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Shakespeare’s
Language
ROMEO & JULIET

Shakespeare’s English

 Shakespeare did not write in
Old English or Middle English.
 Shakespeare wrote in Early
Modern English.
 Early Modern English is only one
generation of language from
the English you speak today!

Shakespeare’s Contributions

 Shakespeare only had an 8th grade education.
 There were no dictionaries.
 Shakespeare is credited by the Oxford English
Dictionary with the introduction of nearly 3,000
words into the language.
 His vocabulary numbers upward of 17,000 words
(quadruple that of an average, well-educated
conversationalist in the language)

A Few Words By Shakespeare

 Accused  Disgraceful
 Addiction  To drug
 Admirable  Excitement
 Assassination  Fashionable
 Bloodstained  Fortune-teller
 Cold-blooded  Gloomy
 Coldhearted  Mimic
 Deafening  Obscene

Phrases Coined by Shakespeare

 As good luck would have it  Full circle
 Be-all and the end-all  Good riddance
 Break the ice  It was Greek to me
 Eaten me out of house and  Heart of gold
home
 In a pickle
 Elbow room
 Kill with kindness
 Fool's paradise
 Lie low
 For goodness' sake
 Love is blind
 Not slept one wink


 In the England of Shakespeare's time, English was a
lot more flexible as a language.
 The most common simple sentence in modern
English follows a familiar pattern: Subject (S), Verb
(V), Object (O). (Will caught the ball).
 However, Shakespeare was much more at liberty to
switch these three basic components
 Shakespeare used a great deal of SOV inversion (Will
the ball caught).


 Switching the S-V-O order to S-O-V made it easier for
Shakespeare to rhyme and to manipulate his words
to flow easily in poems and plays.
 Shakespeare could effectively place the metrical
stress wherever he needed it most by switching word
order
 Shakespeare also used an O-S-V construction (The
ball Will caught) for the same reasons.

Inverted Word Order

 Lady Montague:
 O where is Romeo, saw you him
today?
 Right glad I am he was not at this
fray.
 Translation:
 O where is Romeo; did you see him
today?
 I am very glad he was not in this fight.

Inverted Word Order

 ―Thouhast by moonlight at
her window sung.‖
 Translation:
 Youhave sung at her
window in the moonlight.
 From A Midsummer Night’s Dream

Shakespeare’s Language in Plays

The language used by
Shakespeare in his plays
is in one of three forms
Prose
Rhymed Verse
Blank Verse

Prose

 Prose is writing which resembles
everyday speech
 Prose is often used by Shakespeare
for lower-class characters in his
plays
 Prose lacks meter and rhyme and
is informal
 Shakespeare blends prose with
poetry in his plays

Rhymed Verse

 The majority of Shakespeare’s plays contain rhymed
verse which looks like poetry
 Characters– especially of the higher classes--speak
in poetic form
 Their words have form, meter, and rhyme
 Rhymed verse in Shakespeare's plays is usually in
rhymed couplets, i.e. two successive lines of verse of
which the final words rhyme with another.

Iambic Pentameter

 Iambic pentameter is meter that Shakespeare
nearly always when writing in verse. Most of his plays
were written in iambic pentameter.
 Iambic Pentameter has:
 Ten syllables in each line
 Five pairs of alternating unstressed and stressed
syllables
 The rhythm in each line sounds like:
ba-BUM / ba-BUM / ba-BUM / ba-
BUM / ba-BUM

Iambic Pentameter Example

 Examples of Iambic Pentameter:
 If mu- / -sic be / the food / of love, / play on
 Is this / a dag- / -ger I / see be- / fore me?
 Each pair of syllables is called an iamb. You’ll notice
that each iamb is made up of one unstressed and
one stressed beat (ba-BUM).

Rhymed Verse in Iambic
Pentameter

 Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.
Nor hath Love's mind of any judgment taste;
Wings, and no eyes, figure unheedy haste:
And therefore is Love said to be a child,
Because in choice he is so oft beguiled.

- from A Midsummer Night’s
Dream

Blank Verse

 Blank verse refers to unrhymed iambic pentameter.
 resembles prose in that the final words of the lines do
not rhyme in any regular pattern
 There is meter: a recognizable rhythm in a line of
verse consisting of a pattern of regularly recurring
stressed and unstressed syllables.
 Most lines are in iambic pentameter.

Blank Verse

 BLANK VERSE is employed in a wide range of
situations because it comes close to the natural
speaking rhythms of English but raises it above the
ordinary without sounding artificial
 Rather than prose, blank verse may suggest a
refinement of character.
 Many of Shakespeare's most famous speeches are
written in blank verse.

Blank Verse Example

ROMEO: But, soft! what light through
yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief,
That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.
Be not her maid, since she is envious;
Her vestal livery is but sick and green
And none but fools do wear it; cast it off.
from Romeo and Juliet

Prose, Rhymed Verse or Blank
Verse?

 Juliet: Wilt thou be gone? It is not yet near day.
 It was the nightingale, and not the lark,
 That pierced the fearful hollow of thine ear;
 Nightly she sings on yond pomegranate tree
 Believe me, love, it was the nightingale.

Verse?

 Abraham: Do you bite your thumb at us, sir?
 Sampson: No, sir, I do not bite my thumb at
you, sir, but I bite my thumb, sir.
 Gregory: Do you quarrel, sir?
 Abraham: Quarrel, sir? No, sir.

Verse?

 Full fathom five thy father lies
 Of his bones are coral made
 Those are pearls that were his eyes
 Nothing of him that doth fade
 But doth suffer a sea change
 Into something rich and strange.

Verse?

 NURSE: He was a merry man—took up the child.
 ―Yea,‖ quoth he, ―Dost thou fall upon thy face?
 Thou wilt fall backward when thou hast more wit,
 Wilt thou not, Jule?‖ and, by my holy dame,
 The pretty wretch left crying and said ―ay.‖

Verse?

 ROMEO:
 Oh, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
 It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
 Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope's ear,
 Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear.

Verse?

 ROMEO
 Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?
 JULIET
 Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.
 ROMEO
 O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do.
 They pray; grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.

Verse?

 ROMEO
 Here's goodly gear.
 BENVOLIO
 A sail, a sail!
 MERCUTIO
 Two, two—a shirt and a smock.

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Shakespeare

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