CJTranslations - language

QUOTES BY TOPIC

“Was” is not “is.”

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Celia
CONTEXT:
CELIA
Yes, I think he is not a pick-purse nor a
horse-stealer, but for his verity in love, I do think
him as concave as a covered goblet or a worm-eaten nut.
ROSALIND
Not true in love?
CELIA
Yes, when he is in, but I think he is not in.
ROSALIND
You have heard him swear downright he was.
CELIA
“Was” is not “is.” Besides, the oath of a lover is no
stronger than the word of a tapster. They are both the
confirmer of false reckonings. He attends here in the
forest on the duke your father.
ROSALIND
I met the duke yesterday and had much question with
him. He asked me of what parentage I was. I told him, of
as good as he. So he laughed and let me go. But what
talk we of fathers when there is such a man as Orlando?

DUTCH:
Was is geen is; bovendien, de eed van een minnaar is niet meer waard dan de eed van een tapper; zij zijn beide de bekrachtiging van valsche rekeningen

MORE:
Verity=Truthfulness
Concave=Hollow
Downright=Directly, without stopping short, without further ceremony, plainly
Tapster=Barman (traditionally considered dishonest)
False=Not right, wrong, erroneous
Reckoning=The money charged by a host (a Bill)
Question=Conversation
Compleat:
Verity=Waarheyd
Concave=Hol
Downright (plain and clear)=Eenvoudig and clear
Downright (plain or open)=Duidelyk of openhartig
A downright contradiction=Een rechtstrydede zaak
Tapster=Een tapper, biertapper
False=Valsch, onwaar; nagemaakt, verraderlyk
Reckoning=(in a public house) Gelach

Topics: language, clarity/precision, truth, honesty

A book? O rare one!
Be not, as is our fangled world, a garment nobler than that it covers:

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 5.4
SPEAKER: Posthumus Leonatus
CONTEXT:
POSTHUMUS LEONATUS
Sleep, thou hast been a grandsire, and begot
A father to me; and thou hast created
A mother and two brothers: but, O scorn!
Gone! they went hence so soon as they were born:
And so I am awake. Poor wretches that depend
On greatness’ favour dream as I have done,
Wake and find nothing. But, alas, I swerve:
Many dream not to find, neither deserve,
And yet are steep’d in favours: so am I,
That have this golden chance and know not why.
What fairies haunt this ground? A book? O rare one!
Be not, as is our fangled world, a garment
Nobler than that it covers: let thy effects
So follow, to be most unlike our courtiers,
As good as promise.
When as a lion’s whelp shall, to himself unknown,
without seeking find, and be embraced by a piece of
tender air; and when from a stately cedar shall be
lopped branches, which, being dead many years,
shall after revive, be jointed to the old stock and
freshly grow; then shall Posthumus end his miseries,
Britain be fortunate and flourish in peace and plenty.’
‘Tis still a dream, or else such stuff as madmen
Tongue and brain not; either both or nothing;
Or senseless speaking or a speaking such
As sense cannot untie. Be what it is,
The action of my life is like it, which
I’ll keep, if but for sympathy.

DUTCH:
Een boek? 0 kleinood!
0, wees niet als de wereld thans, een kleed,
Dat eed’ler is dan wat het dekt; uw inhoud
Blijke, ongelijk aan onze hovelingen,
Zoo goed als gij gelooft.

MORE:
Swerve=Go off course, go astray
Such stuff as madmen tongue=The nonsensical, irrational talk of madmen
Or=Either
Jointed=Grafted
Sympathy=Any conformity, correspondence, resemblance
Compleat:
Swerve=Afdwaaaien, afdoolen, afzwerven
Sympathy (natural agreement of things)=Natuurlyke overeenstemming of trek der dingen

Topics: madness, nature, language, reason

A fine volley of words, gentlemen, and quickly shot off

PLAY: The Two Gentlemen of Verona
ACT/SCENE: 2.4
SPEAKER: Silvia
CONTEXT:
VALENTINE
Give him leave, madam; he is a kind of chameleon.
THURIO
That hath more mind to feed on your blood than live in your air.
VALENTINE
You have said, sir.
THURIO
Ay, sir, and done too, for this time.
VALENTINE
I know it well, sir; you always end ere you begin.
SYLVIA
A fine volley of words, gentlemen, and quickly shot off.

DUTCH:
Een fraai geweervuur van woorden, edele heeren; en
wakker losgebrand!

MORE:
Proverb: Saying and doing are two things

Chameleon=Colour-shifting lizard, believed in Sh’s time to live on air
You have said=So you say (you have yet to do)
For this time=For the moment
Compleat:
Chamelion or camelion=Een kamelion [zeker dier]

Topics: language, appearance, proverbs and idioms, still in use

A good moral, my lord: it is not enough to speak, but to speak true

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: Prologue
SPEAKER: Theseus
CONTEXT:
PROLOGUE
If we offend, it is with our good will.
That you should think we come not to offend,
But with good will. To show our simple skill,
That is the true beginning of our end.
Consider then we come but in despite.
We do not come as minding to contest you,
Our true intent is. All for your delight
We are not here. That you should here repent you,
The actors are at hand, and by their show
You shall know all that you are like to know.
THESEUS
This fellow doth not stand upon points.
LYSANDER
He hath rid his prologue like a rough colt. He knows
not the stop. A good moral, my lord: it is not enough to
speak, but to speak true.

DUTCH:
Mishagen we u, we wenschen dit als gunst.
Dat gij ons ijvrig denkt uw lof te winnen,
‘t Kan dwaling zijn. Dit toonen onzer kunst,
‘t Is toch het eind, waarmee we thans beginnen.

MORE:
Quince alters the meaning of the Prologue completely by speaking punctuation in the wrong places.

Minding=Intending
Stand upon=Be concerned with
Points=Punctuation
Compleat:
Minded=Gezind, betracht
To stand upon punctilio’s=Op vodderyen staan blyven
To point=Met punten of stippen onderscheyden, punteeren

Topics: language, offence, life, truth, honesty

A strange tongue makes my cause more strange, suspicious.

PLAY: King Henry VIII
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Queen Katherine
CONTEXT:
CARDINAL WOLSEY
Tanta est erga te mentis integritas, regina serenissima
QUEEN KATHARINE
O, good my lord, no Latin!
I am not such a truant since my coming
As not to know the language I have lived in.
A strange tongue makes my cause more strange, suspicious.
Pray speak in English. Here are some will thank you,
If you speak truth, for their poor mistress’ sake.
Believe me, she has had much wrong. Lord Cardinal,
The willing’st sin I ever yet committed
May be absolved in English

DUTCH:
Een vreemde tong maakt mijne zaak licht vreemder,
Licht meer verdacht.

MORE:
Truant=Poor student
Coming=Arrival (in England)
Strange tongue=Foreign language
Strange=Odd, alien
Willing=Most eagerly (committed)
Compleat:
Truant=Een Lanterfant
To play the truant=Lanterfanten; in plaats van na school te gaan, speelen loopen (Amsterdam zegt ‘Stutteloopen’)
Willing=Willende, gewillig
Willingly=Gewilliglyk

Topics: language, order/society

Action is eloquence, and the eyes of the ignorant more learned than the ears

PLAY: Coriolanus
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Volumnia
CONTEXT:
VOLUMNIA
I prithee now, my son,
Go to them, with this bonnet in thy hand;
And thus far having stretch’d it—here be with them—
Thy knee bussing the stones—for in such business
Action is eloquence, and the eyes of the ignorant
More learned than the ears—waving thy head,
Which often, thus, correcting thy stout heart,
Now humble as the ripest mulberry
That will not hold the handling: or say to them,
Thou art their soldier, and being bred in broils
Hast not the soft way which, thou dost confess,
Were fit for thee to use as they to claim,
In asking their good loves, but thou wilt frame
Thyself, forsooth, hereafter theirs, so far
As thou hast power and person.

DUTCH:
Want gebaren
Zijn reed’naars bij onnooz’len, daar hun oog
Min stomp is dan hun oor

MORE:
Bonnet=Take off a bonnet (sign of respect, courtesy)
To buss=To kiss
Broil=War, combat, battle
Hold=Bear, stand up to
Compleat:
To buss=Zoenen, kussen
Broil=Oproer, beroerte, gewoel

Topics: language, appearance, flattery, manipulation, promise

All this I speak in print, for in print I found it

PLAY: The Two Gentlemen of Verona
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Speed
CONTEXT:
SPEED
I’ll warrant you, ’tis as well:
For often have you writ to her, and she, in modesty,
Or else for want of idle time, could not again reply;
Or fearing else some messenger that might her mind discover,
Herself hath taught her love himself to write unto her lover.
All this I speak in print, for in print I found it.
Why muse you, sir? ‘Tis dinner-time.

DUTCH:
Ik sla u borg, zoo is het, en niet anders;
Gij schreeft wel vaak aan haar een brief, maar zij, uit zedigheid

MORE:
Idle time=Time to spare
Discover=Reveal
Speak in print=Say meticulously
Muse=Ponder
Compleat:
Discover=Ontdekken, bespeuren, aan ‘t licht brengen
To muse=Bepeinzen

Topics: language, communication

An honest tale speeds best, being plainly told

PLAY: Richard III
ACT/SCENE: 4.4
SPEAKER: Queen Elizabeth
CONTEXT:
QUEEN ELIZABETH
But how long shall that title “ever” last?
KING RICHARD
Sweetly in force unto her fair life’s end.
QUEEN ELIZABETH
But how long fairly shall her sweet life last?
KING RICHARD
As long as heaven and nature lengthens it.
QUEEN ELIZABETH
As long as hell and Richard likes of it.
KING RICHARD
Say I, her sovereign, am her subject low.
QUEEN ELIZABETH
But she, your subject, loathes such sovereignty.
KING RICHARD
Be eloquent in my behalf to her.
QUEEN ELIZABETH
An honest tale speeds best being plainly told.
KING RICHARD
Then plainly to her tell my loving tale.
QUEEN ELIZABETH
Plain and not honest is too harsh a style.
KING RICHARD
Your reasons are too shallow and too quick.

DUTCH:
t Eenvoudigst woord wint best een goede zaak .

MORE:
Title=Word
Sovereignty=Rule
Speeds=Progresses
Compleat:
Title=Een tytel, opschrift
To speed=Voortspoeden, voorspoedig zyn, wel gelukken

Topics: honesty, communication, language

And being fap, sir, was, as they say, cashiered; and so conclusions passed the careers

PLAY: The Merry Wives of Windsor
ACT/SCENE:
SPEAKER: Bardolph
CONTEXT:
BARDOLPH
Why, sir, for my part I say the gentleman had drunk
himself out of his five sentences.
SIR HUGH EVANS
It is his five senses: fie, what the ignorance is!
BARDOLPH
And being fap, sir, was, as they say, cashiered; and
so conclusions passed the careers.
SLENDER
Ay, you spake in Latin then too; but ’tis no
matter: I’ll ne’er be drunk whilst I live again,
but in honest, civil, godly company, for this trick:
if I be drunk, I’ll be drunk with those that have
the fear of God, and not with drunken knaves.
SIR HUGH EVANS
So Got udge me, that is a virtuous mind.
FALSTAFF
You hear all these matters denied, gentlemen; you hear
it.

DUTCH:
En toen hij vetjens was, Sir, werd hij, om zoo te zeggen,
gecasseerd; en zoo gingen zijn conclusa’s de spiegaten
uit.

MORE:
Sentences=Bardolph means the five senses
Latin=Meaning a different language (he doesn’t understand the terms used)
Fap=Drunk
Cashiered=Dismissed from service (punning on cash-sheared, i.e. robbed)
Passed the careers=Got out of hand (careering)
For this trick=Because of this trick
God udge me=Judge me
Compleat:
Cashiered=Afgedankt, de zak gekreegen, ontslagen
Career=Een loop, renperk, wedloop
Trick=Een looze trek, greep, gril

Topics: language, communication, understanding, intellect

And dull unfeeling barren ignorance Is made my gaoler to attend on me

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Thomas Mowbray
CONTEXT:
The language I have learn’d these forty years,
My native English, now I must forego:
And now my tongue’s use is to me no more
Than an unstringed viol or a harp,
Or like a cunning instrument cased up,
Or, being open, put into his hands
That knows no touch to tune the harmony:
Within my mouth you have engaol’d my tongue,
Doubly portcullis’d with my teeth and lips;
And dull unfeeling barren ignorance
Is made my gaoler to attend on me.
I am too old to fawn upon a nurse,
Too far in years to be a pupil now:
What is thy sentence then but speechless death,
Which robs my tongue from breathing native breath?

DUTCH:
En maakt tot stokbewaarder, ter bewaking,
Onwetendheid, die dof is, stomp, gevoelloos.
Ik ben reeds te oud tot staam’len met een voedster,
Te veel op jaren om ter school te gaan;

MORE:

A semi-literal allusion to a proverb of the time, ‘Good that the teeth guard the tongue’ (1578) and the virtue of silence. Ben Jonson recommended a ‘wise tongue’ that should not be ‘licentious and wandering’. (See also the Lucio in Measure for Measure: “’tis a secret must be locked within the
teeth and the lips”.)

Cunning=Skilful
Sentence=Verdict (punning on language)
Breathing native breath=Speaking native English (and breathing English air)

Compleat:
Cunning=Behendig

Topics: language, understanding, identity, proverbs and idioms

And with mine eyes I’ll drink the words you send, though ink be made of gall

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Posthumus
CONTEXT:
IMOGEN
O, dissembling courtesy! How fine this tyrant
Can tickle where she wounds! My dearest husband,
I something fear my father’s wrath; but nothing—
Always reserved my holy duty—what
His rage can do on me: you must be gone;
And I shall here abide the hourly shot
Of angry eyes, not comforted to live,
But that there is this jewel in the world
That I may see again.
POSTHUMUS LEONATUS
My queen, my mistress!
O lady, weep no more, lest I give cause
To be suspected of more tenderness
Than doth become a man. I will remain
The loyal’st husband that did e’er plight troth.
My residence in Rome at one Philario’s,
Who to my father was a friend, to me
Known but by letter; thither write, my queen,
And with mine eyes I’ll drink the words you send,
Though ink be made of gall.

DUTCH:
k Neem mijn verblijf in Rome, bij Philario,
Een vriend mijns vaders, dien ikzelf alleen
Uit brieven ken; geliefde, schrijf mij daar;
Mijn oogen zullen uwe woorden drinken,
Al wordt ook inkt uit gal bereid.

MORE:
Tickle=Flatter
Something=Sometimes, to some extent
Hourly=Continually
Gall=Bile; any thing bitter and disagreeable; bitterness of mind, rancour
Gall=An ingredient in ink (iron gall ink)
Compleat:
Gall=Gal
To gall (or vex)=Tergen, verbitteren
Bitter as gall=Zo bitter als gal

Topics: sorrow, appearance, loyalty, language

As if I borrowed mine oaths of him and might not spend them at my pleasure

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Cloten
CONTEXT:
CLOTEN
Was there ever man had such luck! when I kissed the
jack, upon an up-cast to be hit away! I had a
hundred pound on’t: and then a whoreson jackanapes
must take me up for swearing; as if I borrowed mine
oaths of him and might not spend them at my pleasure.
FIRST LORD
What got he by that? You have broke his pate with
your bowl.
SECOND LORD
If his wit had been like him that broke it,
it would have run all out.
CLOTEN
When a gentleman is disposed to swear, it is not for
any standers-by to curtail his oaths, ha?
SECOND LORD
No my lord; nor crop the ears of them.

DUTCH:
Ik had er honderd pond op staan;
en dan stuift me zoo’n hondsvot van een aap nog op,
omdat ik hem uitvloek; alsof ik m’n vloeken van hem
geborgd had, en ze niet kon uitgeven, zooals ikzelf verkies!

MORE:
Proverb: May we not do with our own what we list?

Pate=The head; used in contempt or in ridicule
Curtail=Curtal, having a docked tail (followed by ‘crop the ears’)
Upcast=A throw at the game of bowls
Take up=Rebuke
Kissed the jack … away=The jack being the small ball in bowls, the closest to the jack at the end of the game wins. If the bowl ends up close to it, it is ‘kissing the jack’ (a great advantage). Cloten’s bowl is then hit away by the ‘upcast’ (throw of an opponent).
Compleat:
Jack (in bowling)=Honk, in de klosbaan
To take one up sharply (check, reprimand)=Iemand scherpelyk berispen
Pate=De kop, het hoofd
He threatened to break his pate=Hy dreigde hem den kop in te slaan

Burgersdijk notes:
Had ooit een mensch zulk een geluk?
Cloten spreekt van het geluk, dat zijn tegenspeler gehad heeft.

Topics: language, civility, patience, proverbs and idioms

Away with him, away with him! He speaks Latin.

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 4.7
SPEAKER: Cade
CONTEXT:
SAY
Nothing but this; ’tis ‘bona terra, mala gens.’
CADE
Away with him, away with him! He speaks Latin.
SAY
Hear me but speak, and bear me where you will.
Kent, in the Commentaries Caesar writ,
Is term’d the civil’st place of this isle:
Sweet is the country, because full of riches;
The people liberal, valiant, active, wealthy;
Which makes me hope you are not void of pity.
I sold not Maine, I lost not Normandy,
Yet, to recover them, would lose my life.
Justice with favour have I always done;
Prayers and tears have moved me, gifts could never.
When have I aught exacted at your hands,
But to maintain the king, the realm and you?
Large gifts have I bestow’d on learned clerks,
Because my book preferr’d me to the king,
And seeing ignorance is the curse of God,
Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven,
Unless you be possess’d with devilish spirits,
You cannot but forbear to murder me:
This tongue hath parley’d unto foreign kings
For your behoof

DUTCH:
Weg met hem! weg met hem! hij spreekt Latijn.

MORE:
See also “He can speak French; and therefore he is a traitor” (4.2)

Civil’st=Most civilized
Clerks=Scholars
Liberal=Refined
Favour=Lenience
Aught=Anything
Exacted=Taken in the form of taxes
My book=My learning, education
Preferred me=Recommended me to, put me in favour with
Parley=Talks, negotiations for an agreement
Behoof=Advantage, benefit

Compleat:
Civilized=Welgemanierd, beschaafd, heusch
Clerk=Klerk, schryver
A liberal education=Een goede of ruime opvoeding
Favourable (jkind)=Vriendelyk
Aught=Iets
To exact=Afvorderen, afeisschen
To prefer one=Iemand bevorderen, zyn fortuin maaken
To parley=Gesprek houden, te spraake staane, te woorde staan van overgaave spreeken
Behoof=Nut, geryf, gemak

Burgersdijk notes:
Bona terra, mala gens. Het land goed, maar het volk kwaad.
De leefste streek. In Arthur Golding’s vertaling der Commentaren van Julius Czesar (1565) kon Shakespeare lezen: Of all the inhabitants of this isle the Kentishnien are the civilest. Sh. spreekt hier ook van the civil’st place.

Topics: money, value, learning/education, language

Away with him!
He has a familiar under his tongue.

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 4.7
SPEAKER: Cade
CONTEXT:
I feel remorse in myself with his words; but I’ll bridle it:
he shall die, an it be but for pleading so well for his life.
Away with him! He has a familiar under his tongue;
he speaks not o’ God’s name. Go, take him away,
I say, and strike off his head presently;
and then break into his son-in-law’s house,
Sir James Cromer, and strike off his head,
and bring them both upon two poles hither.

DUTCH:
Weg met hem! hij heeft een dienstbaren duivel onder zijn tong, hij spreekt niet in den naam van God

MORE:

Bridle=Rein in, constrain
Familiar=Demon or spirit
An be it but for=If only for

Compleat:
To bridle=Intoomen, breidelen, beteugelen
Familiar=Een gemeenzaame geet, queldrommel

Topics: language, deceit, truth, punishment, regret

Ay, sir, you shall find me reasonable; if it be so, I shall do that that is reason

PLAY: The Merry Wives of Windsor
ACT/SCENE:
SPEAKER: Slender
CONTEXT:
SLENDER
How now, Simple! where have you been? I must wait
on myself, must I? You have not the Book of Riddles
about you, have you?
SIMPLE
Book of Riddles! why, did you not lend it to Alice
Shortcake upon All-hallowmas last, a fortnight
afore Michaelmas?
SHALLOW
Come, coz; come, coz; we stay for you. A word with
you, coz; marry, this, coz: there is, as ’twere, a
tender, a kind of tender, made afar off by Sir Hugh
here. Do you understand me?
SLENDER
Ay, sir, you shall find me reasonable; if it be so,
I shall do that that is reason.

DUTCH:
Ja zeker, en gij zult mij niet onredelijk vinden. Als
het zoo is, zal ik alles doen , wat redelijk is.

MORE:
All-hallowmass=All Saint’s Day, is a feast celebrated on 1 November
Michaelmas=A feast celebrated on 29 September (Simple is confused about dates)
Stay=Wait
Tender=Marriage proposal
Afar off=Indirectly
Compleat:
Michaelmas=St Michiels dag
To stay=Wagten
To tender=Aanbieden, van harte bezinnen, behartigen

Topics: language, business, reason

Be of comfort.
My father’s of a better nature, sir,
Than he appears by speech.

PLAY: The Tempest
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Miranda
CONTEXT:
MIRANDA
Be of comfort.
My father’s of a better nature, sir,
Than he appears by speech. This is unwonted
Which now came from him.
PROSPERO
Thou shalt be free
As mountain winds. But then exactly do
All points of my command.
ARIEL
To th’ syllable.

DUTCH:
Houd goeden moed!
Mijn vader, heer, is zachter van natuur,
Dan nu zijn taal verraadt; wat hij daar zeide,
Is ongewoon in hem.

MORE:
Proverb: As free as the air (wind). Shakespeare refers to this again in AYL (“I must have liberty
Withal, as large a charter as the wind”, 2.7) and Coriolanus (“Be free as is the wind.”, 1.9).
Unwonted=Uncommon, unusual
Compleat:
Ebb=De eb, ebbe; afvlooijen
The lowest ebb of its authority=Genoegzaam haar gezach veloren
My soul hs never ebbed from its constant principles=Myn ziel is nooit van haare grondbeginzels afgeweeken

Topics: language, civility, proverbs and idioms, still in use, free will

Besides that he’s a fool, he’s a great quarreller

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Maria
CONTEXT:
SIR TOBY BELCH
Fie, that you’ll say so! He plays o’ the
viol-de-gamboys, and speaks three or four languages word
for word without book, and hath all the good gifts of
nature.
MARIA
He hath indeed, almost natural, for besides that he’s a
fool, he’s a great quarreler, and but that he hath the
gift of a coward to allay the gust he hath in
quarreling, ’tis thought among the prudent he would
quickly have the gift of a grave.
SIR TOBY BELCH
By this hand, they are scoundrels and substractors that
say so of him. Who are they?
MARIA
They that add, moreover, he’s drunk nightly in your
company.

DUTCH:
Ja, hij was bij zijne geboorte al even begaafd als nu.
En bij al zijn onnoozelheid is hij een groot twistzoeker;
en had hij niet de gaaf van lafheid om tegen zijn twistzucht
op te wegen, dan zou hij, zooals verstandige lui
zeggen, wel spoedig de gaaf van een graf ontvangen.

MORE:
Viol-de-gambous=Corruption of viola da gamba, played like a cello.
Without book=From memory (implying perhaps that he cannot speak these languages properly)
Natural=Name for fools and clowns
Gust=Relish
Gift=Talent
Substractor=Detractor
Compleat:
Viol=Vedel, fiool
Gust=Smaak
A natural fool=Een geboren gek
Gift=Gaave, gift, begaafdheyd; geschenk
Substract=Aftrekken
Detractor=Een benaadeeler, verkorter, lasteraar

Burgersdijk notes:
Hij speelt basviool. He plays o’ the viol-de-gamboys. De viol-da-gamba was een soort van violoncello, met zes snaren, die tusschen de knieën geplaatst werd en vandaar den naam droeg; men denke aan het Nederlandsche knievedel.
Even begaafd. In ‘t Engelsch: almost natural: schier van nature; of ook: nagenoeg onnoozel.

Topics: language, communication, excess

But I am a great eater of beef, and I believe that does harm to my wit

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Sir Andrew
CONTEXT:
SIR TOBY BELCH
O knight, thou lackest a cup of canary. When did I see
thee so put down?
SIR ANDREW
Never in your life, I think, unless you see canary put
me down. Methinks sometimes I have no more wit than a
Christian or an ordinary man has. But I am a great eater
of beef, and I believe that does harm to my wit.
SIR TOBY BELCH
No question.
SIR ANDREW
An I thought that, I’d forswear it. I’ll ride home
tomorrow,
Sir Toby.
SIR TOBY BELCH
Pourquoi, my dear knight?
SIR ANDREW
What is “pourquoi”? Do, or not do? I would I had
bestowed that time in the tongues that I have in
fencing, dancing, and bear-baiting. O, had I but
followed the arts!

DUTCH:
Ik ben een groot liefhebber van rundvleesch, en
ik denk wel eens, of dit ook kwaad kan doen aan mijn
geest.

MORE:
Canary=Sweet wine originally from the Canary Islands
Put down=Defeated in argument
Christian=Ordinary man
Eater of beef=It was held at the time that beef dulled the wits
Tongues=Languages
Compleat:
Canary=Kanarische sek
The gift of tongues=De gaave der taale
To speak several tongues=Verscheiden taalen spreeken

Burgersdijk notes:
Liefhebber van rundvleesch. Jonker Andries heeft misschien wel eens gehoord, dat beefwitted „dom”
beteekent.

Topics: excess, learning/education, language, understanding

But men may construe things after their fashion, clean from the purpose of the things themselves

PLAY: Julius Caesar
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Cicero
CONTEXT:
CASCA
A common slave—you know him well by sight—
Held up his left hand, which did flame and burn
Like twenty torches joined, and yet his hand,
Not sensible of fire, remained unscorched.
Besides—I ha’ not since put up my sword—
Against the Capitol I met a lion,
Who glaz’d upon me and went surly by,
Without annoying me. And there were drawn
Upon a heap a hundred ghastly women,
Transformèd with their fear, who swore they saw
Men all in fire walk up and down the streets.
And yesterday the bird of night did sit
Even at noon-day upon the marketplace,
Hooting and shrieking. When these prodigies
Do so conjointly meet, let not men say,
“These are their reasons; they are natural.”
For I believe they are portentous things
Unto the climate that they point upon.
CICERO
Indeed, it is a strange-disposèd time.
But men may construe things after their fashion,
Clean from the purpose of the things themselves.
Comes Caesar to the Capitol tomorrow?

DUTCH:
Gewis, de tijd is wondervreemd geluimd;
Maar menigeen legt op zijn eigen wijs
De dingen uit en vaak geheel verkeerd.

MORE:
Proverb: The croaking raven bodes misfortune (death)

Sensible of=Feeling
Put up=Put away
Against=Opposite
Glazed=Stared
Heap=Crowd
Ghastly=White, ghostly
Bird of night=Owl (a bad omen)
Conjointly meet=Coincide
Climate=Region
Construe=Interpret
After their fashion=In their own way
Compleat:
Sensible=Gevoelig, voelbaar
To put up a sword=Een zwaard in de scheede steeken
Against=Tegen, tegens
Heap=Menigte; hoop, stapel
Conjointly=t’Zaamengevoegt, vereenigt
Climate=Streek, luchtstreek, gewest
Construe (conster)=Woordenschikken; t’Zamenschikken, t’zamenstellen
After the French fashion=Naar de Fransche zwier

Topics: language, understanding, proverbs and idioms

But words are words

PLAY: Othello
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Brabantio
CONTEXT:
DUKE
Let me speak like yourself and lay a sentence
Which, as a grise or step, may help these lovers
Into your favour.
When remedies are past, the griefs are ended
By seeing the worst, which late on hopes depended.
To mourn a mischief that is past and gone
Is the next way to draw new mischief on.
What cannot be preserved when fortune takes,
Patience her injury a mock’ry makes.
The robbed that smiles steals something from the thief,
He robs himself that spends a bootless grief.
BRABANTIO
So let the Turk of Cyprus us beguile,
We lose it not, so long as we can smile.
He bears the sentence well that nothing bears
But the free comfort which from thence he hears.
But he bears both the sentence and the sorrow
That, to pay grief, must of poor patience borrow.
These sentences to sugar or to gall,
Being strong on both sides, are equivocal.
But words are words. I never yet did hear
That the bruised heart was piercèd through the ears.
I humbly beseech you, proceed to th’ affairs of state.

DUTCH:
Doch woord blijft woord, en dat het spreuken-hooren
Een krank hart heelde, kwam mij nooit ter ooren.
Ik verzoek u nederig, thans tot de staatszaken over
te gaan.

MORE:
Lay a sentence=Offer a maxim, proverb
Grise=(Grize, grece) Step, degree
Remedies=Opportunities for redress
Patience=Endurance
Injury=Harm caused
Injury=Verongelyking, belediging, smaad, verkorting, laster, ongelykFutile
Sentence that nothing bears=Indifferent platitude
Gall=Bitterness, to embitter
Pierced=lanced (and cured)(See LLL, 5.2: Honest plain words best pierce the ear of grief)
Compleat:
Sentence=Een spreuk, zinspreuk
Remedy=Middel
A thing not to be remedy’d=Een zaak die niet te verhelpen is
Take patience=Geduld neemen
Injury=Verongelyking, belediging, smaad, verkorting, laster, ongelyk”

Topics: language, deceit, appearance, emotion and mood, wisdom, understanding

Cry “holla” to thy tongue, I prithee. It curvets unseasonably

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Rosalind
CONTEXT:
CELIA
Cry “holla” to thy tongue, I prithee. It curvets unseasonably. He was furnished like a hunter.
ROSALIND
Oh, ominous! He comes to kill my heart.
CELIA
I would sing my song without a burden. Thou bring’st me out of tune.
ROSALIND
Do you not know I am a woman? When I think, I must speak. Sweet, say on.

DUTCH:
Roep toch Hola !” tot uw tong, want die maakt ontijdig
kromme sprongen.

MORE:
Curvet=Frolic
Unseasonably=At an improper time
Compleat:
Curvet (a certain motion, or gait of a horse)=Corbet, Eenluchtige sprong van een paerd, eerst met de voorste en dan met de agterlyke pooten in de lucht
Curvet=Springen (in the above sense)
Unseasonably=Ontydiglyk, t’ontyde

Topics: language, wisdom

Cunning in Greek, Latin, and other languages

PLAY: The Taming of the Shrew
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Gremio
CONTEXT:
GREMIO
I doubt it not, sir, but you will curse your wooing.—
neighbour, this is a gift very grateful,
I am sure of it. To express the like kindness, myself,
that have been more kindly beholding to you than any,
freely give unto you this young scholar that hath been long
studying at Rheims, as cunning in Greek, Latin, and
other languages as the other in music and mathematics.
His name is Cambio. Pray accept his service.

DUTCH:
(…) veroorloof ik mij, u dezen jeugdigen geleerde voor te stellen, die lang in Reims gestudeerd heeft en even zoo bedreven is in het Latijn, Grieksch en andere talen, als die ander in muziek en wiskunde ; zijn naam is Cambio; ik bid u, neem zijn diensten aan.

MORE:
Grateful=Gracious, pleasing
Beholding=Beholden, indebted
The like kindness=My own affection
Compleat:
Gratefull=Dankbaar, erkentelyk
Beholding=Gehouden, verpligt, verschuldigd
I never saw the like=Ik heb diergelyk nooit gezien
Kindness=Vrindschap, vrindlykheyd, goedertierenheyd

Topics: skill/talent, learning/education, intellect, language

Defect of judgment is oft the cause of fear

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 4.2
SPEAKER: Belarius
CONTEXT:
BELARIUS
I cannot tell. Long is it since I saw him,
But time hath nothing blurred those lines of favour
Which then he wore. The snatches in his voice
And burst of speaking were as his. I am absolute
’Twas very Cloten.
ARVIRAGUS
In this place we left them.
I wish my brother make good time with him,
You say he is so fell
BELARIUS
Being scarce made up,
I mean to man, he had not apprehension
Of roaring terrors; for defect of judgment
Is oft the cause of fear.
GUIDERIUS
This Cloten was a fool, an empty purse;
There was no money in ’t. Not Hercules
Could have knocked out his brains, for he had none.
Yet I not doing this, the fool had borne
My head as I do his.

DUTCH:
Nauw’lijks opgegroeid,
Ik meen, tot man, ontbrak hem elk begrip
Van iets gevaarlijks ; en gebrek aan oordeel
Wekt vaak vermetelheid. Daar is uw broeder.

MORE:
Scarce made up=Not fully developed, still and immature youth; or not ‘all there’
Lines of favour=Lines on the countenance
Snatches=Catches, seizures followed by a ‘burst of speaking’. (Irish ‘ganch’ meaning stammer)
Absolute=Positive, have no doubt
Roaring=Loud-tongued
Compleat:
Snatch=Een ruk, hap, beet
A snatch and away=Een mond vol en weg ‘er mee
To do a thing by girds and snatches=Ies met horten en stooten doen; met menigvuldige tusschenpoosingen verrigten
Absolute=Volslagen, volstrekt, volkomen, onafhangklyk, onverbonden
To roar=Uitbrullen

Burgersdijk notes:
Gebrek aan oordeel wekt vaak vermetelheid. Het oorspronkelijke is hier blijkbaar bedorven, de folio heeft: for defect of judgment is oft the cause of fear; Shakespeare moet ongeveer het tegendeel gezegd hebben, want de doldriestheid van Cloten wordt uit zijn gebrek aan oordeel verklaard.
Hanmer las daarom: is oft the arre of fear, en dienovereenkomstig is hier vertaald. Doch ook Theobald’s verbetering is zeer opmerkelijk: for the effect of judgment is oft the cause of fear; „want des oordeels werking is oorzaak vaak van vrees” ; de zin van beide verbeteringen is nagenoeg gelijk; de tegenstelling tusschen gevolg of werking en oorzaak pleit er misschien voor, dat Theobald de uitdrukking des dichters getroffen heeft.

Topics: language, memory, judgment, intellect, age/experience

Disarm them, and let them question: let them keep their limbs whole and hack our English

PLAY: The Merry Wives of Windsor
ACT/SCENE:
SPEAKER:
CONTEXT:
SIR HUGH EVANS
He has no more knowledge in Hibbocrates and Galen,
—and he is a knave besides; a cowardly knave as you
would desires to be acquainted withal.
PAGE
I warrant you, he’s the man should fight with him.
SLENDER
O sweet Anne Page!
SHALLOW
It appears so by his weapons. Keep them asunder:
here comes Doctor Caius.
PAGE
Nay, good master parson, keep in your weapon.
SHALLOW
So do you, good master doctor.
HOST
Disarm them, and let them question: let them keep
their limbs whole and hack our English.

DUTCH:
Ontwapen hen en laat hen samen redetwisten. Laat
hen hunne armen en beenen heel houden en ons arm
Engelsch verminken!

MORE:
Hibbocrates=Hippocrates (Hippocrates and Galen, ancient physicians)
Withal=With
Warrant (assure, promise)=Verzekeren, belooven, ervoor instaan
Asunder=Apart
So do you=You too
Question=Talk, discuss
Hack=Chop, cut with frequent blows
Compleat:
I’ll warrant you=Ik verzeker ‘t u, ik staa ‘er borg voor, ik sta er voor in
Asunder=Byzonder, op zich zelven, onderscheiden
To put asunder=Elk byzonder zetten, van één scheiden

Topics: language|conflict|remedy

Forward, I pray, since we have come so far

PLAY: The Taming of the Shrew
ACT/SCENE: 4.5
SPEAKER: Katherine
CONTEXT:
PETRUCHIO
Now, by my mother’s son, and that’s myself,
It shall be moon, or star, or what I list,
Or e’er I journey to your father’s house.
Go on, and fetch our horses back again.—
Evermore crossed and crossed, nothing but crossed!
HORTENSIO
Say as he says, or we shall never go.
KATHERINE
Forward, I pray, since we have come so far,
And be it moon, or sun, or what you please.
An if you please to call it a rush candle,
Henceforth I vow it shall be so for me.
PETRUCHIO
I say it is the moon.
KATHERINE
I know it is the moon.
PETRUCHIO
Nay, then you lie. It is the blessèd sun.
KATHERINE
Then God be blessed, it is the blessèd sun.
But sun it is not, when you say it is not,
And the moon changes even as your mind.
What you will have it named, even that it is,
And so it shall be so for Katherine.

DUTCH:
O voorwaarts toch; wij zijn nu eens zoo ver;
En zij het maan of zon of wat go wilt;
Al wildet gij het ook een nachtlicht noemen,
Ik zweer, voortaan zal ‘t ook voor mij zoo zijn.

MORE:
Proverb: As changeful (inconstant) as the moon

List=Please
Crossed=Challenged
Rush candle=Cheap candle made of a rush dipped in tallow
Compleat:
To list=Genegen zijn, lust hebben
To cross=Tegenstreeven, dwars voor de boeg komen, dwarsboomen, wederestreeven, kruisen

Topics: proverbs and idioms, free will, independence, language

Foul whisperings are abroad

PLAY: Macbeth
ACT/SCENE: 5.1
SPEAKER: Doctor
CONTEXT:
Foul whisp’rings are abroad. Unnatural deeds
Do breed unnatural troubles. Infected minds
To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets.
More needs she the divine than the physician.

DUTCH:
Men fluistert gruw’len. Onnatuurlijk doen
Baart onnatuurlijk wee.

MORE:
Schmidt:
Foul=Disgraceful, derogatory, detractive
Whisperings = rumours
Unnatural = supernatural (sleepwalkers were considered to be cursed; sleepwalking a sign of demonic possession)

Topics: madness, guilt, conspiracy, language

From Rumour’s tongues They bring smooth comforts false, worse than true wrongs.

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 1 Prologue
SPEAKER: Rumour
CONTEXT:
But what mean I
To speak so true at first? My office is
To noise abroad that Harry Monmouth fell
Under the wrath of noble Hotspur’s sword,
And that the King before the Douglas’ rage
Stooped his anointed head as low as death.
This have I rumoured through the peasant towns
Between that royal field of Shrewsbury
And this worm-eaten hold of ragged stone,
Where Hotspur’s father, old Northumberland,
Lies crafty-sick. The posts come tiring on,
And not a man of them brings other news
Than they have learnt of me. From Rumour’s tongues
They bring smooth comforts false, worse than true wrongs.

DUTCH:
Waar Heetspoors vader, graaf Northumberland,
Sluw krank ligt. Moede boden komen aan,
Doch geen brengt ander nieuws dan ik hem leerde,
Elk zoeten schijntroost, komende uit mijn mond,
Veel erger dan een waar bericht, dat wondt.

MORE:
Schmidt:
To noise abroad=Verb meaning to report or spread rumour
Peasant=Condescending description of village inhabitants as ignorant
Crafty-sick=Feigning illness
Post=Courier, messenger

Compleat:
To noise abroad=Uitbrommen, uittrompetten
Peasant=Landman, boer
Crafty=Loos, listig, schalk, doortrapt, leep

Topics: betrayal, deceit, appearance, perception, language

Go, write it in a martial hand. Be curst and brief.

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Sir Toby
CONTEXT:
SIR TOBY BELCH
Why, then, build me thy fortunes upon the basis of
valour. Challenge me the count’s youth to fight with him.
Hurt him in eleven places. My niece shall take note of
it, and assure thyself, there is no love-broker in the
world can more prevail in man’s commendation with woman
than report of valour.
FABIAN
There is no way but this, Sir Andrew.
SIR ANDREW
Will either of you bear me a challenge to him?
SIR TOBY BELCH
Go, write it in a martial hand. Be curst and brief. It
is no matter how witty, so it be eloquent and full of
invention. Taunt him with the licence of ink. If thou
“thou”-est him some thrice, it shall not be amiss; and
as many lies as will lie in thy sheet of paper, although
the sheet were big enough for the bed of Ware in
England, set ’em down. Go, about it. Let there be gall
enough in thy ink, though thou write with a goose-pen,
no matter. About it.

DUTCH:
Ga, schrijf ze met een martiale hand; wees vinnig en
kort; op geestigheid komt het niet aan, als zij maar welsprekend en vol vinding is; beleedig hem zooveel als
de inkt maar toelaat;

MORE:
Proverb: A curst cur must be tied short

Curst=Terse
Brief=Short, succinct
Invention=Originality, ideas
Licence of ink=Freedom afforded by writing
Gall=Oak-gall, used in ink
Goose-pen=Quill (the goose being regarded as cowardly)
Compleat:
Curst=Vervloekt
Brief=Kort
Invention=Vinding
Gall=Gal. (1) Bitter as gall=Zo bitter als gal (2) To gall=Benaauwen (Den vyand benaauwen…)

Burgersdijk notes:
Op uw stuk papier, al ware dit zoo groot als het laken van het familiebed te Ware in Engeland. In eene herberg te Ware, in het graafschap Hartfordshire, stond een bed, waarin tegelijk twaalf mannen en twaalf vrouwen konden liggen; liet wordt ook elders als een merkwaardigheid genoemd. In ‘t Engelsch beteekent sheet zoowel een vel papier als een beddelaken; deze woordspeling was natuur
niet over te brengen.
Gal in uw inkt. Ossegal was een hoofdbestanddeel van inkt, zie “Cymbeline” 1.1.

Topics: proverbs and idioms, clarity/precision, language, reputation

Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing

PLAY: The Merchant of Venice
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Bassanio
CONTEXT:
ANTONIO
Farewell. I’ll grow a talker for this gear.
GRATIANO
Thanks, i’ faith, for silence is only commendable
In a neat’s tongue dried and a maid not vendible.
ANTONIO
Is that any thing now?
BASSANIO
Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than
any man in all Venice. His reasons are as two grains of
wheat hid in two bushels of chaff —you shall seek all day
ere you find them, and when you have them they are not
worth the search.

DUTCH:

Gratiano praat oneindig veel, dat niets is

MORE:
CITED IN US LAW:
Crowley Marine Services, Inc. v. National labour Relations Board, 344 U.S. App. D.C. 165; 234 F.3d 1295 (2000): Used by the judge to introduce her dissenting opinion, stating:
“His reasons are as two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff; you shall
seek all day ere you find them, and when you have them, they are not worth the search. …
The court’s per curiam opinion knocks down the modest, but real, requirement that a union requesting information from an employer explain, at the time of its request, the relevance, or at least potential relevance, of information not ordinarily pertinent to its role as bargaining representative…’
Kneale v. Kneale, 67 So. 2d 233, 234 (Fla., 1953).

You speak an infinite deal of nothing: still in use today.

Topics: emotion and mood, misquoted

Ha! little honour to be much believed,
And most pernicious purpose! Seeming, seeming!

PLAY: Measure for Measure
ACT/SCENE: 2.4
SPEAKER: Isabella
CONTEXT:
ANGELO
Believe me, on mine honour,
My words express my purpose.
ISABELLA
Ha! little honour to be much believed,
And most pernicious purpose! Seeming, seeming!
I will proclaim thee, Angelo; look for’t:
Sign me a present pardon for my brother,
Or with an outstretch’d throat I’ll tell the world aloud
What man thou art.

DUTCH:
Neen, geloof mij,
Neen, op mijn eer, ik zeg, wat ik bedoel .

MORE:
Onions:
Pernicious=Wicked, villainous
Compleat:
Pernicious=Schadelyk, verderflyk
A pernicious counsel=Een schadelyke, snoode raad
A pernicious maxim or doctrine=Een schadelyke stokregel, verderflyke leer.

Topics: language, honour, plans/intentions, purpose, deceit, manipulation, gullibility

He hath a killing tongue and a quiet sword, by the means whereof he breaks words and keeps whole weapons

PLAY: King Henry V
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Boy
CONTEXT:
For indeed three such antics do not amount to a man: for Bardolph, he is white-livered and red-faced, by the means whereof he faces it out but fights not; for Pistol, he hath a killing tongue and a quiet sword, by the means whereof he breaks words and keeps whole weapons; for Nym, he hath heard that men of few words are the best men, and therefore he scorns to say his prayers, lest he should be thought a coward, but his few bad words are matched with as few good deeds, for he never broke any man’s head but his own, and that was against a post when he was drunk. They will steal anything and call it purchase.

DUTCH:
Pistool, die heeft een moorddadige tong en
een vreedzaam zwaard; en daarom breekt hij woorden
den nek, maar houdt zijn wapens heel

MORE:

Antic=Buffoon, practising odd gesticulations
White-livered=Cowardly (White livers used to signify cowardice. Hence lily-livered (Macbeth, 5.3) and milk-livered (King Lear, 4.2), both compounds coined by Shakespeare)
Face it out=To get through one’s business by effrontery
Scorn=To disdain, to refuse or lay aside with contempt
Words=Also in the sense of promises

Compleat:
To scorn=Verachten, verfooijen
White-livered=Een die er altijd bleek uitziet; een bleek-neus, kwaadaardig, nydig
To face out=Iemand iets in ‘t gezigt staande houden

Topics: reputation, honour, language, promise

He hath studied her will, and translated her will, out of honesty into English

PLAY: The Merry Wives of Windsor
ACT/SCENE:
SPEAKER: Pistol
CONTEXT:
FALSTAFF
No quips now, Pistol! Indeed, I am in the waist two
yards about; but I am now about no waste; I am about
thrift. Briefly, I do mean to make love to Ford’s
wife: I spy entertainment in her; she discourses,
she carves, she gives the leer of invitation: I
can construe the action of her familiar style; and
the hardest voice of her behavior, to be Englished
rightly, is, ‘I am Sir John Falstaff’s.’
PISTOL
He hath studied her will, and translated her will,
out of honesty into English.

DUTCH:
Hij heeft haar goed bestudeerd en goed vertaald, uit
de eerbaarheid in het Engelsch.

MORE:
Proverb: To be one’s own carver

Honest=(wives) Faithful
About=Circumference
Carves=Carves the meat; pleases herself
Construe=Interpret
Familiar=Domestic; intimate
Will=1) Desire 2) Will and testament
Compleat:
Honest=Eerlyk, oprecht, vroom
Construe=t’Zamenschikken, t’zamenstellen
Familiar=Gemeenzaam

Burgersdijk notes:
Zij lacht toe. In ‘t Engelsch staat letterlijk: she carves. To carve is eigenlijk „voorsnijden”, „trancheeren”, een kunst die een welopgevoed mensch, man en vrouw, moest verstaan. Als een vrouw aan een man voorsneed, hem bediende, kon dit een teeken van welwillendheid of gunst gerekend worden, en dat Falstaff, die van zijn buik zijn afgod maakte, het zoo opvatte, kan niet verwonderen. Men kan hier het woord dus opvatten in letterlijken zin, maar ook eenvoudig als voorkomend zijn; evenzoo is het in Veel gemin, geen gewin “, 5.2.

Topics: proverbs and idioms, loyalty, language, honesty

He words me, girls, he words me, that I should not be noble to myself

PLAY: Antony and Cleopatra
ACT/SCENE: 5.2
SPEAKER: Cleopatra
CONTEXT:
CAESAR
Cleopatra,
Not what you have reserved nor what acknowledged
Put we i’ th’ roll of conquest. Still be ’t yours.
Bestow it at your pleasure, and believe
Caesar’s no merchant, to make prize with you
Of things that merchants sold. Therefore be cheered.
Make not your thoughts your prison. No, dear Queen,
For we intend so to dispose you as
Yourself shall give us counsel. Feed and sleep.
Our care and pity is so much upon you
That we remain your friend. And so, adieu.
CLEOPATRA
My master, and my lord!
CAESAR
Not so. Adieu.
CLEOPATRA
He words me, girls, he words me, that I should not
Be noble to myself. But, hark thee, Charmian.

DUTCH:
t Zijn woorden, meisjes, woorden, opdat ik
Niet edel voor mijzelf zij. Luister, Charmian!

MORE:
Make prize=Negotiate, haggle
Dispose=Treat
He words me=Pacifies me with meaningless words
Compleat:
To dispose=Beschikken, schikken, bestellen

Burgersdijk notes:
Een knaap. Men bedenke, dat op Sh.’s tooneel de vrouwenrollen door knapen en aankomende jongelingen gespeeld werden.

Topics: language, persuasion

Her speech is nothing,
Yet the unshaped use of it doth move
The hearers to collection.

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 4.5
SPEAKER: Gentleman
CONTEXT:
Her speech is nothing,
Yet the unshaped use of it doth move
The hearers to collection. They aim at it,
And botch the words up fit to their own thoughts,
Which, as her winks and nods and gestures yield them,
Indeed would make one think there might be thought,
Though nothing sure, yet much unhappily.
HORATIO
‘Twere good she were spoken with, for she may strew
Dangerous conjectures in ill-breeding minds.

DUTCH:
Maar toch, haar warreltaal wekt bij de hoorders
Vermoedens ; en als die met hun gedachten
De woorden, die zij met cen wenk of knik
En vreemd gebaar verzelt, gaan samenkopp’len,

MORE:
Spurns enviously=Kicks spitefully
Collection=Inference
To botch up=Piece together unskilfully
Botcher=One who mends and patches old clothes
Compleat:
Botcher=Een lapper, knoeijer, boetelaar, broddelaar

Topics: language, perception, understanding, good and bad

Here comes a pair of very strange beasts, which in all tongues are called fools

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 5.4
SPEAKER: Jaques
CONTEXT:
ORLANDO
My lord, the first time that I ever saw him
Methought he was a brother to your daughter.
But, my good lord, this boy is forest-born
And hath been tutored in the rudiments
Of many desperate studies by his uncle,
Whom he reports to be a great magician
Obscurèd in the circle of this forest.
JAQUES
There is sure another flood toward, and these couples
are coming to the ark. Here comes a pair of very strange
beasts, which in all tongues are called fools.
TOUCHSTONE
Salutation and greeting to you all.
JAQUES
Good my lord, bid him welcome. This is the
motley-minded gentleman that I have so often met in the
forest. He hath been a courtier, he swears.

DUTCH:
Daar komt een paar zeer vreemde beesten aan, die in alle talen den naam van narren dragen.

MORE:
Desperate=Dangerous
Obscurèd=Hidden
Toward=Near at hand, on its way
Motley-minded=As confused as the jester’s costume
Compleat:
Obscured=Verdonkerd, verduisterd
Toward=Na toe
Motley=Een grove gemengelde

Topics: appearance, reputation, language, intellect

His purse is empty already. All ’s golden words are spent.

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 5.2
SPEAKER: Horatio
CONTEXT:
HORATIO
Is ’t not possible to understand in another tongue? You will do ’t, sir, really.
HAMLET
What imports the nomination of this gentleman?
OSRIC
Of Laertes?
HORATIO
His purse is empty already. All ’s golden words are spent.

DUTCH:
Zijn beurs is al leeg; hij heeft al zijn gouden woorden uitgegeven /
Zijn beurs is reeds leêg; hij gaf al zijn gouden woorden al uit. /
Zijn beurs is al leeg; al zijn gouden woorden zijn uitgegeven.

MORE:
Schmidt:
Import= Convey, express, mean, signify, show
Nomination=Mention of, reference to
Tongue=Meaning or expression

Topics: language, understanding

I am too courtly, and thou art too cunning

PLAY: Troilus and Cressida
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Pandarus
CONTEXT:
SERVANT
Who shall I command, sir?
PANDARUS
Friend, we understand not one another: I am too
courtly and thou art too cunning. At whose request
do these men play?
SERVANT
That’s to ‘t indeed, sir: marry, sir, at the request
of Paris my lord, who’s there in person; with him,
the mortal Venus, the heart-blood of beauty, love’s
invisible soul,—
PANDARUS
Who, my cousin Cressida?
SERVANT
No, sir, Helen: could you not find out that by her
attributes?

DUTCH:
Vriend, wij verstaan elkander niet; ik ben te hoffelijk
en gij te gevat. Wie heeft die menschen hier besteld?

MORE:
Courtly=Elegant, polite
Cunning=Crafty
Venus=Goddess of Beauty (but the servant means Helen)
Compleat:
Courtly=Lugtig, gallant, hoflyk
Cunning=Loosheid, Listigheid

Topics: civility, order/society, language, communication, understanding

I do not sue to stand; Pardon is all the suit I have in hand.

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 5.3
SPEAKER: Duchess of York
CONTEXT:
DUCHESS OF YORK
Nay, do not say, ‘stand up;’
Say, ‘pardon’ first, and afterwards ‘stand up.’
And if I were thy nurse, thy tongue to teach,
‘Pardon’ should be the first word of thy speech.
I never long’d to hear a word till now;
Say ‘pardon,’ king; let pity teach thee how:
The word is short, but not so short as sweet;
No word like ‘pardon’ for kings’ mouths so meet.
DUKE OF YORK
Speak it in French, king; say, ‘pardonnez-moi.’
DUCHESS OF YORK
Dost thou teach pardon pardon to destroy?
Ah, my sour husband, my hard-hearted lord,
That set’st the word itself against the word!
Speak ‘pardon’ as ’tis current in our land;
The chopping French we do not understand.
Thine eye begins to speak; set thy tongue there;
Or in thy piteous heart plant thou thine ear;
That hearing how our plaints and prayers do pierce,
Pity may move thee ‘pardon’ to rehearse.
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
Good aunt, stand up.
DUCHESS OF YORK
I do not sue to stand;
Pardon is all the suit I have in hand.

DUTCH:
Ik vraag niet op te staan;
Neen, enkel om vergeving houd ik aan.

MORE:

Proverb: Short and sweet

Meet=Fitting, appropriate
Chopping=Changing the meaning of words
Plaints=Complaints
Sue=Beg
Suit=A request made to a prince, a court-solicitation
Nurse=Nanny

Compleat:
To chop=Ruilen, ruitebuiten
To chop at a thing=Iets aangrypen, vasthouden
Plaint=Klagte, aanklagte
Sue=Voor ‘t recht roepen, in rechte vervolgen
Suit=Een verzoek, rechtsgeding

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, language

I endowed thy purposes
With words that made them known.

PLAY: The Tempest
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Miranda
CONTEXT:
MIRANDA
Abhorrèd slave,
Which any print of goodness wilt not take,
Being capable of all ill! I pitied thee,
Took pains to make thee speak, taught thee each hour
One thing or other. When thou didst not, savage,
Know thine own meaning, but wouldst gabble like
A thing most brutish, I endowed thy purposes
With words that made them known. But thy vile race,
Though thou didst learn, had that in ’t which good natures
Could not abide to be with. Therefore wast thou
Deservedly confined into this rock,
Who hadst deserved more than a prison.
CALIBAN
You taught me language, and my profit on ’t
Is I know how to curse. The red plague rid you
For learning me your language!

DUTCH:
Deernis had ik;
En schonk u met veel zorg de spraak, ik leerde
U ieder uur iets nieuws; toen gij, een wilde,
Uzelven niet begreept, en klanken uitstiet
Gelijk het stomste vee, gaf ik u woorden,
Zoodat ge u uiten kondt;

MORE:
Schmidt:
Print=Imprint
Take=To receive as a thing in any way given or communicated
Gabble=Caliban is speaking in another language (incomprehensible to Miranda)
Purpose=That which a person or thing means to say or express, sense, meaning, purport: “I endowed thy –s with words,”
Rid=Destroy
Compleat:
Imprint=Inddrukken, inprenten
To imprint a thing in one’s mind=Iemand iets in het geheugen prenten
Gabble=Gekakel, gesnater
To gabble=Snappen, kakelen, koeteren
To gabble French=Fransch koeteren

Topics: language, learning/education, understanding, status, pity, order/society

I have a whole school of tongues in this belly of mine, and not a tongue of them all speaks any other word but my name

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 4.2
SPEAKER: Falstaff
CONTEXT:
I have a whole school of tongues in this belly of mine, and not a tongue of them all speaks any other word but my name. An I had but a belly of any indifferency, I were simply the most active fellow in Europe. My womb, my womb, my womb undoes me. Here comes our general.

DUTCH:
Ik heb een gansche school van tongen in dezen mijnen
buik, en geen van al die tongen spreekt een ander woord dan mijn naam.

MORE:

Indifferency=Average, moderate measure
Womb=Belly

Compleat:
Indifference=Onverschilligheid; middelmaatigheid

Topics: language, identity, skill/talent

I have heard of some kind of men that put quarrels purposely on others

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Viola
CONTEXT:
SIR TOBY BELCH
He is knight, dubbed with unhatched rapier and on
carpet consideration, but he is a devil in private
brawl. Souls and bodies hath he divorced three, and his
incensement at this moment is so implacable that
satisfaction can be none but by pangs of death and
sepulchre. Hob, nob, is his word. “Give ’t or take ’t.”
VIOLA
I will return again into the house and desire some
conduct of the lady. I am no fighter. I have heard of
some kind of men that put quarrels purposely on others,
to taste their valour. Belike this is a man of that
quirk.
SIR TOBY BELCH
Sir, no. His indignation derives itself out of a very
competent injury. Therefore get you on and give him his
desire. Back you shall not to the house, unless you
undertake that with me which with as much safety you
might answer him. Therefore on, or strip your sword
stark naked, for meddle you must, that’s certain, or
forswear to wear iron about you.
VIOLA
This is as uncivil as strange. I beseech you, do me
this courteous office, as to know of the knight what my
offence to him is. It is something of my negligence,
nothing of my purpose.

DUTCH:
Ik heb wel gehoord van een soort van lieden, die opzettelijk met anderen twist zoeken om hun moed te toetsen; waarschijnlijk is hij een man van zulk een luim.

MORE:
Unhatched=Unscratched (unused)
Carpet consideration=Courtly reasons (rather than military)
Hob nob=Have or have not, all or nothing, klll or be killed
Word=Motto
Conduct=Escort
Taste=Test
Belike=Likely
Quirk=Humour, disposition
Competent=Real, sufficient (in law)
Meddle=Engage in duel
Compleat:
Hatched=Kruiswys bewerkt (as a sword hilt)
A carpet knight=Een wittebroods kind
Conduct=Bestieren, geleyden
Taste=Proeven
Quirk=Een duister loopje, doortrapte bewoording
Full of quirks and quiddities=Vol van dubbelzinnige loopjes en haairklooveryen
Competent=Bekwaam, bevoegd, behoorlyk
To meddle=Bemoeijen, moeijen

Topics: law/legal, lawyers, language, dispute

I know not the phrase, but I will maintain the word with my sword

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Lord Bardolph
CONTEXT:
Pardon, sir; I have heard the word—“phrase” call you it? By this day, I know not the phrase, but I will maintain the word with my sword to be a soldierlike word, and a word of exceeding good command, by heaven. “Accommodated,” that is when a man is, as they say, accommodated, or when a man is being whereby he may be thought to be accommodated, which is an excellent thing.

DUTCH:
Neem niet kwalijk, heer; ik heb het woord van hooren zeggen. Phrase noemt gij het? Bij den hemel, de phrase ken ik niet; maar het woord wil ik met mijn zwaard volhouden, dat het een goed soldatenwoord is, en een uitmuntend goed woord om te commandeeren…

MORE:
Burgersdijk notes:
Blz. 333. III. 2. 72. Geaccommodeerd. Een modewoord uit Sh.’s tijd, zooals die in groote steden soms opkomen en dan telkens en telkens gebruikt worden; Bardolf kent het woord dus van hooren zeggen; op het land raken zulke uitdrukkingen slechts langzaam bekend of in gebruik; van hier Zieligs verbazing. Ben Jonson bespot het woord ook in zijn “Every man in his humour.”

Topics: language, understanding

I know thou ‘rt full of love and honesty and weigh’st thy words before thou giv’st them breath

PLAY: Othello
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: Othello
CONTEXT:
OTHELLO
“Think, my lord?” Alas, thou echo’st me
As if there were some monster in thy thought
Too hideous to be shown. Thou dost mean something.
I heard thee say even now thou lik’st not that
When Cassio left my wife. What didst not like?
And when I told thee he was of my counsel
Of my whole course of wooing, thou cried’st “Indeed?”
And didst contract and purse thy brow together
As if thou then hadst shut up in thy brain
Some horrible conceit. If thou dost love me
Show me thy thought.
IAGO
My lord, you know I love you.
OTHELLO
I think thou dost.
And for I know thou ‘rt full of love and honesty
And weigh’st thy words before thou giv’st them breath,
Therefore these stops of thine fright me the more.
For such things in a false disloyal knave
Are tricks of custom, but in a man that’s just
They are close dilations, working from the heart,
That passion cannot rule.

DUTCH:
Ik denk dit, ja!
En wijl ik weet, dat gij, vol liefde en plicht,
Uw woorden weegt, aleer gij ze adem geeft,
Beangstigt mij dit staam’len des te meer

MORE:
The two most favoured interpretations of close dilations are: (1) involuntary delays; and (2) half-hidden expressions

Stops=Sudden pauses
Tricks of custom=Customary artifice, stratagem, device
Just=Honest, upright, to be relied on
Compleat:
Just (righteous)=Een rechtvaardige
Custom=Gewoonte, neering

Topics: honesty, loyalty, language, caution

I love not many words
– No more than a fish loves water

PLAY: All’s Well that Ends Well
ACT/SCENE: 3.6
SPEAKER: Parolles
CONTEXT:
PAROLLES
I’ll about it this evening: and I will presently
pen down my dilemmas, encourage myself in my
certainty, put myself into my mortal preparation;
and by midnight look to hear further from me.
BERTRAM
May I be bold to acquaint his grace you are gone about
it?
PAROLLES
I know not what the success will be, my lord; but
the attempt I vow.
BERTRAM
I know thou’rt valiant; and, to the possibility of
thy soldiership, will subscribe for thee. Farewell.
PAROLLES
I love not many words.
SECOND LORD
No more than a fish loves water. Is not this a
strange fellow, my lord, that so confidently seems
to undertake this business, which he knows is not to
be done; damns himself to do and dares better be
damned than to do’t?

DUTCH:
Niet meer dan de visch van het water . – Is dat niet
een kostelijke kerel, graaf, die schijnbaar zoo vol vertrouwen deze zaak op zich neemt, schoon hij weet, dat
zij onuitvoerbaar is, zich verdoemt om haar te volbrengen
en toch eer verdoemd zou willen zijn dan haar uitvoeren?

MORE:
Proverb: To love it no more than (as well as) a fish loves water

Subscribe=Surety, guarantee
Steal himself=Creep furtively, insinuate himself
Compleat:
Subscribe=Onderschryven
Steal=Doorsluypen

Topics: language, work, trust, proverbs and idioms

I never heard such a drawling, affecting rogue

PLAY: The Merry Wives of Windsor
ACT/SCENE:
SPEAKER: Page
CONTEXT:
PAGE
‘The humour of it,’ quoth a’! here’s a fellow
frights English out of his wits.
FORD
I will seek out Falstaff.
PAGE
I never heard such a drawling, affecting rogue.
FORD
If I do find it: well.
PAGE
I will not believe such a Cataian, though the priest
o’ the town commended him for a true man.

DUTCH:
Ik heb nog nooit zulk een langdradigen, kwasterigen
vlegel gehoord.

MORE:
His=Its (wits)
Affecting=Affected
Cataian, Cathayan=Someone not to be believed (ref to returning travellers telling wild tales about Cathay)
Compleat:
Affected style=Een gamaakte styl
Affectedly=Met gemaaktheyd
To drawl out=Langzaam spreeken, lymen

Topics: language, insult

I only speak right on; I tell you that which you yourselves do know

PLAY: Julius Caesar
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Antony
CONTEXT:
ANTONY
Good friends, sweet friends! Let me not stir you up
To such a sudden flood of mutiny.
They that have done this deed are honourable.
What private griefs they have, alas, I know not,
That made them do it. They are wise and honourable,
And will, no doubt, with reasons answer you.
I come not, friends, to steal away your hearts.
I am no orator, as Brutus is,
But, as you know me all, a plain blunt man
That love my friend. And that they know full well
That gave me public leave to speak of him.
For I have neither wit nor words nor worth,
Action nor utterance nor the power of speech,
To stir men’s blood. I only speak right on.
I tell you that which you yourselves do know,
Show you sweet Caesar’s wounds, poor poor dumb mouths,
And bid them speak for me. But were I Brutus,
And Brutus Antony, there were an Antony
Would ruffle up your spirits and put a tongue
In every wound of Caesar that should move
The stones of Rome to rise and mutiny.

DUTCH:
lk kom niet, vrienden, om uw hart te stelen;
lk ben geen reed’naar, zooals Brutus is;
Slechts, daarvoor kent gij mij , een boersch, rond man,
Mijn vriend getrouw ; dit wisten zij zeer goed,
Die mij vergunden hier van hem to spreken.
Ik heb geen woorden, wijsheid, geen gewicht,
Noch kunst, noch voordracht, noch de macht der taal,
Om ‘s menschen bloed te prikk’len, spreek eenvoudig,
Zeg enkel wat gijzelf wel weet.

MORE:
The “Nervii,” or Nervians, were a Belgian tribe whom Caesar defeated in battle in 57 BC

Stir up=Incite
Flood=Surge
Griefs=Grievances
Plain=Plain-speaking
Public leave to speak=Permission to speak privately
Words=Vocabulary
Worth=Authority
Right on=What I think
Utterance=Delivery
Ruffle up=Enrage
Compleat:
To stir up=Gaande maaken, verwekken, opwekken, aanprikkelen
To stir up to anger=Tot toorn verwekken
Grievance=Bezwaarenis
Plain=Vlak, effen, klaar, duydelyk, slecht, eenvoudig, oprecht
Vocabulary=Een klein woordenboek
Utterance=Uytspraak; aftrek, vertier

Topics: language, persuasion, leadership

I pray you, sir, what saucy merchant was this that was so full of his ropery?.

PLAY: Romeo and Juliet
ACT/SCENE: 2.4
SPEAKER: Nurse
CONTEXT:
I pray you, sir, what saucy merchant was this that was so full of his ropery?
ROMEO
A gentleman, Nurse, that loves to hear himself talk, and will speak more in a minute than he will stand to in a month.

DUTCH:
Nu, ook vaarwel. — Heer, zeg mij toch, wat is dat
voor een raren snuiter, met al die vrijmoedighedens?

MORE:
Schmidt:
saucy=impudent, insolent
merchant=fellow
ropery=roguery (Schmidt) =trickery, knavery (Onions)
Stand to=side with, assist, support, maintain, guard, be firm in the cause of
Compleat:
Roguery=Schelmery, fieltery
To stand to one’s word=By zyn woord staan, zijn woord gestand doen

Topics: language, civility

I prithee give me leave to curse awhile.

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 5.3
SPEAKER: Joan la Pucelle
CONTEXT:
JOAN LA PUCELLE
A plaguing mischief light on Charles and thee!
And may ye both be suddenly surprised
By bloody hands, in sleeping on your beds!
YORK
Fell banning hag, enchantress, hold thy tongue!
JOAN LA PUCELLE
I prithee, give me leave to curse awhile.
YORK
Curse, miscreant, when thou comest to the stake.

DUTCH:
Treffe u en Karel beide’ een folt’rend onheil,
En moge een hand des bloeds u beiden plotsling
Bij ‘t slapen in uw bedden overvallen!

MORE:
Fell=Cruel, vicious, intense, savage.
Banning=Cursing
Plaguing=Tormenting, afflicting
Mischief=Calamity, misfortune

Compleat:
Fell=(cruel) Wreed
To ban=Vervloeken, in den ban doen (also ‘bann’)
Plaguing=Plaagende
Mischief=Onheil, kwaad, ongeluk, ramp, verderf, heilloosheid

Topics: language, civility, insult

I promise you, the king
Prettily, methought, did play the orator

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Warwick
CONTEXT:
WARWICK
My Lord of York, I promise you, the king
Prettily, methought, did play the orator.
YORK
And so he did; but yet I like it not,
In that he wears the badge of Somerset.
WARWICK
Tush, that was but his fancy, blame him not;
I dare presume, sweet prince, he thought no harm.
YORK
An if I wist he did,—but let it rest;
Other affairs must now be managed.

DUTCH:
Mylord van York, de koning, moet ik zeggen,
Heeft daar zijn rol van reed’naar goed gespeeld.

MORE:

Schmidt:
Badge=Device, emblem, or mark on a piece of cloth or of silver used to identify a knight or distinguish his followers
Tush=Interjection expressive of contempt
Dare=Would venture to
Wist=Knew

Compleat:
Badge=Merk, teken
Tush=Een woordje van verachting
To dare=Durven, de stoutheid hebben, ‘t hart hebben
If I may dare to say so=Als ik zo durf spreeken
Wist=Geweeten
Had I wist=Had ik geweeten

Topics: language, leadership

I will indeed no longer endure it, nor am I yet persuaded to put up in peace what already I have foolishly suffered

PLAY: Othello
ACT/SCENE: 4.2
SPEAKER: Roderigo
CONTEXT:

RODERIGO
Every day thou daff’st me with some device, Iago, and rather, as it seems to me now, keep’st from me all conveniency than suppliest me with the least advantage of hope.
I will indeed no longer endure it, nor am I yet persuaded to put up in peace what already I have foolishly suffered.
IAGO
Will you hear me, Roderigo?
RODERIGO
I have heard too much, and your words and performances are no kin together.
IAGO
You charge me most unjustly.
RODERIGO
With naught but truth. I have wasted myself out of my means. The jewels you have had from me to deliver Desdemona would half have corrupted a votaress. You have told me she hath received them and returned me expectations and comforts of sudden respect and acquaintance, but I find none.
IAGO
Well, go to. Very well.
RODERIGO
“Very well,” “go to”! I cannot go to, man, nor ’tis not very well. Nay, I think it is scurvy, and begin to find myself fopped in it.

DUTCH:
Ik wil dit bepaald niet langer verdragen, en ben volstrekt
niet gezind, verder kalm mij te laten welgevallen, wat
ik tot nog toe dwaas genoeg verduurd heb.

MORE:
Proverb: ‘Great promise small performance’ (your words and performances are no kin together.)

Conveniency=Opportunity
Advantage=Increase
Device=Scheme
Daff’st=Fob off (Daff=to put off (clothes)) Variation of doff, do off
Put up in peace=Endure silently
Votaress/Votarist=Nun
Comfort=Encouragement
Fopped=To make a fool of, to dupe
Compleat:
Conveniency=Bequaamheyd, gelegenheyd, geryflykheyd
Votary=Een die zich door een (religieuse) belofte verbonden heeft; die zich ergens toe heeft overgegeeven
Device (cunning trick)=Een listige streek
Device (invention or contrivance)=Uitvinding, vinding
Comfort=Vertroosting, troost, verquikking, vermaak, verneugte
To fob one off=Iemand te leur stellen; voor de gek houden

Topics: proverbs and idioms, perception, language, blame

I will make a complimental assault upon him

PLAY: Troilus and Cressida
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Pandarus
CONTEXT:
PANDARUS
It should seem, fellow, that thou hast not seen the
Lady Cressida. I come to speak with Paris from the
Prince Troilus: I will make a complimental assault
upon him, for my business seethes.
SERVANT
Sodden business! there’s a stewed phrase indeed!

DUTCH:
Ik wil hem met hoffelijkheden bestormen, want
mijn boodschap kookt in mij.

MORE:
Fellow=A slightly insulting way of addressing the servant, pointing out his lower class
Complimental=Ceremonial, full of flattery
Seethes=Is very urgent
Sodden=Boiled; stupid or drunk
Stewed=Overdone
Compleat:
A cunning fellow=Een doortrapte vent, een looze gast
To compliment=Een pligtreeden afleggen, pligtpleegen, dienstbieden
To seeth=Zieden, kooken
Sod, sodden=[van to seeth] Gezooden, gekookt
To stew=Stooven

Topics: language, civility, persuasion, flattery

I will speak daggers to her but use none.

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Hamlet
CONTEXT:
I will speak daggers to her but use none.
My tongue and soul in this be hypocrites.
How in my words somever she be shent,
To give them seals never, my soul, consent!

DUTCH:
k Zal dolken spreken, maar ‘k gebruik er geen. /
Wreed wil ik zijn, maar aan mijn inborst tro
uw; met dolken spreken, maar ze niet gebruiken.

MORE:
Schmidt:
Shent=put to the blush, blamed, reproached, reviled
Somever=soever
Compleat:
Shent=Beschuldigd, bekeeven

Topics: language

I would crave a word or two, the which shall turn you to no further harm than so much loss of time

PLAY: Coriolanus
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Menenius
CONTEXT:
MENENIUS
If, by the tribunes’ leave, and yours, good people,
I may be heard, I would crave a word or two,
The which shall turn you to no further harm
Than so much loss of time.
SICINIUS
Speak briefly then,
For we are peremptory to dispatch
This viperous traitor. To eject him hence
Were but one danger, and to keep him here
Our certain death. Therefore it is decreed
He dies tonight.

DUTCH:
.
Zoo gij, tribunen, en
Gij, goede burgers, mij gehoor verleent,
Vraag ik: vergunt me een woord of twee; zij kosten
U verder niets dan wat verloren tijd.

MORE:
Viperous (venomous, malignant) was a common source of metaphor in Elizabethan writing.
Peremptory=Resolved, determined
Compleat:
Peremptory=Volstrekt, uitvoering, volkomen, uiteindig

Topics: anger, punishment, language, patience

If voluble and sharp discourse be marred, unkindness blunts it more than marble hard

PLAY: The Comedy of Errors
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Adriana
CONTEXT:
LUCIANA
Fie, how impatience loureth in your face.
ADRIANA
His company must do his minions grace,
Whilst I at home starve for a merry look.
Hath homely age th’ alluring beauty took
From my poor cheek? Then he hath wasted it.
Are my discourses dull? Barren my wit?
If voluble and sharp discourse be marred,
Unkindness blunts it more than marble hard.
Do their gay vestments his affections bait?
That’s not my fault; he’s master of my state.
What ruins are in me that can be found
By him not ruined? Then is he the ground
Of my defeatures. My decayèd fair
A sunny look of his would soon repair.
But, too unruly deer, he breaks the pale
And feeds from home. Poor I am but his stale.

DUTCH:
Ontnam reeds rimp’lige ouderdom mijn wang
Haar boeiend schoon? Wie heeft het mij geroofd,
Dan hij? Is geest en scherts in mij verdoofd?
Neemt iets aan vlug en lucht gekout den moed,
‘t Is barschheid, ruw en hard als steen, die ‘t doet.
Lokt and’rer fraai gewaad hem van mijn zij,
‘t Is mijn schuld niet, want hij koopt mij kleedij.
Wat is in mij vervallen en is ‘t niet
Door hem? Ja, zoo hij mij vervallen ziet,
Hij ziet zijn eigen werk; één zonnestraal
Van hem, mijn schoon herleeft in morgenpraal.

MORE:
Proverb: As hard as a stone (flint, rock)

Voluble=Fluent, articulate
Sharp=Subtle, witty
Voluble and sharp discourse=Articulate and witty conversation
To blunt=Dull the edge of, repress, impair, i.e. blunt the natural edge
Ground of=Reason for
Defeatures=Disfigurements
Stale=Laughing-stock, dupe; decoy or bait set up as a lure
Pale=Enclosure
Compleat:
A voluble tongue=Een vloeijende tong, een gladde tong, een tong die wel gehangen is
Sharp=Scherp, spits, bits, streng, scherpzinnig
Court minion=Een gunsteling van den Vorst; Troetelkind
To blunt=Stomp maaken, verstompen
To pale in=Met paalen afperken, afpaalen. Paled in=Rondom met paalen bezet, afgepaald
To make on a stale (property or stalking-horse) to one’s design=Iemand gebruiken om ons oogmerk te bereiken

Topics: language, intellect, respect, marriage, relationship, loyalty, proverbs and idioms

If your four negatives make your two affirmatives, why then the worse for my friends and the better for my foes

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 5.1
SPEAKER: Fool
CONTEXT:
FOOL
Marry, sir, they praise me and make an ass of me, now
my foes tell me plainly I am an ass. So that by my foes,
sir I profit in the knowledge of myself, and by my
friends, I am abused. So that, conclusions to be as
kisses, if your four negatives make your two
affirmatives, why then the worse for my friends and the
better for my foes.
ORSINO
Why, this is excellent.
FOOL
By my troth, sir, no—though it please you to be one of
my friends.

DUTCH:
Wel, heer, zij prijzen mij en maken mij tot een ezel;
maar mijn vijanden zeggen mij ronduit, dat ik een ezel
ben; zoodat ik door mijn vijanden, heer, vooruitga in
zelfkennis en door mijn vrienden bedrogen word; zoodat,
wanneer het met gevolgtrekkingen is als met kusjes,
dat vier ontkenningen twee bevestigingen zijn, het mij
slecht gaat met mijn vrienden en goed met mijn vijanden.

MORE:
Proverb: God send me a friend that may tell me my faults; if not, an enemy, and to be sure he will
Proverb: Two negatives make an affirmative

The argument being that if, as in grammar, four negatives make two affirmatives, if someone says ‘No, no, no, no’, the first no negates the second and the third negates the fourth, turning it into ‘Yes, yes’.

Topics: truth, honesty, friendship, language, clarity/precision

If’t be summer news, smile to’t before; if winterly, thou need’st but keep that countenance still

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Imogen
CONTEXT:
IMOGEN
Thou told’st me, when we came from horse, the place
Was near at hand: ne’er long’d my mother so
To see me first, as I have now. Pisanio! man!
Where is Posthumus? What is in thy mind,
That makes thee stare thus? Wherefore breaks that sigh
From the inward of thee? One, but painted thus,
Would be interpreted a thing perplex’d
Beyond self-explication: put thyself
Into a havior of less fear, ere wildness
Vanquish my staider senses. What’s the matter?
Why tender’st thou that paper to me, with
If’t be summer news,
Smile to’t before; if winterly, thou need’st
But keep that countenance still. My husband’s hand!
That drug-damned Italy hath out-craftied him,
And he’s at some hard point. Speak, man: thy tongue
May take off some extremity, which to read
Would be even mortal to me.

DUTCH:
Wat houdt ge mij, met ingehouden smart,
Dien brief voor? Brengt hij zomerzonneschijn,
Zoo glimlach; is het ijzig winternieuws,
Dan past die schrik.

MORE:
At some hard point=In a difficult situation
Take off some extremity=Soften the blow
Out-craftied=Outwitted with cunning (See als crafty-sick (feigning sickness), Henry IV Part 2)
Drug-damned=Detested for its drugs or poisons
Compleat:
Extremity=Uitspoorigheid; elende, jammerstaat
Crafty=Loos, listig, schalk, doortrapt, leep

Topics: life/experience, appearance, language

Ignorance is the curse of God,
Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven.

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 4.7
SPEAKER: Saye
CONTEXT:
SAYE
Nothing but this; ’tis ‘bona terra, mala gens.’
CADE
Away with him, away with him! He speaks Latin.
SAYE
Hear me but speak, and bear me where you will.
Kent, in the Commentaries Caesar writ,
Is term’d the civil’st place of this isle:
Sweet is the country, because full of riches;
The people liberal, valiant, active, wealthy;
Which makes me hope you are not void of pity.
I sold not Maine, I lost not Normandy,
Yet, to recover them, would lose my life.
Justice with favour have I always done;
Prayers and tears have moved me, gifts could never.
When have I aught exacted at your hands,
But to maintain the king, the realm and you?
Large gifts have I bestow’d on learned clerks,
Because my book preferr’d me to the king,
And seeing ignorance is the curse of God,
Knowledge the wing wherewith we fly to heaven,
Unless you be possess’d with devilish spirits,
You cannot but forbear to murder me:
This tongue hath parley’d unto foreign kings
For your behoof

DUTCH:
Veel giften schonk ik aan geleerde mannen,
Omdat mijn weten bij den koning gold,
En wijl onwetendheid Gods vloek, maar kennis
De vleugel is, die ons ten hemel voert.

MORE:
See also “He can speak French; and therefore he is a traitor” (4.2)

Topics: money, value, learning/education, language

In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt
But, being seasoned with a gracious voice,
Obscures the show of evil?

PLAY: The Merchant of Venice
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Bassanio
CONTEXT:
BASSANIO
So may the outward shows be least themselves.
The world is still deceived with ornament.
In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt
But, being seasoned with a gracious voice,
Obscures the show of evil? In religion,
What damned error, but some sober brow
Will bless it and approve it with a text,
Hiding the grossness with fair ornament?
There is no vice so simple but assumes
Some mark of virtue on his outward parts.
How many cowards whose hearts are all as false
As stairs of sand wear yet upon their chins
The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars,
Who, inward searched, have livers white as milk,
And these assume but valour’s excrement
To render them redoubted…

DUTCH:
In ’t recht, wat zaak is ooit zoo voos en valsch,
Die niet, door schrandre en gladde tong verfraaid,
Den schijn van ’t kwaad bemantelt?

MORE:
: CITED IN IRISH LAW:
Kirwan & Ors -v- The Mental Health Commission [2012] IEHC 217 (28 May 2012)
CITED IN US LAW:
McCauley v. State, 405 So.2d 1350, 1351 (Fla., 1981) (cited in opinion: “In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt but, being seasoned with a gracious voice, Obscures the show of evil?”);
United States v. Powell, 55 M.J. 633, 642 (2001): “The standard of review in this area of the law is difficult to apply because a judge is attempting to peer into an attorney’s heart by relying on his or her words. In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt / But, being seasoned with a gracious voice,
Obscures the show of evil.”;
Day v. Rosenthal, 170 Cal. App. 3d 1125, 1180 (1985).

To season=To temper, qualify
Gracious voice=Attractive, graceful, elegant
To season=To fit for any use by time or habit; to mature; to grow fit for any purpose (Samuel Johnson)
Compleat:
Seasoned=Toebereid, bekwaam gemaakt, getemperd.
Children should be season’d betimes to virtue=Men behoorde de kinderen by tyds aan de deugd te gewennen.

Topics: emotion and mood, misquoted

It is a custom
More honoured in the breach than the observance

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 1.4
SPEAKER: Hamlet
CONTEXT:
It is a custom
More honoured in the breach than the observance.
This heavy-headed revel east and west
Makes us traduced and taxed of other nations.

DUTCH:
Het is een gebruik, meer eervol voor die het schendt, dan voor die het volgt /
Is ‘t een zede, Meer eerbiedwaard, als men haar schendt, dan volgt. /
Is het een zede Eervoller om te laten dan te volgen.

MORE:
Misquoted in that the meaning has moved nowadays to regretting the falling out of use of a custom or tradition, i.e. a custom more often ignored and observed; whereas Hamlet meant the opposite: if his uncle’s drinking and making promises is a tradition, it is one they can well do without.
CITED IN US LAW –
The above point is made by Judge Posner, who wrote that a reader frequently thinks that this means custom that is not observed, which is what the expression viewed in isolation seems plainly to mean. “But if you go back to the passage in Hamlet from which the expression comes (Act I, Sc. iv, lines 8-20), you will see that the custom referred to is that of getting drunk on festive occasions. The point is general: context, in the broadest sense, is the key to understanding language”. (Alliance to End Repression v United States Department of Justice, 742 F 2d 1007, 1013 (7th Cir. 1983)(Posner, J);
U.S. v. Smith, 812 F.2d 161, 167 (4th Cir. 1987);
Calley v. Callaway, 382 F.Supp. 650, 666 (M.D.Ga. 1974);
Arthur v. Nyquist, 415 F.Supp. 904, 959 (W.D.N.Y. 1976);
State v. Griffin, 347 So.2d 692, 694 (Fla. Ct. App. 1977).

Topics: language, still in use, cited in law, proverbs and idioms

It is something of my negligence, nothing of my purpose

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Viola
CONTEXT:
SIR TOBY BELCH
He is knight, dubbed with unhatched rapier and on
carpet consideration, but he is a devil in private
brawl. Souls and bodies hath he divorced three, and his
incensement at this moment is so implacable that
satisfaction can be none but by pangs of death and
sepulchre. Hob, nob, is his word. “Give ’t or take ’t.”
VIOLA
I will return again into the house and desire some
conduct of the lady. I am no fighter. I have heard of
some kind of men that put quarrels purposely on others,
to taste their valor. Belike this is a man of that
quirk.
SIR TOBY BELCH
Sir, no. His indignation derives itself out of a very
competent injury. Therefore get you on and give him his
desire. Back you shall not to the house, unless you
undertake that with me which with as much safety you
might answer him. Therefore on, or strip your sword
stark naked, for meddle you must, that’s certain, or
forswear to wear iron about you.
VIOLA
This is as uncivil as strange. I beseech you, do me
this courteous office, as to know of the knight what my
offence to him is. It is something of my negligence,
nothing of my purpose.

DUTCH:
Ik verzoek u, mij den beleefden dienst te willen doen, van den ridder te vragen, waarmee ik hem beleedigd heb; het is uit onachtzaamheid, volstrekt niet met opzet geschied.

Topics: law/legal, lawyers, language, dispute

It needs not, nor it boots thee not, proud queen,
Unless the adage must be verified
That beggars mounted run their horse to death.

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 3
ACT/SCENE: 1.4
SPEAKER: York
CONTEXT:
She-wolf of France, but worse than wolves of France,
Whose tongue more poisons than the adder’s tooth!
How ill-beseeming is it in thy sex
To triumph, like an Amazonian trull,
Upon their woes whom fortune captivates!
But that thy face is, visor-like, unchanging,
Made impudent with use of evil deeds,
I would assay, proud queen, to make thee blush.
To tell thee whence thou camest, of whom derived,
Were shame enough to shame thee, wert thou not
shameless.
Thy father bears the type of King of Naples,
Of both the Sicils and Jerusalem,
Yet not so wealthy as an English yeoman.
Hath that poor monarch taught thee to insult?
It needs not, nor it boots thee not, proud queen,
Unless the adage must be verified,
That beggars mounted run their horse to death.

DUTCH:
Maar, fiere koningin, het baat u niets,
Dan dat het spreekwoord waar blijkt: „Als een beed’laar
Te paard ooit komt, hij jaagt zijn rijdier dood.”

MORE:

Proverb: Set a beggar on horseback and he will ride a gallop (run his horse out of breath): newfound power will go to their heads

Ill-beseeming=Unbecoming, unattractive
Trull=A drab, lewd woman
Captivate=Subdue
Visor=(Vizor, Vizard): Mask
Impudent=Shameless
Assay=Try
Type=Title
Yeoman=Landowner
Needs not=Is unnecessary
Boots not=Is futile
Adage=Proverb

Compleat:
To beseem=Betaamen, voegen, passen
Trull=Een smots, snol
Captivate=Overmeesteren, gevangen neemen
Vizard=Een momaanzigt, mombakkus, masker
Impudent=Onbeschaamd
to assay=Beproeven, toetsen, onderstaan, keuren
Yeoman=Een welgegoed landman, een ryke boer, een Landjonker
It is to no boot=Het doet geen nut, het is te vergeefs
Adage=Spreekwoord

Topics: proverbs and idioms, appearance, civility, language, dignity

Jesters do oft prove prophet

PLAY: King Lear
ACT/SCENE: 5.3
SPEAKER: Regan
CONTEXT:
ALBANY
That were the most if he should husband you.
REGAN
Jesters do oft prove prophets.
GONERIL
Holla, holla!
That eye that told you so looked but asquint.

DUTCH:
Een dwaas blijkt dikwijls een profeet. /
Spotters zijn vaak profeten.

MORE:
Proverb: Many a true word spoken in jest
Schmidt:
Jester=One who cracks jokes, a scoffer
Compleat:
To husband=To supply with a husband, to marry

Topics: language, proverbs and idioms, still in use

Kneel not to me. The power that I have on you is to spare you; the malice towards you to forgive you

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 5.5
SPEAKER: Cymbeline
CONTEXT:
CYMBELINE
The forlorn soldier, that so nobly fought,
He would have well becomed this place, and graced
The thankings of a king.
POSTHUMUS LEONATUS
I am, sir,
The soldier that did company these three
In poor beseeming; ’twas a fitment for
The purpose I then follow’d. That I was he,
Speak, Iachimo: I had you down and might
Have made you finish.
IACHIMO
I am down again:
But now my heavy conscience sinks my knee,
As then your force did. Take that life, beseech you,
Which I so often owe: but your ring first;
And here the bracelet of the truest princess
That ever swore her faith.
POSTHUMUS
Kneel not to me.
The power that I have on you is to spare you;
The malice towards you to forgive you. Live
And deal with others better.
CYMBELINE
Nobly doomed.
We’ll learn our freeness of a son-in-law:
Pardon’s the word to all.

DUTCH:
Kniel niet voor mij;
De macht, die ‘k op u heb, is u te sparen,
En heel mijn wrok, u te vergeven. Leef,
Behandel and’ren beter.

MORE:
Proverb: To be able to harm and not to do it is noble

Doomed=Judged
Malice=Malignity, disposition to injure others
Freeness=Generosity
Compleat:
Doom=Vonnis, oordeel, verwyzing
To doom=Veroordelen, verwyzen, doemen
Doomed=Veroordeeld, verweezen.

Topics: life/experience, appearance, language, proverbs and idioms

Let not his smoothing words
Bewitch your hearts; be wise and circumspect.

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Cardinal
CONTEXT:
So, there goes our protector in a rage.
‘Tis known to you he is mine enemy,
Nay, more, an enemy unto you all,
And no great friend, I fear me, to the king.
Consider, lords, he is the next of blood,
And heir apparent to the English crown:
Had Henry got an empire by his marriage,
And all the wealthy kingdoms of the west,
There’s reason he should be displeased at it.
Look to it, lords! Let not his smoothing words
Bewitch your hearts; be wise and circumspect.
What though the common people favour him,
Calling him ‘Humphrey, the good Duke of Gloucester,’
Clapping their hands, and crying with loud voice,
‘Jesu maintain your royal excellence!’
With ‘God preserve the good Duke Humphrey!’
I fear me, lords, for all this flattering gloss,
He will be found a dangerous protector.

DUTCH:
Lords, zorgt er voor, dat niet zijn gladde taal
Uw hart beheks’, weest wijs en op uw hoede!

MORE:

Smoothing=Flattering
Flattering gloss=Sheen
What though=Never mind, so what if

Compleat:
Gloss=Uitlegging
To set a gloss upon a thing=Iets een schoonen opschik geeven
To smooth one up (coaks)=Iemand streelen

Topics: language, deceit, truth, caution, wisdom

Let not my cold words here accuse my zeal

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Thomas Mowbray
CONTEXT:
HENRY BOLINGBROKE
(…) Thou art a traitor and a miscreant,
Too good to be so and too bad to live,
Since the more fair and crystal is the sky,
The uglier seem the clouds that in it fly.
Once more, the more to aggravate the note,
With a foul traitor’s name stuff I thy throat;
And wish, so please my sovereign, ere I move,
What my tongue speaks my right drawn sword may prove.
THOMAS MOWBRAY
Let not my cold words here accuse my zeal:
Tis not the trial of a woman’s war,
The bitter clamour of two eager tongues,
Can arbitrate this cause betwixt us twain;
The blood is hot that must be cool’d for this:
Yet can I not of such tame patience boast
As to be hush’d and nought at all to say:
First, the fair reverence of your highness curbs me
From giving reins and spurs to my free speech;
Which else would post until it had return’d
These terms of treason doubled down his throat.
Setting aside his high blood’s royalty,
And let him be no kinsman to my liege,
60I do defy him, and I spit at him;
Call him a slanderous coward and a villain:
Which to maintain I would allow him odds,
And meet him, were I tied to run afoot
Even to the frozen ridges of the Alps,
Or any other ground inhabitable,
Where ever Englishman durst set his foot.
Mean time let this defend my loyalty,
By all my hopes, most falsely doth he lie.

DUTCH:
Laat niet mijn koude taal mijn moed doen laken.
Niet de schermuts’ling van een vrouwentwist,
De bitt’re smaad van twee verwoede tongen,
Kan deze zaak beslechten tusschen ons;

MORE:

Miscreant=Villain, scoundrel
Good=Noble in rank
Crystal=Bright, transparent
Aggravate the note=Add weight, exacerbate, increase the reproach
Accuse=Belie, impugn
Zeal=Intense and eager interest or endeavour, ardour
Woman’s war=Ref to ‘women are words, men deeds’
Eager=Sharp, acidic
Curbs, reins, spurs=Equestrian metaphors
Post=Gallop

Compleat:
The crystalline heaven=De kristalyne Hemel
Aggravate=Verzwaaren
Zeal=Yver
Eager=Scherp, zuur, wrang

Topics: blame, dispute, language

Let thy tongue tang with arguments of state. Put thyself into the trick of singularity

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Malvolio
CONTEXT:
MALVOLIO
Oh, ho! Do you come near me now? No worse man than Sir
Toby to look to me. This concurs directly with the
letter. She sends him on purpose that I may appear
stubborn to him, for she incites me to that in the
letter. “Cast thy humble slough,” says she. “Be opposite
with a kinsman, surly with servants. Let thy tongue
tang with arguments of state. Put thyself into the trick
of singularity,” and consequently sets down the manner
how: as, a sad face, a reverend carriage, a slow tongue,
in the habit of some sir of note, and so forth. I have
limed her, but it is Jove’s doing, and Jove make me
thankful! And when she went away now, “Let this fellow
be looked to.” “Fellow!” Not “Malvolio,” nor after my
degree, but “fellow.” Why, everything adheres together,
that no dram of a scruple, no scruple of a scruple, no
obstacle, no incredulous or unsafe circumstance—what can
be said? Nothing that can be can come between me and
the full prospect of my hopes. Well, Jove, not I, is the
doer of this, and he is to be thanked.

DUTCH:
Zij zendt hem opzettelijk tot mij, opdat ik hem stug behandelen kan, want daartoe wekt zij mij in den brief op. „Werp uwe deemoedige huid af,” zegt zij, kant u tegen een bloedverwant, wees norsch jegens bedienden; Iaten er staatsaangelegenheden van uwe tong ruischen; zorg eigenaardig te zijn in uwe manieren,” en daarop beschrijft zij de manier hoe;

MORE:
Come near=Understand, value
Stubborn=Harsh
Consequently=Subsequently
Habit=Dress
Sir of note=Distinguished gentleman
Limed=Trapped (ref. to bird lime)
Adheres together=Conspires, converges
Dram=Small weight
Scruple=Tiny scrap
Unsafe=Dangerous, untrustworthy
Compleat:
Draw near=Naderen
Stubborn=Hardnekkig, halstarrig, wederspannig
Habit=Heblykheyd, gewoonte, gesteltenis
Of note=Van aanzien, aanzienlyk
Bird-lime=Vogellym
Dram=Vierendeel loods; een zoopje, een borrel
Scruple=Een gewigtje van xx greinen

Topics: language, communication, persuasion, skill/talent

Let us make an honourable retreat; though not with bag and baggage

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Touchstone
CONTEXT:
TOUCHSTONE
Come, shepherd, let us make an honourable retreat,
though not with bag and baggage, yet with scrip and
scrippage.
CELIA
Didst thou hear these verses?
ROSALIND
Oh, yes, I heard them all, and more too, for some of
them had in them more feet than the verses would bear.
CELIA
That’s no matter. The feet might bear the verses.
ROSALIND
Ay, but the feet were lame and could not bear
themselves without the verse, and therefore stood lamely
in the verse.

DUTCH:

Kom, scheper, een eervollen terugtocht! zoo niet met
pak en zak, toch met tasch en staf!

MORE:
Bag and baggage=The necessaries of an army, as the phrase “”with bag and b.”
Clear out bag and baggage=Leave nothing behind
Scrippage=Coins, contents of scrip (shepherds’s pouch)
Feet=Punning on metrical units in verse
Compleat:
March away bag and baggage=Met pak en zak weg trekken
Scrip (a budget or bag=Tasch

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, language

Look you lisp and wear strange suits

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Rosalind
CONTEXT:
JAQUES
Nay then, God be wi’ you, an you talk in blank verse.
ROSALIND
Farewell, Monsieur Traveler. Look you lisp and wear
strange suits, disable all the benefits of your own
country, be out of love with your nativity, and almost
chide God for making you that countenance you are, or I
will scarce think you have swam in a gondola.
Why, how now,
Orlando, where have you been all this while? You a
lover? An you serve me such another trick, never come in
my sight more.

DUTCH:
Vaarwel, signore Reiziger. Zorg vooral, dat gij lispelt en u uitheemsch kleedt, al wat er goed is in uw eigen land nietswaardig noemt, met het uur van uw geboorte overhoop ligt en bijna tegen den lieven God uitvaart, omdat hij u geen ander gezicht gegeven heeft;

MORE:
Disable=To disparage, to undervalue
Countenance=Face, air
Compleat:
Disable=Onmagtig maaken, onvermogend maaken
Countenance=Gelaat, gezigt, uitzigt, weezen

Topics: language, appearance, value, ingratitude

Lysander riddles very prettily

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Hermia
CONTEXT:
HERMIA
Lysander riddles very prettily.
Now much beshrew my manners and my pride
If Hermia meant to say Lysander lied.
But, gentle friend, for love and courtesy
Lie further off in human modesty.
Such separation as may well be said
Becomes a virtuous bachelor and a maid.
So far be distant. And, good night, sweet friend.
Thy love ne’er alter till thy sweet life end!

DUTCH:
Gij haalt er dat „vertrouwen” aardig bij; —
Geloof toch, ‘t was geen wantrouwen of vrees,
Dat ik u maar wat verder ginds verwees.

MORE:
Riddles very prettily=Is skilful with language
Beshrew=Curse
Compleat:
Riddle=een Raadsel
Beshrew=Bekyven, vervloeken

Topics: language, pride, love

Men in rage strike those that wish them best

PLAY: Othello
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER: Iago
CONTEXT:
IAGO
Touch me not so near.
I had rather have this tongue cut from my mouth
Than it should do offence to Michael Cassio.
Yet I persuade myself to speak the truth
Shall nothing wrong him. This it is, general:
Montano and myself being in speech,
There comes a fellow crying out for help
And Cassio following him with determined sword
To execute upon him. Sir, this gentleman
Steps in to Cassio and entreats his pause,
Myself the crying fellow did pursue,
Lest by his clamour—as it so fell out—
The town might fall in fright. He, swift of foot,
Outran my purpose, and I returned then rather
For that I heard the clink and fall of swords
And Cassio high in oath, which till tonight
I ne’er might say before. When I came back—
For this was brief— I found them close together
At blow and thrust, even as again they were
When you yourself did part them.
More of this matter cannot I report.
But men are men, the best sometimes forget.
Though Cassio did some little wrong to him,
As men in rage strike those that wish them best,
Yet surely Cassio, I believe, received
From him that fled some strange indignity
Which patience could not pass.
OTHELLO
I know, Iago,
Thy honesty and love doth mince this matter,
Making it light to Cassio. Cassio, I love thee,
But never more be officer of mine.

DUTCH:
Zooals in woede een mensch zijn vriend kan slaan,
Ik houd voor zeker: Cassio ondervond
Van hem, die mij ontkwam, een krenking, dieper
Dan zelfs ‘t Geduld zou dragen.

MORE:
CITED IN US LAW:
Lindros v. Governing Board of the Torrance Unified School District, 9 Cal.3d 524, 540, 510 P.2d 361, 371, 108 Cal. Rptr. 185, 195 (1973)(Torriner, J.)(en banc).

Proverb: To mince the matter (Tell sparingly or by halves)

Forget=Forget themselves
Indignity=Contemptuous injury, insult
Patience=Self-control
Pass=Overlook
Compleat:
Indignity=Smaad
Pass, pass by=Passeren, voorbygaan, overslaan
Mince=Kleyn kappen

Topics: proverbs and idioms, invented or popularised, still in use, cited in law, language, honour, truth, error, anger

Men of few words are the best men.

PLAY: King Henry V
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Boy
CONTEXT:
For indeed three such antics do not amount to a man: for Bardolph, he is white-livered
and red-faced, by the means whereof he faces it out but fights not; for Pistol, he hath a killing tongue and a quiet sword, by the means whereof he breaks words and keeps whole weapons; for Nym, he hath heard that men of few words are the best men, and therefore he scorns to say his prayers, lest he should be thought a coward, but his few bad words are matched with as few good deeds, for he never broke any man’s head but his own, and that was against a post when he was drunk.

DUTCH:
Nym, die heeft wel eens gehoord, dat menschen van weinig woorden de besten zijn, en daarom verdraait hij het, ooit te bidden, opdat men hem niet voor een lafaard zou houden, maar naast zijn weinige en slechte woorden staan even weinige goede daden.

Compleat:
To scorn=Verachten, verfooijen
White-livered=Een die er altijd bleek uitziet; een bleek-neus, kwaadaardig, nydig
To face out=Iemand iets in ‘t gezigt staande houden

Topics: reputation, honour, language, promise

Methinks thy voice is altered, and thou speak’st
In better phrase and matter than thou didst.

PLAY: King Lear
ACT/SCENE: 4.5
SPEAKER: Gloucester
CONTEXT:
GLOUCESTER
So may it be indeed.
Methinks thy voice is altered, and thou speak’st
In better phrase and matter than thou didst.
EDGAR
Y’are much deceived. In nothing am I changed
But in my garments.
GLOUCESTER
Methinks y’are better spoken.
EDGAR
Come on, sir, here’s the place. Stand still. How fearful
And dizzy ’tis to cast one’s eyes so low.
The crows and choughs that wing the midway air
Show scarce so gross as beetles. Half-way down
Hangs one that gathers samphire, dreadful trade!

DUTCH:
Mij komt
Uw stem ook anders voor; uw spreken, en
Ook wat gij zegt, is beter dan voorheen.

MORE:
Onions:
Choughs=Jackdaws, or possibly the Cornishi chough or red-legged crow.
Burgersdijk notes:
Zeevenkel zaam ‘lend. Zeevenkel, sampire of samphire, Crithmum maritimum, een plant tot de schermdragende gewassen behoorende, blauwachtig green van kleur, met gevinde vleezige blaadjens, groeit aan zeekusten, op plaatsen, die door de zee niet bereikt worden; van daar hier: halfweg de hoogte der rots. Die de plant inzamelden, moesten dikwijls van den top der klippen aan een touw verscheidene vademen diep worden neergelaten. De bladen worden als salade of, in azijn ingelegd, als toespijs gebruikt. In Sh’s tijd werd zij veel ingezameld en in de straten te koop geveild. Tegenwoordig is de voor het verbruik verlangde hoeveelheid wel op gemakkelijker toegankelijke plaatsen te bekomen.

Topics: language, appearance

Most mischievous foul sin in chiding sin, for thou thyself hast been a libertine

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 2.7
SPEAKER: Duke Senior
CONTEXT:
DUKE SENIOR
Fie on thee! I can tell what thou wouldst do.
JAQUES
What, for a counter, would I do but good?
DUKE SENIOR
Most mischievous foul sin in chiding sin,
For thou thyself hast been a libertine,
As sensual as the brutish sting itself,
And all th’ embossèd sores and headed evils
That thou with license of free foot hast caught
Wouldst thou disgorge into the general world.
JAQUES
Why, who cries out on pride
That can therein tax any private party?
Doth it not flow as hugely as the sea
Till that the weary very means do ebb?
What woman in the city do I name,
When that I say the city-woman bears
The cost of princes on unworthy shoulders?
Who can come in and say that I mean her,
When such a one as she such is her neighbour?
Or what is he of basest function
That says his bravery is not of my cost,
Thinking that I mean him, but therein suits
His folly to the mettle of my speech?
There then. How then, what then? Let me see wherein
My tongue hath wronged him. If it do him right,
Then he hath wronged himself. If he be free,
Why then my taxing like a wild goose flies
Unclaimed of any man. But who comes here?

DUTCH:
Recht booze zonde, als gij op zonde raast;
Want gij zijt zelf een woesteling geweest,
Een slaaf, niet min dan ‘t vee, der zinn’lijkheid;

MORE:
Counter=Coin or counter having no value
Sting=Carnal appetite
Embossed=Swollen
Evils=Boils
Licence=Licentiousness (and permission)
Free foot=Freedom of movement
Tax=Accuse
Means=Source
City-woman=Extravagantly dressed city wife
Mettle=Spirit
Do him=Describe him
Right=Correctly
Free=Innocent
Compleat:
Sting=Prikkel, steekel
Licence=Verlof, oorlof, vergunning, toelaating, vrygeeving, goedkeuring; vryheyd
To tax=Beschuldigen
Full of mettle=Vol vuurs, moedig
Right=Recht, behoorlyk

Topics: advantage/benefit, pride, language, insult

My husband says my son profits nothing in the world at his book

PLAY: The Merry Wives of Windsor
ACT/SCENE:
SPEAKER: Mistress Page
CONTEXT:
MISTRESS PAGE
Sir Hugh, my husband says my son profits nothing in
the world at his book. I pray you, ask him some
questions in his accidence.
SIR HUGH EVANS
Come hither, William; hold up your head; come.
MISTRESS PAGE
Come on, sirrah; hold up your head; answer your
master, be not afraid.
SIR HUGH EVANS
William, how many numbers is in nouns?
WILLIAM PAGE
Two.
MISTRESS QUICKLY
Truly, I thought there had been one number more,
because they say, ”Od’s nouns.’

DUTCH:
Sir Hugo, mijn man zegt, dat mijn zoon niets ter wereld
leert uit zijn spraakkunst. Wees zoo goed en vraag
hem eens het een en ander uit zijn taalboek.

MORE:
Accidence=Knowledge of Latin inflexions
Od’s nouns=Corrupted version of the phrase “God’s bones.” Three is an odd number, hence “Od’s nouns”.
Compleat:
Accidence=Het beginsel der Letterkonst

Topics: language|learning/education

My language! Heavens,
I am the best of them that speak this speech,
Were I but where ’tis spoken.

PLAY: The Tempest
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Ferdinand
CONTEXT:
MIRANDA
No wonder, sir,
But certainly a maid.
FERDINAND
My language! Heavens,
I am the best of them that speak this speech,
Were I but where ’tis spoken.
PROSPERO
How? The best?
What wert thou if the King of Naples heard thee?
FERDINAND
A single thing, as I am now, that wonders
To hear thee speak of Naples. He does hear me,
And that he does I weep. Myself am Naples,
Who with mine eyes, never since at ebb, beheld
The king my father wrecked.

DUTCH:
Mijne taal, o hemel! —
Van wie haar spreken ben ik de eerste, ware ik
Slechts daar, waar zij gesproken wordt.

MORE:
Best=Highest in rank
At ebb=Tears have never since stopped
A single thing=(1) Standing alone, without support; (2) One and the same

Topics: language, understanding, status, order/society, independence

My lord, he speaks most vilely of you, like a foul-mouthed man as he is

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: Mistress Quickly
CONTEXT:
So I told him, my lord; and I said I heard your grace say so: and, my lord, he speaks most vilely of you, like a foul-mouthed man as he is; and said he would cudgel you.

DUTCH:
My lord, he speaks most vilely of you, like a foul-mouthed man as he is

MORE:
Defined as using obscene, abusive, opporobrious language. First used by Shakespeare, though there are previous recordings of foul-spoken and foul-tongued.
Schmidt:
Vilely (O. Edd. vildly or vildely; vilely only in Henry IV)=Meanly, basely, shamefully
Foul-mouthed=Speaking ill of others, given to calumny and detraction
Compleat:
Vilely=Op een verachtelyke wyze
Foul-mouthed=Vuil van mond, die een vuilen bek heeft in ‘t spreeken.

Topics: language, insult, reputation

My tongue will tell the anger of my heart, or else my heart concealing it will break

PLAY: The Taming of the Shrew
ACT/SCENE: 4.3
SPEAKER: Katherine
CONTEXT:
KATHERINE
Why, sir, I trust I may have leave to speak,
And speak I will. I am no child, no babe.
Your betters have endured me say my mind,
And if you cannot, best you stop your ears.
My tongue will tell the anger of my heart
Or else my heart, concealing it, will break,
And, rather than it shall, I will be free
Even to the uttermost, as I please, in words.
PETRUCHIO
Why, thou say’st true. It is a paltry cap,
A custard-coffin, a bauble, a silken pie.
I love thee well in that thou lik’st it not.
KATHERINE
Love me or love me not, I like the cap,
And it I will have, or I will have none.

DUTCH:
Ik wil mij uiten;
Mijn hart bezweek van ergernis, zoo ‘k zweeg;
En eerder geef ik, wat ik denk en wil,
Al zij het nog zoo fel, in woorden lucht.

MORE:
Endured=Suffered
Uttermost=Without limits (I will speak as I like)
Me say=Me to say
Custard coffin=Pastry crust filled with custard
Compleat:
To endure=Verdraagen, harden, duuren
Utmost=Uiterste

Topics: language, independence, anger

My words fly up, my thoughts remain below:
Words without thoughts never to heaven go

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Claudius
CONTEXT:
My words fly up, my thoughts remain below.
Words without thoughts never to heaven go.

DUTCH:
Mijn woord stijgt op, mijn ziel blijft lager dwalen;
Het zielloos woord zal nooit den hemel halen. /
Mijn woord wiekt op en mijn gedachten zijgen: Ledige woorden nooit ten hemel stijgen. /
Mijn woord heeft vleugels, maar ontbeert de zin, en ’t holle woord wiekt nooit de hemel in.

MORE:
CITED IN US LAW:
Inappropriately cited (See William Domnarski Shakespeare in the Law) in People v. Langston, 131 Cal. App.3d 7 (1982)(Brown, J.)

Topics: language, cited in law, honesty, caution

Nay, ’tis no matter, what he ‘leges in Latin

PLAY: The Taming of the Shrew
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Grumio
CONTEXT:
HORTENSIO
Alla nostra casa ben venuto, molto honourato signor mio
Petruchio.—Rise, Grumio, rise. We will compound this
quarrel.
GRUMIO
Nay, ’tis no matter, sir, what he ‘leges in Latin. If
this be not a lawful case for me to leave his service
—look you, sir: he bid me knock him and rap him soundly,
sir. Well, was it fit for a servant to use his master
so, being perhaps, for aught I see, two-and-thirty, a
pip out?
Whom, would to God, I had well knocked at first,
Then had not Grumio come by the worst.

DUTCH:
Ach, heer, dat doet er niets toe, wat hij daar
in ‘t Latijn vertelt.

MORE:
Compound=Settle
‘leges=Alleges
Latin=Confuses Latin and Italian
Two-and-thirty=Drunk
Pip=Dot on the dice or playing cards
Rap=Strike quickly
Compleat:
To compound=’t Zamenzetten, byleggen, afmaaken, vereffenen, overeenkomen
To allege=(alledge) Bybrengen, aantrekken, aanhallen
To alledge against one=Tegen iemand inbrengen

Burgersdijk notes:
Het doet er niet, wat hij daar in het Latijn vertelt. Het moge vreemd schijnen, dat Grumio, de Italiaan, zijn eigen moedertaal voor Latjjn houdt, maar hij spreekt door Shakespeare Engelsch; het ltaliaansch is hem, al speelt het stuk in ltalie, een onbekende taal en kan hem dus Latijn toeschijnen of iedere andere vreemde taal; alleen voor ltaliaansch moet hij het niet houden.

En niet meer meespeelt. In ‘t Engelsch staat: being, perhaps, two-and-thirty, – a pip out. Een pip is een oog, een punt op een speelkaart, a spot on cards. De zegswijze is ontleend aan het kaartspel: Bone-ace or One and thirty; wie meer had dan een-en-dertig, viel uit, speelde niet meer mee. Was Petruccio twee-en dertig, dan was zijn tijd van spelen voorbij . – Halliwell merkt verder nog op : , to be two-and-thirty, a pip out, was an old cant phrase applied to a person who was intoxicated .”

Topics: language, law, work

No further with your din express impatience, lest you stir up mine

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 5.4
SPEAKER: Jupiter
CONTEXT:
JUPITER
No more, you petty spirits of region low,
Offend our hearing; hush! How dare you ghosts
Accuse the thunderer, whose bolt, you know,
Sky-planted batters all rebelling coasts?
Poor shadows of Elysium, hence, and rest
Upon your never-withering banks of flowers:
Be not with mortal accidents opprest;
No care of yours it is; you know ’tis ours.
Whom best I love I cross; to make my gift,
The more delay’d, delighted. Be content;
Your low-laid son our godhead will uplift:
His comforts thrive, his trials well are spent.
Our Jovial star reign’d at his birth, and in
Our temple was he married. Rise, and fade.
He shall be lord of lady Imogen,
And happier much by his affliction made.
This tablet lay upon his breast, wherein
Our pleasure his full fortune doth confine:
And so, away: no further with your din
Express impatience, lest you stir up mine.
Mount, eagle, to my palace crystalline.

DUTCH:
Gaat nu, en ducht mijn toorn, vervangt gij niet
Uw ongeduld door passende eerbetooning. —
Stijg, aad’laar, op naar mijn kristallen woning.

MORE:
Shadows=Ghosts
Elysium=Heaven
Accidents=Events
Jovial star=Jupiter
Tablet=Inscription
Compleat:
Shadow=Schim
Accident=Een toeval, quaal, aankleefsel
Jovial=Ref to Jove, or Jupiter
Tblet=Zakboekje

Topics: language, insult, blame, marriage

No, thy words are too precious to be cast away upon curs

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Celia
CONTEXT:
CELIA
Why, cousin! Why, Rosalind! Cupid have mercy, not a word?
ROSALIND
Not one to throw at a dog.
CELIA
No, thy words are too precious to be cast away upon curs.
Throw some of them at me. Come, lame me with reasons.
ROSALIND
Then there were two cousins laid up, when the one
should be lamed with reasons and the other mad without
any.

DUTCH:
Geen enkel; woorden zouden paarlen voor de honden zijn.

MORE:
Cast away=to throw away, waste or lavish
Lame=Disable me with reasons
Compleat:
To cast away care=Werp de zorg weg
Lame=Verlammen, lam maaken

Topics: language, value, reason, madness

O, good my lord, no Latin!

DUTCH:
O geen Latijn, mijn waarde lord!
‘k Was, na mijn komst hier, niet zoo traag, dat ik
De taal niet ken, waarin ik heb geleefd.

Topics: language, order/society

O’ my word, an she knew him as well as I do, she would think scolding would do little good upon him

PLAY: The Taming of the Shrew
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Grumio
CONTEXT:
GRUMIO
I pray you, sir, let him go while the humour lasts. O’ my word, an she knew him as well as I do, she would think scolding would do little good upon him. She may perhaps call him half a score knaves or so.
Why, that’s nothing; an he begin once, he’ll rail in his rope tricks. I’ll tell you what sir: an she stand him but a little, he will throw a figure in her face and so disfigure her with it that she shall have no more eyes to see withal than a cat. You know him not, sir.

DUTCH:
Ik bid u, heer, laat hem gaan, nu hij er lust in heeft.
Op niijn woord, als zij hem zoo goed kende als ik, zou
zij begrijpen, dat kijven bij hem bijzonder weiniguitricht.

MORE:
Humour=Mood
An=If
Rope tricks=Grumio’s mistake for “rhetoric”
Stand=Stand up to
Figure=Phrase, rhetoric
Compleat:
Figure=Voorbeeldsel, afbeeldsel
Humour (or disposition of the mind)=Humeur, gemoeds gesteldheid
To stand it out=Staand houden, het uytstaan

Topics: emotion and mood, insult, language

Oh, that’s a brave man. He writes brave verses, speaks brave words, swears brave oaths, and breaks them bravely

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Celia
CONTEXT:
CELIA
“Was” is not “is.” Besides, the oath of a lover is no
stronger than the word of a tapster. They are both the
confirmer of false reckonings. He attends here in the
forest on the duke your father.
ROSALIND
I met the duke yesterday and had much question with
him. He asked me of what parentage I was. I told him, of
as good as he. So he laughed and let me go. But what
talk we of fathers when there is such a man as Orlando?
CELIA
Oh, that’s a brave man. He writes brave verses, speaks
brave words, swears brave oaths, and breaks them
bravely, quite traverse, athwart the heart of his lover,
as a puny tilter that spurs his horse but on one side
breaks his staff like a noble goose; but all’s brave
that youth mounts and folly guides.

DUTCH:
Ja, dat is een prachtig man; hij schrijft prachtige verzen, spreekt prachtige woorden, zweert prachtige eeden en breekt ze prachtig, dwars door, vlak voor het hart van zijn liefste, juist als een sukkelig tournooiruiter, die zijn paard maar aan de eene zijde spoort en als een adellijk uilskuiken zijn lans breekt. Maar alles is prachtig, als jeugd in den zadel zit en dwaasheid den teugel houdt.

MORE:
Tapster=Barman (traditionally considered dishonest)
False=Not right, wrong, erroneous
Reckoning=The money charged by a host (a Bill)
Question=Conversation
Brave=Fine, splendid, beautiful
Traverse=Sideways (in jousting it was dishonourable to break the lance in this way instead of straight at the opponent’s shield)
Puny=Inferior
Compleat:
Tapster=Een tapper, biertapper
False=Valsch, onwaar; nagemaakt, verraderlyk
Reckoning=(in a public house) Gelach
Brave=Braaf, fraai, treffelyk, dapper
Taverse=Overdwaars
Puny=Klein, lief
A puny judge=Een jongste rechter (See Puisny. Puisne (or puisny)=a law term for younger; a name given in the house of lords to the youngest baron, and in Westminster hall to the youngest judge. De jongste Lord in ‘t hogerhuis, of de jongste Rechter in de pleitzaal van Westmunster.)

Topics: language, courage, appearance

Or senseless speaking or a speaking such as sense cannot untie

DUTCH:
t Is nog een droom, of wel het zinn’loos kallen
Van hersenlooze onnooz’len; dit of niets;
Of zinnelooze taal, of taal waarvan
‘t Verstand den zin niet vat

Topics: madness, nature, language, reason

Out, hyperbolical fiend! How vexest thou this man!

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 4.2
SPEAKER: Fool
CONTEXT:
FOOL
Out, hyperbolical fiend! How vexest thou this man!
Talkest thou nothing but of ladies?
SIR TOBY BELCH
Well said, Master Parson.
MALVOLIO
Sir Topas, never was man thus wronged. Good Sir Topas,
do not think I am mad. They have laid me here in
hideous darkness.
FOOL
Fie, thou dishonest Satan! I call thee by the most
modest terms, for I am one of those gentle ones that
will use the devil himself with courtesy. Sayest thou that house is dark?

DUTCH:

MORE:
Hyperbolical=Exaggerated, diabolical
Wronged=Mistreated
Modest=Mild (referring to dishonest)
Compleat:
Hyperbolical=Grootspreekend, byster uitspoorig
Wronged=Verongelykt, verkort
Modest=Zedig, eerbaar

Topics: good and bad, abuse, civility, language

Pardon’s the word to all

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 5.5
SPEAKER: Cymbeline
CONTEXT:
CYMBELINE
The forlorn soldier, that so nobly fought,
He would have well becomed this place, and graced
The thankings of a king.
POSTHUMUS LEONATUS
I am, sir,
The soldier that did company these three
In poor beseeming; ’twas a fitment for
The purpose I then follow’d. That I was he,
Speak, Iachimo: I had you down and might
Have made you finish.
IACHIMO
[Kneeling] I am down again:
But now my heavy conscience sinks my knee,
As then your force did. Take that life, beseech you,
Which I so often owe: but your ring first;
And here the bracelet of the truest princess
That ever swore her faith.
POSTHUMUS
Kneel not to me.
The power that I have on you is to spare you;
The malice towards you to forgive you. Live
And deal with others better.
CYMBELINE
Nobly doomed.
We’ll learn our freeness of a son-in-law:
Pardon’s the word to all.

DUTCH:
Mijn schoonzoon doet mij zien, wat edel is;
Vergiffenis voor allen!

MORE:
Proverb: To be able to harm and not to do it is noble

Doomed=Judged
Malice=Malignity, disposition to injure others
Freeness=Generosity
Compleat:
Doom=Vonnis, oordeel, verwyzing
To doom=Veroordelen, verwyzen, doemen
Doomed=Veroordeeld, verweezen.

Topics: life/experience, appearance, language, proverbs and idioms

Prove true, imagination, O, prove true

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Viola
CONTEXT:
VIOLA
Methinks his words do from such passion fly,
That he believes himself. So do not I.
Prove true, imagination, oh, prove true,
That I, dear brother, be now ta’en for you!
SIR TOBY BELCH
Come hither, knight. Come hither, Fabian. We’ll whisper
o’er a couplet or two of most sage saws.
VIOLA
He named Sebastian. I my brother know
Yet living in my glass. Even such and so
In favour was my brother, and he went
Still in this fashion, colour, ornament,
For him I imitate. Oh, if it prove,
Tempests are kind and salt waves fresh in love!

DUTCH:
Hoe toont zijn woord, de gloed, waarmee hij spreekt,
Een vast geloof, dat mij, helaas! ontbreekt.
Toch hoop ik, — o verbeelding, niet te stout! —
Dat, dierb’re broeder, hij voor u mij houdt!

MORE:
So do not I=I do no
Saws=Sayings
Glass=Mirror
Favour=Appearance
Prove=Proves true
Compleat:
An old saw=Een oud zeggen
Glass=Spiegel
Well-favoured=Aangenaam, bevallig
To prove (become, come to pass)=Uitvallen, bevinden, worden

Topics: language, persuasion, deceit, truth, appearance, imagination

Purpose is but the slave to memory,
Of violent birth, but poor validity

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Player King
CONTEXT:
I do believe you think what now you speak,
But what we do determine oft we break.
Purpose is but the slave to memory,
Of violent birth, but poor validity,
Which now, like fruit unripe, sticks on the tree,
But fall, unshaken, when they mellow be.

DUTCH:
Al te vaak verbreekt men zijn beloften. Beloften zijn slechts slaven van ‘t geheugen; in aanleg sterk, doch later krachteloos. /
‘t Plan is de slaaf slechts der herinnering

MORE:
Schmidt:
Validity= Strength, efficacy
Compleat:
Validity=Krachtigheid, bondigheid

Topics: honour, still in use, memory, plans/intentions, language

Rumour doth double, like the voice and echo, The numbers of the feared.

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Warwick
CONTEXT:
It cannot be, my lord.
Rumour doth double, like the voice and echo,
The numbers of the feared. Please it your Grace
To go to bed. Upon my soul, my lord,
The powers that you already have sent forth
Shall bring this prize in very easily.
To comfort you the more, I have received
A certain instance that Glendower is dead.
Your Majesty hath been this fortnight ill,
And these unseasoned hours perforce must add
Unto your sickness.

DUTCH:
Dit kan niet zijn, mijn vorst.
‘t Gerucht verdubbelt, als de stem der echo,
Het tal van wie men ducht

MORE:

Like the voice and echo=As an echo doubles the voice
Unseasoned=Unrasonable, irregular hours
Instance=Proof

Compleat:
Unseasoned=Ontoebereid
Unseasonable=Ontydig
Instance=Een voorval, voorbeeld, exempel; aandringing, aanhouding; blyk

Topics: language, truth

Since brevity is the soul of wit,
And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I will be brief.

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Polonius
CONTEXT:
My liege, and madam, to expostulate
What majesty should be, what duty is,
What day is day, night night, and time is time,
Were nothing but to waste night, day, and time;
Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,
And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I will be brief. Your noble son is mad. . . .

DUTCH:
Beknoptheid is het kenmerk van verstand./
Wijl de ziel van wijsheid kortheid is /
Sinds bondigheid de ziel is van ‘t vernuft

MORE:

If you are quoting this, be aware of the irony that Polonius is a sly and devious blowhard with no self-awareness who says this in the middle of a grand speech!

Proverb: Brevity is the soul of wit

Wit=acumen, keen intelligence.
Soul=quintessence

Compleat:
“Een man van goed verstand”

CITED IN EU LAW: Telefonica SA and Telefonica de Espana v Commission (Advocate General’s Opinion) [2013] EUECJ C-295/12
Opinion of Advocate General Wathelet delivered on 26 September 2013.: ‘It is true that ‘brevity is the soul of wit’ (Shakespeare in Hamlet, 1602), but unlimited jurisdiction requires more than wit’.
CITED IN US LAW:
Louisville and Jefferson County Metropolitan Sewer District v. Simpson, 730 S.W.2d 939, 942 (Ky. 1987)(“Shakespeare described …. This may be true in many situations, hut the majority opinion in this case is not one of them.”);
State v. Eichstedt, 20 Conn. App. 395, 401, 567 A.2d 1237 (1989)(“there must be sufficient
amplification to make an intelligent argument. The briefs fail in this regard.”);
Indiana Alcoholic Beverage Commission v. W-W Associates, Inc., 152 Ind. App. 622,284 N.E.2d
534,536 (1972)(“and while we find no humor in entering judgment against ABC before
its time limit had lapsed within which to answer, we can be brief.”)

Topics: cited in law, proverbs and idioms, still in use, language, madness

Since he could draw a sword, and is ill schooled in bolted language; meal and bran together he throws without distinction

PLAY: Coriolanus
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Menenius
CONTEXT:
MENENIUS
Consider this: he has been bred i’ the wars
Since he could draw a sword, and is ill schooled
In bolted language; meal and bran together
He throws without distinction. Give me leave,
I’ll go to him, and undertake to bring him
Where he shall answer, by a lawful form,
In peace, to his utmost peril.
FIRST SENATOR
Noble tribunes,
It is the humane way: the other course
Will prove too bloody, and the end of it
Unknown to the beginning.

DUTCH:
Bedenkt nog dit: sinds hij een zwaard kon trekken,
Wies hij in de’ oorlog op en leerde nooit
Zijn woorden ziften; meel en zeem’len werpt hij
Er uit, zooals het valt.

MORE:
Bolted language=Refined phraseology.
To bolt=To sift is often used figuratively, in this case carefully chosen words
Answer=Answer a charge, meet accusation, give an account under peaceful forms of law
To his utmost peril=Whatever the danger it involves
End… beginning. See The Tempest 2.1 “The latter end of his commonwealth forgets the beginning.”
Compleat:
Utmost=Uiterste
Peril=Gevaar, perykel, nood
To bolt out=Uitschieten, uitpuilen
To bolt meal=Meel builen

Topics: language, learning/education, skill/talent

Sir, my circumstances, being so near the truth as I will make them, must first induce you to believe.

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 2.4
SPEAKER: Iachimo
CONTEXT:
POSTHUMUS
If you can make ’t apparent
That you have tasted her in bed, my hand
And ring is yours. If not, the foul opinion
You had of her pure honour gains or loses
Your sword or mine, or masterless leave both
To who shall find them.
IACHIMO
Sir, my circumstances,
Being so near the truth as I will make them,
Must first induce you to believe; whose strength
I will confirm with oath, which I doubt not
You’ll give me leave to spare when you shall find
You need it not.

DUTCH:
t Bericht, dat ik omstandig geven zal,
En dat den stempel van zijn waarheid draagt,
Zal tot geloof u dwingen

MORE:
Question=Hold debate
Circumstances=Details, particulars, incidental proofs
Compleat:
Circumstance=Omstandigheid
A fact set out in all its circumstances=Een geval in alle zyne omstandigheden verhaalen

Topics: truth, honesty, manipulation, language

Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Hamlet
CONTEXT:
Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue. But if you mouth it, as many of your players do, I had as lief the town crier spoke my lines.

DUTCH:
Zeg die regels zoals ik ze je voorgezegd heb: luchtig, langs je neus weg. /
Spreek de zinnen, als ‘t u blieft, zooals ik ze u voorzei, luchtigjes van de tong /
Zeg de toespraak, ik bid u, gelijk ik het voordeed, trippelend op de tong.

MORE:
Shakespeare had also used “trippingly” in a Midsummer Night’s Dream (Oberon 5.1), but this is the first time that it referred to speech.
Nowadays: “tripping off the tongue”, or words that “trip off the tongue”.
Compleat:
To mince it=Met een gemaakten tred gaan, prat daar heene treeden
Mincing gate (sic)=Een trippelende gang

Topics: language, still in use

Speak what terrible language you will: though you understand it not yourselves, no matter

PLAY: All’s Well that Ends Well
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Second Lord
CONTEXT:
SECOND LORD
He can come no other way but by this hedge-corner.
When you sally upon him, speak what terrible
language you will: though you understand it not
yourselves, no matter; for we must not seem to
understand him, unless some one among us whom we
must produce for an interpreter.
FIRST SOLDIER
Good captain, let me be the interpreter.
SECOND LORD
Art not acquainted with him? knows he not thy voice?
FIRST SOLDIER
No, sir, I warrant you.
SECOND LORD
But what linsey-woolsey hast thou to speak to us again?

DUTCH:
Spreek, als gjj hem overvalt, een vreeselijke taal, hoe
ook; al verstaat gij die zelf niet, het doet er niet toe;
want wij moeten doen alsof wij hem niet verstaan, op
een van ons na, dien wij voor een tolk moeten uitgeven.

MORE:
Sally upon=Ambush
Linsey-woolsey=Nonsense, mish-mash (originally a fabric mixdure of linen and wool)
Compleat:
Linsey woolsey=Tierenteyn, stof van half garen en half wol, boezel stof, miscellaan
Sally=Een uytval
To saly forth=Uytvallen, eenen uytval doen

Topics: language, misunderstanding, conflict

Speak you so gently? Pardon me, I pray you

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 2.7
SPEAKER: Orlando
CONTEXT:
ORLANDO
I almost die for food, and let me have it.
DUKE SENIOR
Sit down and feed, and welcome to our table.
ORLANDO
Speak you so gently? Pardon me, I pray you.
I thought that all things had been savage here,
And therefore put I on the countenance
Of stern commandment. But whate’er you are
That in this desert inaccessible,
Under the shade of melancholy boughs,
Lose and neglect the creeping hours of time,
If ever you have looked on better days,
If ever been where bells have knolled to church,
If ever sat at any good man’s feast,
If ever from your eyelids wiped a tear
And know what ’tis to pity and be pitied,
Let gentleness my strong enforcement be,
In the which hope I blush and hide my sword.

DUTCH:
Spreekt gij zoo vriend’lijk, o vergeef mij dan!
Mij dacht, dat alles woest hier wezen zou;
En daarom nam ik toon en houding aan
Van ‘t barsch bevel.

MORE:
Gentle=Used in polite address or as a complimentary epoithet; tame
Put on a countenance=Give the appearance
Knolled=Summoned by bells
Gentleness=Gentility; kindness, mild manners
Enforcement=Persuasive power
Compleat:
Gentle (mild or moderate)=Zagtmoedig, maatig
To knoll bells=(also knowl) De klokken luyden
Genteel (or gallant)=Hoffelyk, wellevend; Genteel (that has a genteel carriage)=Bevallig
To enforce=Dwingen, opdwingen

Topics: language, order/society

Still you keep o’ the windy side of the law

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Fabian
CONTEXT:
SIR TOBY BELCH
Give me. [reads] “Youth, whatsoever thou art, thou art
but a scurvy fellow.”
FABIAN
Good, and valiant.
SIR TOBY BELCH
[reads] “Wonder not, nor admire not in thy mind, why I
do call thee so, for I will show thee no reason for ’t.”
FABIAN
A good note, that keeps you from the blow of the law.
SIR TOBY BELCH
(reads) “Thou comest to the lady Olivia, and in my
sight she uses thee kindly. But thou liest in thy
throat. That is not the matter I challenge thee for.”
FABIAN
Very brief, and to exceeding good sense—less.
SIR TOBY BELCH
[reads] “I will waylay thee going home, where if it be
thy chance to kill me—”
FABIAN
Good.
SIR TOBY BELCH
[reads] “Thou killest me like a rogue and a villain.”
FABIAN
Still you keep o’ the windy side of the law. Good.

DUTCH:
Gij houdt u altijd beneden ‘s winds van de wet, goed.

MORE:
Admire=Marvel
Note=Observation
Keeps=Protects, preserves
Blow of the law=Charges
In thy throat=Deeply
On the windy side (see also Much Ado about Nothing, 2.1, “on the windy side of care”) =
according to the OED, to be situated downwind and not ‘scented’.
On the windy side of the law=(Just) upwind
Compleat:
To admire=Zich verwonderen, met verwondering ingenomen zyn, zich vergaapen, groot achten
Keep=Houden, bewaaren, behouden
Windward=Tegenwindsch

Topics: language, law/legal, clarity/precision

Suit the action to the word, the word to the action

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Hamlet
CONTEXT:
Be not too tame neither, but let your own discretion be your tutor. Suit the action to the word, the word to the action, with this special observance that you o’erstep not the modesty of nature.

DUTCH:
Regel je gebaar naar je woord, je woord naar je gebaar /
Laat het gebaar passen bij het woord, het woord bij het gebaar

MORE:
Schmidt:
Tame=Metaphorically, either in a good sense, == free from passion, mild, gentle, meek; or in a bad sense, == heartless, spiritless, insensible, dull
Compleat:
Tame (to humble or conquer)=Vernederen, overwinnen.
Tamely (with submission)=Met onderwerping

Topics: language, civility, caution, still in use

Swear me, Kate, like a lady as thou art, A good mouth-filling oath

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Hotspur
CONTEXT:
Not yours, in good sooth! Heart, you swear like a comfit-maker’s wife! “Not you, in good sooth,” and “as true as I live,” and “as God shall mend me,” and “as sure as day”—
And givest such sarcenet surety for thy oaths
As if thou never walk’st further than Finsbury.Swear me, Kate, like a lady as thou art,
A good mouth-filling oath, and leave “in sooth,”
And such protest of pepper-gingerbread,
To velvet-guards and Sunday citizens.

DUTCH:
En geeft zoo taffen eedwaarborg, als waart gij
Nooit verder weg geweest dan Finsbury
Zweer als een edelvrouw, zooals gij zijt,
Een vollen eed, die klinkt,—en laat “In ernst”
En zulke peperkoekbetuigingen
Aan fulpgalons en zondagsburgers over.

MORE:
Onions:
Velvet-guards=Guards with velvet-trimmed clothes (trimmings of velvet being a city fashion at the time)
Mouth-filling=Robust
Protest=Oath, protestation
Burgersdijk notes:
En geeft zoo taffen eedwaarborg, als waart gij Nooit verder weg geweest dan Finsbury. Heetspoor kan die makke betuigingen niet lijden, zooals welgestelde burgervrouwtjens, die, het gewaad met fluweel omboord, hare zondagswandeling naar Finsbury richtten, gaarne gebruiken. Zijne vrouw moest ze aan de vrouwen van zijdehandelaars, — vandaar taffen eedwaarborg, — en peperkoekverkopers overlaten. Finsbury lag toen nog buiten de poorten van Londen en was een gewoon doel van de op Zondag wandelende burgers.

Topics: language, civility, order/society, fashion/trends

Tell them that I will not come today. “Cannot” is false, and that I dare not, falser.

PLAY: Julius Caesar
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Caesar
CONTEXT:
DECIUS
Caesar, all hail! Good morrow, worthy Caesar.
I come to fetch you to the senate house.
CAESAR
And you are come in very happy time
To bear my greeting to the senators
And tell them that I will not come today.
“Cannot” is false, and that I dare not, falser.
I will not come today. Tell them so, Decius.
CALPHURNIA
Say he is sick.
CAESAR
Shall Caesar send a lie?
Have I in conquest stretched mine arm so far
To be afraid to tell greybeards the truth?
Decius, go tell them Caesar will not come.
DECIUS
Most mighty Caesar, let me know some cause,
Lest I be laughed at when I tell them so.
CAESAR
The cause is in my will. I will not come.
That is enough to satisfy the senate.
But for your private satisfaction,
Because I love you, I will let you know.
Calphurnia here, my wife, stays me at home.
She dreamt tonight she saw my statue,
Which, like a fountain with an hundred spouts,
Did run pure blood. And many lusty Romans
Came smiling and did bathe their hands in it.
And these does she apply for warnings and portents
And evils imminent, and on her knee
Hath begged that I will stay at home today.

DUTCH:
En juist te goeder uur zijt gij gekomen,
Om met mijn groeten den senaat de tijding
Te brengen, dat ik heden niet wil komen ;
„Niet kan” waar leugen, en „niet durf’ nog erger ;
lk wil vandaag niet komen ; meld dit, Decius.

MORE:
Happy time=Opportune moment
Greybeards=Old men
Cause=Reason
Compleat:
Happy=Gelukkig, gelukzalig
Cause=Oorzaak, reden, zaak

Topics: language, authority, civility, order/society

That keep the word of promise to our ear,
And break it to our hope

PLAY: Macbeth
ACT/SCENE: 5.8
SPEAKER: Macbeth
CONTEXT:
Accursèd be that tongue that tells me so,
For it hath cowed my better part of man!
And be these juggling fiends no more believed,
That palter with us in a double sense,
That keep the word of promise to our ear,
And break it to our hope. I’ll not fight with thee.

DUTCH:
En nooit
Leene iemand aan die guichelduivels ‘t oor,
Die ons door dubbelzinnigheid bedriegen,
‘t Beloofde houden aan ons oor, maar ‘t breken
Aan onze hoop.

MORE:
Schmidt:
Palter=To shift, to dodge, to shuffle, to equivocate
Compleat:
To palter=Weyfelen, leuteren, haperen, achteruyt kruypen, aerzelen, bedektelyk handelen
CITED IN US LAW:
Prather v. Dayton Power & Light Company, 918 F.2d 1255, 1262 (6th Cir. 1990)(dissent);
Hydro-Dyne, Inc. v. Ecodyne Corporation, 812 F.2d 1407 (6th Cir. 1987)(dissent);
Shango v. Jurich, 521 F.Supp. 1196, 1202 (N.D.Ill. 1981);
Stringer v. Thompson, 537 F.Supp. 133, 136 (N.D.Ill. 1982);
State v. Neely, 112 N.M. 702, 819 P.2d 249 (1991);
U.S. v. Pollard, 959 F.2d 1011, 1039 (D.C.Cir. 1992)(Williams, J.)(dissenting). “Though I do not wish to be too critical of the government, and though the analogy is inexact on some points, the case does remind me of Macbeth’s curse against the witches whose promises-and their sophistical interpretation of them – led him to doom:”.

Topics: cited in law, promise, language, hope

That solder’st close impossibilities, and makest them kiss! that speak’st with every tongue, to every purpose

PLAY: Timon of Athens
ACT/SCENE: 4.3
SPEAKER: Timon
CONTEXT:
TIMON
Rogue, rogue, rogue!
I am sick of this false world, and will love nought
But even the mere necessities upon ‘t.
Then, Timon, presently prepare thy grave;
Lie where the light foam the sea may beat
Thy grave-stone daily: make thine epitaph,
That death in me at others’ lives may laugh.
O thou sweet king-killer, and dear divorce
‘Twixt natural son and sire! thou bright defiler
Of Hymen’s purest bed! thou valiant Mars!
Thou ever young, fresh, loved and delicate wooer,
Whose blush doth thaw the consecrated snow
That lies on Dian’s lap! thou visible god,
That solder’st close impossibilities,
And makest them kiss! that speak’st with
every tongue,
To every purpose! O thou touch of hearts!
Think, thy slave man rebels, and by thy virtue
Set them into confounding odds, that beasts
May have the world in empire!

DUTCH:
Gij, die onmooglijkheden samenwelt,
Ten kus vereent! die spreekt met ied’re tong,
Tot ieder doel! gij toetssteen van de harten!

MORE:
Even the mere=The most basic
Solder=Fuse
Impossibilities=Things that cannot be joined
With every tongue=In every language
Touch of hearts=Touchstone; wounder of hearts
Compleat:
To solder=Soudeeren
The gift of tongues=De gaave der taale
To speak several tongues=Verscheiden taalen spreeken

Topics: value, truth, language, communication, leadership

The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose

PLAY: The Merchant of Venice
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Antonio
CONTEXT:
ANTONIO
Mark you this, Bassanio,
The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.
An evil soul producing holy witness
Is like a villain with a smiling cheek,
A goodly apple rotten at the heart.
Oh, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!
SHYLOCK
Three thousand ducats—’tis a good round sum.
Three months from twelve, then. Let me see. The rate—
ANTONIO
Well, Shylock, shall we be beholding to you?

DUTCH:
Merk dit op, Bassanio;
De duivel zelf beroept zich op de schrift.
Een boos gemoed, dat heil’ge woorden spreekt,
Is als een fielt met liefelijken lach;
Een schijnschoone appel, maar in ‘t hart verrot;
O, glanzend schoon is ‘t uiterlijk der valschheid!

MORE:
CITED IN US LAW – some examples:
In re Amy B, 1997 Conn. Super LEXIS at 28;
Harris v. Superior Court, 3 Cal. App. 4th 661, 666 (Cal. 1992);
Shattuck Denn Mining Corporation v. National labour Relations Board, 362 F.2d 466, 469 (9th Cir. 1966);
Middleton Development Corp v Gust, 44 Mich. App.71, 79, 205, NW 2d.39,43 (1972);
Delmarva Power and Light Company of Maryland v. Eberhard, 247 Md. 273, 230 A.2d 644 (Md. Ct. App, 1966);
United States ex rel. Green v. Peters, WL 8258, 17, n. 11 (1994), where the court clarified that “its figure of speech does not of course suggest that the Attorney General has literally joined the forces of darkness”. (!)

Proverb: Sodom apples outwardly fair, ashes at the
Beholding=Beholden, indebted

Topics: emotion and mood, misquoted

The more pity that fools may not speak wisely what wise men do foolishly

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Touchstone
CONTEXT:
CELIA
My father’s love is enough to honour him. Enough. Speak
no more of him; you’ll be whipped for taxation one of these days.
TOUCHSTONE
The more pity that fools may not speak wisely what wise
men do foolishly.
CELIA
By my troth, thou sayest true. For, since the little
wit that fools have was silenced, the little foolery
that wise men have makes a great show. Here comes
Monsieur Le Beau.
ROSALIND
With his mouth full of news.
CELIA
Which he will put on us as pigeons feed their young.
ROSALIND
Then shall we be news-crammed.

DUTCH:
Des te erger, als dwazen niet meer in hun wijsheid mogen zeggen, wat wijze lui in hun dwaasheid doen.

MORE:
Proverb: The wise man knows himself to be a fool, the fool thinks he is wise

‘Silenced’ is probably a topical reference, either to new restraints imposed on theatrical companies or to the burning of satirical books in 1599.

Whipping was a cruel punishment. In the days of Henry VIII an Act decreed that vagrants were to be carried to some market town, or other place, and there tied to the end of a cart, naked, and beaten with whips throughout such market-town, or other place, till the body should be bloody by reason of such whipping. The punishment was mitigated in Elizabeth’s reign, to the extent that vagrants need only to be “stripped naked from the middle upwards and whipped till the body should be bloody”.

Whipped=Censure, satire, invective “You’ll be whipped for taxation one of these days”.
Foolery=Absurdity
News-crammed=Full of news (and therefore valuable on the market)
Compleat:
Whipped=Gegeesseld
Foolery=Malligheid
Cram=Kroppen, proppen, mesten, overladen

Topics: pity, wisdom, language, proverbs and idioms

The pox of such antic, lisping, affecting fantasmines, these new tuners of accents!

PLAY: Romeo and Juliet
ACT/SCENE: 2.4
SPEAKER: Mercutio
CONTEXT:
The pox of such antic, lisping, affecting fantasticoes, these new tuners of accents! “By Jesu, a very good blade! A very tall man! A very good whore!” Why, is not this a lamentable thing, grandsire, that we should be thus afflicted with these strange flies, these fashion-mongers, these “pardon me’s,” who stand so much on the new form, that they cannot sit at ease on the old bench? Oh, their bones, their bones!

DUTCH:
Och, naar de maan met al die bespottelijke, lispelende,
gemaakte windbuilen, die nieuwe bauwers van brabbelwoorden!

MORE:
Schmidt:
Affecting=Using affectations
Fantasticoes (sometimes fantasmines)=Fantastic, coxcomical persons (fopppish, conceited)
Blade=Fencer; used as an emblem of youth
Fashion-monger=one who affects gentility (fashion-monging)
Tune=tune of the time (see Hamlet 5.2)
A pardon-me=One who is always excusing himself
Compleat:
Blade=Een Jonker, wittebroods kind
A fine blade=Een fraai Jongeling
To blade it=Den Jonker speelen
Pardon me=Vergeef het my
To pardon=Vergeeven, quytschelden
A pardon-monger=Die Aflaaten verkoopt

Topics: civility, appearance, custom, language

The weight of this sad time we must obey.
Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.

PLAY: King Lear
ACT/SCENE: 5.3
SPEAKER: Edgar
CONTEXT:
The weight of this sad time we must obey.
Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.
The oldest hath borne most. We that are young
Shall never see so much, nor live so long.

DUTCH:
Wij hebben ons bij rampspoed neer te leggen.
Zeg wat je voelt, niet wat wij moeten zeggen./
Ons dwingt van dezen tijd het droef gewicht;
Wij spreken ons gevoel, niet onzen plicht.

MORE:
Schmidt:
Weight=Burden, load
Obey=Comply with, submit to
Compleat:
Weight (importance, consequence)=Gewigt, belang
Obey=Gehoorzaamen
REFERENCED IN E&W LAW: Chambers v Director of Public Prosecutions [2012] EWHC 2157 (Admin) (27 July 2012)
Given the submissions by Mr Cooper, we should perhaps add that for those who have the inclination to use “Twitter” for the purpose, Shakespeare can be quoted unbowdlerised, and with Edgar, at the end of King Lear, they are free to speak not what they ought to say, but what they feel.

Topics: truth, honesty, age/experience, language, wisdom, caution

Therefore you speak unskilfully:
or if your knowledge be more it is much darkened in your malice.

PLAY: Measure for Measure
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Duke Vincentio
CONTEXT:
Let him be but testimonied in his own
bringings-forth, and he shall appear to the
envious a scholar, a statesman and a soldier.
Therefore you speak unskilfully: or if your
knowledge be more it is much darkened in your malice.

DUTCH:
Daarom, gij spreekt zonder eenig inzicht; of, als gij er meer kennis van hebt, dan is die door uwe boosaardigheid zeer verduisterd.

MORE:
Schmidt:
Testimonied=Attested, witnessed, proved by testimony
Compleat:
Testimony=Getuigen. To bear testimony against one=Tegen iemand getuigen
In testimony whereof=Ten bewyze daar van

Topics: skill/talent, learning/education, evidence, language

These are old fond paradoxes to make fools laugh i’ th’ alehouse

PLAY: Othello
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Desdemona
CONTEXT:
DESDEMONA
These are old fond paradoxes to make fools laugh i’
th’ alehouse.
What miserable praise hast thou for her
That’s foul and foolish?
IAGO
There’s none so foul and foolish thereunto,
But does foul pranks which fair and wise ones do.
DESDEMONA
Oh, heavy ignorance! Thou praisest the worst best. But
what praise couldst thou bestow on a deserving woman
indeed, one that in the authority of her merit did
justly put on the vouch of very malice itself?
IAGO
She that was ever fair and never proud,
Had tongue at will and yet was never loud,
Never lacked gold and yet went never gay,
Fled from her wish and yet said “Now I may,”
She that being angered, her revenge being nigh,
Bade her wrong stay and her displeasure fly,
She that in wisdom never was so frail
To change the cod’s head for the salmon’s tail,
She that could think and ne’er disclose her mind,
See suitors following and not look behind,
She was a wight, if ever such wights were—
DESDEMONA
To do what?
IAGO
To suckle fools and chronicle small beer.
DESDEMONA
Oh, most lame and impotent conclusion! Do not learn of
him, Emilia, though he be thy husband. How say you,
Cassio? Is he not a most profane and liberal counselor?
CASSIO
He speaks home, madam. You may relish him more in the
soldier than in the scholar.

DUTCH:
Dat zijn oude onnoozele spitsvondigheden om zotten in
een bierhuis te doen lachen

MORE:
Fond=Foolish
Paradoxes=Tenets, sayings; statement or tenet contrary to received opinion
Foul=Ugly
In the authority=By virtue
Put on the vouch=Compel approval, recommendation from
Fled from her wish=Did not indulge desires
Wrong=Sense of injury, anger; injustice suffered
Stay=Stop
Chronicle=Record, register
Small beer=Trivia (Shakespeare was supposedly the first to use ‘small beer’ to mean something trivial, here in Othello) Also in French petite bière.
Chronicle small beer=Keep household account for trivial amounts
Liberal=Licentious
Scholar=Intellectual
Compleat:
Fond=Zot, dwaas, ongerymt
Paradox=Een wonderspreuk, een vreemde reden die tegen ‘t gemeen gevoelen schynt aan te loopen
Foul=Vuyl, slordig
To vouch=Staande houden, bewyzen, verzekeren
Wrong=Nadeel. Wronged=Verongelykt, verkort
To chronicle=In eenen kronyk aanschryven
Small beer=Klein bier, dun bier
Liberal=Mild, milddaadig, goedertieren, gulhartig, openhartig
Scholar=Schoolier, student; geleerde

Topics: language, wisdom, free will, intellect

These words of yours draw life-blood from my heart

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 4.6
SPEAKER: Lord Talbot
CONTEXT:
The sword of Orleans hath not made me smart;
These words of yours draw life-blood from my heart:
On that advantage, bought with such a shame,
To save a paltry life and slay bright fame,
Before young Talbot from old Talbot fly,
The coward horse that bears me fail and die!
And like me to the peasant boys of France,
To be shame’s scorn and subject of mischance!
Surely, by all the glory you have won,
An if I fly, I am not Talbot’s son:
Then talk no more of flight, it is no boot;
If son to Talbot, die at Talbot’s foot.

DUTCH:
Van ‘t zwaard van Orleans voelde ik geen smart,
Van deze uw woorden bloedt en krimpt mij ‘t hart.

MORE:
Smart=Hurt
Mischance=Misfortune
No boot=Of no use, pointless

Compleat:
Smart=Pijn, smart of smerte
Mischance=Misval, mislukking, ongeval, ongeluk
No boot=Geen nut, te vergeefs

Topics: language, leadership, value, wisdom

This babble shall not henceforth trouble me

PLAY: The Two Gentlemen of Verona
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Julia
CONTEXT:
LUCETTA
Nay, now you are too flat
And mar the concord with too harsh a descant:
There wanteth but a mean to fill your song.
JULIA
The mean is drown’d with your unruly bass.
LUCETTA
Indeed, I bid the base for Proteus.
JULIA
This babble shall not henceforth trouble me.
Here is a coil with protestation!
JULIA
Go get you gone, and let the papers lie:
You would be fingering them, to anger me.

DUTCH:
Neen, ‘k laat door al die praatjens mij niet kwellen. —
O foei, een stapel liefdes-eeden!

MORE:
Flat=(1) Downright (2) Low-pitched
Mean=Middle (tenor)
Mar=Spoil
Concord=Harmony
Descant=Accompaniment
Unruly=Untrained
Coil=Fuss
Babble=Prattle
Compleat:
Downright=Recht-uyt, recht-neer
Mean=Het midden, de middemaat
To marr=Bederven, verboetelen, verknoeijen
Concord=Eendragt, eendragtigheid, saamensstemming
Descant=Uytbreyding in een reede
Unruly=Ongeregeld, toomeloos
Coil=Geraas, getier
Babble=Klappen, snappen, snateren, kakelen

Topics: language, civility, unity/collaboration

This dream is all amiss interpreted. It was a vision fair and fortunate.

PLAY: Julius Caesar
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Decius
CONTEXT:
DECIUS
This dream is all amiss interpreted.
It was a vision fair and fortunate.
Your statue spouting blood in many pipes,
In which so many smiling Romans bathed,
Signifies that from you great Rome shall suck
Reviving blood, and that great men shall press
For tinctures, stains, relics, and cognizance.
This by Calphurnia’s dream is signified.
CAESAR
And this way have you well expounded it.
DECIUS
I have, when you have heard what I can say.
And know it now: the senate have concluded
To give this day a crown to mighty Caesar.

DUTCH:
Voorwaar, die droom is averechts geduid ;
Het was een schoon vizioen, dat heil verkondt.

MORE:
Amiss interpreted=Misinterpreted
Pipes=Veins
Tinctures=Colours
Stains=Bloodstains, heraldic colours
Relics=Remains of a saint or martyr
Cognizance=Distinguishing mark/heraldic device
Expounded=Interpreted
Compleat:
Amiss=Onrecht, verkeerd, quaalyk
To be taken amiss=Quaalyk genomen worden
Tincture=Een verwsel, uyttreksel, treksel, smet
Tinctured=Geverwd, doortrokken, doordrongen, besmet
To stain=Bevlekken, besmetten, bezwalken
Reliques=H. Overblyffelen
Cognizance=Kennisse, wapenmerk, kenteken
To expound=Uytleggen, verklaaren

Topics: language, understanding

This fellow doth not stand upon points.

DUTCH:
Die knaap let niet bijzonder op komma’s en punten.

MORE:
Quince alters the meaning of the Prologue completely by speaking punctuation in the wrong places.

Topics: language, offence, life, truth, honesty

This fellow is wise enough to play the fool; and to do that well craves a kind of wit

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Viola
CONTEXT:
FOOL
The matter, I hope, is not great, sir, begging but a
beggar. Cressida was a beggar. My lady is within, sir. I
will construe to them whence you come. Who you are and
what you would are out of my welkin, I might say
“element,” but the word is overworn.
VIOLA
This fellow is wise enough to play the fool;
And to do that well craves a kind of wit:
He must observe their mood on whom he jests,
The quality of persons, and the time,
And, like the haggard, check at every feather
That comes before his eye. This is a practice
As full of labour as a wise man’s art
For folly that he wisely shows is fit;
But wise men, folly-fall’n, quite taint their wit.

DUTCH:
Die knaap is wijs genoeg om nar te spelen;
En ja, dit goed te zijn, eischt schranderheid,
Hij moet de luim van hen, met wie hij schertst,
Persoon en tijd met scherpen blik bespién,
En als de valk op ied’re veder stooten,
Die voor zijn oogen kom

MORE:
Proverb: He is out of his element
Proverb: To be in one’e element
Proverb: No man can play the fool as well as the wise man

Overworn=Spoiled by too much use
Welkin=Sky
Construe=Explain (also ‘conster’)
Wit=Intelligence
Haggard=Hawk
Check=Start, be startled
Feather=Fig., birds in general
Practice=Skill
Wisely=Deliberately
Fit=Appropriate
Taint=Discredit
Compleat:
Overworn=Gantsch afgesleeten, uitgesleeten, afgeleefd
Construe (conster)=Woordenschikken; t’Zamenschikken, t’zamenstellen
Wit (understanding)=Vinding, schranderheid, verstand
Hagard=Wild. A hagard hawk=Een wilde valk
To take check a a thing=Zich aan iets stooten, of ergeren
Practize=Oeffening, bewerking, praktyk
Well practised in the Law=Wel in de Rechten geoeffend
Wisely=Wyslyk
Fit=Bequaam, dienstig, betaaamelyk, raadzaam
To taint (attaint)=Overtuigen van misdaad, schuldig verklaaren, betichten; bevlekken, bederf aanzetten

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, skill/talent, language, intellect, appearance

This is the deadly spite that angers me: My wife can speak no English, I no Welsh.

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 1
ACT/SCENE:
SPEAKER: Mortimer
CONTEXT:
WORCESTER
In faith, my lord, you are too wilful-blame,
And, since your coming hither, have done enough
To put him quite beside his patience.
You must needs learn, lord, to amend this fault.
Though sometimes it show greatness, courage, blood—
And that’s the dearest grace it renders you—
Yet oftentimes it doth present harsh rage,
Defect of manners, want of government,
Pride, haughtiness, opinion, and disdain,
The least of which, haunting a nobleman,
Loseth men’s hearts and leaves behind a stain
Upon the beauty of all parts besides,
Beguiling them of commendation.
HOTSPUR
Well, I am schooled. Good manners be your speed!
Here come our wives, and let us take our leave.
MORTIMER
This is the deadly spite that angers me:
My wife can speak no English, I no Welsh.

DUTCH:
Dit is voor mij een dood’lijk grievend leed:
Mijn vrouw verstaat geen Engelsch, ik geen Welsch.

MORE:
Wilful-blame=Blameable on purpose, on principle; indulging faults, though conscious that they are faults. (Arden: blameworthy in the obstinacy or rashness of your behaviour. (…) Others explain as “
wilfully blameworthy” or “wilfully to blame,” comparing “wilful-negligent” in Winter’s Tale, i. ii. 255,)
Haunting=Affecting
Blood=Mettle, spirit
Want of government=Lack of self-control
Opinion= Conceit
Boiling them of commendation=Making them lose respect
I am schooled=I have learned my lesson
Compleat:
Commendation=Pryzing, aanpryzing, aanbeveling
Opinion=Waan
A man of government=Een gemaatigt Man
He hath not the government of his tongue=Hy kan zyn tong niet beteugelen

Topics: learning/education, civility, order/society, respect, language, blame

This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 5.1
SPEAKER: Theseus
CONTEXT:
DEMETRIUS
No remedy, my lord, when walls are so wilful to hear
without warning.
HIPPOLYTA
This is the silliest stuff that ever I heard.
THESEUS
The best in this kind are but shadows, and the worst
are no worse if imagination amend them.
HIPPOLYTA
It must be your imagination then, and not theirs.
THESEUS
If we imagine no worse of them than they of themselves,
they may pass for excellent men. Here come two noble
beasts in, a man and a lion.

DUTCH:
Dit is wel het onzinnigste ding, dat ik ooit gehoord heb.

MORE:
Proverb: Walls (hedges) have ears (eyes)

Shadows=Without substance, illusions
Compleat:
Shadow=een Schaduw, schim

Topics: proverbs and idioms, communication, language

This was the most unkindest cut of all

DUTCH:
Goden, oordeelt, hoe hem Caesar liefhad!
Dit was de stoot, van alle ‘t onnatuurlijkst

MORE:
The “Nervii,” or Nervians, were a Belgian tribe whom Caesar defeated in battle in 57 BC

Topics: language, persuasion, leadership

Thou echo’st me as if there were some monster in thy thought too hideous to be shown

PLAY: Othello
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: Othello
CONTEXT:
OTHELLO
What dost thou think?
IAGO
Think, my lord?
OTHELLO
“Think, my lord?” Alas, thou echo’st me
As if there were some monster in thy thought
Too hideous to be shown. Thou dost mean something.
I heard thee say even now thou lik’st not that
When Cassio left my wife. What didst not like?
And when I told thee he was of my counsel
Of my whole course of wooing, thou cried’st “Indeed?”
And didst contract and purse thy brow together
As if thou then hadst shut up in thy brain
Some horrible conceit. If thou dost love me
Show me thy thought.
IAGO
My lord, you know I love you.

DUTCH:
Denk, heer!
Bij God, hij is mijn echo,
Alsof in zijn gedachte een monster school,
Te afzichtlijk om te zien.

MORE:
Mean=Hint at
Even now=Just now
Of my counsel=In my confidence
Conceit=Idea
Compleat:
Mean=Meenen
Conceit=Waan, bevatting, opvatting, meening

Topics: language, advice, secrecy

Thou hast men about thee that usually talk of a noun and a verb and such abominable words

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 4.7
SPEAKER: Cade
CONTEXT:
Thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm
in erecting a grammar school; and whereas,
before, our forefathers had no other books but the
score and the tally, thou hast caused printing to be
used, and, contrary to the King his crown and dignity,
thou hast built a paper mill. It will be proved
to thy face that thou hast men about thee that usually
talk of a noun and a verb and such abominable
words as no Christian ear can endure to hear. Thou hast
appointed justices of peace, to call poor men before them
about matters they were not able to answer.
Moreover, thou hast put them in prison ; and because
they could not read, thou hast hanged them; when,
indeed, only for that cause they have been most
worthy to live. Thou dost ride in a foot-cloth, dost
thou not?

DUTCH:
Het zal u in uw gezicht bewezen worden, dat gij mannen om u heen hebt, die plegen te praten van naamwoorden en van werkwoorden en meer zulke afschuwelijke woorden, die geen christenoor kan uitstaan

MORE:

The score and the tally=The score was a notch made on the tally (stick) to keep accounts
These presence=These presents (these documents)
To answer=To account for

Compleat:
Score=Rekening, kerfstok
Scored up=Op rekening, op de kerfstok gezet
Tally=Kerfstok
To tally=Op de kerfstok zetten
By these presents=Door deezen tegenwoordigen [brief]To answer for=Verantwoorden, voor iets staan, borg blyven

Topics: learning/education, order/society, language

Thou hast the most unsavoury similes.

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Falstaff
CONTEXT:
PRINCE HENRY
What sayest thou to a hare, or the melancholy of Moorditch?
FALSTAFF
Thou hast the most unsavoury similes, and art indeed the most comparative, rascaliest, sweet young Prince. But, Hal, I prithee trouble me no more with vanity. I would to God thou and I knew where a commodity of good names were to be bought. An old lord of the council rated me the other day in the street about you, sir, but I marked him not, and yet he talked very wisely, but I regarded him not, and yet he talked wisely, and in the street, too.

DUTCH:
Gij hebt de onsmakelijkste vergelijkingen ter wereld,
en zijt inderdaad de vergelijkendste, spitsboefachtigste,
aardigste jonge prins.

MORE:
Eating rabbit was believed to cause depression
Onions:
Moorditch=stagnant ditch outside city walls draining the swampy ground of Moorfields
Schmidt:
Unsavoury (metaphorically)=Displeasing
Comparative=Quick at comparisons
Rate (Berate)=Chide
Mark=To take notice of, to pay attention to, to heed, to observe
Compleat:
Unsavoury=Onsmaakelyk, smaakeloos
Burgersdijk:
Gij hebt vloekwaardige aanhalingen.
Een aanhaling, als Prins Hendrik juist uit de spreuken van Salomo deed, werd door de strenge protestanten zondig gerekend en was ook door een statuut van K. Jacobus I verboden. Daarom is dan ook het citaat in folio- uitgave van 1623 verminkt, zoodat daar Falstaffs antwoord zinledig wordt.

Topics: language, reputation, vanity

Thou sayest well, and it holds well too.

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Prince Hal
CONTEXT:
Thou sayest well, and it holds well too, for the fortune of us that are the moon’s men doth ebb and flow like the sea, being governed, as the sea is, by the moon. As for proof now: a purse of gold most resolutely snatched on Monday night and most dissolutely spent on Tuesday morning, got with swearing “Lay by” and spent with crying “Bring in”; now in as low an ebb as the foot of the ladder, and by and by in as high a flow as the ridge of the gallows

DUTCH:

Zeer goed gezegd, en zeer juist bovendien; want het geluk van ons, die dienaars zijn der maan, heeft zijn eb en vloed als de zee, en wordt, evenals de zee, door de maan bestuurd.

MORE:
Schmidt:
Holds=to be fit, to be consistent: “thou sayest well, and it –s well too
Ridge=The top of a long and narrow elevation
Compleat:
Hold (bear up)=Ondersteunen

Topics: language, understanding, money, reason

Thou’lt torture me to leave unspoken that which, to be spoke, would torture thee

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 5.5
SPEAKER: Iachimo
CONTEXT:
IACHIMO
Thou’lt torture me to leave unspoken that
Which, to be spoke, would torture thee.
CYMBELINE
How! me?
IACHIMO
I am glad to be constrain’d to utter that
Which torments me to conceal. By villainy
I got this ring: ’twas Leonatus’ jewel;
Whom thou didst banish; and—which more may grieve thee,
As it doth me—a nobler sir ne’er lived
‘Twixt sky and ground. Wilt thou hear more, my lord?
CYMBELINE
All that belongs to this.
IACHIMO
That paragon, thy daughter,—
For whom my heart drops blood, and my false spirits
Quail to remember—Give me leave; I faint.

DUTCH:
Gij wilt mij folt’ren, als ik dat verzwijg,
Wat, als ik sprak, u folt’ren zou.

MORE:
Constrained=Forced
Quail=Shrink, cringe
Compleat:
Constrained=Bedwongen, gedrongen, gepraamd
To quail=Weerhouden, beteugelen; saamenrunnen, verflaauwen

Topics: language, secrecy, honesty

Though it be honest, it is never good to bring bad news

PLAY: Antony and Cleopatra
ACT/SCENE: 2.5
SPEAKER: Cleopatra
CONTEXT:
CHARMIAN
Good madam, keep yourself within yourself.
The man is innocent.
CLEOPATRA
Some innocents ’scape not the thunderbolt.
Melt Egypt into Nile, and kindly creatures
Turn all to serpents. Call the slave again.
Though I am mad, I will not bite him. Call!
CHARMIAN
He is afeard to come.
CLEOPATRA
I will not hurt him.
These hands do lack nobility that they strike
A meaner than myself, since I myself
Have given myself the cause.
Come hither, sir.
Though it be honest, it is never good
To bring bad news. Give to a gracious message
An host of tongues, but let ill tidings tell
Themselves when they be felt

DUTCH:
Treed nader , vriend ;
Rechtschapen moog’ het zijn, goed is het nimmer,
Onheil te melden; geef een goede tijding
Een heer van tongen; slechte tijding melde
Zichzelf aan, als zij wordt gevoeld.

MORE:
Keep yourself within yourself=Restrain yourself
Kindly=Good-natured
Meaner=Of lower rank
Compleat:
Kindly=Op een vrindlyke wyze; vrindelyk
The meaner sort of people=Het gemeene slach van volk

Topics: communication, understanding, language

Thus to have said, as you were fore-advised, had touch’d his spirit

PLAY: Coriolanus
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER:
CONTEXT:
BRUTUS
Could you not have told him
As you were lesson’d, when he had no power,
But was a petty servant to the state,
He was your enemy, ever spake against
Your liberties and the charters that you bear
I’ the body of the weal; and now, arriving
A place of potency and sway o’ the state,
If he should still malignantly remain
Fast foe to the plebeii, your voices might
Be curses to yourselves? You should have said
That as his worthy deeds did claim no less
Than what he stood for, so his gracious nature
Would think upon you for your voices and
Translate his malice towards you into love,
Standing your friendly lord.
SICINIUS
Thus to have said,
As you were fore-advised, had touch’d his spirit
And tried his inclination; from him pluck’d
Either his gracious promise, which you might,
As cause had call’d you up, have held him to
Or else it would have gall’d his surly nature,
Which easily endures not article
Tying him to aught; so putting him to rage,
You should have ta’en the advantage of his choler
And pass’d him unelected.

DUTCH:
Zulk een zeggen, —
Men ried het u vooruit, — had hem getroffen
En zijn gemoed beproefd; het had misschien
Hem een belofte ontlokt van gunst en vriendschap …

MORE:
Lessoned=Instructed
Ever=Always
Charters=Rights
Body=Common people
Weal=Commonwealth
Sway=Influence
Translate=Transform
Fore-advised=Advised in advance
Tried=Tested, found out
Inclination=Thinking
Article=Conditions
Compleat:
Ever=Altoos, altyd
Charter=Handvest, voorrecht
Inclination=Neiging, geneigdheid, genegenheid, trek, zucht
The common-weal=’t Welvaaren van ‘t algemeen
A common-wealths man=Een republyks gezinde
Sway=Zwaaijen; regeren
To translate=Overzetten, vertaalen, overvoeren, verplaatsen
Tried=Beproefd, te recht gesteld, verhoord
Inclination=Neiging, geneigdheid, genegenheid, trek, zucht
Article=Een lid, artykel, verdeelpunt

Topics: learning/education, dispute, language, communication

Thy honesty and love doth mince this matter

PLAY: Othello
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER: Othello
CONTEXT:
IAGO
Touch me not so near.
I had rather have this tongue cut from my mouth
Than it should do offence to Michael Cassio.
Yet I persuade myself to speak the truth
Shall nothing wrong him. This it is, general:
Montano and myself being in speech,
There comes a fellow crying out for help
And Cassio following him with determined sword
To execute upon him. Sir, this gentleman
Steps in to Cassio and entreats his pause,
Myself the crying fellow did pursue,
Lest by his clamour—as it so fell out—
The town might fall in fright. He, swift of foot,
Outran my purpose, and I returned then rather
For that I heard the clink and fall of swords
And Cassio high in oath, which till tonight
I ne’er might say before. When I came back—
For this was brief— I found them close together
At blow and thrust, even as again they were
When you yourself did part them.
More of this matter cannot I report.
But men are men, the best sometimes forget.
Though Cassio did some little wrong to him,
As men in rage strike those that wish them best,
Yet surely Cassio, I believe, received
From him that fled some strange indignity
Which patience could not pass.
OTHELLO
I know, Iago,
Thy honesty and love doth mince this matter,
Making it light to Cassio. Cassio, I love thee,
But never more be officer of mine.

DUTCH:
Uw trouw, vriendschapp’lijk hart verkleint de zaak
En Cassio’s schuld. — ‘k Ben u genegen, Cassio;
Doch wees voortaan mijn officier niet meer.

MORE:
CITED IN US LAW:
Lindros v. Governing Board of the Torrance Unified School District, 9 Cal.3d 524, 540, 510 P.2d 361, 371, 108 Cal. Rptr. 185, 195 (1973)(Torriner, J.)(en banc).

Proverb: To mince the matter (Tell sparingly or by halves)

Forget=Forget themselves
Indignity=Contemptuous injury, insult
Patience=Self-control
Pass=Overlook
Compleat:
Indignity=Smaad
Pass, pass by=Passeren, voorbygaan, overslaan
Mince=Kleyn kappen

Topics: proverbs and idioms, invented or popularised, still in use, cited in law, language, honour, truth, error, anger

Thy tongue may take off some extremity, which to read would be even mortal to me

DUTCH:
Spreek, man; laat toch uw tong
Het ergste mij verzachten, dat bij ‘t lezen
Zelfs doodlijk wezen kon.

Topics: life/experience, appearance, language

Thy words, I grant, are bigger, for I wear not my dagger in my mouth

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 4.2
SPEAKER: Guiderius
CONTEXT:
CLOTEN
Thou art a robber,
A lawbreaker, a villain. Yield thee, thief.
GUIDERIUS, [as Polydor]To who? To thee? What art thou? Have not I
An arm as big as thine? A heart as big?
Thy words, I grant, are bigger, for I wear not
My dagger in my mouth. Say what thou art,
Why I should yield to thee.
CLOTEN
Thou villain base,
Know’st me not by my clothes?

DUTCH:
Is niet mijn arm
Zoo sterk als de uwe, niet mijn hart zoo sterk?
In woorden kunt gij sterker zijn; ik draag
Mijn dolk niet in mijn mond.

MORE:
Proverb: The tailor makes the man

“My dagger is my mouth” ref. Solimon and Perseda, “I fight not with my tongue; this (pointing to sword) is my oratrix”
Base=Of low station, of mean account, i.e. base metal
Compleat:
A base fellow=Een slechte vent, oolyke boef
Base=Ondergeschikt

Topics: language, learning/education, order/society, status, appearance, proverbs and idioms

Tis a word too great for any mouth of this age’s size

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Celia
CONTEXT:
ROSALIND
Alas the day, what shall I do with my doublet and
hose? What did he when thou saw’st him? What said he?
How looked he? Wherein went he? What makes him here?
Did he ask for me? Where remains he? How parted he with thee?
And when shalt thou see him again? Answer me in one word.
CELIA
You must borrow me Gargantua’s mouth first. ‘Tis a
word too great for any mouth of this age’s size. To say
ay and no to these particulars is more than to answer in
a catechism.
ROSALIND
But doth he know that I am in this forest and in man’s
apparel? Looks he as freshly as he did the day he
wrestled?
CELIA
It is as easy to count atomies as to resolve the
propositions of a lover. But take a taste of my finding
him, and relish it with good observance. I found him
under a tree like a dropped acorn.

DUTCH:
Dan moet gij eerst Gargantua’s mond voor mij huren;
want dat woord is veel te groot voor een mond van het
hedendaagsche formaat.

MORE:
Gargantua=Rabelais’ giant (giant with an enormous appetite}.
Particular=A single point, single thing; minute detail of things singly enumerated
Catechism=Series of questions and answers used to teach religious principles
Atomies=Specks, motes
Resolve=Answer
Propositions=Questions
Relish=Enhance
Good observance=Paying close attention
Compleat:
Particular=Byzonder, zonderling, byzonderheid
I don’t remember every particular of it=Ik heb juist alle de byzonderheden daarvan niet onthouden
Cathechism=Een mondelyke onderwyzing, geloofs-onderwyzing, Katechismus
Atom=Een ziertje, ondeelbaar stofken
To resolve upon something=Iets bepaalen
Proposition=Voorstel; Een sluitreden over eenig onderwerp
To relish=Smaakellyk maaken
Observance=Gedienstigheid, eerbiedigheid, opmerking, waarneeming

Burgersdijk notes:
Gargantua’s mond. De reus Gargantua, uit Rabelais’ beroemden satyrischen roman, die eens (Livre I, Ch, 38) saladeplanten, zoo groot als pruim- of noteboomen, waartussvhen zes pelgrims lagen te rusten, verzamelde, en toevallig de pelgrims ook meenam, de salade in een reuzenschotel klaar maakte en de arme drommels achtereenvolgens in den mond kreeg, zonder het te merken; zij moesten met hunne pelgrimsstokken rondspringen om niet tusschen zijne kiezen te geraken en niet met het drinken ingezwolgen te worden; gelukkig werden zij door hem, weder zonder dat hij er eenig vermoeden van had, met zijn tandenstoker uit hun benauwden toestand bevrijd.

Topics: language, reply

Tis slander, whose edge is sharper than the sword

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Pisanio
CONTEXT:
PISANIO
Please you, read;
And you shall find me, wretched man, a thing
The most disdain’d of fortune.
IMOGEN
[Reads] ‘Thy mistress, Pisanio, hath played the
strumpet in my bed; the testimonies whereof lie
bleeding in me. I speak not out of weak surmises,
but from proof as strong as my grief and as certain
as I expect my revenge. That part thou, Pisanio,
must act for me, if thy faith be not tainted with
the breach of hers. Let thine own hands take away
her life: I shall give thee opportunity at
Milford-Haven. She hath my letter for the purpose
where, if thou fear to strike and to make me certain
it is done, thou art the pandar to her dishonour and
equally to me disloyal.’
PISANIO
What shall I need to draw my sword? the paper
Hath cut her throat already. No, ’tis slander,
Whose edge is sharper than the sword, whose tongue
Outvenoms all the worms of Nile, whose breath
Rides on the posting winds and doth belie
All corners of the world: kings, queens and states,
Maids, matrons, nay, the secrets of the grave
This viperous slander enters. What cheer, madam?

DUTCH:
Wat is hier zwaard van noode ? Reeds de brief
Heeft haar de keel doorpriemd. — Neen, neen, ‘t is laster;
Diens vlijm is scherper dan het zwaard; zijn tand
Is giftiger dan ‘t giftigst Nijlgebroed.

MORE:
Slander is sharper than the sword (see Winter’s Tale, 2.3, and Measure for Measure, 3.2)
Worms=Serpents
Outvenom=Is more venomous than
Posting=Swift, fleet
Belie=Misrepresent
Compleat:
Slander=Laster, lasterkladde
In post-haste=Met groote spoed, te post
Belie (Bely)=Beliegen; lasteren
His actions bely his words=Zyn bedryf logenstraft zyne woorden; hy spreekt zich zelf tegen door zyn gedrag

Topics: language, law/legal, abuse, truth

To change the cod’s head for the salmon’s tail

PLAY: Othello
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Iago
CONTEXT:
DESDEMONA
These are old fond paradoxes to make fools laugh i’
th’ alehouse.
What miserable praise hast thou for her
That’s foul and foolish?
IAGO
There’s none so foul and foolish thereunto,
But does foul pranks which fair and wise ones do.
DESDEMONA
Oh, heavy ignorance! Thou praisest the worst best. But
what praise couldst thou bestow on a deserving woman
indeed, one that in the authority of her merit did
justly put on the vouch of very malice itself?
IAGO
She that was ever fair and never proud,
Had tongue at will and yet was never loud,
Never lacked gold and yet went never gay,
Fled from her wish and yet said “Now I may,”
She that being angered, her revenge being nigh,
Bade her wrong stay and her displeasure fly,
She that in wisdom never was so frail
To change the cod’s head for the salmon’s tail,
She that could think and ne’er disclose her mind,
See suitors following and not look behind,
She was a wight, if ever such wights were—
DESDEMONA
To do what?
IAGO
To suckle fools and chronicle small beer.
DESDEMONA
Oh, most lame and impotent conclusion! Do not learn of
him, Emilia, though he be thy husband. How say you,
Cassio? Is he not a most profane and liberal counselor?
CASSIO
He speaks home, madam. You may relish him more in the
soldier than in the scholar.

DUTCH:
Die nooit zoo dom was of zoo onbedreven,
Een zalmstaart voor een schelvischkop te geven

MORE:
Fond=Foolish
Paradoxes=Tenets, sayings; statement or tenet contrary to received opinion
Foul=Ugly
In the authority=By virtue
Put on the vouch=Compel approval, recommendation from
Fled from her wish=Did not indulge desires
Wrong=Sense of injury, anger; injustice suffered
Stay=Stop
Chronicle=Record, register
Small beer=Trivia (Shakespeare was said to be the first to use ‘small beer’ to mean something trivial) Also in French petite bière.
Chronicle small beer=Keep household account for trivial amounts
Liberal=Licentious
Scholar=Intellectual
Compleat:
Fond=Zot, dwaas, ongerymt
Paradox=Een wonderspreuk, een vreemde reden die tegen ‘t gemeen gevoelen schynt aan te loopen
Foul=Vuyl, slordig
To vouch=Staande houden, bewyzen, verzekeren
Wrong=Nadeel. Wronged=Verongelykt, verkort
To chronicle=In eenen kronyk aanschryven
Small beer=Klein bier, dun bier
Liberal=Mild, milddaadig, goedertieren, gulhartig, openhartig
Scholar=Schoolier, student; geleerde

Topics: language, wisdom, free will, intellect

To conclude, I am so good a proficient in one quarter of an hour that I can drink with any tinker in his own language during my life.

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 2.4
SPEAKER: Prince Hal
CONTEXT:
To conclude, I am so good a proficient in one quarter of an hour that I can drink with any tinker in his own language during my life. I tell thee, Ned, thou hast lost much honor that thou wert not with me in this action; but, sweet Ned—to sweeten which name of Ned, I give thee this pennyworth of sugar, clapped even now into my hand by an underskinker, one that never spake other English in his life than “Eight shillings and sixpence,” and “You are welcome,”

DUTCH:
Kortom, ik heb het in een kwartier uur zoo ver gebracht, dat ik mijn leven lang met elken ketellapper in zijn eigen taal drinken kan. Ik zeg u, Edu, veel eer is u ontgaan, dat gij niet met mij bij deze heldendaad geweest zijt.

MORE:
Schmidt:
A proficient=one who has made progress
Tinker=Mender of old brass; Proverbial tipplers and would-be politicians.
Under-skinker=An under-drawer, one that serves liquors
Action=Engagement
Compleat:
Proficient=Vorderende, toeneemende
He is a great proficient in his learning=Hy neemt zeer wel aan zyn leeren.
To skink (to fill drink)=Schenken, inschenken
Skinker=Schenker
Burgersdijk:
Dit stuiverszaksken suiker. In de wijnhuizen kregen de gasten bij den wijn een zakjen suiker. Men mag er uit vermoeden, dat of de wijn of die hem dronk vaak niet al te best van smaak was.

Topics: language, learning/education, order/society

Twas never merry world since lowly feigning was call’d compliment

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Olivia
CONTEXT:
VIOLA
Cesario is your servant’s name, fair princess.
OLIVIA
My servant, sir! ‘Twas never merry world
Since lowly feigning was call’d compliment.
You’re servant to the Count Orsino, youth.
VIOLA
And he is yours, and his must needs be yours:
Your servant’s servant is your servant, madam.
OLIVIA
For him, I think not on him. For his thoughts,
Would they were blanks, rather than fill’d with me.
VIOLA
Madam, I’ve come on his behalf to improve your feelings
towards him.

DUTCH:
Mijn dienaar? Ach, het ziet er treurig uit,
Sinds laffe vleierij beleefdheid heet.

MORE:
Proverb: He is out of his element
Proverb: To be in one’e element
Proverb: No man can play the fool as well as the wise man

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, skill/talent, language, intellect, appearance, flattery

Twere good she were spoken with, for she may strew
Dangerous conjectures in ill-breeding minds.

DUTCH:
t Waar’ goed haar eens to spreken ; licht’lijk strooit
Zij argwaan in een geest, die boosheid broedt .

Topics: language, perception, understanding, good and bad

Unbidden guests are often welcomest when they are gone

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Bedford
CONTEXT:
BURGUNDY
Is it even so? Nay, then, I see our wars
Will turn unto a peaceful comic sport,
When ladies crave to be encounter’d with.
You may not, my lord, despise her gentle suit.
TALBOT
Ne’er trust me then; for when a world of men
Could not prevail with all their oratory,
Yet hath a woman’s kindness over-ruled:
And therefore tell her I return great thanks,
And in submission will attend on her.
Will not your honours bear me company?
BEDFORD
No, truly; it is more than manners will:
And I have heard it said, unbidden guests
Are often welcomest when they are gone.
TALBOT
Well then, alone, since there’s no remedy,
I mean to prove this lady’s courtesy.
Come hither, captain.

DUTCH:
Gewis niet, dit ware onbeleefd en laakbaar;
‘k Heb wel gehoord, dat ongenoode gasten
‘t Meest welkom zijn, wanneer zij weder gaan.

MORE:
Proverb: An unbidden guest is welcome when gone

Gentle suit=Polite, well-mannered petition
Manners will=Etiquette permits
Mean=Intend

Compleat:
Gentle=Aardig, edelmoedig
Suit=Een verzoek, rechtsgeding
Manners=Zeden, manieren, manierlykheid
Mean=Meenen

Topics: proverbs and idioms, civility, language

Upon my tongues continual slanders ride, The which in every language I pronounce, Stuffing the ears of men with false reports.

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 1 Prologue
SPEAKER: Rumour
CONTEXT:
Open your ears, for which of you will stop
The vent of hearing when loud Rumour speaks?
I, from the orient to the drooping west,
Making the wind my post-horse, still unfold
The acts commenced on this ball of earth.
Upon my tongues continual slanders ride,
The which in every language I pronounce,
Stuffing the ears of men with false reports.
I speak of peace while covert enmity
Under the smile of safety wounds the world.

DUTCH:
Voortdurend zweeft er laster op mijn topgen,
En dien verkondig ik in elke taal ,
Der menschen oor met valsche tijding vullend.
Van vrede spreek ik, als verholen haat,
Schijngoedig lachend, diep de wereld wondt;

MORE:

Stop=Block
Vent of hearing=Ears
Post-horse=A horse kept at a post-house or the inn for messengers or travellers; emblem of swiftness
Drooping=West, where the sun sets
Unfold=Reveal

Compleat:
Unfold=Ontvouwen, open leggen
Drooping=Neerslagtig, moedeloosheid; quynenende

Topics: betrayal, deceit, appearance, perception, language

Very brief, and to exceeding good sense—less

DUTCH:
Zeer kort, en bovenmatig goed van zin—neloosheid.

Topics: language, law/legal, clarity/precision

Well, forward, forward! Thus the bowl should run, and not unluckily against the bias

PLAY: The Taming of the Shrew
ACT/SCENE: 4.5
SPEAKER: Petruchio
CONTEXT:
KATHERINE
Then God be blessed, it is the blessèd sun.
But sun it is not, when you say it is not,
And the moon changes even as your mind.
What you will have it named, even that it is,
And so it shall be so for Katherine.
HORTENSIO
Petruchio, go thy ways; the field is won.
PETRUCHIO
Well, forward, forward! Thus the bowl should run,
And not unluckily against the bias.
But, soft! Company is coming here.

DUTCH:
Vooruit dan, voort; zoo rolt de bal wel goed
En poedelt niet meer zijwaarts aan ‘t beschot. –
Maar kijk, wie komt ons daar gezelschap houden?

MORE:
Proverb: As changeful (inconstant) as the moon

Topics: proverbs and idioms, free will, independence, language

What is thy sentence then but speechless death,
Which robs my tongue from breathing native breath?

DUTCH:
Wat is uw vonnis, dan een stomme dood,
Nu ‘t mij mijn levensademklank verbood?

Cunning=Skilful
Sentence=Verdict (punning on language)
Breathing native breath=Speaking native English (and breathing English air)

Compleat:
Cunning=Behendig

Topics: language, understanding, identity, proverbs and idioms

When a gentleman is disposed to swear, it is not for any standers-by to curtail his oaths

DUTCH:
Als een man van rang verkiest te vloeken, behoeft
niemand het hart te hebben zijn vloeken te kortstaarten;
hè?

MORE:
Proverb: May we not do with our own what we list?

Burgersdijk notes:
Had ooit een mensch zulk een geluk?
Cloten spreekt van het geluk, dat zijn tegenspeler gehad heeft.

Topics: language, civility, patience, proverbs and idioms

When a man’s verses cannot be understood

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: Touchstone
CONTEXT:
TOUCHSTONE
When a man’s verses cannot be understood nor a man’s
good wit seconded with the forward child, understanding,
it strikes a man more dead than a great reckoning in a
little room. Truly, I would the gods had made thee
poetical.
AUDREY
I do not know what “poetical” is. Is it honest in deed
and word? Is it a true thing?
TOUCHSTONE
No, truly, for the truest poetry is the most feigning,
and lovers are given to poetry, and what they swear in
poetry may be said as lovers they do feign.
AUDREY
Do you wish then that the gods had made me poetical?
TOUCHSTONE
I do, truly, for thou swear’st to me thou art honest.
Now, if thou wert a poet, I might have some hope thou
didst feign.

DUTCH:
Als iemands verzen niet begrepen worden en iemands geestigheid niet wordt bijgestaan door het voorlijke kind Verstand,

MORE:
Seconded with=Supported by
Reckoning (substantively)=The money charged by a host (a Bill)
Honest=Respectable
Feigning=Imaginative (and thus deceptive)
Feign=Pretend
Honest=Chaste
Compleat:
Seconded=Bygestaan, bygesprongen, geholpen
Reckoning=(in a public house) Gelach
Honest=Eerlyk, oprecht, vroom
Feigning=Verdichting, veynzing

Topics: intellect, understanding, skill/talent, language

When stubbornly he did repugn the truth
About a certain question in the law

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Basset
CONTEXT:
KING HENRY VI
What is that wrong whereof you both complain?
First let me know, and then I’ll answer you.
BASSET
Crossing the sea from England into France,
This fellow here, with envious carping tongue,
Upbraided me about the rose I wear;
Saying, the sanguine colour of the leaves
Did represent my master’s blushing cheeks,
When stubbornly he did repugn the truth
About a certain question in the law
Argued betwixt the Duke of York and him;
With other vile and ignominious terms:
In confutation of which rude reproach
And in defence of my lord’s worthiness,
I crave the benefit of law of arms.

DUTCH:
Toen die de waarheid vinnig had weerstreefd
Bij zeek’ren redetwist om recht en wetten,
Dien hij gehad had met den hertog York,
Met verdre lage schimp- en lastertaal

MORE:
Wrong=Wrongdoing, offence, trespass
Envious=Malicious, spiteful, jealous of another’s good fortune
Carping=Mocking
Upbraid=To reproach
Sanguine=Blood-red
Repugn=Reject
Confutation=Legal refutation
Law of arms=A duel

Compleat:
Wrong=Nadeel
Envious=Nydig, afgunstig, wangunstig
To upbraid=Verwyten, smaadelyk toedryven
Sanguine=Bloed-rood
To repugn=Wederstreeven, bestryden, tegenstryden, wederstaan
Confutation=Wederlegging

Topics: dispute, envy, truth, language

Where did you study all this goodly speech?
– It is extempore, from my mother wit.

PLAY: The Taming of the Shrew
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Katherine
CONTEXT:
PETRUCHIO
Did ever Dian so become a grove
As Kate this chamber with her princely gait?
Oh, be thou Dian, and let her be Kate,
And then let Kate be chaste and Dian sportful.
KATHERINE
Where did you study all this goodly speech?
PETRUCHIO
It is extempore, from my mother wit.
KATHERINE
A witty mother! Witless else her son.
PETRUCHIO
Am I not wise?
KATHERINE
Yes, keep you warm.

DUTCH:
Waar hebt gij al dien schoonen praat geleerd?

MORE:
Proverb: He is wise enough that can keep himself warm

Dian=Goddess Diana
Grove=Wood
Extempore=Improvised, off the cuff
Mother wit=Natural intelligence
Compleat:
Grove=Een kleyn bosch, een hout
Extempore=Voor de vuyst, opstaandevoet

Burgersdijk notes:
Nu, houd dien geest maar warm. Yes, keep you warm. Een spreekwoordelijk zeggen, vollediger uitgedrukt in “Veel leven om niets”, 1.1: If he have wit enough to keep himself warm, „als hij geest genoeg heeft om zich warm te houden”.

Topics: proverbs and idioms, wisdom, intellect, language, skill/talent

Where every something, being blent together, turns to a wild of nothing

PLAY: The Merchant of Venice
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Bassanio
CONTEXT:
BASSANIO
Madam, you have bereft me of all words.
Only my blood speaks to you in my veins.
And there is such confusion in my powers
As after some oration fairly spoke
By a belovèd prince there doth appear
Among the buzzing pleasèd multitude,
Where every something, being blent together,
Turns to a wild of nothing, save of joy,
Expressed and not expressed. But when this ring
Parts from this finger, then parts life from hence.
O, then be bold to say Bassanio’s dead!

DUTCH:
Gelijk zich, als een aangebeden vorst
Door schoone taal de schare heeft geboeid,
Een blij gemurmel onder ‘t volk doet hooren,
Waar iedre klank en elk gebaar, schoon niets,
Tot de uiting samensmelt van loutre vreugd,
Welsprekend zonder spraak

MORE:
Pleasèd multitude=gratified, amused crowd.
A wild=wilderness
Blent=Blended
Bold=Have confidence
Bereft me=Robbed me
Powers=Vital organ, physical or intellectual faculties
Compleat:
Wilds=wildernissen
Bereft=Beroofd

Topics: emotion and mood, misquoted

Where the devil should he learn our language?

PLAY: The Tempest
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Stephano
CONTEXT:
This is some monster of the isle with four legs who hath got, as I take it, an ague. Where the devil should he learn our language? I will give him some relief if it be but for that. If I can recover him and keep him tame and get to Naples with him, he’s a present for any emperor that ever trod on neat’s leather.

DUTCH:
Dit is het een of ander monster van het eiland met vier pooten, dat, zoo het schijnt, de koorts heeft gekregen. Maar waar, voor den duivel heeft hij onze taal geleerd?

MORE:
Recover=Revive
Neat’s leather=Cowhide.
Proverbial: As good a man as ever trod on shoe (beat’s) leather. (See also Julius Caesar 1.1: ‘As proper men as ever trod upon neat’s leather…).
Compleat:
Neat=Een rund, varre (Os of koe)

Topics: language, civility, order/society

Where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: John of Gaunt
CONTEXT:
DUKE OF YORK
Vex not yourself, nor strive not with your breath;
For all in vain comes counsel to his ear.
JOHN OF GAUNT
O, but they say the tongues of dying men
Enforce attention like deep harmony:
Where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain,
For they breathe truth that breathe their words in pain.
He that no more must say is listen’d more
Than they whom youth and ease have taught to glose;
More are men’s ends mark’d than their lives before:
The setting sun, and music at the close,
As the last taste of sweets, is sweetest last,
Writ in remembrance more than things long past:
Though Richard my life’s counsel would not hear,
My death’s sad tale may yet undeaf his ear

DUTCH:
Vaak klemt het woord van hem, wiens stemme breekt,
Want waarheid ademt, wie zwaar-aad’mend spreekt.

MORE:

Proverb: Dying mean speak true (prophesy)

CITED IN US LAW: People v. Smith 214 Cal. App. 3d 904, 907 (Cal. Ct. App 1989)(Arabian, J).

Must=Can
Listened more=Heard, listened to more closely
Gloze=To make tirades, to make mere words. Veil with specious comments (OED)
Close=Closing phrase (musical)
Remembrance=In memory
Undeaf=To free from deafness

Compleat:
Remembrance=Gedachtenis, geheugenis
To gloze=Vleijen, flikflooijen

Topics: language, value, death, proverbs and idioms, cited in law

Who you are and what you would are out of my welkin, I might say “element,” but the word is overworn

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Fool
CONTEXT:
FOOL
The matter, I hope, is not great, sir, begging but a
beggar. Cressida was a beggar. My lady is within, sir. I
will construe to them whence you come. Who you are and
what you would are out of my welkin, I might say
“element,” but the word is overworn.
VIOLA
This fellow is wise enough to play the fool,
And to do that well craves a kind of wit.
He must observe their mood on whom he jests,
The quality of persons, and the time,
And, like the haggard, check at every feather
That comes before his eye. This is a practise
As full of labor as a wise man’s art,
For folly that he wisely shows is fit.
But wise men, folly-fall’n, quite taint their wit.

DUTCH:
Ik wil haar beduiden, van waar gij komt; wie gij zijt en wat gij wilt, ligt buiten mijn uitspansel; ik kon zeggen „sfeer”, maar dit woord is versleten.

MORE:

Overworn=Spoiled by too much use
Welkin=Sky
Construe=Explain (also ‘conster’)
Compleat:
Construe (conster)=Woordenschikken; t’Zamenschikken, t’zamenstellen
Overworn=Gantsch afgesleeten, uitgesleeten, afgeleefd

Topics: proverbs and idioms, skill/talent, language, intellect, appearance

Who, every word by all my wit being scanned, wants wit in all one word to understand

PLAY: The Comedy of Errors
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Antipholus of Syracuse
CONTEXT:
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Plead you to me, fair dame? I know you not.
In Ephesus I am but two hours old,
As strange unto your town as to your talk,
Who, every word by all my wit being scanned,
Want wit in all one word to understand.
LUCIANA
Fie, brother, how the world is changed with you!
When were you wont to use my sister thus?
She sent for you by Dromio home to dinner.
ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
By Dromio?
DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
By me?
ADRIANA
By thee; and this thou didst return from him:
That he did buffet thee and, in his blows,
Denied my house for his, me for his wife.

DUTCH:
Geldt mij dit, schoone vrouw? Ik ken u niet.
Twee uren pas ben ik in Ephesus ,
En vreemder dan de stad is mij uw taal;
Want, hoe ik napluis, wat ik heb gehoord,
‘k Versta van alles, wat gij zegt, geen woord.

MORE:
But two hours old=I have only been here for two hours
Scanned=Considered (with every ounce of my intellect)
Buffet=Attack
Compleat:
To scan=Onderzoeken, uitpluizen
To be a stranger to=Geen kennis van hebben
To buffet=Met vuisten slaan

Topics: language, civility, understanding

Why, ’tis a boisterous and a cruel style, a style for challengers

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 4.3
SPEAKER: Rosalind
CONTEXT:
ROSALIND
Come, come, you are a fool,
And turned into the extremity of love.
I saw her hand. She has a leathern hand,
A freestone-colored hand. I verily did think
That her old gloves were on, but ’twas her hands.
She has a huswife’s hand—but that’s no matter.
I say she never did invent this letter.
This is a man’s invention, and his hand.
SILVIUS
Sure it is hers.
ROSALIND
Why, ’tis a boisterous and a cruel style,
A style for challengers. Why, she defies me
Like Turk to Christian. Women’s gentle brain
Could not drop forth such giant-rude invention,
Such Ethiop words, blacker in their effect
Than in their countenance. Will you hear the letter?

DUTCH:
Kom, ‘t is een woeste, wreede stijl, zooals
Uitdagers kiezen; ja zij tart mij uit,
Als Turken ‘t Christ’nen doen

MORE:
Leathern=Leathery, coarse
Free-stone=Yellow limestone
Turk to Christian=Enemies in the Crusades
Ethiop=Black
Countenance=Appearance, face value
Compleat:
Leathern=Lederen, van leer
Free-stone=Hardsteen
Countenance=Gelaat, gezigt, uitzigt, weezen

Topics: language, clarity/precision, discovery, communication

Why, rude companion, whatsoe’er thou be,
I know thee not; why, then, should I betray thee?

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 2
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Iden
CONTEXT:
CADE
Here’s the lord of the soil come to seize me for a
stray, for entering his fee-simple without leave.
Ah, villain, thou wilt betray me, and get a thousand
crowns of the king carrying my head to him: but
I’ll make thee eat iron like an ostrich, and swallow
my sword like a great pin, ere thou and I part.
IDEN
Why, rude companion, whatsoe’er thou be,
I know thee not; why, then, should I betray thee?
Is’t not enough to break into my garden,
And, like a thief, to come to rob my grounds,
Climbing my walls in spite of me the owner,
But thou wilt brave me with these saucy terms?
CADE
Brave thee! Ay, by the best blood that ever was
broached, and beard thee too. Look on me well: I
have eat no meat these five days; yet, come thou and
thy five men, and if I do not leave you all as dead
as a doornail, I pray God I may never eat grass more.

DUTCH:
Gij onbeschofte knaap, wie ge ook moogt zijn,
Ik ken u niet; wat zou ik u verraden?

MORE:

Proverb: As dead (deaf, dumb) as a doornail.

Dead as a doornail wasn’t coined by Shakespeare but can be traced back to the 14th century.

To stand seised in fee simple=A feudal term that meant to have both possession and title of property, a form of freehold ownership. Shakespeare sometimes used the phrase to mean absoluteness.

Stray=Trespass, straying animals
Ostriches were believed to eat iron
Brave=Challenge
Terms=Language
Beard=Defy, challenge (e.g. ‘beard the lion in his den’)

Compleat:
To stray=Verdwaalen, doolen
To brave=Trotsen, braveeren, trotseeren, moedig treden
Term=Woord, uitdrukking
To beard (outbrave)=Uittarten, eenen anderen by den baard trekken, braveeren
Fee-simple (or fee absolute)=Een onbepaald leen, ons en onze erfgenaamen voor altoos toebehorende

Topics: law/legal, dispute, language, proverbs and idioms

With some excellent jests, fire-new from the mint, you should have banged the youth into dumbness

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Fabian
CONTEXT:
FABIAN
She did show favour to the youth in your sight only to
exasperate you, to awake your dormouse valor, to put
fire in your heart and brimstone in your liver. You
should then have accosted her, and with some excellent
jests, fire-new from the mint, you should have banged
the youth into dumbness. This was looked for at your
hand, and this was balked. The double gilt of this
opportunity you let time wash off, and you are now
sailed into the north of my lady’s opinion, where you
will hang like an icicle on a Dutchman’s beard, unless
you do redeem it by some laudable attempt either of
valour or policy.
SIR ANDREW
An ’t be any way, it must be with valour, for policy I
hate. I had as lief be a Brownist as a politician.

DUTCH:
Gij hadt haar toen moeten aanklampen, en door eenige schitterende kwinkslagen, fonkelnieuw van de munt, den jongen mensch met stomheid moeten slaan.

MORE:
Proverb: New out of the mint

Dormouse=Sleeping, timid
Brimstone=Sulphur (association with hell)
Fire-new=Brand new
Balked=Neglected
North of the opinion=Out of favour, cold disfavour
Dutchman=Sailor, supposedly reference to Arctic explorer Willem Barentsz
Brownist=Member of Puritan sect
Politician=Strategist
Compleat:
Dormouse=Hazelmuis (Hy slaapt als een hazelmuis)
Brimstone=Zwavel, sulfer
Fire-new (brand new)=Vlinder nieuw
To balk=Voorby gaan, daar over heen stappen, zyn woord niet houden, verongelyken, te leur stellen
He balked him not a whit=Hy zweeg niet voor hem, hy bleef hem niet schuldig

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, clarity/precision, language

With what a sharp-provided wit he reasons!

PLAY: Richard III
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Duke of York
CONTEXT:
PRINCE
My lord of York will still be cross in talk.
Uncle, your Grace knows how to bear with him.
YORK
You mean, to bear me, not to bear with me.—
Uncle, my brother mocks both you and me.
Because that I am little, like an ape,
He thinks that you should bear me on your shoulders.
BUCKINGHAM
With what a sharp-provided wit he reasons!
To mitigate the scorn he gives his uncle,
He prettily and aptly taunts himself.
So cunning and so young is wonderful.

DUTCH:
Hoe rijk aan scherp vernuft is wat hij zegt!
Om ‘t spotten met zijn oom wat te verzachten,
Steekt hij behendig met zichzelf den draak .
Zoo slim en nog zoo jong, is wonderbaar!

MORE:
Cross in talk=Quarrelsome
Bear with=Tolerate
Bear me=Support
Sharp=Keen
Scorn=Insult
Compleat:
To cross=Tegenstreeven, dwars voor de boeg komen, dwarsboomen, wederestreeven, kruisen
To bear=Draagen, voeren, verdraagen; dulden
To bear with=Toegeeven, geduld hebben, zich verdraagzaam aanstellen
Pray bear with me=Ey lieve schik wat met my in
Sharp=Scherp, spits, bits, streng, scherpzinnig
To scorn=Verachten, verfooijen
Scorn=Versmaading, verachting, bespotting

Burgersdijk notes:
Dat gjj mij op uw schouders dragen moet. Hij zinspeelt natuurljjk op een kameel met een aap op den rug.

Topics: language, intellect, reason

Words, words, words.

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Hamlet
CONTEXT:
Lord Polonius: What do you read, my lord?
Hamlet: Words, words, words.
Lord Polonius: What is the matter, my lord?
Hamlet: Between who?
Lord Polonius: I mean, the matter that you read, my lord.

DUTCH:
Woorden, woorden, woorden.

MORE:

Topics: language, learning/education

Yes, yes. The lines are very quaintly writ, but, since unwillingly, take them again

PLAY: The Two Gentlemen of Verona
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Sylvia
CONTEXT:
SYLVIA
Yes, yes. The lines are very quaintly writ,
But, since unwillingly, take them again.
Nay, take them.
VALENTINE
Madam, they are for you.
SYLVIA
Ay, ay. You writ them, sir, at my request,
But I will none of them. They are for you.
I would have had them writ more movingly.
VALENTINE
Please you, I’ll write your ladyship another.
SYLVIA
And when it’s writ, for my sake read it over.
And if it please you, so; if not, why, so.

DUTCH:
Ja, ja, gij schreeft dit, heer, op mijn verzoek;
Maar ik begeer het niet; het is voor u;
Ik had nog meer gevoel er in gewenscht.

MORE:
Quaintly=Skilfully
Unwillingly=Not deliberately
Compleat:
Quaintly=Aardiglyk, cierlyk, netjes
Unwilling=Ongewillig, ongeneegen

Topics: skill/talent, communication, language

You are now sailed into the north of my lady’s opinion, where you will hang like an icicle on a Dutchman’s beard

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Fabian
CONTEXT:
FABIAN
She did show favor to the youth in your sight only to
exasperate you, to awake your dormouse valor, to put
fire in your heart and brimstone in your liver. You
should then have accosted her, and with some excellent
jests, fire-new from the mint, you should have banged
the youth into dumbness. This was looked for at your
hand, and this was balked. The double gilt of this
opportunity you let time wash off, and you are now
sailed into the north of my lady’s opinion, where you
will hang like an icicle on a Dutchman’s beard, unless
you do redeem it by some laudable attempt either of
valor or policy.
SIR ANDREW
An ’t be any way, it must be with valor, for policy I
hate. I had as lief be a Brownist as a politician.

DUTCH:
(…) gij liet het dubbel verguldsel dezer gelegenheid door den tijd afwasschen; en thans zijt gij in de goede meening van de jonkvrouw geheel naar het noorden verzeild, waar gij zult blijven hangen als een ijskegel in den baard van een Hollander, tenzij gij het weer goed maakt door de een of andere lofwaardige onderneming, of van uw dapperheid, of van uw staatkunde.

MORE:
Proverb: New out of the mint

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, clarity/precision, language

You cram these words into mine ears against
The stomach of my sense.

PLAY: The Tempest
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Alonso
CONTEXT:
GONZALO
Is not, sir, my doublet as fresh as the first day I wore it? I mean, in a sort.
ANTONIO
That “sort” was well fished for.
GONZALO
When I wore it at your daughter’s marriage?
ALONSO
You cram these words into mine ears against
The stomach of my sense. Would I had never
Married my daughter there! For, coming thence,
My son is lost and, in my rate, she too,
Who is so far from Italy removed
I ne’er again shall see her.—O thou mine heir
Of Naples and of Milan, what strange fish
Hath made his meal on thee?
FRANCISCO
Sir, he may live.
I saw him beat the surges under him,
And ride upon their backs. He trod the water,
Whose enmity he flung aside, and breasted
The surge most swoll’n that met him. His bold head
‘Bove the contentious waves he kept, and oared
Himself with his good arms in lusty stroke
To th’ shore, that o’er his wave-worn basis bowed,
As stooping to relieve him. I not doubt
He came alive to land.

DUTCH:
Gij propt die woorden in mijn oor, al weigert
Mijn geest dit voedsel.

MORE:
In a sort=In a way, manner (comparatively)
Well fished for=lucky catch, after fishing for it.
Schmidt:
Fished. Figuratively, to catch at sth., to seek to obtain by artifice: “that sort was well –ed for”
Cram=To thrust in, to press, against his will: “you c. these words into mine ear”.
Stomach=Inclination, disposition: “you cram these words into mine ears against the s. of my sense.”
Oared=Rowed
Compleat:

Topics: language, relationship

You have spoken truer than you purposed.

PLAY: The Tempest
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Gonzalo
CONTEXT:
SEBASTIAN
Look he’s winding up the watch of his wit. By and by it will strike.
GONZALO
(to ALONSO) Sir—
SEBASTIAN
One. Tell.
GONZALO
When every grief is entertained that’s offered,
comes to th’entertainer –
SEBASTIAN
A dollar.
GONZALO
Dolour comes to him, indeed. You have spoken truer than you purposed.

DUTCH:
Ja juist, de tering; gij hebt het beter geraden, dan
gijzelf wel dacht.

MORE:
A visitor is ‘One who visits from charitable motives or with a view of doing good’ (OED)
Dollar=’The English name for the German thaler, a large silver coin’ (OED).
Dolour=Sorrow, grief (wordplay on ‘dollar’)
Tell=Count
Entertain=To conceive, to harbour, to feel, to keep (When everyone who feels grief embraces every grief that comes their way)
Compleat:
Entertain (receive or believe) a principle, an opinion, etc.=Een stelling, een gevoelen aanneemen, koesteren’ gelooven of voorstaan
Dolor=Droefheid, smerte
Dolorous=Pynlyk, droevig
To visit (to go about to see whether things be as they should)=Bezoeken, nazien, onderzoeken
To visit (to affect, to try)=Bezoeken, beproeven

Topics: language, truth, understanding

You must forget to be a woman; change command into obedience, fear and niceness … into a waggish courage

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Pisanio
CONTEXT:
IMOGEN
Where then
Hath Britain all the sun that shines? Day, night,
Are they not but in Britain? I’ the world’s volume
Our Britain seems as of it, but not in ‘t;
In a great pool a swan’s nest: prithee, think
There’s livers out of Britain.
PISANIO
I am most glad
You think of other place. The ambassador,
Lucius the Roman, comes to Milford-Haven
To-morrow: now, if you could wear a mind
Dark as your fortune is, and but disguise
That which, to appear itself, must not yet be
But by self-danger, you should tread a course
Pretty and full of view; yea, haply, near
The residence of Posthumus; so nigh at least
That though his actions were not visible, yet
Report should render him hourly to your ear
As truly as he moves.
IMOGEN
O, for such means!
Though peril to my modesty, not death on’t,
I would adventure.
PISANIO
Well, then, here’s the point:
You must forget to be a woman; change
Command into obedience, fear and niceness—
The handmaids of all women, or, more truly,
Woman it pretty self—into a waggish courage,
Ready in gibes, quick-answered, saucy, and
As quarrellous as the weasel. Nay, you must
Forget that rarest treasure of your cheek,
Exposing it—but O, the harder heart!
Alack, no remedy—to the greedy touch
Of common-kissing Titan, and forget
Your laboursome and dainty trims, wherein
You made great Juno angry.
IMOGEN
Nay, be brief
I see into thy end, and am almost
A man already.

DUTCH:
Vergeet, dat gij een vrouw zijt; ruil ‘t gebieden.
Voor dienstbaarheid, de schuchterheid en kieschheid, —
Der vrouwen gezellinnen, ja veeleer,
Haar lieflijk wezen zelf, — voor dart’len moed;
Wees spotziek, onbeschaamd, vlug met de tong,
En twistziek als een wezel;

MORE:
Niceness=Delicacy, daintiness, coyness
Quarrellous as the weasel. Weasels were kept for killing vermin. Cf. Henry IV Part 1: “A weasel hath not such a deal of spleen as you are tossed with.”
Laboursome=Elabourate, requiring much pains and industry (also laboursome petition, Hamlet)
Common-kissing=Kissing anybody and anything
Trims=Ornamental dress
Compleat:
To gibe=Boerten, gekscheeren
Quarrelsome=Krakeelachtig, twistig, twistgierig, kyfachtig
Laboursom=Lastig, verdrdietig, verveelend
Niceness=Viezigheid, keurigheid

Burgersdijk notes:
Den fellen straler van omhoog. In het oorspronkelijke wordt gesproken van the greedg touch of common-kissing Titan. De zonnegod wordt meermalen Titan genoemd.

Topics: appearance, intellect, independence, language, reply

Your gentleness shall force more than your force move us to gentleness

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 2.7
SPEAKER: Duke Senior
CONTEXT:

DUKE SENIOR
Art thou thus boldened, man, by thy distress
Or else a rude despiser of good manners,
That in civility thou seem’st so empty?
ORLANDO
You touched my vein at first. The thorny point
Of bare distress hath ta’en from me the show
Of smooth civility, yet am I inland bred
And know some nurture. But forbear, I say.
He dies that touches any of this fruit
Till I and my affairs are answerèd.
JAQUES
An you will not be answered with reason, I must die.
DUKE SENIOR
What would you have? Your gentleness shall force
More than your force move us to gentleness.

DUTCH:
Doch vriend’lijkheid dwingt meer,
Dan ooit uw dwang tot vriend’lijkheid ons stemt.

MORE:
Proverb: There is a great force hidden in a sweet command (1581).

Empty=Void, destitute
Touched=Identified
Vein=Disposition, temper, humour
Thorny point=(fig.) Piercing
Bare distress=Pure pain and misery
Inland=A word of a very vague signification, not so much denoting remoteness from the sea or the frontier, as a seat of peace and peaceful civilization; (perhaps opposite to ‘outlandish’)
Nurture=Good breeding, humanity
Answered=Satisfied, settled
Gentleness=Gentility; kindness, mild manners
Compleat:
Emtpy=Ledig
An empty hope=Een ydele hoop
Thorny=Doornig
Distress=Benaauwdheyd, verlegenheyd; beslag an goederen, panding
Nurture=Opvoeding
Answer=Beantwoorden; antwoord geven
Gentle=(mild or moderate) Zagtmoedig, maatig

Topics: proverbs and idioms, order/society, language, civility, learning/education

Your words and performances are no kin together

PLAY: Othello
ACT/SCENE: 4.2
SPEAKER: Roderigo
CONTEXT:
RODERIGO
Every day thou daff’st me with some device, Iago, and rather, as it seems to me now, keep’st from me all conveniency than suppliest me with the least advantage of hope.
I will indeed no longer endure it, nor am I yet persuaded to put up in peace what already I have foolishly suffered.
IAGO
Will you hear me, Roderigo?
RODERIGO
I have heard too much, and your words and performances are no kin together.
IAGO
You charge me most unjustly.
RODERIGO
With naught but truth. I have wasted myself out of my
means. The jewels you have had from me to deliver
Desdemona would half have corrupted a votaress. You have
told me she hath received them and returned me
expectations and comforts of sudden respect and
acquaintance, but I find none.

DUTCH:
Waarachtig, ik heb te veel naar u geluisterd, want
uw woorden en uw daden zijn elkaar niet verwant.

MORE:
Proverb: ‘Great promise small performance’ (your words and performances are no kin together.)

Topics: proverbs and idioms, perception, language, blame