Not much introduction is needed for one of the most influential figures in the english language. However, It is interesting that despite his fame we still know so little about William Shakespeare the man.

This lack of first hand evidence has even led to theories that he never even existed at all! Or that his plays were in fact written by other people. Sir Francis Bacon often comes up...As well as his rival Christopher Marlowe.

These may be wild theories but they add to the mystique surrounding the bard and make him that much more interesting.

I hope you enjoy this collection of Shakespeare quotes!

Also take a look at some of the english language sayings that originated with Shakespeare, you may be surprised.

Shakespeare Quotes

Hamlet Quotes

"In my mind's eye."

"That it should come to this!"

"This above all: to thine own self be true."

"Neither a borrower nor a lender be; For loan oft loses both itself and friend, and borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry."

"There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so."

"The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king."

"What a piece of work is 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!"

"The lady doth protest too much, methinks."

"Brevity is the soul of wit."

"To be, or not to be: that is the question."

"When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions."

- more Shakespeare quotes -

Romeo and Juliet Quotes

"See, how she leans her cheek upon her hand! O that I were a glove upon that hand, that I might touch that cheek!"

"O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo?"

"It is the east, and Juliet is the sun."

"Tempt not a desperate man."

"Good Night, Good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow, that I shall say good night till it be morrow."

"O! she doth teach the torches to burn bright."

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

"Not stepping o'er the bounds of modesty."

- more Shakespeare quotes -

Richard III Quotes

"Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this son of York;
And all the clouds that loured upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths,
Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings,
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visaged war hath smoothed his wrinkled front,"

"So wise so young, they say, do never live long."

"A horse! a horse! My kingdom for a horse!"

"Conscience is but a word that cowards use, devised at first to keep the strong in awe."

- more Shakespeare quotes -

Macbeth Quotes

Come, you spirits
That tend on mortal thoughts! unsex me here,
And fill me from the crown to the toe, top-full
Of direst cruelty; make thick my blood,
Stop up the access and passage to remorse,
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
The effect and it! Come to my woman's breasts,
And take my milk for gall, you murdering ministers,
Wherever in your sightless substances
You wait on nature's mischief!

Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee;
I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight? or art thou but
A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?
I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw.

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.

"There 's daggers in men's smiles."

"The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees Is left this vault to brag of."

- more Shakespeare quotes -

King Lear Quotes

"Nothing will come of nothing."

"Time shall unfold what plaited cunning hides."

This is the excellent foppery of the world, that,
when we are sick in fortune,--often the surfeit
of our own behavior,--we make guilty of our
disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as
if we were villains by necessity; fools by
heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and
treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards,
liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of
planetary influence; and all that we are evil in,
by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion
of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish
disposition to the charge of a star!

- more Shakespeare quotes -

Have more than thou showest,
Speak less than thou knowest,
Lend less than thou owest.

"Who is it that can tell me who I am?"

"You see me here, you gods, a poor old man,
As full of grief as age; wretched in both!

Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow!
You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout
Till you have drenched our steeples, drowned the cocks!
You sulphurous and thought-executing fires,
Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts,
Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder,
Strike flat the thick rotundity o' the world!
Crack nature's moulds, all germens spill at once
That make ingrateful man!

"Keep thy foot out of brothels, thy hand out of plackets, thy pen from lenders' books, and defy the foul fiend."

"The prince of darkness is a gentleman."

"He's mad that trusts in the tameness of a wolf, a horse's health, a boy's love, or a whore's oath."

"You are not worth the dust which the rude wind
Blows in your face."

"When we are born we cry that we are come
To this great stage of fools.

The weight of this sad time we must obey;
Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.
The oldest hath borne most: we that are young
Shall never see so much, nor live so long.

- more Shakespeare quotes -

Othello Quotes

Heaven is my judge, not I for love and duty,
But seeming so, for my peculiar end:
For when my outward action doth demonstrate
The native act and figure of my heart
In compliment extern, 'tis not long after
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve
For daws to peck at: I am not what I am.

The Moor is of a free and open nature,
That thinks men honest that but seem to be so,
And will as tenderly be led by the nose
As asses are.

"Reputation is an idle and most false imposition; oft got without merit and lost without deserving."

Villain, be sure thou prove my love a whore,
Be sure of it; give me the ocular proof;
Or, by the worth of mine eternal soul,
Thou hadst been better have been born a dog
Than answer my wak'd wrath.

I kissed thee ere I killed thee, no way but this,
Killing myself, to die upon a kiss.

I hope you enjoyed these selected Shakespeare quotes!

Sayings That Stem From Shakespeare

All corners of the world

All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players

All's well that ends well

As dead as a doornail

As good luck would have it

At one fell swoop

Discretion is the better part of valour

Eaten out of house and home

Fair play

Fancy free

Fight fire with fire

For ever and a day

Foul play

Good riddance

Heart's content

I have not slept one wink

In a pickle

Love is blind

Make your hair stand on end

Set your teeth on edge

Star crossed lovers

The Devil incarnate

The game is afoot

There's method in my madness

This is the short and the long of it

Too much of a good thing

Vanish into thin air

Wild goose chase

Woe is me

He's had quite the influence as you can see!

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