Bard's Birthday

Seems like April takes the cake when it comes to birthday celebrations. 

I know for sure that the family/close friends' birthdays I've acknowledged this month would take up the fingers on both hands and maybe even a start on the toes. 

Bill and I attended a trifecta birthday party last night.  We lovingly call the honored guests the "outlaws."

In this case three birthdays of siblings (youngest 65; oldest 80) happened within a week. 

Anyway, with birthdays on the mind, this ol' English teacher always remembers the birthday of William Shakespeare April 23, 1564. 

How many times did I teach the play Julius Caesar to my sophomores.   

Probably not enough fingers and toes to get that total. 

Usually we were making our way through Julius Caesar when Shakespeare's birthday occurred. 

We didn't have parties for his birthday.  We saved those for when the kids had to recite a number of lines of Marc Antony's funeral oration for Caesar. 

Those recitals were often enhanced by creative approaches AND food AND occasionally togas. 

All fun, thanks to a brilliant writer of English literature whose works displayed the frailties and sometimes the strengths of human nature. 

So, in honor of William, the bard, today I'm keeping it simple with a few Shakespearean quotes, which when simplified remind us of our day-to-day encounters with members of the human race.

Happy Birthday, Shakespeare! 

Enjoy and maybe even ponder your own examples/experiences depicting each of the messages within Shakespeare's words.  

 Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,

And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,

I will be brief.

Hamlet

There's small choice in rotten apples.

The Taming of the Shrew

Cowards die many times before their deaths;
The valiant never taste of death but once.

Julius Caesar

Modest doubt is call'd
The beacon of the wise.

Troilus and Cressida

To gild refined gold, to paint the lily,
To throw a perfume on the violet,
To smooth the ice, or add another hue
Unto the rainbow, or with taper light
To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish,
Is wasteful and ridiculous excess.

King John

They say, best men are moulded out of faults;
And, for the most, become much more the better
For being a little bad.

Measure for Measure

Crabbed age and youth cannot live together:
Youth is full of pleasance, age is full of care.

The Passionate Pilgrim

How far that little candle throws his beams!
So shines a good deed in a naughty world.
 The Merchant of Venice

I do desire we may be better strangers.

 As You Like It

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.

 Macbeth

If music be the food of love, play on;
Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting,
 The appetite may sicken, and so die.

Shakespeare: Twelfth Night

Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt.

Measure for Measure

No legacy is as rich as honesty. 

All's Well That Ends Well