Up@dawn 2.0

Monday, July 17, 2017

The Bard

We're pulling in shortly to Stratford-upon-Avon, as our virtual alternate-universe course continues.

Image result for stratford upon avon

Their favorite son sure had a way with words. 
  • “Words are easy, like the wind; Faithful friends are hard to find.” 
  • “Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.” 
  • “The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”
    • “Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.”
    • “All the world's a stage, 
      And all the men and women merely players; 
      They have their exits and their entrances; 
      And one man in his time plays many parts, 
      His acts being seven ages.” 
    • “Cowards die many times before their deaths;
      The valiant never taste of death but once.
      Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,
      It seems to me most strange that men should fear;
      Seeing that death, a necessary end,
      Will come when it will come.” 
    • “To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
      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 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.” 
    • “This above all: to thine own self be true,
      And it must follow, as the night the day,
      Thou canst not then be false to any man.”  
    That last one, from Hamlet, was offered by one of my undergrad philosophy profs to introduce the Existentialists' concept of authenticity. Ironic that so many have doubted the authenticity of the author of Hamlet! Bill Bryson does a nice job of rebutting the Will-deniers in his Shakespeare book, especially the patrician types who think his background was too plebeian. Bryson points out that nobody ever said Lincoln couldn't have written the Gettysburg Address just because he grew up in a log cabin.

    The Bard had a sense of humor, I'm sure he'd be amused.


     Image result for shakespeare cartoon new yorker


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