# Favorite lines from Shakespeare's works **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 19, 2002, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549 "2002-08-19T04:13:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Atreyu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5e9695/32.png) [@Atreyu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atreyu)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/1 "2002-08-19T04:13:01Z")
I did a search for this, but was surprised when I couldn’t find any threads with a title relating to favorite Shakespeare lines. Hard to narrow it down, but my personal favorite is probably this soliloquoy from _Macbeth_ (my personal favorite of the Shakespearean tragedies), delivered by the title character after hearing of his wife’s suicide: “She should have died hereafter: There would have been time for such a word. Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow Creeps in this petty pace from day to day To the last syllable of recorded time, And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! Life’s but a 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.” (_Macbeth_, Act V, Scene v, 18-29) Any Dopers out there have their own personal favorites? [sub]I’m assuming that since Shakespeare’s works are in the public domain, there will be no problem with quoting his material. Right? [/sub] ---
**Author:** ![Fred](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/db5fbb/32.png) [@Fred](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fred)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/2 "2002-08-19T04:30:00Z")
As soon as I read the thread title, I thought of that exact speech. 🙂 Other than that, I dug most of Othello’s final speech, but maybe that’s just me. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/3 "2002-08-19T04:49:22Z")
“Exit, pursued by a bear.” ---
**Author:** ![Briny\_Deep](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/briny_deep/32/17188_2.png) [@Briny\_Deep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Briny_Deep)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/4 "2002-08-19T05:33:15Z")
This little exchange is a quirky favorite of mine: Hor. My lord, I came to see your father’s funeral. Ham. I prithee do not mock me, fellow-student. I think it was to see my mother’s wedding. Hor. Indeed, my lord, it follow’d hard upon. Ham. Thrift, thrift, Horatio! The funeral bak’d meats Did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables. ---
**Author:** ![Violet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/ebca7d/32.png) [@Violet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Violet)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/5 "2002-08-19T07:18:41Z")
One of many: > [@](#): > > Thou art so leaky that we must leave thee to thy sinking. – from Antony and Cleopatra ---
**Author:** ![SPOOFE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c5a1d2/32.png) [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 10:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/6 "2002-08-19T10:45:26Z")
I’ve always been partial to the Porter’s monologue from “the Scottish play” (bah, fuck the superstition… Macbeth, dammit, MACBETH!). But that’s primarily because a friend once told me all the proofs for his theory that the Porter is the most important character to the play. ---
**Author:** ![Bernard\_Marx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4491bb/32.png) [@Bernard\_Marx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bernard_Marx)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 11:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/7 "2002-08-19T11:23:20Z")
Not having my trusty “_Complete works of_” to hand I can’t give act/scene references, but from _MacBeth_: “I will not yield, To kiss the ground before young Malcolm’s feet, And to be baited with the rabble’s curse. Though Birnam wood be come to Dunsinane, And thou opposed, being of no woman born, Yet I will try the last. Before my body I throw my warlike shield. Lay on, Macduff, And damn’d be him that first cries, 'Hold, enough!” and from \*Henry V \*the whole Agincourt speech - “we few, we happy few” and all that. _Tres_ noble. Make me want to be a better person. ---
**Author:** ![dantheman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dantheman/32/9421_2.png) [@dantheman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dantheman)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 11:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/8 "2002-08-19T11:31:08Z")
> [@](#): > > If music be the food of love, play on; > Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, > The appetite may sicken, and so die. > That strain again! it had a dying fall: > O, it came o’er my ear like the sweet sound, > That breathes upon a bank of violets, > Stealing and giving odour! - Twelfth Night, Act I, scene i ---
**Author:** ![Katisha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bcef8e/32.png) [@Katisha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katisha)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/9 "2002-08-19T12:09:02Z")
Mmmmmm…Shakespeare… I’ve only got time for one right now, though. This is from _Richard II_ (3.2; don’t ask me for line numbers off the top of my head ;)): > [@](#): > > No matter where – of comfort no man speak! > Let’s talk of graves, and worms, and epitaphs, > Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes > Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth. > Let’s choose executors and talk of wills; > And yet not so, for what can we bequeath > Save our deposed bodies to the ground? > Our lands, our lives, and all are Bolingbroke’s, > And nothing can we call our own but death > And that small model of the barren earth > Which serves as paste and cover to our bones. > For God’s sake let us sit upon the ground > And tell sad stories of the death of kings: > How some have been deposed, some slain in war, > Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed, > Some poisoned by their wives, some sleeping killed, > All murdered – for within the hollow crown > That rounds the mortal temples of a king > Keeps Death his court, and there the antic sits, > Scoffing his state and grinning at his pomp, > Allowing him a breath, a little scene, > To monarchize, be feared, and kill with looks, > Infusing him with self and vain conceit > As if this flesh which walls about our life > Were brass impregnable; and, humored thus, > Comes at the last, and with a little pin > Bores through his castle wall – and farewell king! > Cover your heads, and mock not flesh and blood > With solemn reverence; throw away respect, > Tradition, form, and ceremonious duty, > For you have but mistook me all this while: > I live with bread like you, feel want, > Taste grief, need friends – subjected thus, > How can you say to me I am a king? Oh yeah…great stuff, that. Will be back with more later. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Potter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Potter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Potter)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/10 "2002-08-19T13:14:13Z")
From sonnet XVII - > [@](#): > > If I could write the beauty of your eyes, > And in fresh numbers number all your graces, > The age to come would say 'This poet lies; There’s so much to quote, but this? It’s so perfectly simple and says so much. Beautiful. ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/11 "2002-08-19T13:25:16Z")
“Old fashions please me best; I am not so nice, To change true rules for old inventions.” —Bianca, _The Taming of the Shrew_ ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/12 "2002-08-19T13:27:13Z")
. . . Actually the site I cut-and-pasted that quote from got it wrong! it should be “_odd_ inventions.” ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/13 "2002-08-19T13:32:41Z")
_Ack!_ “Hot potato, off his drawers, Puck will make amends!” [pulls Spoofe’s nose] ---
**Author:** ![Fretful\_Porpentine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fretful_porpentine/32/2873_2.png) [@Fretful\_Porpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fretful_Porpentine)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/14 "2002-08-19T13:57:52Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Northern Piper \* > \*\*“Exit, pursued by a bear.” \*\* “Enter a messenger with two heads and a hand.” _Richard III_ has some great one-liners: “Simple, plain Clarence! I do love thee so That I will shortly send thy soul to heaven – If heaven will take the present at our hands.” _Lady Anne_: Villain, thou know’st no law of God nor man: No beast so fierce but knows some touch of pity. _Richard_: But I know none, and therefore am no beast. And I absolutely adore [Mark Antony’s suicide](http://the-tech.mit.edu/Shakespeare/cleopatra/cleopatra.4.14.html), which is much too long to copy out here. ---
**Author:** ![h.sapiens](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e0b2c6/32.png) [@h.sapiens](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/h.sapiens)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/15 "2002-08-19T15:46:30Z")
A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act V: If we shadows have offended, Think but this, and all is mended, That you have but slumber’d here While these visions did appear. And this weak and idle theme, No more yielding but a dream, Gentles, do not reprehend: if you pardon, we will mend: And, as I am an honest Puck, If we have unearned luck Now to 'scape the serpent’s tongue, We will make amends ere long; Else the Puck a liar call; So, good night unto you all. Give me your hands, if we be friends, And Robin shall restore amends. Also from A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Act V: Joy, gentle friends! joy and fresh days of love Accompany your hearts! Comes in handy as a toast at weddings! ---
**Author:** ![TV\_time](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f17d59/32.png) [@TV\_time](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TV_time)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/16 "2002-08-19T16:12:43Z")
“First, kill all the lawyers.”\* - in _Romeo and Juliet_ as Mercutio lies dying having been asked by Romeo if he is all right, “'Tis not as deep as a well, nor as wide as a church door, but 'twill serve… Ask for me tomorrow and you will find me a grave man.”\* -in _Macbeth_ a discription of the execution of the original thane of Cawdor. “Nothing became his life so much as his leaving it.”\* [sub]\*keep in mind this is being done by memory so the quotes may not be exact.[/sub] ---
**Author:** ![Avalonian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ee7513/32.png) [@Avalonian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Avalonian)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/17 "2002-08-19T16:21:46Z")
Hamlet Act I, scene ii is full of some amazing passages… > [@](#): > > HAMLET: A little more than kin, and less than kind. > [@](#): > > HAMLET: Not so, my lord; I am too much i’ the sun. > [@](#): > > HAMLET: 'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother, > Nor customary suits of solemn black, > Nor windy suspiration of forced breath, > No, nor the fruitful river in the eye, > Nor the dejected 'havior of the visage, > Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief, > That can denote me truly: these indeed seem, > For they are actions that a man might play: > But I have that within which passeth show; > These but the trappings and the suits of woe. And this last, from Hamlet, Act II, scene ii, is a comedic masterpiece when performed well, with Hamlet playing Polonius like a six-string fiddle. > [@](#): > > LORD POLONIUS: Do you know me, my lord? > > HAMLET: Excellent well; you are a fishmonger. > > LORD POLONIUS: Not I, my lord. > > HAMLET: Then I would you were so honest a man. > > LORD POLONIUS: Honest, my lord! > > HAMLET: Ay, sir; to be honest, as this world goes, is to be > one man picked out of ten thousand. > > LORD POLONIUS: That’s very true, my lord. > > HAMLET: For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being a > god kissing carrion,–Have you a daughter? > > LORD POLONIUS: I have, my lord. > > HAMLET: Let her not walk i’ the sun: conception is a > blessing: but not as your daughter may conceive. > Friend, look to 't. > > LORD POLONIUS: [Aside] How say you by that? Still harping on my > daughter: yet he knew me not at first; he said I > was a fishmonger: he is far gone, far gone: and > truly in my youth I suffered much extremity for > love; very near this. I’ll speak to him again. > > What do you read, my lord? > > HAMLET: Words, words, words. > > LORD POLONIUS: What is the matter, my lord? > > HAMLET: Between who? > > LORD POLONIUS: I mean, the matter that you read, my lord. > > HAMLET: Slanders, sir: for the satirical rogue says here > that old men have grey beards, that their faces are > wrinkled, their eyes purging thick amber and > plum-tree gum and that they have a plentiful lack of > wit, together with most weak hams: all which, sir, > though I most powerfully and potently believe, yet > I hold it not honesty to have it thus set down, for > yourself, sir, should be old as I am, if like a crab > you could go backward. > > LORD POLONIUS: [Aside] Though this be madness, yet there is method in 't. > > Will you walk out of the air, my lord? > > HAMLET: Into my grave. > > LORD POLONIUS: Indeed, that is out o’ the air. > > [Aside] How pregnant sometimes his replies are! a happiness > that often madness hits on, which reason and sanity > could not so prosperously be delivered of. I will > leave him, and suddenly contrive the means of > meeting between him and my daughter. > > My honourable lord, I will most humbly take my leave of you. > > HAMLET: You cannot, sir, take from me any thing that I will > more willingly part withal: except my life, except my life, except my life. ---
**Author:** ![Intaglio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/71e660/32.png) [@Intaglio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intaglio)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/18 "2002-08-19T16:52:03Z")
Et Tu Brutus, and Beware the Ides of March - Julius Ceasar ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/19 "2002-08-19T17:05:59Z")
Best evocation of depression I done ever read (Hamlet Act 2 Scene 2): > [@](#): > > I have of late–but > wherefore I know not–lost all my mirth, forgone all > custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily > with my disposition that this goodly frame, the > earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most > excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave > o’erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted > with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to > me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. > What a piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! > how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how > express and admirable! in action how like an angel! > in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the > world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me, > what is this quintessence of dust? man delights not > me: no, nor woman neither, though by your smiling > you seem to say so. ---
**Author:** ![gallows\_fodder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8c91f0/32.png) [@gallows\_fodder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gallows_fodder)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2002, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549/20 "2002-08-19T17:28:34Z")
The line in bold occasionally pops into my consciousness at inopportune moments: [quote] I grant him bloody, Luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful, Sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin That has a name: but there’s no bottom, none, In my voluptuousness: **your wives, your daughters, Your matrons and your maids, could not fill up The cistern of my lust**, and my desire All continent impediments would o’erbear That did oppose my will: better Macbeth Than such an one to reign. –Macbeth, Act IV, Scene III [quote] Richard III and Othello have some great lines (I love Iago’s simple “I am not what I am”), but my favorite phrase of all is from the Taming of the Shrew, in which Petruchio berates the tailor and calls him “thou quantity!” (King Lear has some good insults, too – one-trunk-inheriting slave, thou eater of broken meats!, etc.) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-lines-from-shakespeares-works/124549.md?page=2)