Poem of the Week

Happy Birthday To Ye!

No one really knows when the Bard was born, but records of his christening on April 26th suggest that April 23rd is his birthday. So many of our ideas about this guy who wrote in iambic pentameter, had no formal education, and who we all had to read in school or otherwise are dubious. There is even speculation as to whether or not Shakespeare wrote all the plays and sonnets which have been attributed to him. Recently, scientists ran his plays through a fancy computer program to compare his work to his contemporaries, such as Francis Bacon, Christopher Marlowe, and the Earl of Oxford. The only writer who used words and phrases similar to Shakespeare's was Queen Elizabeth I, and she was eventually ruled out.

Wielding about 30, 000 words, like so many swords, Shakespeare boasts one of the largest vocabularies of any English writer. Plus, he's responsible for some pretty incredible idioms and phrases, including "foul play," "as luck would have it," "too much of a good thing," "good riddance," "in one fell swoop," "cruel to be kind," "play fast and loose," "vanish into thin air," "the game is up," "truth will out" and "in the twinkling of an eye."

Sonnet 29
When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,
Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts my self almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.