# Dirty Shakespeare **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 9, 2003, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dirty-shakespeare/212168 "2003-11-09T02:55:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2003, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dirty-shakespeare/212168/21 "2003-11-09T23:27:00Z")
From _An Incomplete Education,_ by Judy Jones and William Wilson (Ballantine Books, 1987), p. 212: > [@](#): > > DIE – Can mean “to come in lovemaking; to have an orgasm.” This is what Benedick means in _Much Ado About Nothing_ when he says, "I will live in thy mouth, die in thy lap, and be buried in thy eyes.’ Heady knowledge, but use it sparingly: _Die_ usually means, “to die.” > > \ > > HORNS – The adornment and symbol of the cheated-on husband, the cuckold. Alluded to when Othello says, “I have a pain upon my forehead here.” More often, the basis of the favorite family of jokes among the Elizabethans, who seemed to think any reference to horns was in and of itself uproarious. ---
**Author:** ![GilaB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8e7dd6/32.png) [@GilaB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GilaB)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2003, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dirty-shakespeare/212168/22 "2003-11-10T05:23:24Z")
We got the semi-bowdlerized version of Shakespeare in my high school (the joys of religious education!), so I was very surprised recently to see a reference in a story I was reading to a dirty joke in the first scene of Romeo and Juliet, which I’d read multiple times in ninth grade when I was bored with what was going on in class. Anyway, an exchange between two Capulet servants: Sampson: A dog of that house shall move me to stand: I will take the wall of any man or maid of Montague’s. Gregory: That shows thee a weak slave; for the weakest goes to the wall. Sampson: True; and therefore women, being the weaker vessels, are ever thrust to the wall: therefore I will push Montague’s men from the wall, and thrust his maids to the wall. Gregory: The quarrel is between our masters and us their men Sampson: 'Tis all one, I will show myself a tyrant: when I have fought with the men, I will be cruel with the maids, and cut off their heads. Gregory: The heads of the maids? Sampson: Ay, the heads of the maids, or their maidenheads; take it in what sense thou wilt. Gregory: They must take it in sense that feel it. Sampson: Me they shall feel while I am able to stand: and 'tis known I am a pretty piece of flesh. Gregory: 'Tis well thou art not fish; if thou hadst, thou hadst been poor John. Draw thy tool! here comes two of the house of the Montagues. ---
**Author:** ![jackelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@jackelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackelope)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2003, 5:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dirty-shakespeare/212168/23 "2003-11-10T05:57:20Z")
Oddly, I was thinking of opening a similar thread recently as well, **Johnny Bravo**. [Sonnet 20](http://www.shakespeares-sonnets.com/sonn01.htm#anchor020): > [@](#): > > A woman’s face with Nature’s own hand painted > Hast thou, the master-mistress of my passion; > A woman’s gentle heart, but not acquainted > With shifting change, as is false women’s fashion; > An eye more bright than theirs, less false in rolling, > Gilding the object whereupon it gazeth; > A man in hue, all ‘hues’ in his controlling, > Much steals men’s eyes and women’s souls amazeth. > And for a woman wert thou first created; > Till Nature, as she wrought thee, fell a-doting, > And by addition me of thee defeated, > By adding one thing to my purpose nothing. > But since she prick’d thee out for women’s pleasure, > Mine be thy love and thy love’s use their treasure. This is written to the young prettyboy the narrator admires. The “addition” by which Nature “me of thee defeated” is of course a penis; “this person is so beautiful that I can’t help being in love, but dammit, he’s MALE!” I picture him looking like young Elvis. The rest of the sonnet is left open to the interpretation of your filthy minds. ---
**Author:** ![jackelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@jackelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackelope)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2003, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dirty-shakespeare/212168/24 "2003-11-10T06:08:39Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jackelope \* > **Oddly, I was thinking of opening a similar thread recently as well, Johnny Bravo.** And my inner copyeditor begins to shriek. Make that: “It’s an odd coincidence: I was just thinking…” I wasn’t thinking oddly. Or no more so than usual, I suppose. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2003, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dirty-shakespeare/212168/25 "2003-11-10T06:14:36Z")
_Henry V_ when the French princess Katherine is getting a lesson in English from her lady in waiting: Katherine: Comment appelez-vous _le pied_ et _la robe_? [What do you call la pied and la robe?] Alice: Le foot,\* madame, et le count.\*\* Katherine: Le foot et le count! O Seigneur Dieu! ils sont les mots de son mauvais, corruptible, gros, et impudique, et non pour les dames de honneur d’user. Je ne voudrais prononcer ces mots devant les seigneurs de France pour tout le monde. Foh! le foot et le count! [Le foot and le count! O Lord, those are bad words, wicked, coarse, and immodest, and not proper for well-bred ladies to use. I wouldn’t utter those words before French gentlemen for all the world. Foh! le foot and le count!] - sounds like the French word _foutre_, “fuck” \*\* Alice meant to say “gown”; “count” sounds like the French word _con_, “cunt” ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2003, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dirty-shakespeare/212168/26 "2003-11-10T06:14:36Z")
_Romeo and Juliet_ Act III Scene 5 is full of this stuff. It’s the scene immediately following the consummation of their marriage, i.e. got down and most iambically dirty. The first word of the scene is “wilt,” in Juliet’s question “wilt thou be gone,” but of course there’s a sense that they’ve been rockin’ the bed all night and Romeo just can’t get it up again. She also makes a few bird-related references that will go over the head of a modern audience, but that follow the theme; the one that the modern listener won’t miss is when she says a bird’s call “_pierced the fearful hollow_ of thine ear.” Romeo, in his dialogue, continues the bird imagery, but also responds to the “wilt” reference when he says, “Night’s candles are burnt out.” He’s also probably thinking of Juliet’s boobalies when he describes how the breaking dawn “stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops.” He finishes this speech by saying, “I must be gone and live, or stay and die,” with “die” of course being a double entendre both for death and for sexual climax. It continues in this vein, though the references aren’t quite so explicit. The last thing Juliet says before the Nurse comes and interrupts them is “more light and light _it grows_,” and you know she’s only partly referring to the dawn. I love this stuff. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![jackelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@jackelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackelope)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2003, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dirty-shakespeare/212168/27 "2003-11-10T07:02:07Z")
This thread rocks. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dirty-shakespeare/212168.md?page=1)