and exaggerate some one aspect of the tragic fact."
- Andrew Coyle Bradley
(Related: People, Fact, Mind, Shakespeare)

"In speaking, for convenience, of devices and expedients, I did not intend to imply that Shakespeare always deliberately aimed at the effects which he produced."
- Andrew Coyle Bradley
(Related: Shakespeare)

"In Shakespearean tragedy the main source of the convulsion which produces suffering and death is never good: good contributes to this convulsion only from its tragic implication with its opposite in one and the same character."
- Andrew Coyle Bradley
(Related: Death, Character, Suffering, Tragedy)

"In approaching our subject it will be best, without attempting to shorten the path by referring to famous theories of the drama, to start directly from the facts, and to collect from them gradually an idea of Shakespearean Tragedy."
- Andrew Coyle Bradley
(Related: Idea, Drama, Facts, Famous, Theories, Tragedy, Will)

"Shakespeare's idea of the tragic fact is larger than this idea and goes beyond it; but it includes it, and it is worth while to observe the identity of the two in a certain point which is often ignored."
- Andrew Coyle Bradley
(Related: Idea, Fact, Identity, Shakespeare, Worth)

"You can find more traditional Shakespeare than we do. But what we want to bring to these works is energy, passion, freshness."
- John Bradshaw
(Related: Energy, Passion, Shakespeare, Want)

"I do think that, for instance, we've been very lucky to have theatrical careers and be associated with Shakespeare which sometimes gives you a kind of bogus kudos."
- Kenneth Branagh
(Related: Careers, Shakespeare)

"The elasticity of Shakespeare is extraordinary."
- Kenneth Branagh
(Related: Shakespeare)

"There is some mysterious thing that goes on whereby, in the process of playing Shakespeare continuously, actors are surprised by the way the language actually acts on them."
- Kenneth Branagh
(Related: Actors, Language, Shakespeare)

"One of the things that makes Hamlet unique among Shakespeare's characters is his courage to face up to the darker elements of his personality."
- Kenneth Branagh
(Related: Courage, Personality, Shakespeare)

"Nobody's ever called me Sir Richard. Occasionally in America, I hear people saying Sir Richard and think there's some Shakespearean play taking place. But nowhere else anyway."
- Richard Branson
(Related: People, America, Play, Saying)

"If Shakespeare had to go on an author tour to promote Romeo and Juliet, he never would have written Macbeth."
- Joyce Brothers
(Related: Shakespeare)

"And to Shakespeare I owe my vision of the world as a theater, wherein all humans are acting out their parts."
- James Broughton
(Related: Vision, Acting, Shakespeare, Theater, World)

"I grew up reading Shakespeare and Mark Twain."
- Jackson Browne
(Related: Reading, Shakespeare)

"The aim, if reached or not, makes great the life: Try to be Shakespeare, leave the rest to fate!"
- Robert Browning
(Related: Rest, Shakespeare)

"I did about 2000 covers altogether, for all sorts of books - from Shakespeare to James Bond - and I always had the idea that I must give 100%, no matter who the author was."
- Dick Bruna
(Related: Idea, Books, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare was a dramatist of note who lived by writing things to quote."
- H. C. Bunner
(Related: Shakespeare, Writing)

"Shakespeare's name, you may depend on it, stands absurdly too high and will go down."
- George Byron
(Related: May, Name, Shakespeare, Will)

"Read not Milton, for he is dry; nor Shakespeare, for he wrote of common life."
- Charles Stuart Calverley
(Related: Life, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare said, nothing is either good nor bad but thinking makes it so."
- Dyan Cannon
(Related: Nothing, Shakespeare, Thinking)

"I hate Shakespeare. I think Shakespeare's rubbish."
- Allan Carr
(Related: Hate, Shakespeare)

"If you got what it takes, you'll make it. If you don't, Shakespeare couldn't help you."
- Jack L. Chalker
(Related: Help, Shakespeare)

"The only line that's wrong in Shakespeare is 'holding a mirror up to nature.' You hold a magnifying glass up to nature. As an actor you just enlarge it enough so that your audience can identify with the situation. If it were a mirror, we would have no art."
- Montgomery Clift
(Related: Art, Nature, Actor, Shakespeare, Wrong)

"Prior to Wordsworth, humor was an essential part of poetry. I mean, they don't call them Shakespeare comedies for nothing."
- William Collins
(Related: Humor, Poetry, Nothing, Shakespeare)

"I don't know how this company got the name National Shakespeare Company, because it was literally like retards employing retards."
- Rob Corddry
(Related: Company, Name, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare, who is probably the greatest writer and poet of the English language, lived in a time that was politically very conservative and it's reflected in his writings."
- Alex Cox
(Related: Time, Conservative, English, Language, Shakespeare, Writer)

"The greatest crime in a Shakespeare play is to murder the king."
- Alex Cox
(Related: Crime, Murder, Play, Shakespeare)

"Everybody gets a little dose of Shakespeare. He's the greatest playwright in the English language, but his politics are fairly square."
- Alex Cox
(Related: Politics, English, Language, Shakespeare)

"I've never really had a desire to do Shakespeare. For me, it's just too many lines."
- Daniel Craig
(Related: Desire, Shakespeare)

"It took three years to put Shakespeare's words together, there were a lot of words to be studied and a lot of words to be sorted out, and it proved to be a major project."
- David Crystal
(Related: Project, Shakespeare, Words, Years)

"We had five goats, two dogs, a cat and racks of commentaries on Shakespeare."
- Charles Dance
(Related: Dogs, Shakespeare)

"I loved doing Shakespeare. My two favorite roles, in fact, have been Viola in Twelfth Night and Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream."
- Blythe Danner
(Related: Dream, Fact, Favorite, Night, Shakespeare)

"I have tried lately to read Shakespeare, and found it so intolerably dull that it nauseated me."
- Charles Darwin
(Related: Shakespeare)

"When I first started acting, and we would all sit down and talk about Shakespeare and how great it was. I thought well, I suppose it is."
- Judy Davis
(Related: Thought, Acting, First, Shakespeare, Talk)

"It is true that there are few plays of Shakespeare that I haven't done."
- Judi Dench
(Related: Shakespeare)

"It's incredibly moving to hear some of our greatest actors performing Shakespeare."
- Judi Dench
(Related: Actors, Shakespeare)

"If Antarctica were music it would be Mozart. Art, and it would be Michelangelo. Literature, and it would be Shakespeare. And yet it is something even greater; the only place on earth that is still as it should be. May we never tame it."
- Andrew Denton
(Related: Music, Art, Earth, Literature, May, Shakespeare)

"A team is a team is a team. Shakespeare said that many times."
- Dan Devine
(Related: Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare in Love... such smart writing of an alternative view of history, and such beautiful acting. Like most Americans, I'm a sucker for the accent."
- Anita Diament
(Related: History, Love, Acting, Americans, Shakespeare, Writing)

"I think reading Shakespeare's plays when I was young was extremely important. He had the ability to make utter strangers come alive."
- Rita Dove
(Related: Ability, Reading, Shakespeare, Strangers)

"Jacobean plays, before Shakespeare, were particularly visceral."
- Christopher Eccleston
(Related: Shakespeare)

"I wasn't always such a great fan of Shakespeare, mind you. I can guess we all at one time had it rammed down our necks at school, which tends to take the edge off it."
- Christopher Eccleston
(Related: Time, Mind, School, Shakespeare)

"I was already devouring literature and I was the ripe old age of 15 when I decided to be an actor. I just thought plays were the most fantastic way of expressing life. I thought I'd discovered Shakespeare - 'hey, there's a new guy in town, don't know if anyone's read him.' I was just excited about the whole thing, from day one."
- Chiwetel Ejiofor
(Related: Age, Life, Thought, Actor, Day, Literature, Old, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare was not meant for taverns, nor for tavern louts."
- Samuel G. Engel
(Related: Shakespeare)

"I'd like to be for cinema what Shakespeare was for theatre, Marx for politics and Freud for psychology: someone after whom nothing is as it used to be."
- Rainer W. Fassbinder
(Related: Politics, Cinema, Nothing, Shakespeare, Theatre)

"I think academics are infuriating. For every expert on Shakespeare there is another one to cancel his theory out. It drives you up the wall. I think the greatest form of finding out the truth is through fantasy."
- Joseph Fiennes
(Related: Truth, Fantasy, Shakespeare, Theory)

"The English people, a lot of them, would not be able to understand a word of spoken Shakespeare. There are people who do and I'm not denying they exist. But it's a far more philistine country than people think."
- Colin Firth
(Related: People, Country, English, Shakespeare, Word)

"An actor should be ready to play any role within reason. For example, I think the most ridiculous thing for me to do would be to try and play Shakespeare."
- Glenn Ford
(Related: Actor, Example, Play, Reason, Shakespeare)

"To me, Mozart is our Shakespeare, the one who wrote the most dramatic, psychologically most baffling music. He combined ideas that no one else would have thought of putting together."
- Lukas Foss
(Related: Music, Thought, Ideas, Shakespeare)

"To me, Shakespeare uses the supernatural elements to reveal his character's inner desires and fears."
- John Foster
(Related: Character, Shakespeare, Supernatural)

"What if Shakespeare had had a test audience for Romeo and Juliet or Hamlet?"
- Brendan Fraser
(Related: Shakespeare)

"I'd probably want to teach at university, because children would drive me insane. I suspect it would be English literature, Shakespeare and so forth. I've always been deeply, deeply in love with that kind of thing."
- Stephen Fry
(Related: Love, Children, English, Literature, Shakespeare, University, Want)

"Was there ever such stuff as great as part of Shakespeare? Only one must not say so! But what think you? - What? - Is there not sad stuff? What? - What?"
- George III
(Related: Shakespeare)

"I think Shakespeare had a lot to contribute with his understanding of the human condition."
- Sharon Gless
(Related: Shakespeare, Understanding)

"To date or not to date that is the question. It's almost as important as Shakespeare's to be or not to be which deals with death."
- Al Goldstein
(Related: Death, Deals, Question, Shakespeare)

"A remarkable thing about Shakespeare is that he is really very good in spite of all the people who say he is very good."
- Robert Graves
(Related: People, Remarkable, Shakespeare)

"The remarkable thing about Shakespeare is that he really is very good, in spite of all the people who say he is very good."
- Robert Graves
(Related: People, Remarkable, Shakespeare)

"Well it is certainly the case that the poems - which were in fact published during Shakespeare's lifetime - are weird if they began or originated in this form, as I think they did, because the poems get out of control."
- Stephen Greenblatt
(Related: Control, Fact, Poems, Shakespeare)

"But if Shakespeare himself is maybe about meaning and truth, I don't know, then he is certainly about pleasure and interest, we start with pleasure and interest, but maybe eventually it gets to meaning and truth."
- Stephen Greenblatt
(Related: Truth, Interest, Meaning, Pleasure, Shakespeare)

"Now a Protestant confronting a Catholic ghost is exactly Shakespeare's way of grappling with what was not simply a general social problem but one lived out in his own life."
- Stephen Greenblatt
(Related: Life, Now, Shakespeare)

"It is not that Shakespeare's art is in technicolor and fancy, and that real life is black and white and tedious. The life that Shakespeare was living was the only life he had, and he had to use it to create what he was doing."
- Stephen Greenblatt
(Related: Art, Life, Fancy, Living, Shakespeare)

"I believe that nothing comes of nothing, even in Shakespeare. I wanted to know where he got the matter he was working with and what he did with that matter."
- Stephen Greenblatt
(Related: Nothing, Shakespeare)

"I believe that it is a whole lifetime of work on Shakespeare's part that enabled him to do what he did. But the question is how you can explain this whole lifetime in such a way to make it accessible and available to us, to me."
- Stephen Greenblatt
(Related: Work, Question, Shakespeare)

"First of all, Shakespeare is about pleasure and interest. He was from the first moment he actually wrote something for the stage, and he remains so."
- Stephen Greenblatt
(Related: First, Interest, Pleasure, Shakespeare)

"What we know is that Shakespeare wrote perhaps the most remarkable body of passionate love poetry in the English language to a young man."
- Stephen Greenblatt
(Related: Love, Poetry, Body, English, Language, Man, Remarkable, Shakespeare)

"First of all, there was a volcano of words, an eruption of words that Shakespeare had never used before that had never been used in the English language before. It's astonishing. It pours out of him."
- Stephen Greenblatt
(Related: English, First, Language, Shakespeare, Words)

"The Shakespeare that Shakespeare became is the name that's attached to these astonishing objects that he left behind."
- Stephen Greenblatt
(Related: Name, Shakespeare)

"When I was an undergraduate I had very badly annotated editions of Shakespeare's sonnets, all of which left out the important fact that will has a sexual sense in Shakespeare's sonnets."
- Thom Gunn
(Related: Fact, Sense, Shakespeare, Will)

"We were not allowed to say, Screw, but we could say, Hump the hostess, because hump is in Shakespeare."
- Uta Hagen
(Related: Shakespeare)

"We have cut the text, but what remains are Shakespeare's words."
- Edward Hall
(Related: Shakespeare, Words)

"Shakespeare reveals human nature brilliantly: he shines a light on our instinctive desire to dominate each other."
- Edward Hall
(Related: Nature, Desire, Human nature, Light, Shakespeare)

"I'm a games and theory kind of guy. I love puzzles, so it was fun dissecting Shakespeare's prose."
- Neil Patrick Harris
(Related: Love, Fun, Games, Prose, Shakespeare, Theory)

"I felt a little green, because Shakespeare writes the thought process within the text; it was tricky not to think of what to say and then say it, and instead just deliver the lines."
- Neil Patrick Harris
(Related: Thought, Shakespeare)

"There's a statistical theory that if you gave a million monkeys typewriters and set them to work, they'd eventually come up with the complete works of Shakespeare. Thanks to the Internet, we now know this isn't true."
- Ian Hart
(Related: Work, Internet, Now, Shakespeare, Theory)

"If we wish to know the force of human genius, we should read Shakespeare. If we wish to see the insignificance of human learning, we may study his commentators."
- William Hazlitt
(Related: Genius, Force, Learning, May, Shakespeare, Study)

"It is no exaggeration to say that the English Bible is, next to Shakespeare, the greatest work in English literature, and that it will have much more influence than even Shakespeare upon the written and spoken language of the English race."
- Lafcadio Hearn
(Related: Work, Bible, English, Exaggeration, Influence, Language, Literature, Race, Shakespeare, Will)

"Dreaming is an act of pure imagination, attesting in all men a creative power, which if it were available in waking, would make every man a Dante or Shakespeare."
- Frederick Henry Hedge
(Related: Men, Imagination, Power, Act, Man, Shakespeare, Waking)

"Shakespeare is the outstanding example of how that can be done. In all of Shakespeare's plays, no matter what tragic events occur, no matter what rises and falls, we return to stability in the end."
- Charlton Heston
(Related: End, Events, Example, Shakespeare, Stability)

"I've got no need to prove to myself that I can do Shakespeare. I've done it."
- Anthony Hopkins
(Related: Shakespeare)

"I have no interest in Shakespeare and all that British nonsense... I just wanted to get famous and all the rest is hogwash."
- Anthony Hopkins
(Related: Famous, Interest, Nonsense, Shakespeare)

"In real life, unlike in Shakespeare, the sweetness of the rose depends upon the name it bears. Things are not only what they are. They are, in very important respects, what they seem to be."
- Hubert H. Humphrey
(Related: Life, Name, Shakespeare, Sweetness)

"Shakespeare was the great one before us. His place was between God and despair."
- Eugene Ionesco
(Related: God, Despair, Shakespeare)

"Wouldn't you like to have heard the voice of Shakespeare, or Jesus Christ?"
- Henry Irving
(Related: Christ, Shakespeare, Voice)

"I'll bet Shakespeare compromised himself a lot; anybody who's in the entertainment industry does to some extent."
- Christopher Isherwood
(Related: Entertainment, Shakespeare)

"I cannot understate the ability to handle classical texts such as Shakespeare."
- Louise Jameson
(Related: Ability, Shakespeare)

"And it was the idea that you can do a play - like a Shakespeare play, or any well-written play, Arthur Miller, whatever - and say things you could never imagine saying, never imagine thinking in your own life."
- James Earl Jones
(Related: Life, Idea, Play, Saying, Shakespeare, Thinking)

"Shakespeare is the happy hunting ground of all minds that have lost their balance."
- James Joyce
(Related: Balance, Hunting, Shakespeare)

"With Westerns you have the landscape is important, and it's empty, and only you populate it. When you populate it, you can tell any kind story that Shakespeare told, you can tell in a Western."
- Lawrence Kasdan
(Related: Shakespeare)

"My background is somewhat unusual, as I trained to be a ballet dancer. I worked in the theatre for eight or nine years as a contemporary dancer. But as an actor one does read Shakespeare and does try to learn the classics."
- William Kempe
(Related: Actor, Ballet, Shakespeare, Theatre, Years)

"When Shakespeare was writing, he wasn't writing for stuff to lie on the page; it was supposed to get up and move around."
- Ken Kesey
(Related: Lie, Shakespeare, Writing)

"Then I got out of the service, and I was going to be a Shakespearean actor."
- Harvey Korman
(Related: Actor, Service)

"Shakespeare is one of the last books one should like to give up, perhaps the one just before the Dying Service in a large Prayer book."
- Charles Lamb
(Related: Books, Dying, Prayer, Service, Shakespeare)

"It was easier to do Shakespeare than a lot of modern movie scripts that are so poorly written."
- Jessica Lange
(Related: Shakespeare)

"I had never done Shakespeare before, but I don't think you can be an actor and not do it. There were moments when I thought, I'm just not going to be able to pull this off."
- Jessica Lange
(Related: Thought, Actor, Moments, Shakespeare)

"Because Shakespeare's language is so expansive, we're under this misconception that it's difficult. But I discovered that it's easy because it's so brilliantly written. The words are perfect, and the language is intelligent and very emotional."
- Jessica Lange
(Related: Language, Shakespeare, Words)

"I couldn't believe verse was supposed to be hard. It was a snap for me. I loved Shakespeare."
- Ted Lange
(Related: Shakespeare)

"I am a genius who has written poems that will survive with the best of Shakespeare, Wordsworth and Keats."
- Irving Layton
(Related: Genius, Poems, Shakespeare, Will)

"Shaw is like a train. One just speaks the words and sits in one's place. But Shakespeare is like bathing in the sea - one swims where one wants."
- Vivien Leigh
(Related: Sea, Shakespeare, Words)

"Classical plays require more imagination and more general training to be able to do. That's why I like playing Shakespeare better than anything else."
- Vivien Leigh
(Related: Imagination, Shakespeare, Training)

"In college, I started out doing musicals and Shakespeare."
- Ray Liotta
(Related: College, Shakespeare)

"I was in 20 Shakespearean plays by the time I was 20."
- John Lithgow
(Related: Time)

"Shakespeare is like mother's milk to me."
- John Lithgow
(Related: Mother, Shakespeare)

"If you see the Sopranos, you're not going to be speaking in the Shakespearean English."
- Lucy Liu
(Related: English)

"I'd like to do more Shakespeare. I'd like to do Iago in Othello. I look so benign. It would be interesting to see that black evil come out of my soul."
- Kyle MacLachlan
(Related: Soul, Evil, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare wrote great plays that we're still watching all these years later. Charlie Chaplin made great comedies and they are still as funny today as they ever were."
- Leonard Maltin
(Related: Funny, Shakespeare, Today, Years)

"If you are feeling something, then Shakespeare felt it and wrote about it - and wrote about it so eloquently."
- Richard McCabe
(Related: Feeling, Shakespeare)

"I don't make much distinction between being a stand-up comic and acting Shakespeare - in fact, unless you're a good comedian, you're never going to be able to play Hamlet properly."
- Ian Mckellen
(Related: Acting, Being, Fact, Play, Shakespeare)

"The printing press was at first mistaken for an engine of immortality by everybody except Shakespeare."
- Marshall McLuhan
(Related: First, Immortality, Press, Printing, Shakespeare)

"It's not that Shakespeare is frivolous, but you spend your time just getting people to dress up in other people's costumes and pretending to be people that they're not, and you think, after the years go by, well, what on earth was all that about?"
- Jonathan Miller
(Related: Time, People, Dress, Earth, Shakespeare, Years)

"I thought I'd begin by reading a poem by Shakespeare, but then I thought, why should I? He never reads any of mine."
- Spike Milligan
(Related: Thought, Reading, Shakespeare)

"To judge therefore of Shakespeare by Aristotle's rule is like trying a man by the Laws of one Country who acted under those of another."
- Elizabeth Montagu
(Related: Country, Laws, Man, Shakespeare, Trying)

"Anything well written with good language and clarity and honesty is worth doing. It comes out of the same tradition as Shakespeare."
- Michael Moriarty
(Related: Honesty, Clarity, Language, Shakespeare, Tradition, Worth)

"Well, as a kid I did not get Shakespeare. I just never understood it."
- Alanis Morissette
(Related: Shakespeare)

"You have to work with what you are given, even in Shakespeare. we have our form and it is important that we free ourselves through it."
- Ajay Naidu
(Related: Work, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare tells the same stories over and over in so many guises that it takes a long time before you notice."
- Howard Nemerov
(Related: Time, Shakespeare)

"Yes, it's true, I've been called the Laurence Olivier of spoofs. I guess that would make Laurence Olivier the Leslie Nielsen of Shakespeare."
- Leslie Nielsen
(Related: Shakespeare)

"Peter Hall was just organizing the Royal Shakespeare Company. It was going to be an ensemble, it was going to be in repertory, it was going to have a home in London as well as in the Midlands, and all of those things were happening at that time."
- Trevor Nunn
(Related: Home, Time, Company, London, Shakespeare)

"So, through all that early professional career I would occasionally do a musical, a pantomime or a play with songs. The next stop would be a Shakespeare, or an Ibsen, or a play by a brand new writer who had never done anything in the theater before."
- Trevor Nunn
(Related: Career, Play, Shakespeare, Songs, Theater, Writer)

"The thing that I had saved up for myself and wanted most to bring off was a fully fledged professional production of Hamlet at the Royal Shakespeare Theater in Stratford."
- Trevor Nunn
(Related: Production, Shakespeare, Theater)

"I had a feeling about Shakespeare's soliloquies, that there should be a real exchange between the actor and the audience."
- Trevor Nunn
(Related: Actor, Feeling, Shakespeare)

"I went to London because, for me, it was the home of literature. I went there because of Dickens and Shakespeare."
- Ben Okri
(Related: Home, Literature, London, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare doesn't really write subtext, you play the subtext."
- Gary Oldman
(Related: Play, Shakespeare)

"I should be soaring away with my head tilted slightly toward the gods, feeding on the caviar of Shakespeare. An actor must act."
- Laurence Olivier
(Related: Gods, Act, Actor, Shakespeare)

"I'd like people to remember me for a diligent expert workman. I think a poet is a workman. I think Shakespeare was a workman. And God's a workman. I don't think there's anything better than a workman."
- Laurence Olivier
(Related: God, People, Shakespeare)

"You rarely pay the rent by doing Shakespeare or Ibsen."
- Mandy Patinkin
(Related: Shakespeare)

"Sondheim is the Shakespeare of the musical theater world."
- Mandy Patinkin
(Related: Shakespeare, Theater, World)

"A book is sent out into the world, and there is no way of fully anticipating the responses it will elicit. Consider the responses called forth by the Bible, Homer, Shakespeare - let alone contemporary poetry or a modern novel."
- Chaim Potok
(Related: Poetry, Bible, Shakespeare, Will, World)

"I'm working now on a collection of Shakespearean sonnets, about 100 of them, that I may publish if anyone's interested. My take on life is a little different from the bard's."
- Jack Prelutsky
(Related: Life, May, Now)

"It's a perfectly valid position to not like Shakespeare."
- Ted Rall
(Related: Shakespeare)

"Sometimes I just crave to play in Shakespeare again and I know and love playing Orlando so much."
- Basil Rathbone
(Related: Love, Play, Shakespeare)

"The society Shakespeare knew was heading for tremendous change, and he seems to have recognized that and written about it in a coded way. I understand those codes, I think."
- Vanessa Redgrave
(Related: Society, Change, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare lets us see real people undergoing real processes, with real feelings."
- Vanessa Redgrave
(Related: People, Feelings, Shakespeare)

"Most people don't know that I am an accomplished dramatic actor... But I've performed in several Shakespeare productions including Hamlet, except in this version, Hamlet lives in an apartment with two women, and has to pretend he's gay so that the landlord won't evict him."
- John Ritter
(Related: Women, People, Actor, Gay, Shakespeare)

"It's an intuitive exercise to do a Shakespeare play and to go through a Shakespeare play."
- Mark Rylance
(Related: Exercise, Play, Shakespeare)

"Our job is to make manifest the story, to be it. In a sense, the theatre is such a big star itself, bigger than any Shakespearean actor I could hire, that we should take the opportunity to fill it with voice and verse and movement, not interpretation."
- Mark Rylance
(Related: Opportunity, Actor, Job, Sense, Theatre, Voice)

"I don't admire Freud as much as some people do. Imagine Shakespeare being aware of the Oedipal complex when he wrote Hamlet. It would have been a disaster."
- Nathalie Sarraute
(Related: People, Being, Disaster, Shakespeare)

"My writing improved the more I wrote - and the more I read good writing, from Shakespeare on down."
- Dick Schaap
(Related: Shakespeare, Writing)

"I think there's a poet who wrote once a tragedy by Shakespeare, a symphony by Beethoven and a thunderstorm are based on the same elements. I think that's a beautiful line."
- Maximilian Schell
(Related: Shakespeare, Tragedy)

"Everyone ought to bear patiently the results of his own conduct."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Results)

"Exceeds man's might: that dwells with the gods above."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Gods, Man)

"Expectation is the root of all heartache."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Expectation)

"Faith, there hath been many great men that have flattered the people who ne'er loved them."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Faith, People)

"Death is a fearful thing."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Death)

"Desire of having is the sin of covetousness."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Covetousness, Desire, Sin)

"False face must hide what the false heart doth know."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Heart)

"Farewell, fair cruelty."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Cruelty)

"Fishes live in the sea, as men do a-land; the great ones eat up the little ones."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Sea)

"For I can raise no money by vile means."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Money)

"Better a witty fool than a foolish wit."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Fool, Wit, Witty)

"For my part, it was Greek to me."
- William Shakespeare

"Lord, Lord, how subject we old men are to this vice of lying!"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Old, Vice)

"Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love, Trust, Wrong)

"Love is a smoke made with the fume of sighs."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love)

"Modest doubt is called the beacon of the wise."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Doubt)

"Maids want nothing but husbands, and when they have them, they want everything."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Husbands, Nothing, Want)

"Many a good hanging prevents a bad marriage."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Marriage)

"Men are April when they woo, December when they wed. Maids are May when they are maids, but the sky changes when they are wives."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, April, December, May, Sky, Wives)

"Men's vows are women's traitors!"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Women)

"Mind your speech a little lest you should mar your fortunes."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Mind, Speech)

"Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Death, Cowards, Taste)

"Love is not love that alters when it alteration finds."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love)

"Be not afraid of greatness: some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Greatness)

"As soon go kindle fire with snow, as seek to quench the fire of love with words."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love, Fire, Snow, Words)

"As he was valiant, I honour him. But as he was ambitious, I slew him."
- William Shakespeare

"There's place and means for every man alive."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Man)

"As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Gods, Boys, Flies)

"Love is too young to know what conscience is."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love, Conscience)

"Come, gentlemen, I hope we shall drink down all unkindness."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Hope, Gentlemen, Unkindness)

"Men shut their doors against a setting sun."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Sun)

"To do a great right do a little wrong."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Right, Wrong)

"We cannot conceive of matter being formed of nothing, since things require a seed to start from... Therefore there is not anything which returns to nothing, but all things return dissolved into their elements."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Being, Nothing)

"Things won are done, joy's soul lies in the doing."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Soul, Joy, Lies)

"Time and the hour run through the roughest day."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Time, Day)

"'Tis best to weigh the enemy more mighty than he seems."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Enemy)

"'Tis better to bear the ills we have than fly to others that we know not of."
- William Shakespeare

"'Tis not enough to help the feeble up, but to support them after."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Help, Support)

"And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Life, Books, Brooks, Public, Running, Sermons, Trees)

"To be, or not to be: that is the question."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Question)

"There's not a note of mine that's worth the noting."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Worth)

"To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Day, Man, Night, Self)

"Truly, I would not hang a dog by my will, much more a man who hath any honesty in him."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Honesty, Man, Will)

"Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Lies)

"Use every man after his desert, and who should scape whipping?"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Man)

"Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Virtue, Goodness)

"Virtue itself scapes not calumnious strokes."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Virtue)

"We are time's subjects, and time bids be gone."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Time)

"'Tis one thing to be tempted, another thing to fall."
- William Shakespeare

"Brevity is the soul of wit."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Soul, Brevity, Wit)

"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."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Life, Men, Fortune, Now, Sea)

"There is no darkness but ignorance."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Darkness, Ignorance)

"There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Nothing, Thinking)

"There was never yet fair woman but she made mouths in a glass."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Woman)

"Children wish fathers looked but with their eyes; fathers that children with their judgment looked; and either may be wrong."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Children, Eyes, Fathers, Judgment, May, Wrong)

"By that sin fell the angels."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Angels, Sin)

"They do not love that do not show their love."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love)

"But men are men; the best sometimes forget."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Forget)

"This above all; to thine own self be true."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Self)

"Boldness be my friend."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Friend, Boldness)

"Better three hours too soon than a minute too late."
- William Shakespeare

"There's many a man has more hair than wit."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Hair, Man, Wit)

"They say miracles are past."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Miracles, Past)

"Fortune brings in some boats that are not steered."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Boats, Fortune)

"There's no art to find the mind's construction in the face."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Art, Mind)

"Love to faults is always blind, always is to joy inclined. Lawless, winged, and unconfined, and breaks all chains from every mind."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love, Blind, Faults, Joy, Mind)

"But O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man's eyes."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Happiness, Eyes, Man)

"Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Man, Voice)

"Lawless are they that make their wills their law."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Law)

"It is the stars, The stars above us, govern our conditions."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Stars)

"My pride fell with my fortunes."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Pride)

"My crown is called content, a crown that seldom kings enjoy."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Content, Kings)

"Listen to many, speak to a few."
- William Shakespeare

"Ambition should be made of sterner stuff."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Ambition)

"It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Destiny, Stars)

"Alas, I am a woman friendless, hopeless!"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Woman)

"Let every eye negotiate for itself and trust no agent."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Trust, Eye)

"A fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Fool, Man)

"A man loves the meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Age, Man, Youth)

"A peace is of the nature of a conquest; for then both parties nobly are subdued, and neither party loser."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Nature, Peace, Conquest, Party)

"We know what we are, but know not what we may be."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: May)

"Absence from those we love is self from self - a deadly banishment."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love, Absence, Self)

"Things done well and with a care, exempt themselves from fear."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Fear, Care)

"Most dangerous is that temptation that doth goad us on to sin in loving virtue."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Virtue, Sin, Temptation)

"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."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Time, Women, Being, Man, World)

"Love sought is good, but given unsought, is better."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love)

"Well, if Fortune be a woman, she's a good wench for this gear."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Fortune, Woman)

"What a piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Work, God, Action, Infinite, Man, Reason)

"What is past is prologue."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Past)

"What, man, defy the devil. Consider, he's an enemy to mankind."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Devil, Enemy, Man, Mankind)

"What's done can't be undone."
- William Shakespeare

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Name)

"When a father gives to his son, both laugh; when a son gives to his father, both cry."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Father, Son)

"It will have blood, they say; blood will have blood."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Blood, Will)

"When we are born we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Fools)

"And oftentimes excusing of a fault doth make the fault the worse by the excuse."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Fault)

"Like as the waves make towards the pebbl'd shore, so do our minutes, hasten to their end."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: End)

"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."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Life, Nothing, Poor, Shadow, Sound, Walking)

"Life is as tedious as twice-told tale, vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Life, Man)

"Life every man holds dear; but the dear man holds honor far more precious dear than life."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Life, Honor, Man)

"Let no such man be trusted."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Man)

"An overflow of good converts to bad."
- William Shakespeare

"Let me embrace thee, sour adversity, for wise men say it is the wisest course."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Adversity)

"When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions."
- William Shakespeare

"Sweet are the uses of adversity which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, wears yet a precious jewel in his head."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Adversity, Ugly)

"So foul and fair a day I have not seen."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Day)

"Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Greatness)

"Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Virtue, Sin)

"Teach not thy lip such scorn, for it was made For kissing, lady, not for such contempt."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Contempt, Lady, Kissing)

"Speak low, if you speak love."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love)

"Such as we are made of, such we be."
- William Shakespeare

"Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Mind, Suspicion)

"Sweet mercy is nobility's true badge."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Mercy, Nobility)

"Talking isn't doing. It is a kind of good deed to say well; and yet words are not deeds."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Deed, Deeds, Talking, Words)

"Reputation is an idle and most false imposition; oft got without merit, and lost without deserving."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Merit, Reputation)

"Suit the action to the word, the word to the action."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Action, Word)

"Praise us as we are tasted, allow us as we prove."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Praise)

"Poor and content is rich, and rich enough."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Content, Poor)

"Pleasure and action make the hours seem short."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Action, Pleasure)

"Parting is such sweet sorrow."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Parting, Sorrow)

"Our peace shall stand as firm as rocky mountains."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Peace, Mountains)

"Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt."
- William Shakespeare

"One touch of nature makes the whole world kin."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Nature, World)

"O' What may man within him hide, though angel on the outward side!"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Man, May)

"O! Let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven; keep me in temper; I would not be mad!"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Heaven, Temper)

"The attempt and not the deed confounds us."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Deed)

"O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Falsehood)

"The stroke of death is as a lover's pinch, which hurts and is desired."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Death)

"O, had I but followed the arts!"
- William Shakespeare

"O! for a muse of fire, that would ascend the brightest heaven of invention."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Fire, Heaven, Invention)

"The undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Country)

"I see that the fashion wears out more apparel than the man."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Apparel, Fashion, Man)

"Words, words, mere words, no matter from the heart."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Heart, Words)

"Words without thoughts never to heaven go."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Thoughts, Heaven, Words)

"Women may fall when there's no strength in men."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Women, Strength, May)

"With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Laughter, Mirth, Old)

"Wisely, and slow. They stumble that run fast."
- William Shakespeare

"Who could refrain that had a heart to love and in that heart courage to make love known?"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love, Heart, Courage)

"Where every something, being blent together turns to a wild of nothing."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Being, Nothing)

"When words are scarce they are seldom spent in vain."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Words)

"There have been many great men that have flattered the people who ne'er loved them."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, People)

"The wheel is come full circle."
- William Shakespeare

"The most peaceable way for you, if you do take a thief, is, to let him show himself what he is and steal out of your company."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Company)

"The valiant never taste of death but once."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Death, Taste)

"The course of true love never did run smooth."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love)

"O thou invisible spirit of wine, if thou hast no name to be known by, let us call thee devil."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Devil, Name, Spirit, Wine)

"The robbed that smiles, steals something from the thief."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Smiles)

"The man that hath no music in himself, Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Music, Man)

"The lunatic, the lover, and the poet, are of imagination all compact."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Imagination)

"The love of heaven makes one heavenly."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Love, Heaven)

"The lady doth protest too much, methinks."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Lady, Protest)

"The golden age is before us, not behind us."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Age)

"The fashion of the world is to avoid cost, and you encounter it."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Fashion, World)

"The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Evil)

"The empty vessel makes the loudest sound."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Sound)

"The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Purpose, Devil, Scripture)

"The very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Dream, Shadow)

"Heat not a furnace for your foe so hot that it do singe yourself."
- William Shakespeare

"I may neither choose who I would, nor refuse who I dislike; so is the will of a living daughter curbed by the will of a dead father."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Father, Daughter, Living, May, Will)

"I like not fair terms and a villain's mind."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Mind)

"I hold the world but as the world, Gratiano; A stage where every man must play a part, And mine is a sad one."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Man, Play, World)

"I had rather have a fool to make me merry than experience to make me sad and to travel for it too!"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Experience, Travel, Fool)

"I dote on his very absence."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Absence)

"I bear a charmed life."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Life)

"I am not bound to please thee with my answer."
- William Shakespeare

"How well he's read, to reason against reading!"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Reason)

"How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child!"
- William Shakespeare

"How poor are they that have not patience! What wound did ever heal but by degrees?"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Poor)

"How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds makes ill deeds done!"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Deeds, Sight)

"I never see thy face but I think upon hell-fire."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Hell)

"Hell is empty and all the devils are here."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Hell)

"Give thy thoughts no tongue."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Thoughts, Tongue)

"He that loves to be flattered is worthy o' the flatterer."
- William Shakespeare

"He that is giddy thinks the world turns round."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: World)

"He is winding the watch of his wit; by and by it will strike."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Will, Wit)

"He does it with better grace, but I do it more natural."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Grace)

"Having nothing, nothing can he lose."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Nothing)

"God hath given you one face, and you make yourselves another."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: God)

"God has given you one face, and you make yourself another."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: God)

"Go to you bosom: Knock there, and ask your heart what it doth know."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Heart)

"O God, O God, how weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world!"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: God)

"Give me my robe, put on my crown; I have Immortal longings in me."
- William Shakespeare

"I was adored once too."
- William Shakespeare

"How far that little candle throws its beams! So shines a good deed in a naughty world."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Deed, World)

"In time we hate that which we often fear."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Time, Fear, Hate)

"I say there is no darkness but ignorance."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Darkness, Ignorance)

"Now, God be praised, that to believing souls gives light in darkness, comfort in despair."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: God, Comfort, Darkness, Despair, Light, Now)

"Now is the winter of our discontent."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Discontent, Now, Winter)

"Nothing can come of nothing."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Nothing)

"No, I will be the pattern of all patience; I will say nothing."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Nothing, Patience, Will)

"No legacy is so rich as honesty."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Honesty)

"Neither a borrower nor a lender be."
- William Shakespeare

"Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Nature, Time)

"It is neither good nor bad, but thinking makes it so."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Thinking)

"Is it not strange that desire should so many years outlive performance?"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Performance, Desire, Years)

"In a false quarrel there is no true valor."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Quarrel, Valor)

"Ignorance is the curse of God; knowledge is the wing wherewith we fly to heaven."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: God, Knowledge, Heaven, Ignorance)

"I will praise any man that will praise me."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Man, Praise, Will)

"I shall the effect of this good lesson keeps as watchman to my heart."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Heart, Effect)

"It is a wise father that knows his own child."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Father)

"I were better to be eaten to death with a rust than to be scoured to nothing with perpetual motion."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Death, Nothing)

"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 shall we not revenge?"
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Poison, Revenge, Wrong)

"If it be a sin to covet honor, I am the most offending soul."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Soul, Honor, Sin)

"If music be the food of love, play on."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Food, Music, Love, Play)

"If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men's cottage princes' palaces."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Churches, Poor)

"If we are marked to die, we are enough to do our country loss; and if to live, the fewer men, the greater share of honor."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Men, Country, Honor, Loss)

"If you can look into the seeds of time, and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak then unto me."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Time, Will)

"If you have tears, prepare to shed them now."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Now, Tears)

"I wasted time, and now doth time waste me."
- William Shakespeare
(Related: Time, Now, Waste)

"Find enough clever things to say, and you're a Prime Minister; write them down and you're a Shakespeare."
- George Bernard Shaw
(Related: Shakespeare)

"Most of my career has been spent with the RSC doing Shakespeare, and the thing you learn from Shakespeare is that his historical plays don't bear anything other than a basic resemblance to history."
- Antony Sher
(Related: History, Career, Shakespeare)

"When you know your cast well and their strengths and weaknesses, you can start writing for them, just the way Shakespeare wrote for his actors."
- Stephen Sondheim
(Related: Actors, Shakespeare, Writing)

"I remain loyal to Bach, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert in music and to Shakespeare and Jane Austen in literature."
- Anne Stevenson
(Related: Music, Literature, Shakespeare)

"One day, out of irritation, I said, you know all of those years with the Royal Shakespeare Company, all those years of playing kings and princes and speaking black verse, and bestriding the landscape of England was nothing but a preparation for sitting in the captain's chair of the Enterprise."
- Patrick Stewart
(Related: Company, Day, England, Kings, Nothing, Preparation, Shakespeare, Years)

"Having spent so much of my life with Shakespeare's world, passions and ideas in my head and in my mouth, he feels like a friend - someone who just went out of the room to get another bottle of wine."
- Patrick Stewart
(Related: Life, Ideas, Friend, Shakespeare, Wine, World)

"But as I grew up as a child, falling in love with the theater and Shakespeare, my heroes were Sir Laurence Olivier and Sir John Gielgud."
- Patrick Stewart
(Related: Love, Heroes, Shakespeare, Theater)

"English dramatic literature is, of course, dominated by Shakespeare; and it is almost inevitable that an English reader should measure the value of other poetic drama by the standards which Shakespeare has already implanted in his mind."
- Lytton Strachey
(Related: Drama, English, Literature, Measure, Mind, Shakespeare, Value)

"In the literature of France Moliere occupies the same kind of position as Cervantes in that of Spain, Dante in that of Italy, and Shakespeare in that of England. His glory is more than national - it is universal."
- Lytton Strachey
(Related: EnglFrance, Glory, Italy, Literature, Shakespeare, Spain)

"A Shakespeare could have arisen only on English soil. In the same way, your great dramatists and poets express the nature and essence of the Norwegian people, but they also express that which is universally valid for all mankind."
- Gustav Stresemann
(Related: Nature, People, English, Mankind, Poets, Shakespeare)

"If you think about Shakespeare, you remember Richard III and Macbeth before you remember Ferdinand, whose role is just to fall in love and be a bit of a wimp. I love the baddies. More important, though, is making the baddies somehow, weirdly, understood."
- Mark Strong
(Related: Love, Shakespeare)

"You learn from mistakes, but Shakespeare is one big non mistake isn't he? He just got everything right really."
- Janet Suzman
(Related: Mistake, Mistakes, Right, Shakespeare)

"I don't fool myself. I can't see myself doing Shakespeare."
- Sharon Tate
(Related: Fool, Shakespeare)

"And I just think that to introduce an unknown Shakespeare is thrilling, too - not to do Hamlet or Romeo and Juliet, to do the richer Shakespeare. People will come to this and not know the story."
- Julie Taymor
(Related: People, Shakespeare, Will)

"But I don't think there has ever been anything written on the nature of violent man as deep and as thorough as Shakespeare's Titus. I think it puts all modern movies and modern exploitations of violence to shame."
- Julie Taymor
(Related: Movies, Nature, Deep, Man, Shakespeare, Shame, Violence)

"The nearest figure to myself would be Shakespeare."
- Michael Tippett
(Related: Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare fascinated me. He hardly ever left the country. His imagination was worldwide though reading."
- Michael Tippett
(Related: Imagination, Country, Reading, Shakespeare)

"Characters are an extreme form in Shakespeare's theater."
- Michael Tippett
(Related: Extreme, Shakespeare, Theater)

"There is hardly a pioneer's hut which does not contain a few odd volumes of Shakespeare. I remember reading the feudal drama of Henry V for the first time in a log cabin."
- Alexis de Tocqueville
(Related: Time, Drama, First, Reading, Shakespeare)

"Normally, I could hit hard enough, as anyone who studied my fights might have known. But the impression was that I was essentially defensive, the very reverse of a killer, the prize fighter who read books, even Shakespeare."
- Gene Tunney
(Related: Impression, Books, Shakespeare)

"On the streets, unrequited love and death go together almost as often as in Shakespeare."
- Scott Turow
(Related: Death, Love, Shakespeare)

"I'd like to do a piece of Shakespeare. Any upcoming Shakespeare film. Just a bit to say I did a classic."
- Jim Varney
(Related: Film, Shakespeare)

"I think Shakespeare is really the one. Words as music and music as words. Everything he wrote was good, which is really frightening."
- Don Van Vliet
(Related: Music, Shakespeare, Words)

"I have always wanted what I have now come to call the voice of personal narrative. That has always been the appealing voice in poetry. It started for me lyrically in Shakespeare's sonnets."
- Diane Wakoski
(Related: Poetry, Now, Shakespeare, Voice)

"How well Shakespeare knew how to improve and exalt little circumstances, when he borrowed them from circumstantial or vulgar historians."
- Horace Walpole
(Related: Circumstances, Historians, Shakespeare)

"I never wanted to become an actress because I'd read great literature or seen great Shakespeare. It was more just wanting to understand what the people were really like, why they said all the strange things they did."
- Julie Walters
(Related: People, Literature, Shakespeare)

"Any good piece of material like Shakespeare ought to be open to reinterpretation."
- Denzel Washington
(Related: Open, Shakespeare)

"Shakespeare is the one who gets re-interpreted most frequently."
- Sam Waterston
(Related: Shakespeare)

"People have known of Shakespeare's homosexuality down through the ages."
- George Weinberg
(Related: People, Homosexuality, Shakespeare)

"Now we sit through Shakespeare in order to recognize the quotations."
- Orson Welles
(Related: Now, Order, Quotations, Shakespeare)

"I'm lucky enough to work with, I think, the greatest writer there's ever been, Shakespeare. Whose collected works would always be under my pillow if I was only ever allowed one book to keep, and who never bores me."
- Samuel West
(Related: Work, Shakespeare, Writer)

"There's that old adage about how there's only seven plots in the world and Shakespeare's done them all before."
- Terri Windling
(Related: Old, Shakespeare, World)

"Nobody knows anything about Shakespeare the person. It's all legend, it is all rumor."
- Jeanette Winterson
(Related: Rumor, Shakespeare)

"I say this quite deliberately, this is the finest Shakespearean performance I've seen."
- Donald Wolfit
(Related: Performance)

"This is not writing at all. Indeed, I could say that Shakespeare surpasses literature altogether, if I knew what I meant."
- Virginia Woolf
(Related: Literature, Shakespeare, Writing)

"If you had a million Shakespeares, could they write like a monkey?"
- Steven Wright

"I surrendered to a world of my imagination, reenacting all those wonderful tales my father would read aloud to me. I became a very active reader, especially history and Shakespeare."
- Andrew Wyeth
(Related: History, Imagination, Father, Shakespeare, World)

"Doing Shakespeare in the Park has always been a dream. Everyone else says Hamlet, but I want to play Romeo."
- Aaron Yoo
(Related: Dream, Play, Shakespeare, Want)