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Nov. 18, 2006 At one time I was a Shakespeare reader. I didn’t see any of his plays performed live, but that was not for lack of trying. It was simply a matter of not being in the right place at the right time. I saw movie versions of several of his plays, most memorably, Zeffirelli’s “Romeo and Juliet”, whence the song, “What Is a Maid?”. I did, however, read most of his plays, two or three times, all in high style. I’d sit in a red velvet robe, in a leather wing chair, with a hide-bound volume with gilt-edged pages. This was to put me in the mood, and it went on mostly during the 70’s and 80’s. I approached Shakespeare with a kind of mystical awe, deifying him in my mind like some of the other famous poets of yore, for example, Homer and Vergil, whom I had already read and idolized. Today, at a more advanced age, I don’t know if I could recapture that magical feeling that I then had. I’ve grown much more mundane, scientific and pragmatic. I don’t even know if I could still muster up the nerve to say that Shakespeare was the greatest poet or playwright in the English language, as I used to do so glibly, having read not even 1% of such poets. But it’s safe to say that I recall a few passages that I considered gems, and thought I’d offer them up for whatever they’re worth. The first excerpt is from “Richard II”. John of Gaunt describes an England he considers shamed: “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, This nurse, this teeming womb of royal kings, This land of such dear souls, this dear dear land, Dear for her reputation through the world, Is now leas'd out — I die pronouncing it — Like to a tenement or pelting farm.” Another moving passage is the soliloquy of King Henry VI, who didn’t want to be a king, from “King Henry VI”, Part II: “O God! methinks it were a happy life To be no better than a homely swain, To sit upon a hill as I do now, To carve out dials quaintly, point by point, Thereby to see the minutes how they run: How many make the hour full complete, How many hours bring about the day, How many days will finish up the year, How many years a mortal man may live. When this is known, then to divide the times: So many hours must I tend my flock, So many hours must I take my rest, So many hours must I contemplate, So many hours must I sport myself; So many days my ewes have been with young, So many weeks ere the poor fools will yean, So many months ere I shall shear the fleece: So many minutes, hours, weeks, months, and years Past over, to the end they were created, Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave. Ah! what a life were this! how sweet, how lovely! Gives not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shade To shepherds looking on their silly sheep, Than doth a rich embroidered canopy To kings that fear their subjects' treachery? O yes it doth, a thousand-fold it doth. And to conclude, the shepherds' homely curds, His cold thin drink out of his leather bottle, His wonted sleep under a fresh tree's shade, All which secure and sweetly he enjoys, Is far beyond a prince's delicates, His viands sparkling in a golden cup, His body couched in a curious bed, When care, mistrust, and treasons wait on him.” One of Shakespeare’s most sumptuous and voluptuous passages comes from the mouth of Domitius Enobarbus, in the play, “Anthony and Cleopatra”: “The barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne, Burn'd on the water: the poop was beaten gold; Purple the sails, and so perfumed that The winds were love-sick with them; the oars were silver, Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made The water which they beat to follow faster, As amorous of their strokes. For her own person, It beggar'd all description: she did lie In her pavilion--cloth-of-gold of tissue-- O'er-picturing that Venus where we see The fancy outwork nature: on each side her Stood pretty dimpled boys, like smiling Cupids, With divers-colour'd fans, whose wind did seem To glow the delicate cheeks which they did cool, And what they undid did. … Her gentlewomen, like the Nereides, So many mermaids, tended her i' the eyes, And made their bends adornings: at the helm A seeming mermaid steers: the silken tackle Swell with the touches of those flower-soft hands, That yarely frame the office. From the barge A strange invisible perfume hits the sense Of the adjacent wharfs. The city cast Her people out upon her; and Antony, Enthroned i' the market-place, did sit alone, Whistling to the air; which, but for vacancy, Had gone to gaze on Cleopatra too, And made a gap in nature.” My choices are not entirely capricious or personalized. All three of these passages are widely recognized as among the choicest of the bard’s words. I trust that their merit is obvious enough. ------------ About the author Thomas Keyes: I have written two books: A SOJOURN IN ASIA (non-fiction) and A TALE OF UNG (fiction), neither published so far. I have studied languages for years and traveled extensively on five continents. Email: udikeyes@yahoo.com Comment on this article here! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
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