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UNDERSTANDING SHAKESPEARE’S LANGUAGE
I can’t tell you how many times a student has remarked, “Why didn’t
Shakespeare use normal language?!” Of course, part of the reason that his
language sounds strange is that it’s hundreds of years old. But that’s not the
whole story. Many of his (and his contemporaries’) plays are written in verse
(poetry), and he certainly didn’t walk around spouting rhythm and rhyme to his
greengrocer.
But when the witches in Macbeth stir their evil, magic brew they chant:
Double, double, toil and trouble,
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.
Can you imagine how much more boring and ineffective this message would be
in prose?
(“Work and problems will increase, while our fire makes the pot boil.” I
don’t think so.)
Simply put, poetry can do things that prose cannot. It goes deeper, is more
vivid, more profound, prettier or uglier (as the case may be). It’s more “more.”
In other words: it’s less prosaic!
Most of Shakespeare’s poetry doesn’t rhyme, but it often follows a very steady
BEAT, or rhythm:
da DUH da DUH da DUH da DUH da DUH
5 beats (pattern units) of “short-long” (usually 10 syllables) is what is called
iambic pentameter. (The same of “long-short” is called trochaic pentameter.)
Iambic refers to the short-long bit, and pentameter means five meters (or feet).
In other words, it is a rhythmic pattern that repeats itself 5 times.
Shakespeare uses iambic pentameter all over the place.
How can these things in me seem scorn to you?
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or......
Arise fair sun, and kill the en vious moon,
Who is alrea dy sick and pale with grief
That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.
The metered pattern is why a character’s lines may start far from the left margin.
Two characters may share one five meter line!
(Cleo) Where is he?
(Char)
I did not see him since.
(Antony and Cleopatra)
As you read Shakespeare, concentrate on reading from period to period, and
only give the subtlest of pauses at the end of lines. In fact, until you learn how to
be really subtle, try only pausing fully at periods. Reading this way aloud (Even
if your family begins to think you’ve become a little strange when they hear
conversation in your bedroom when you’re alone in there), will definitely tease
out the meaning of the text. Remember: Shakespeare wrote these plays
as SCRIPTS for actors. I’m sure that the idea of becoming THE standard in
our American high school canon was the farthest thing from his mind. The lines
were written to be spoken, and the more you speak them, the better off you’ll be.
Four hundred years ago in Elizabethan England, people used thee, thou,
thine, thy in everyday speech. We can still hear traces of these words in certain
formal ceremonies:
Do you take this man to be thy lawful wedded husband?
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Thee - thou pronouns were used by certain kinds of people in certain
situations, such as:
 Lovers:
Wherefore art thou Romeo?
 Family Members:
Thou hast a careful father, child.
 Masters to servants:
Is not thy master with him?
The following table should prove helpful:
SINGULAR
1st 2nd
PLURAL
3rd
1st
2nd 3rd
Subject
I
thou
he/she/it
we
ye
they
Object
me
thee
him/her/it
us
you
them
Possessive
my
thine
thy
thine
his/her/its
our
your
their
Pronoun
mine
thine
his/her/its
ours
yours
theirs
As you do with verbs now, Elizabethans had to change verb endings to make
verbs agree with pronouns.
I laugh
Thou laughest
I am
You are
Thou art
I do
Thou dost
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I shall
Thou shalt
I give
She giveth
Thou
givest
MORE VERB INFLECTIONS
Third person singular: often substitute th for s:
She giveth for She gives
Second person familiar: adds the endings est, ’st, or st.
Thou givest. Thou sing’st.
Some irregular verbs:
You:
(Today, present tense)
are
have
will
Thou
(Elizabethan times, present tense)
art
hast
wilt
can
shall
do
canst
shalt
dost
(Elizabethan times, past tense)
wast
hadst
wouldst couldst
shouldst didst
Since Shakespeare’s time, many other words have changed. There are two major
types of changes:
 Words we don’t use anymore
Who would fardels bear?
The scrimers of their nation.
He galls his kibe.
With bisson rheum.
 Words that look the same but have different meanings
I could fancy more than any other
Examine well your blood
I would kiss as many of you as had beards that pleased me,
complexions that liked me
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Shakespeare also knew a LOT of words—more than perhaps all educated people
during his time. (Or ours.) Today, a very educated person might have a
vocabulary of 15,000 words at best. Shakespeare used around 30,000 words in
his writing! The more words a person knows, the better s/he can communicate.
Why? Because true synonyms are practically nonexistent, so an extensive
vocabulary can better express precise and subtle ideas. For example, one could
say I like Shakespeare. But the word like is a rather broad swipe at meaning.
Replace like with adore, admire, esteem, prize, appreciate, relish, fancy, value,
cherish, savor, treasure, and you communicate similar but subtlety distinct
ideas.
Amazingly, during the late sixteenth century, the English didn’t have enough
words for Shakespeare to do what he needed to do. No problem: he invented
new ones and used familiar ones in new ways. (For example, it was
Shakespeare’s idea to use the noun ferret as a verb meaning to seek and obtain
with determined energy. Ever see a ferret at work? It makes a perfect and
precise verb!
Some of the hundreds of words that first appear in Shakespeare’s plays:
 accommodation
 assassination
 dexterously
 dislocate
 obscene
 reliance
 premeditate
 indistinguishable
Shakespeare liked to play around with words. (There is no one more famous for
puns! Look for me tomorrow and you shall find me a grave man.
Here, even as he is dying, Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet jokes around with his
friends who are unaware that Tybalt has stabbed him.)
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He also fooled around with the order of words by:
REARRANGING
That handkerchief
Did an Egyptian to my mother give
(Othello, III. iv. 55-56)
These babes for Clarence weep, and so do I
(Macbeth, II. ii. 84)
Look I so pale, Lord Dorset, as the rest?
(Macbeth, II. i. 84)
SEPARATING
All weary and o’erwatched,
Take vantage, heavy eyes, not to behold
this shameful lodging.
(Lear, II. ii. 185-87)
Instead of: Heavy eyes, all weary and o’erwatched, take
vantage not to behold this shameful lodging.
GRAMMATICAL SHIFTS
This sickly land might solace as before
(Macbeth, II. iii. 30)
Instead of: This sickly land might give solace as before
OMITTING
I’ll to England
(Macbeth, II. iii. 137)
Instead of: I’ll go to England
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WHY? WHY? WHY?
 Sometimes to make the words fit five beats
 Sometimes to accommodate rhyme
 Sometimes to reveal a nuance
 Sometimes to spin the meaning of the words
But more than anything else, I get the impression that Shakespeare loved to play
with words, to revel in the joy and beauty of words, to bathe himself in the sound
and sense of them.
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SOME REFERENCES
Abbott, E. A. A Shakespearean Grammar, new ed. London:
Macmillan, 1879. (A grammar textbook arranged by part of speech,
rife with quotations from the plays and poems)
Blake, Norman. Shakespeare’s Language: An Introduction. New
York: St. Martin’s Press, 1983.
Charney, Maurice. How to Read Shakespeare. New York: McGrawHill, 1971.
Hussey, S. S. The Literary Language of Shakespeare. London:
Longmans, 1982.
Onions, C. T. A Shakespeare Glossary.
Roberts, Marcia. Reading Shakespeare. New York: Harcourt, 1969.
(A student workbook of 52 chapters)
Tilley, Maurice Palmer. A Dictionary of Proverbs in England in the
Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. Ann Arbor: University of
Michigan Press, 1950.
Vickers, Brian. “Shakespeare’s Use of Rhetoric,” Chapter 6 of Kenneth
Muir and S. Schoenbaum, A New Companion to Shakespeare
Studies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1971. (A
technical rhetorical analysis for teachers and the most advanced
students.)
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