Along with writing his plays, he reportedly acted in them sometimes too.

He was secretly Catholic, something that was illegal in England at the time. In his will, Shakespeare left most of his belongings to one of his daughters, and only bequeathed his wife “the second best bed.” Shakespeare got married when he was 18 years old to 26-year-old Anne Hathaway (not to be confused, of course, with the modern actress with the same name). (Sidenote: I think England’s hyphenated town names are delightful.) His father was a glove maker. His hometown was a place in England named Stratford-upon-Avon. These are all interesting tidbits about Shakespeare’s work, but this week I also dug up some random facts about the man himself, courtesy of the website My favorite, however, is simply “You scullion! You rampallian! You fustilarian!” from “Henry IV, Part 2.” Fun words to say, right? Scullion is a person who does grunt work in the kitchen, rampallian means something like a scoundrel, and fustilarian is a clumsy person. I particularly like this one from the play “All’s Well That Ends Well” because the character speaking basically starts with the equivalent of “no offense but…” and follows up with “he’s a most notable coward, an infinite and endless liar, an hourly promise-breaker, the owner of no one good quality.” Surely, some offense was meant there. Here are a few examples of Shakespeare’s swears that you can use to spice up your complaints:Ī character in “As You Like It” declares “your brain is as dry as the remainder biscuit after voyage.” Use this one whenever you want to say someone’s head is only filled with dry, stale biscuits. Some of my other favorites include “dead as a doornail” (from Henry VI Part II), “It’s Greek to me” (from Julius Caesar), and “in a pickle” (from The Tempest). Patroclus from the play “Troilus and Cressida” says this once a character he doesn’t like exits the stage. When you get annoyed with someone or something, do you say “good riddance” when it’s gone? Shakespeare’s responsible for that one too. Shakespeare penned that phrase in his play “Othello” when Iago warns the titular character “beware, my lord, of jealousy! It is the green-eyed monster, which doth mock the meat it feeds on.” We often use the phrase “green-eyed monster” to describe jealousy. Again, a confusing, comedic love triangle ensues with the new people she meets. The story is actually an adaptation of Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night” play, a tale of shipwrecked twins Viola and Sebastian who get separated, and Viola ends up disguising herself as a man. A confusing, comedic love triangle ensues with her new classmates. Have you ever seen the 2006 comedy film “She’s the Man”? It stars Amanda Bynes and Channing Tatum, and tells the story of Viola, an aspiring soccer player who enrolls in place of her brother at a fancy prep school and pretends to be a boy to play on their soccer team. Here are a few examples of works inspired by Shakespeare’s plays: It’s really astounding how often we quote or engage with Shakespeare’s work without even realizing it. I’ve written columns before on this subject, detailing how modern works draw inspiration from his own, which common phrases he penned and popularized, and even the best silly insults Shakespeare came up with. His impact on our language and literature today, made through his plays and sonnets written over 400 years ago, is almost unfathomable.

Romeo and juliet with sidenotes