# Shakespeare's other joke **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 20, 2005, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482 "2005-09-20T02:44:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/1 "2005-09-20T02:44:19Z")
Shakespeare has two jokes. One is two people looking like each other. But what is the second? ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/2 "2005-09-20T02:47:20Z")
> [@Peter Morris](#): > > Shakespeare has two jokes. One is two people looking like each other. > > But what is the second? “Guy walks into a bar…” Sorry, I’ve never heard anybody say this before. He reused plot devices sometimes, and a missing twin was popular - he used disguises a lot, too - but not two jokes. ---
**Author:** ![anyrose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/54ee81/32.png) [@anyrose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anyrose)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/3 "2005-09-20T02:53:59Z")
are you referring to mistaken identities in the dark, as in MidSummer Night’s Dream or Much ado About Nothing? ---
**Author:** ![Terrifel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c68b51/32.png) [@Terrifel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terrifel)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/4 "2005-09-20T03:17:12Z")
I’ve never heard of “Shakespeare’s other joke,” either; but if I had to guess, I’d say that maybe it’s the ‘play-within-a-play’ gag that he seems to get a lot of mileage out of? ---
**Author:** ![Tracy\_Lord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@Tracy\_Lord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tracy_Lord)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/5 "2005-09-20T03:35:27Z")
Women dressing as men gets the most mileage (even better when the woman has a twin brother to which she looks identical when in disguise! ;)) ---
**Author:** ![Twoflower](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/twoflower/32/22_2.png) [@Twoflower](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Twoflower)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/6 "2005-09-20T04:46:01Z")
> [@Tracy Lord](#): > > Women dressing as men gets the most mileage (even better when the woman has a twin brother to which she looks identical when in disguise! ;)) I just saw Twelfth Night in Ashland a week ago … loved it! ---
**Author:** ![Tracy\_Lord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@Tracy\_Lord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tracy_Lord)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/7 "2005-09-20T05:15:35Z")
> [@Twoflower](#): > > I just saw Twelfth Night in Ashland a week ago … loved it! HECK YES you did! Isn’t Robin Nordli (the actor playing Olivia) amazing? She’s one of my favorite actors here. 🙂 Did you see anything else while you were in town? ---
**Author:** ![bienville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@bienville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bienville)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/8 "2005-09-20T13:06:07Z")
A traveller weary did enter a local tavern And brought with him a duck whom he did love But met he not so great a welcome there When from behind the bar the good proprietor Cried “Stop! and bring no turkey fowl in here!” And laughed the traveller to hear such vain protest, “Thine eyes deceive or do they fail with age? Have thou indulged unwise in ale and wine? For certain any child can know and see I carry here no turkey but a duck!” In turn did speak the barman to the tramp “T’was not to you I spoke, but to the duck!” ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/9 "2005-09-20T13:10:05Z")
I don’t know if you’d call it a joke, but he uses the idea that a man can’t tell one woman from another in the dark (as in _Measure for Measure_). It was already a venerable theatrical device when Shakespeare was born. ---
**Author:** ![Trunk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/87869e/32.png) [@Trunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trunk)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/10 "2005-09-20T13:18:12Z")
I just read in the New York Times today that the title “Much Ado About Nothing” is a play on “Much Ado About An O Thing”. “O Thing” apparently referring to female genitalia. Does this make any sense to anyone? > [@NYT](#): > > Young children will memorize the illicit inventory long before they can grasp its sense, said John McWhorter, a scholar of linguistics at the Manhattan Institute and the author of “The Power of Babel,” and literary giants have always constructed their art on its spine. > \ > The title “Much Ado About Nothing,” Dr. McWhorter said, is a word play on “Much Ado About an O Thing,” the O thing being a reference to female genitalia. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/11 "2005-09-20T13:42:14Z")
Is that serious? Because it sounds pretty ridiculously _post-hoc_. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/12 "2005-09-20T14:00:44Z")
In his will, he leaves his wife his “second-best bed”. Some might regard that as humor. I’m certain _she_ didn’t… ---
**Author:** ![Trunk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/87869e/32.png) [@Trunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trunk)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/13 "2005-09-20T14:03:04Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Is that serious? Because it sounds pretty ridiculously _post-hoc_. Are you talking to me? That is serious. The article was about curse words in society through the ages. That tidbit jumped out at me as a little bit of a reach. I was thinking, “I gotta fnd some learned doper’s opinion on that”. Sounds a little like bunk. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/14 "2005-09-20T14:04:57Z")
I don’t know about “Much Ado about an O Thing”, but a lot of Shakespeare’s jokes are puns, often very vulgar ones: > [@Shakespeare's Hamlet](#): > > **HAMLET** Lady, shall I lie in your lap? > **OPHELIA** No, my lord. > **HAMLET** I mean, my head upon your lap? > **OPHELIA** Ay, my lord. > **HAMLET** Do you think I meant country matters? > **OPHELIA** I think nothing, my lord. > **HAMLET** That’s a fair thought to lie between maids’ legs. > **OPHELIA** What is, my lord? > **HAMLET** Nothing. > **OPHELIA** You are merry, my lord. So, were Ophelia and Hamlet thinking about “an O thing” “between maid’s legs”? ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/15 "2005-09-20T14:11:04Z")
‘country matters’ is the euphemism in the above quote, not some spurious ‘o thing’ explanation. ---
**Author:** ![Corii](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/aeb1de/32.png) [@Corii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corii)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/16 "2005-09-20T15:23:52Z")
Also from Hamlet the whole “Get thee to a nunnery” line was also PUNishment; nunnery was slang for a brothel. ---
**Author:** ![thwartme](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecc23a/32.png) [@thwartme](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thwartme)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/17 "2005-09-20T15:50:48Z")
Can the OP maybe drop in and say where he heard about this “two jokes” theory? I’ve performed a great deal of Shakespeare, and worked with some pretty well-read and respected people, and I’ve never heard it mentioned before. Shakespeare had a whole pile of jokes. A lot of them were filthy. Some of them were quite topical at the time, and for some of those the full meaning may never again be known (who was the yoeman of the wardrobe, anyway?). And then there were a number of comical devices, such as the aformentioned play-within-a-play and mistaken identity bits, that he got mileage out of in more than one show. I can’t see anyone saying that old Will was a two-joke wonder. Not seriously, anyway. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/18 "2005-09-20T15:57:43Z")
> [@Terrifel](#): > > I’ve never heard of “Shakespeare’s other joke,” either; [cite.](http://www.rowanatkinson.org/jones.htm) He never does tell us what Shakespeare’s _other_ joke is. ---
**Author:** ![Terrifel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c68b51/32.png) [@Terrifel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terrifel)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/19 "2005-09-20T16:08:16Z")
> [@Peter Morris](#): > > [cite.](http://www.rowanatkinson.org/jones.htm) He never does tell us what Shakespeare’s _other_ joke is. … You’re actually Dr. John McWhorter, aren’t you? ---
**Author:** ![Max\_the\_Immortal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/6de8d8/32.png) [@Max\_the\_Immortal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_the_Immortal)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482/20 "2005-09-20T16:16:00Z")
Shakespeare’s work is saturated with sexual double-entendres. Skimming through a collection of his sonnets, it takes very little time to find poems that are thinly veiled jokes about gay sex, premature ejaculation, having a small penis… and some really nasty stuff, too. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/shakespeares-other-joke/322482.md?page=2)