ウィリアム・シェイクスピア
ウィリアム・シェイクスピア（英語: William Shakespeare, 1564年4月26日（洗礼日） - 1616年4月23日（グレゴリオ暦5月3日））は、イングランドの劇作家、詩人であり、イギリス・ルネサンス演劇を代表する人物でもある。卓越した人間観察眼からなる内面の心理描写により、最も優れた英文学の作家とも言われている。また彼ののこした膨大な著作は、初期近代英語の実態を知る上での貴重な言語学的資料ともなっている。 出生地はストラトフォード・アポン・エイヴォンで、1585年前後にロンドンに進出し、1592年には新進の劇作家として活躍した。1612年ごろに引退するまでの約20年間に、四大悲劇「ハムレット」、「マクベス」、「オセロ」、「リア王」をはじめ、「ロミオとジュリエット」、「ヴェニスの商人」、「夏の夜の夢」、「ジュリアス・シーザー」など多くの傑作を残した。
Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste of death but once.
Brevity is the soul of wit.
Sweet are the uses of adversity, Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, Wears yet a precious jewel in his head.
A fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool.
Women are as roses, whose fairflower being once displayed, doth fall that very hour.
You gods, will give us. Some faults to make us men.
Life is but a walking shadow.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice; Take each man’s censure, but reserve thy judgement.
Most subject is the fattest soil to weeds.
It is a wise father that knows his own child.
Love like a shadow flies when substance love pursues; Pursuing that that flies, and flying what pursues.
Glory is like a circle in the water, Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself. Till, by broad spreading it disperse to nought.
The labor we delight in cures pain.
Expectation is the root of all heartache.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be; For loan oft loses both itself and friend, And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
The course of true love never did run smooth.
Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale.
All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances; And one man in his time plays many parts, His acts being seven ages.
One sorrow never comes but brings an heir. That may succeed as his inheritor.
The miserable have no other medicine but only hope.
O, how this spring of love resembleth. The uncertain glory of an April day!
The worst is not, So long as we can say, ‘This is the worst.’
Present fears. Are less than horrible imaginings.
Love sought is good, but given unsought, is better.
There’s beggary in the love that can be reckoned.
How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a naughty world.
There is a tide in the affairs of men. Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune; Omitted, all the voyage of their life. Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
To be, or not to be: that is the question.
The better for my foes and the worse for my friends.
Poor and content is rich and rich enough; but riches endless is as poor and winter to him that ever fears he shall be poor.
There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.
Love is blind, and lovers cannot see the pretty follies that themselves commit.