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Bard's Curtain Call
Season 5 Episode 541
NARRATOR (WARM, INVITING)
Welcome to Celebrate Creativity and Conversations with Toys,
our after-hours visit to the Metropolitan Museum
of Toys and Childhood Artifacts—
where the lights are low,
the alarms are set,
and words wait quietly on the shelves…
until someone notices them.
Narrator
And we see the action figure of William Shakespeare - complete with quill - surrounded by a group of alphabet blocks. He continues to talk about his life and literary career.
Shakespeare
Many scholars believe that it was around this time that I wrote the comedy As You Like It with its famous all the world’s a stage monologue. By the way, the word sans in the last line of this monologue means without - as you can probably tell, much of my language was quite different from today.
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. At first, the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.
Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
Thank you for experiencing Celebrate Creativity.
Published on 1 week, 2 days ago