Posted on 09/17/2011 8:57:46 PM PDT by Mountain Bike Vomit Carnage
As a self-proclaimed loser word nerd, my absolute favorite class in college was Shakespeare. Regardless if the dude even existed or not, I feel intimidated writing about him using my own pathetically limited vocabulary, as I am that enthralled and marveled by his English language skillz (sorry, Will).
That's why I was so stoked to see the newest Tumblr hit sweeping the Internet world: "Things We Say Today Which We Owe to Shakespeare." There are so many things! I remember reading through his plays late at night for class, coming across phrases and sayings and having the light bulb in my head go off: So that's where that came from.
A 20-year-old from London named Becky scribbled down a bunch of these sayings in her notebook and posted it to Tumblr. And people love it! Who'da thunk it ... I mean, o, wonder! How many goodly creatures are there here! How beauteous mankind is!
I guess this is proof that Shakespeare and technology actually can get along. Here are just eight of the best from the wonderment that is Becky's list:
Love is blind: "But love is blind, and lovers cannot see/The petty follies that themselves commit." -- Jessica, The Merchant of Venice (this phrase appears in Two Gentlemen of Verona and Henry V)
Knock knock! Who's there?: "Knock, knock, knock! Who's there, i' th' name of Beelzebub? Here's a farmer that hanged himself on the expectation of plenty. Come in time, have napkins enough about you, here you'll sweat for 't." -- Drunk or hungover porter, Macbeth
Green-eyed monster: "O, beware, my lord, of jealousy!/It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock/The meat it feeds on." -- Iago, Othello
The world is my oyster: "Why then the world's mine oyster/Which I with sword will open." -- Pistol, The Merry Wives of Windsor
Wild goose chase: "Nay, if our wits run the wild-goose chase, I am done; for thou hast more of the wild goose in one of thy wits than, I am sure, I have in my whole five." -- Mercutio, Romeo & Juliet
In a pickle: "And Trinculo is reeling ripe: where should they find this grand liquor that hath gilded 'em? How camest thou in this pickle?" -- Alonso, The Tempest
Break the ice: "And if you break the ice and do this feat/Achieve the elder, set the younger free/For our access, whose hap shall be to have her/Will not so graceless be to be ingrate." -- Tranio, The Taming of the Shrew
Hair stand on end: "Thy knotted and combinèd locks to part/And each particular hair to stand on end/Like quills upon the fearful porpentine." -- Ghost, Hamlet
Did you know we had Shakespeare to thank for these phrases? I didn't!
We are such stuff as dreams are made of, and our lives are rounded with a little sleep. - Prospero - “The Tempest.”
I Believe you must be “in your cups”...Romeo and Juliet
I Believe you must be “in your cups”...Romeo and Juliet
The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers!
A plague on both your houses. Often rendered incorrectly as a POX on both your houses. ~ Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet
8:}
Did he/you say light BULB? You talkin about those things we put in our lights and give off good light and some heat in the Northeast winter...Shakespeare? Talked lighbulbs. I think Gore just fainted.
A common confusion in the sign....It’s bated breath as in weak and hesitant not baited...something done to mouse traps and fish hooks, not breath.
"Merchant of Da Hood," I think.
Or was it "The Taming of the Ho?"
and make worms meat... of you.... Mercutio
I tried to get into Shakespeare, but it was just too full of clichés...
I thought it was in Henry XXIV...
;-P
To thine own self be true.
Act1, Sc3, Hamlet
and make worms meat... of you.... Mercutio
look for me tomorrow and you will find me a grave man
That’s one of my favorite quotes. It begins with “Neither a borrower nor a lender be...”
‘hairs’ breadth ‘scapes’ (Othello)
The Romans previously put it something like “Graecum est; non potus legum” (it’s Greek; it can’t be read).
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