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PLAY: Measure for Measure ACT/SCENE: 2.2 SPEAKER: Isabella CONTEXT: Merciful Heaven,
Thou rather with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt
Split’st the unwedgeable and gnarled oak
Than the soft myrtle: but man, proud man,
Drest in a little brief authority,
Most ignorant of what he’s most assured,
His glassy essence, like an angry ape,
Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven
As make the angels weep; who, with our spleens,
Would all themselves laugh mortal DUTCH: de mensch, de trotsche mensch,
Met korte, nietig kleine macht bekleed,
Het meest vergetend, wat hij ‘t zekerst kent,
Zijn aard van glas, -speelt, als een toornige aap,
Voor ‘t oog des hemels zulke vreemde kluchten,
Dat de eng’len weenen, die, zoo onze luim
Hun eigen waar’, zich sterflijk zouden lachen.
MORE: Little brief authority=Short-lived and limited power
Glassy essence is traditionally interpreted as fragile nature, but this is disputed (argument that essence overlaps but extends beyond ‘nature’, quintessence)
Compleat:
Essence=Het weezen, de weezendheyd
“Enough to make the angels weep” is still in use Topics: authority, life, nature, invented or popularised, still in use

PLAY: The Tempest
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Prospero
CONTEXT:
A devil, a born devil on whose nature
Nurture can never stick, on whom my pains,
Humanely taken, all, all lost, quite lost.
And as with age his body uglier grows,
So his mind cankers. I will plague them all,
Even to roaring.

DUTCH:
Een duivel, een geboren duivel, waar
Verpleging aan verspild is, alle zorg,
Die ‘k liefd’rijk droeg, verloren, gansch verloren!

MORE:
Pains humanely taken = efforts with the best intentions
Canker’ blossom (or canker rose): dog rose or wild rose. Also used to refer to something that would destroy, infect or decay.
Compleat:
Humanely=Menschelyker wyze, beleefdelyk
Canker=Inkankeren, ineeten

Topics: insult, good and bad, nature

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: Belarius
CONTEXT:
BELARIUS
A goodly day not to keep house with such
Whose roof’s as low as ours! Stoop, boys. This gate
Instructs you how t’ adore the heavens and bows you
To a morning’s holy office. The gates of monarchs
Are arched so high that giants may jet through
And keep their impious turbans on, without
Good morrow to the sun. Hail, thou fair heaven!
We house i’ th’ rock, yet use thee not so hardly
As prouder livers do.

DUTCH:
Een dag te schoon om thuis te blijven, onder
Een dak zoo laag als ‘t onze

MORE:
Keep the house=Stay home
Jet=Strut, swagger
Stoop=Bow down
Impious=Sinful, wicked (turbans: Giants were often depicted in romantic novels as turban-wearing Saracens)
Compleat:
To keep house=Huis houden; binnens huis blyven
To jet or jut=Uitstooten, uitwaards loopen
To stoop=Buigen, bokken of bukken
Impious=Ongodvruchtig, godloos

Topics: nature, life, equality, status, authority

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 5.1
SPEAKER: Laertes
CONTEXT:
Lay her i’ th’ earth,
And from her fair and unpolluted flesh
May violets spring! I tell thee, churlish priest,
A minist’ring angel shall my sister be
When, thou liest howling.

DUTCH:
Gods dienende engel zal mijn zuster zijn /
Mijn zuster is een engel voor Gods aanschijn wanneer jij ligt te janken in de hel. /
Een dienende engel zal mijn zuster zijn.

MORE:
Schmidt:
Minister to=Administer (medicines), to prescribe, to order
Ministering=caring for (ministrations=provision of care).

Topics: invented or popularised, death, nature

PLAY: All’s Well that Ends Well
ACT/SCENE: 4.4
SPEAKER: Helen
CONTEXT:
HELEN
Nor you, mistress,
Ever a friend whose thoughts more truly labour
To recompense your love: doubt not but heaven
Hath brought me up to be your daughter’s dower,
As it hath fated her to be my motive
And helper to a husband. But, O strange men!
That can such sweet use make of what they hate,
When saucy trusting of the cozened thoughts
Defiles the pitchy night: so lust doth play
With what it loathes for that which is away.
But more of this hereafter. You, Diana,
Under my poor instructions yet must suffer
Something in my behalf.
DIANA
Let death and honesty
Go with your impositions, I am yours
Upon your will to suffer.
HELEN
Yet, I pray you:
But with the word the time will bring on summer,
When briers shall have leaves as well as thorns,
And be as sweet as sharp. We must away;
Our wagon is prepared, and time revives us:
All’s well that ends well; still the fine’s the crown;
Whate’er the course, the end is the renown.

DUTCH:
Komt, wij moeten heen;
De wagen staat gereed; de tjd baart rozen;
Eind goed, al goed; aan ‘t einde hangt de kroon;
De loop zij zwaar, het einde brengt het loon.

MORE:
CITED IN US LAW:
In Re San Juan Dupont Plaza Hotel Fire Litigation, 907 F.2d 4, 6 (1st Cir. 1990)(per
curiam); Collett v. State, 133 Ga. App. 318, 211 S.E.2d 198 (Ga. Ct. App: 1974).

Proverb: All’s Well that Ends Well
Proverb: The end crowns (tries) all

Objective achieved; problems experienced along the way can be forgotten.
Shakespeare didn’t invent this; the earliest known version in print is from the 13th century, in The proverbs and idioms of Hendyng.
Fine=End, conclusion
Revive=To bring again to life, to reanimate
Compleat:
In fine=Eindelyk, ten laatsten
Revive=Herleeven, doen herleeven, weder bekomen, verquikken

Topics: cited in law, purpose, achievement, time, nature, proverbs and idioms, still in use

PLAY: The Two Gentlemen of Verona
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Valentine
CONTEXT:
PROTEUS
‘Tis love you cavil at: I am not Love.
VALENTINE
Love is your master, for he masters you:
And he that is so yoked by a fool,
Methinks, should not be chronicled for wise.
PROTEUS
Yet writers say, as in the sweetest bud
The eating canker dwells, so eating love
Inhabits in the finest wits of all.
VALENTINE
And writers say, as the most forward bud
Is eaten by the canker ere it blow,
Even so by love the young and tender wit
Is turned to folly, blasting in the bud,
Losing his verdure even in the prime
And all the fair effects of future hopes.
But wherefore waste I time to counsel thee,
That art a votary to fond desire?
Once more adieu! My father at the road
Expects my coming, there to see me shipped .

DUTCH:
Liefde is uw meester, want die meestert U;
En hij, die zoo het juk draagt van een dwaas,
Zij, dunkt mij, bij de wijzen niet geboekt.

MORE:
Cavil=To quarrel, to find fault (the phrase “splitting hairs” was recorded in the 1652 OED and would mean one who is very persistent, stubborn)
Yoke=Emblem of slavery
Blasting=Withering
Verdure=Freshness
Prime=Spring
Votary=One who takes a vow
Fond=Foolish
Shipped=Aboard
Compleat:
Cavil=Haairkloovery, woordentwist
To cavil=Knibbelen, kibbelen, haairklooven, woordvitten, bedillen, schimpen
Yoke=Een juk; (yoke of bondage) Het juk der dienstbaarheid
To stoop onder the yoke=Onder ‘t juk buigen
Canker=Kanker
To blow=Bloeijen
To blast=Doen verstuyven, wegblaazen, verzengen, door ‘t weer beschaadigen
Verdure=Groente, groenheyd
Prime=Eerste, voornaamste
Votary=Een die zich door een (religieuse) belofte verbonden heeft; die zich ergens toe heeft overgegeeven
Fond=Zot, dwaas, ongerymt
To ship=Scheepen, inscheepen

Topics: dispute, love, nature

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 2.7
SPEAKER: Jaques
CONTEXT:
JAQUES
A fool, a fool, I met a fool i’ th’ forest,
A motley fool. A miserable world!
As I do live by food, I met a fool,
Who laid him down and basked him in the sun
And railed on Lady Fortune in good terms,
In good set terms, and yet a motley fool.
“Good morrow, fool,” quoth I. “No, sir,” quoth he,
“Call me not ‘fool’ till heaven hath sent me fortune.”
And then he drew a dial from his poke
And, looking on it with lackluster eye,
Says very wisely, “It is ten o’clock.
Thus we may see,” quoth he, “how the world wags.
‘Tis but an hour ago since it was nine,
And after one hour more ’twill be eleven.
And so from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,
And then from hour to hour we rot and rot,
And thereby hangs a tale.” When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer
That fools should be so deep-contemplative,
And I did laugh sans intermission
An hour by his dial. O noble fool!
A worthy fool! Motley’s the only wear.

DUTCH:
En keek er op met somb’ren, doffen blik

MORE:
Proverb: Thereby hangs (lies) a tale
Proverb: Fortune favours fools

Motley=Multicoloured jester outfit
Set=Composed
Rail=To use reproachful language, to scold in opprobrious terms
Poke=Pouch or pocket
Lacklustre=Lacking radiance, gloss or brightness (Latin lustrare).
Dial=(Fob)watch
Poke=Pouch, pocket
Moral=Moralise
Deep=Profoundly
Chanticleer=Rooster
Compleat:
Motley=Een grove gemengelde
To rail=Schelden
To wag (to move or stir)=Schudden, beweegen
Poke=Zak
Lustre=Luyster
Dial=Wysplaat
To moralize=Een zedelyke uitlegging of toepassing op iets maaken
Deep=Diepzinnig

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, blame, nature, time

PLAY: The Taming of the Shrew
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Petruchio
CONTEXT:
PETRUCHIO
No, not a whit. I find you passing gentle.
‘Twas told me you were rough and coy and sullen,
And now I find report a very liar.
For thou are pleasant, gamesome, passing courteous,
But slow in speech, yet sweet as springtime flowers.
Thou canst not frown, thou canst not look askance,
Nor bite the lip as angry wenches will,
Nor hast thou pleasure to be cross in talk.
But thou with mildness entertain’st thy wooers,
With gentle conference, soft and affable.
Why does the world report that Kate doth limp?
O slanderous world! Kate like the hazel-twig
As hazel nuts, and sweeter than the kernels.
Oh, let me see thee walk! Thou dost not halt.

DUTCH:
Volstrekt niet; ‘k vind u allerliefst. Men had
U mij geschetst als schuw en ruw en geem’lijk;
En nu vind ik ‘t Gerucht een lastertong,
Want gij zijt vroolijk, geestig, allerhoflijkst.

MORE:
Not a whit=Not at all
Passing=Exceedingly
Coy=Disdainful
Gamesome=Playful
Askance=Scornful
Entertain=Receive
Conference=Conversation
Halt=Limp
Compleat:
Not a whit displeased=Niet een zier misnoegd
A passing (or excellent) beauty=Een voortreffelyke schoonheid
Coy=Gemaakt, schuw, zedig in schyn
Gamesom=Speelziek, weeldrig, dartel
I never saw him so gamesome=Ik heb hem nooit zo kortswylig gezien
Entertain=Onthaalen, huysvesten, plaats vergunnen
Conference=Onderhandeling, t’zamenspraak, mondgemeenschap gesprekhouding
To halt=Hinken, mank gaan

Topics: nature, civility, reputation

PLAY: The Merchant of Venice
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Solanio
CONTEXT:
SOLANIO
Not in love neither? Then let us say you are sad
Because you are not merry— and ’twere as easy
For you to laugh and leap and say you are merry
Because you are not sad. Now, by two-headed Janus,
Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time.
Some that will evermore peep through their eyes
And laugh like parrots at a bagpiper,
And other of such vinegar aspect
That they’ll not show their teeth in way of smile
Though Nestor swear the jest be laughable.

DUTCH:
Natuur brengt soms toch rare snuiters voort:
Die knijpt voortdurend de oogen toe van ‘t lachen,
Als bij een doedelzak een papegaai;
En de ander heeft zoo’n uitzicht van azijn,
Dat hij van ‘t lachen nooit zijn tanden toont,
Al deed een grap ook de’ ouden Nestor schaat’ren.

MORE:
Laugh like parrots at a bagpiper=parrots were thought of as foolish, bagpipe music as melancholy.
Vinegar aspect=sour (‘sowr’) disposition.
Janus=A Roman God with two faces, one at the front and one at the back of his head (although not thought to have expressed contrasting moods). Janus was the god of beginnings duality, gates and doors, passages and endings.
Nestor, legendary wise King of Pylos in Homer’s Odyssey.
Compleat:
To sowr=Zuur worden, zuur maaken, verzuuren.
Sowred=Gezuurd, verzuurd. Sowrish=Zuurachtig.
To look sowrly upon one=Iemand zuur aanzien

Topics: emotion and mood, misquoted

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Titania
CONTEXT:
TITANIA
These are the forgeries of jealousy.
And never, since the middle summer’s spring,
Met we on hill, in dale, forest, or mead,
By pavèd fountain, or by rushy brook,
Or in the beachèd margent of the sea,
To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,
But with thy brawls thou hast disturbed our sport.
Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
As in revenge, have sucked up from the sea
Contagious fogs, which falling in the land
Have every pelting river made so proud
That they have overborne their continents.
The ox hath therefore stretched his yoke in vain,
The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn
Hath rotted ere his youth attained a beard.
The fold stands empty in the drownèd field,
And crows are fatted with the murrain flock.
The nine-men’s-morris is filled up with mud,
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green
For lack of tread are undistinguishable.
The human mortals want their winter here.
No night is now with hymn or carol blessed.
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound.
And thorough this distemperature we see
The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems’ thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set. The spring, the summer,
The childing autumn, angry winter change
Their wonted liveries, and the mazèd world,
By their increase, now knows not which is which.
And this same progeny of evils comes
From our debate, from our dissension.
We are their parents and original

DUTCH:
En heel deez’ sleep van plagen komt alleen
Van onze oneenigheid, van onzen twist;
Wij hebben dien verwekt, dien voortgebracht.

MORE:
Forgeries=Lies
Rushy=Bordered with rushes
Ringlets=Dances
Brawls=Quarrels
Pelting=Paltry (or pelting)
Continent=Bank
Murrain=Diseased (murrain is a disease affecting sheep and cattle)
Nine-men’s-morris=An outdoor game
Quaint=Intricate
Lack of tread=Where nobody walks
Hiems=Winter god
Childing=Fruitful
Change=Exchange
Wonted=Usual
Liveries=Clothing
Mazèd=Bewildered
Debate=Dispute
Compleat:
Forgery=Een verdichtsel, verziersel
Brawl=Gekyf
Continent=Het vaste land
Murrain (murren)=Sterfte onder de beesten
Quaint=Cierlyk
To tread=Treeden, betreeden
Livery=een Lievry
Wonted=Gewoon, gewoonlyk
It put me in a maze=Het deed my versteld staan, het maakte my bedwelmd
Debate=Twist, verschil, krakkeel

Topics: nature, dispute

PLAY: Julius Caesar
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Casca
CONTEXT:
CASCA
Are not you moved when all the sway of earth
Shakes like a thing unfirm? O Cicero,
I have seen tempests when the scolding winds
Have rived the knotty oaks, and I have seen
Th’ ambitious ocean swell and rage and foam
To be exalted with the threatening clouds,
But never till tonight, never till now,
Did I go through a tempest dropping fire.
Either there is a civil strife in heaven,
Or else the world, too saucy with the gods,
Incenses them to send destruction.

DUTCH:
Treft u dit niet, dat heel ‘t gevaart der aarde
Trilt als een tenger riet?

MORE:
Sway=Realm
Riven=Split, cleave
Exalted=Lifted as high as
Saucy=Insolent
Incense=Anger
Compleat:
Sway=Heerschappij
Riven=Gescheurd, gebarsten
Exalted=Verhoogd, verheven
Saucy=Stout, onbeschaamd, baldaadig
To incense=Ophitsen, vertoornen, tergen

Topics: nature, anger

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: Bolingbroke
CONTEXT:
Let’s march without the noise of threatening drum,
That from this castle’s tottered battlements
Our fair appointments may be well perused.
Methinks King Richard and myself should meet
With no less terror than the elements
Of fire and water, when their thundering shock
At meeting tears the cloudy cheeks of heaven.
Be he the fire, I’ll be the yielding water:
The rage be his, whilst on the earth I rain
My waters; on the earth, and not on him.
March on, and mark King Richard how he looks.
See, see, King Richard doth himself appear,
As doth the blushing discontented sun
From out the fiery portal of the east,
When he perceives the envious clouds are bent
To dim his glory and to stain the track
Of his bright passage to the occident.

DUTCH:
Ziet, ziet daar, koning Richard zelf verschijnt,
Zooals de blakende en verstoorde zon
Vooruit treedt uit de vuur’ge poort van ‘toosten

MORE:

Proverb: A red morning foretells a stormy day

Tottered=Jagged, irregular, ragged
Occident=West
Fair appointments=Fine equipment, furniture, appearance
Be he=Allow him to be
Yielding=Submissive, giving way, not opposing
Discontented=Dissatisfied

Compleat:
Tattered=Gescheurd, haveloos
Occident=Het westen
Yielding=Overgeeving, toegeeving, toegeeflyk, meegeeflyk
Discontented=Misnoegd, knyzig, ‘t onvreede

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, nature

PLAY: King Lear
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: King Lear
CONTEXT:
Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! Rage, blow!
You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout
Till you have drenched our steeples, drowned the cocks!
You sulph’rous and thought-executing fires,
Vaunt-couriers of oak-cleaving thunderbolts,
Singe my white head; and thou all-shaking thunder,
Strike flat the thick rotundity o’th’world,
Crack nature’s moulds, all germens spill at once
That makes ingrateful man.
FOOL
O nuncle, court holy water in a dry house is better than this rain-water out o’door. Good nuncle, in, ask thy daughters
blessing. Here’s a night pities neither wise men nor fools.

DUTCH:
Blaas, winden, scheur uw wangen stuk! Raas! Tier!
U, cataracten en orkaanvloed, spuit
de torens weg en overspoel hun hanen!

MORE:
Court holy water=Flattery at court
Schmidt:
Cocks = weathervanes
Thought-executing fires=Lightning that is more rapid than, or precedes, thought
Burgersdijk notes:
Wijwatersprenging. Het geven van mooie woorden, vleien; dit wordt door den Nar aan den koning als middel aanbevolen, om uit den nood te geraken. In ‘t Engelsch staat court holy-water; de Franschen spreken evenzoo van ‘eau bénite du cour’.

Topics: nature, poverty and wealth, order/society, flattery

PLAY: King Henry V
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Hostess
CONTEXT:
BOY
Mine host Pistol, you must come to my master and your hostess. He is very sick and would to bed.—Good Bardolph, put thy face between his sheets, and do the office of a warming-pan. Faith, he’s very ill.
BARDOLPH
Away, you rogue!
HOSTESS
By my troth, he’ll yield the crow a pudding one of these days. The king has killed his heart. Good husband, come home presently.

DUTCH:
Waarachtig, hij wordt dezer dagen een gebraad voor
de kraaien; de koning heeft zijn hart gedood

MORE:

Proverb: To make the crow a pudding (c. 1598)
Yield the crow a pudding=Feed the crows after his death

Compleat:
To give the crow a pudding=Sterven

Topics: proverbs and idioms, death, nature

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Hotspur
CONTEXT:
Diseas—d nature oftentimes breaks forth
In strange eruptions; oft the teeming earth
Is with a kind of colic pinched and vexed
By the imprisoning of unruly wind
Within her womb, which, for enlargement striving,
Shakes the old beldam earth and topples down
Steeples and moss-grown towers.

DUTCH:
Niet zelden breekt een ziekte der natuur
In dolle krampen uit; de zwangere aard
Wordt vaak, als door koliek gekweld, genepen;

MORE:
Beldam=old woman
Teeming=Fruitful

Topics: nature, life, consequence

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Joan la Pucelle
CONTEXT:
Assign’d am I to be the English scourge.
This night the siege assuredly I’ll raise:
Expect Saint Martin’s summer, halcyon days,
Since I have entered into these wars.
Glory is like a circle in the water,
Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself
Till by broad spreading it disperse to nought.
With Henry’s death the English circle ends;
Dispersed are the glories it included.
Now am I like that proud insulting ship
Which Caesar and his fortune bare at once.

DUTCH:
Ik ben tot Englands geese! uitverkoren.
Nog deze nacht ontzet ik wis de stad;
Verwacht, nu ik den strijd aanvaard, een schoonen
Sint Maartenszomer, Halcyonendagen.

MORE:
Saint Martin’s summer=Equivalent of an ‘Indian summer’
Halcyon days=Unseasonable calm (so called because when it was calm in winter the kingfisher could build its nest)
Halcyon=Kingfisher
“Pround insulting ship” is a ref. to Plutarch, who wrote that Caesar told the captain of his ship no harm would befall him because he was carrying Caesar and therefore had Caesar’s ‘fortune’
Insulting=Triumphant

Compleat:
Halcyon (a sea-owl)=Een zekere Zee-vogel
Halcyon days=Een tijd van vrede en rust

Burgersdijk notes:
Sint Maartenszomer, Halcyonendagen. Halcyonendagen waren bij de ouden schoone, stormlooze dagen. Het schoone weder, op een storm volgend, wordt hier met een schoonen zomerschen dag in November, op Sint Maarten, vergeleken.

Ik ben nu als dat fiere schip, dat eens Tegader Caesar droeg en zijn geluk. Het verhaal, dat Caesar eens zijn bezorgden schipper toeriep: „Wees goedsmoeds, knaap, want gij hebt Cesar en zijn geluk aan boord”, vond Shakespeare in de vertaling van Plutarchus door North, een werk, dat zeker vlijtig door hem beoefend werd en dat hem aanleiding gaf tot de meeste geleerde toespelingen, waaraan dit stuk rijk is.

Topics: fate/destiny, achievement, hope/optimism, nature

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Fool
CONTEXT:
FOOL
Foolery, sir, does walk about the orb like the sun. It
shines everywhere. I would be sorry, sir, but the fool
should be as oft with your master as with my mistress: I
think I saw your wisdom there.
VIOLA
Nay, an thou pass upon me, I’ll no more with thee.
Hold, there’s expenses for thee.

DUTCH:
Narrerij, heerschap, reist de wereld rond, evenals de
zon: zij schijnt overal. Het zou mij spijten, als de nar
niet even zoo dikwijls bij uwen meester was, als bij
mijne meesteres. Het komt mij voor, dat ik uwe wijsheid
daar heb gezien.

MORE:
Proverb: The sun shines upon all alike

Orb=Globe, earth (the Ptolemaic view of the universe where the sun orbited the Earth, was still loosely accepted at the time, although there was mounting evidence to the contrary)
An=If
Pass upon=Give an opinion of
Compleat:
Orb=Een kloot, rond, hemelkring
To pass judgment upon=Veroordeelen
To pass approbation=Goedkeuren

Topics: proverbs and idioms, equality, nature

PLAY: All’s Well that Ends Well
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Countess
CONTEXT:
LAFEW
I would it were not notorious. Was this gentlewoman
the daughter of Gerard de Narbon?
COUNTESS
His sole child, my lord, and bequeathed to my
overlooking. I have those hopes of her good that
her education promises; her dispositions she
inherits, which makes fair gifts fairer; for where
an unclean mind carries virtuous qualities, there
commendations go with pity; they are virtues and
traitors too; in her they are the better for their
simpleness; she derives her honesty and achieves her
goodness.
LAFEW
Your commendations, madam, get from her tears.
COUNTESS
‘Tis the best brine a maiden can season her praise
in. The remembrance of her father never approaches
her heart but the tyranny of her sorrows takes all
livelihood from her cheek. No more of this, Helen;
go to, no more; lest it be rather thought you affect
a sorrow than have it.

DUTCH:
Ik heb alle verwachting van het goede, dat hare opvoeding belooft; de natuur, die zij geërfd heeft, maakt de schoone gaven, die opvoeding schenkt, nog schooner;

MORE:
Proverb: Blood is inherited but virtue is achieved

Overlooking=Guardianship
Fated=Fateful (see also King Lear “The plagues that hang fated over men’s faults”, 3.2)
Go with pity=Accompanied by regret
Simpleness=Plainness (being unmixed), unrefined nativeness, innocence
Unclean=(in a moral sense) Impure
Derive=Inherit
Compleat:
Disposition (or Inclination)=Genegenheid, Lust
Disposition of mind=Gesteltenis van gemoed
Simple=Onbeschadigend, eenvoudig
Fated=Door ‘t noodlot beschooren

Topics: nature, learning/education, virtue, innocence, fate/destiny, proverbs and idioms

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Hippolyta
CONTEXT:
THESEUS
Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour
Draws on apace. Four happy days bring in
Another moon. But oh, methinks how slow
This old moon wanes! She lingers my desires,
Like to a stepdame or a dowager
Long withering out a young man’s revenue.
HIPPOLYTA
Four days will quickly steep themselves in night.
Four nights will quickly dream away the time.
And then the moon, like to a silver bow
New bent in heaven, shall behold the night
Of our solemnities.
THESEUS
Go, Philostrate,
Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments.
Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth.
Turn melancholy forth to funerals.
The pale companion is not for our pomp.

DUTCH:
Vier dagen, zij verzinken snel in nacht;
Vier nachten, zij verdroomen snel den tijd;
Dan wordt op nieuw de zilvren boog der maan
Gespannen aan den hemel, en beschouwt
De nacht van ons festijn.

MORE:
Hippolyta=Legendary Queen of the Amazons, women warriors.
Steep themselves=Pass into, be absorbed in
Lingers=Delays
Stepdame=Stepmother
Solemnities=Ceremony
Companion=Fellow, emotion
Compleat:
Steep=Indoopen, te weeken leggel
Linger=Leuteren, draalen, sammelen
Solemnities=Plegtigheyd, hoogtyd, feestelykheyd
Companion=Medegezel, medegenoot, maat, makker”

Topics: time, emotion and mood, nature

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Hippolyta
CONTEXT:
THESEUS
Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour
Draws on apace. Four happy days bring in
Another moon. But oh, methinks how slow
This old moon wanes! She lingers my desires,
Like to a stepdame or a dowager
Long withering out a young man’s revenue.
HIPPOLYTA
Four days will quickly steep themselves in night.
Four nights will quickly dream away the time.
And then the moon, like to a silver bow
New bent in heaven, shall behold the night
Of our solemnities.
THESEUS
Go, Philostrate,
Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments.
Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth.
Turn melancholy forth to funerals.
The pale companion is not for our pomp.

DUTCH:
Vier nachten, zij verdroomen snel den tijd;
Dan wordt op nieuw de zilvren boog der maan
Gespannen aan den hemel, en beschouwt
De nacht van ons festijn.

MORE:
Hippolyta=Legendary Queen of the Amazons, women warriors.
Steep themselves=Pass into, be absorbed in
Lingers=Delays
Stepdame=Stepmother
Solemnities=Ceremony
Companion=Fellow, emotion
Compleat:
Steep=Indoopen, te weeken leggel
Linger=Leuteren, draalen, sammelen
Solemnities=Plegtigheyd, hoogtyd, feestelykheyd
Companion=Medegezel, medegenoot, maat, makker”

Topics: time, emotion and mood, nature

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Joan la Pucelle
CONTEXT:
Assign’d am I to be the English scourge.
This night the siege assuredly I’ll raise:
Expect Saint Martin’s summer, halcyon days,
Since I have entered into these wars.
Glory is like a circle in the water,
Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself
Till by broad spreading it disperse to nought.
With Henry’s death the English circle ends;
Dispersed are the glories it included.
Now am I like that proud insulting ship
Which Caesar and his fortune bare at once.

DUTCH:
Ik ben tot Englands geese! uitverkoren.
Nog deze nacht ontzet ik wis de stad;
Verwacht, nu ik den strijd aanvaard, een schoonen
Sint Maartenszomer, Halcyonendagen.

MORE:
Saint Martin’s summer=Equivalent of an ‘Indian summer’
Halcyon days=Unseasonable calm (so called because when it was calm in winter the kingfisher could build its nest)
Halcyon=Kingfisher
“Pround insulting ship” is a ref. to Plutarch, who wrote that Caesar told the captain of his ship no harm would befall him because he was carrying Caesar and therefore had Caesar’s ‘fortune’
Insulting=Triumphant

Compleat:
Halcyon (a sea-owl)=Een zekere Zee-vogel
Halcyon days=Een tijd van vrede en rust

Burgersdijk notes:
Sint Maartenszomer, Halcyonendagen. Halcyonendagen waren bij de ouden schoone, stormlooze dagen. Het schoone weder, op een storm volgend, wordt hier met een schoonen zomerschen dag in November, op Sint Maarten, vergeleken.

Ik ben nu als dat fiere schip, dat eens Tegader Caesar droeg en zijn geluk. Het verhaal, dat Caesar eens zijn bezorgden schipper toeriep: „Wees goedsmoeds, knaap, want gij hebt Cesar en zijn geluk aan boord”, vond Shakespeare in de vertaling van Plutarchus door North, een werk, dat zeker vlijtig door hem beoefend werd en dat hem aanleiding gaf tot de meeste geleerde toespelingen, waaraan dit stuk rijk is.

Topics: fate/destiny, achievement, hope/optimism, nature

PLAY: Romeo and Juliet
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Romeo
CONTEXT:
He that is strucken blind cannot forget
The precious treasure of his eyesight lost.
Show me a mistress that is passing fair;
What doth her beauty serve but as a note
Where I may read who passed that passing fair?
Farewell. Thou canst not teach me to forget.

DUTCH:
De blindgeword’ne kan den dierb’ren schat
Van ‘t licht, dat hij moet derven, nooit vergeten.

MORE:
Onions:
Passing=Exceedingly
Compleat:
A passing (or excellent) beauty=Een voortreffelyke schoonheid

Topics: memory, value, appearance, nature

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Corin
CONTEXT:
CORIN
And how like you this shepherd’s life, Master
Touchstone?
TOUCHSTONE
Truly, shepherd, in respect of itself, it is a good
life; but in respect that it is a shepherd’s life, it is
naught. In respect that it is solitary, I like it very
well; but in respect that it is private, it is a very
vile life. Now in respect it is in the fields, it
pleaseth me well; but in respect it is not in the court,
it is tedious. As it is a spare life, look you, it fits
my humor well; but as there is no more plenty in it, it
goes much against my stomach. Hast any philosophy in
thee, shepherd?
CORIN
No more but that I know the more one sickens, the worse
at ease he is, and that he that wants money, means, and
content is without three good friends; that the
property of rain is to wet, and fire to burn; that good
pasture makes fat sheep; and that a great cause of the
night is lack of the sun; that he that hath learned no
wit by nature nor art may complain of good breeding or
comes of a very dull kindred.

DUTCH:
Niet meer, dan dat ik weet, dat iemand, hoe zieker hij is, zich minder pleizierig voelt; en dat wie geen geld, geen goed en geen tevredenheid heeft, drie goede vrienden minder heeft.

MORE:
Naught=Worthless
Solitary=Contemplative
Private=Deprived of company, lonely
Vile=Base, bad, abject (contemptuous)
Spare=Frugal
Stomach=Inclination (appetite)
No more but=Only
Property=Innate character
Wit=Understanding
Compleat:
Naught=Ondeugend (deugt niet); niet
Solitary=Eenig, heimelyk, afzonderlyk. Eenzaam, stil.
Private=Afgezonderd, geheim, byzonder, gemeen, ampteloos
Vile=Slecht, gering, verachtelyk, eerloos
Spare=Dun, mager
Stomach=Trek (appetite); hart (spirit)
Property=Eigenschap, natuurlyke hoedaanigheid
Wit (understanding)=Vinding, schranderheid, verstand

Topics: order/society, intellect, money, poverty and wealth, nature, understanding

PLAY: The Tempest
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Ariel
CONTEXT:
PROSPERO
My brave spirit!
Who was so firm, so constant, that this coil
Would not infect his reason?
ARIEL
Not a soul
But felt a fever of the mad and played
Some tricks of desperation. All but mariners
Plunged in the foaming brine and quit the vessel,
Then all afire with me. The king’s son, Ferdinand,
With hair up-staring – then like reeds, not hair –
Was the first man that leaped; cried “Hell is empty
And all the devils are here.”

DUTCH:
Vóór de and’ren
Sprong Ferdinand, des konings zoon, wien ‘t haar, —
Het scheen eer riet, — te berge stond; hij riep:
„De hel is ledig, alle duivels hier !”

MORE:
Schmidt:
Coil=Confusion, turmoil
Up-staring=Standing on end
Compleat:
Coil=Geraas, getier

Topics: courage, madness, nature, good and bad

PLAY: Titus Andronicus
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER: Tamora
CONTEXT:
TAMORA
Have I not reason, think you, to look pale?
These two have ‘ticed me hither to this place:
A barren detested vale, you see it is;
The trees, though summer, yet forlorn and lean,
O’ercome with moss and baleful mistletoe:
Here never shines the sun; here nothing breeds,
Unless the nightly owl or fatal raven:
And when they showed me this abhorred pit,
They told me, here, at dead time of the night,
A thousand fiends, a thousand hissing snakes,
Ten thousand swelling toads, as many urchins,
Would make such fearful and confused cries
As any mortal body hearing it
Should straight fall mad, or else die suddenly.
No sooner had they told this hellish tale,
But straight they told me they would bind me here
Unto the body of a dismal yew,
And leave me to this miserable death:
And then they called me foul adulteress,
Lascivious Goth, and all the bitterest terms
That ever ear did hear to such effect:
And, had you not by wondrous fortune come,
This vengeance on me had they executed.
Revenge it, as you love your mother’s life,
Or be ye not henceforth called my children.

DUTCH:
Nooit schijnt de zon hier en geen vogel broedt er,
Dan dagschuwe uilen en onzaal’ge raven.

MORE:
Ticed=Enticed
Baleful=Pernicious
Fatal=Ominous
Urchin=Hedgehog
Straight=Immediately
Compleat:
To intice or entice=Verlokken, bekooren
Baleful=Droevig
Fatal=Noodlottig, noodschikkelyk, verderflyk, doodelyk
Urchin=Een egel
Straightway=Eenswegs, terstond, opstaandevoet

Topics: nature, death, betrayal, revenge

PLAY: Timon of Athens
ACT/SCENE: 4.3
SPEAKER: Apemantus
CONTEXT:
APEMANTUS
This is in thee a nature but infected;
A poor unmanly melancholy sprung
From change of fortune. Why this spade? this place?
This slave-like habit? and these looks of care?
Thy flatterers yet wear silk, drink wine, lie soft;
Hug their diseased perfumes, and have forgot
That ever Timon was. Shame not these woods,
By putting on the cunning of a carper.
Be thou a flatterer now, and seek to thrive
By that which has undone thee: hinge thy knee,
And let his very breath, whom thou’lt observe,
Blow off thy cap; praise his most vicious strain,
And call it excellent: thou wast told thus;
Thou gavest thine ears like tapsters that bid welcome
To knaves and all approachers: ’tis most just
That thou turn rascal; hadst thou wealth again,
Rascals should have ‘t. Do not assume my likeness.

DUTCH:
Neen, wordt nu zelf een vleier, tracht te stijgen
Door dat, wat uw verderf was; knik uw knieën,
En laat den ademtocht van wien gij huldigt,
Uw muts afblazen; roem zijn schandlijkste ondeugd
En noem die prachtig.

MORE:
Infected=Corrupted
Cunning=Shrewdness
Carper=Cynic, complainer, censurer
Hinge=Bend
Observe=Follow, flatter
Strain=Characteristic
Tapsters=Barkeepers
Rascal=Rogue
Compleat:
Infected=Besmet; Infected with a false opinion=Door een valsch gevoelen vergiftigd
Cunning=Behendigheid, Schranderheid, Naarstigheid
A cunning fellow=Een doortrapte vent, een looze gast
Carper=Een pluizer, muggezifter
To observe=Waarneemen, gadeslaan, onderhouden, aanmerken, opmerken
Strain=Trant
Tapster=Een tapper, biertapper
Rascal=Een schelm, guit, schobbejak, schurk,vlegel, schavuit

Topics: nature, emotion and mood, fate/destiny, flattery

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: Belarius
CONTEXT:
(…) How hard it is to hide the sparks of nature!
These boys know little they are sons to the king;
Nor Cymbeline dreams that they are alive.
They think they are mine; and though train’d
up thus meanly
I’ the cave wherein they bow, their thoughts do hit
The roofs of palaces, and nature prompts them
In simple and low things to prince it much
Beyond the trick of others. This Polydore,
The heir of Cymbeline and Britain, who
The king his father call’d Guiderius,— Jove!
When on my three-foot stool I sit and tell
The warlike feats I have done, his spirits fly out
Into my story: say ‘Thus, mine enemy fell,
And thus I set my foot on ‘s neck;’ even then
The princely blood flows in his cheek, he sweats,
Strains his young nerves and puts himself in posture
That acts my words. The younger brother, Cadwal,
Once Arviragus, in as like a figure,
Strikes life into my speech and shows much more
His own conceiving.— Hark, the game is roused!
O Cymbeline! heaven and my conscience knows
Thou didst unjustly banish me: whereon,
At three and two years old, I stole these babes;
Thinking to bar thee of succession, as
Thou reft’st me of my lands. Euriphile,
Thou wast their nurse; they took thee for their mother,
And every day do honour to her grave:
Myself, Belarius, that am Morgan call’d,
They take for natural father. The game is up.

DUTCH:
Hoe zwaar is ‘t, spranken der natuur te dooven!
Zij gissen niet, dat zij des konings zonen,

MORE:
Know little=Have no idea
Meanly=Humbly
Prince it=Act like a prince
Trick=Skill
Shows=Reveals
Conceiving=Thoughts
Compleat:
Meanly=Op een gierige, slechte wyze
Trick=Een looze trek, greep, gril

Topics: nature, learning/education, intellect

PLAY: The Merchant of Venice
ACT/SCENE: 5.1
SPEAKER: Portia
CONTEXT:
PORTIA
The crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark
When neither is attended, and I think
The nightingale, if she should sing by day
When every goose is cackling, would be thought
No better a musician than the wren.
How many things by season seasoned are
To their right praise and true perfection!
Peace! How the moon sleeps with Endymion
And would not be awaked.
LORENZO
That is the voice,
Or I am much deceived, of Portia.
PORTIA
He knows me as the blind man knows the cuckoo—
By the bad voice.

DUTCH:
Hoe menig ding wordt op zijn tijd alleen, naar waarde en naar volkomenheid geschat!

MORE:
Proverb: A bird is known by its note and a man by his talk
Endymion=a youth loved by the goddess of the moon.
To season=To temper, qualify
Samuel Johnson:
To season=To fit for any use by time or habit; to mature; to grow fit for any purpose.
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

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Celia
CONTEXT:
ROSALIND
Indeed, there is Fortune too hard for Nature, when
Fortune makes Nature’s natural the cutter-off of
Nature’s wit.
CELIA
Peradventure this is not Fortune’s work neither, but
Nature’s, who perceiveth our natural wits too dull to
reason of such goddesses, and hath sent this natural for
our whetstone, for always the dullness of the fool is
the whetstone of the wits. How now, wit, whither wander
you?
TOUCHSTONE
Mistress, you must come away to your father.
CELIA
Were you made the messenger?
TOUCHSTONE
No, by mine honor, but I was bid to come for you.

DUTCH:
Zeg eens, Wijsheid, waarheen zijt gij op den loop?

MORE:
Peradventure=Perhaps
Reason=Debate, speak of
Natural=Idiot (name for fools and clowns)
Dullness=Stupidity, bluntness
Wit, whither wander you=Saying use for those who talk without thinking
Compleat:
Peradventure=Bygeval, misschien
To whet a knife=een Mes wetten (of slypen)
Whet-stone=een Wetsteen, Slypsteen
Whetted=Gewet, gesleepen, scherp gemaakt
A natural fool=Een geboren gek
Dullness=Botheyd, stompheyd, domheyd, loomheyd, dofheyd, vadsigheyd

Topics: fate/destiny, intellect, nature

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 2.7
SPEAKER: Jaques
CONTEXT:
JAQUES
A fool, a fool, I met a fool i’ th’ forest,
A motley fool. A miserable world!
As I do live by food, I met a fool,
Who laid him down and basked him in the sun
And railed on Lady Fortune in good terms,
In good set terms, and yet a motley fool.
“Good morrow, fool,” quoth I. “No, sir,” quoth he,
“Call me not ‘fool’ till heaven hath sent me fortune.”
And then he drew a dial from his poke
And, looking on it with lackluster eye,
Says very wisely, “It is ten o’clock.
Thus we may see,” quoth he, “how the world wags.
‘Tis but an hour ago since it was nine,
And after one hour more ’twill be eleven.
And so from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,
And then from hour to hour we rot and rot,
And thereby hangs a tale.” When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer
That fools should be so deep-contemplative,
And I did laugh sans intermission
An hour by his dial. O noble fool!
A worthy fool! Motley’s the only wear.

DUTCH:
Toen die nar
Zoo tijdsbespiegelingen hield, begonnen
Mijn longen luid te kraaien als een haan,
Dat narren soms zoo diepe denkers zijn;
En ‘k lachte, lachte, lachte, op ‘t uurwerk af,
Wel ruim een uur.

MORE:
Proverb: Thereby hangs (lies) a tale
Proverb: Fortune favours fools

Motley=Multicoloured jester outfit
Set=Composed
Rail=To use reproachful language, to scold in opprobrious terms
Poke=Pouch or pocket
Lacklustre=Lacking radiance, gloss or brightness (Latin lustrare).
Dial=(Fob)watch
Poke=Pouch, pocket
Moral=Moralise
Deep=Profoundly
Chanticleer=Rooster
Compleat:
Motley=Een grove gemengelde
To rail=Schelden
To wag (to move or stir)=Schudden, beweegen
Poke=Zak
Lustre=Luyster
Dial=Wysplaat
To moralize=Een zedelyke uitlegging of toepassing op iets maaken
Deep=Diepzinnig

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, blame, nature, time

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Hermia
CONTEXT:
HELENA
Call you me “fair?” That “fair” again unsay.
Demetrius loves your fair. O happy fair!
Your eyes are lodestars, and your tongue’s sweet air
More tunable than lark to shepherd’s ear
When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear.
Sickness is catching. Oh, were favour so,
Yours would I catch, fair Hermia, ere I go.
My ear should catch your voice. My eye, your eye.
My tongue should catch your tongue’s sweet melody.
Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated,
The rest I’d give to be to you translated.
O, teach me how you look and with what art
You sway the motion of Demetrius’ heart.
HERMIA
I frown upon him, yet he loves me still.
HELENA
Oh, that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill!

DUTCH:
Ik frons het voorhoofd, toch zoekt hij mijn gunst.

MORE:
Fair=Beautiful
Happy=Lucky to be
Lodestar=Guiding star
Air=Melody
Tuneable=Musical
Favour=Good looks
Bated=Excepted
Translated=Transformed
Motion=Affection
Compleat:
Fair=Schoon, braaf, fraai, oprecht
Happy=Gelukkig, gelukzalig
Loadstar=Noordstar
Air of musick=Een deuntje
Tunable=Welluydend, dat een goeden toon heeft
Bate=Verminderen, afkorten, afslaan
To translate=Overzetten, vertaalen, overvoeren, verplaatsen

Burgersdijk notes:
Leidster is de poolster, die den stuurman zijn weg doet vinden.

Topics: fate/destiny, appearance, nature

PLAY: Coriolanus
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Volumnia
CONTEXT:
VOLUMNIA
You might have been enough the man you are,
With striving less to be so; lesser had been
The thwartings of your dispositions, if
You had not show’d them how ye were disposed
Ere they lack’d power to cross you.
CORIOLANUS
Let them hang.
A PATRICIAN
Ay, and burn too.
MENENIUS
Come, come, you have been too rough, something too rough;
You must return and mend it.
FIRST SENATOR
There’s no remedy;
Unless, by not so doing, our good city
Cleave in the midst, and perish.
VOLUMNIA
Pray, be counsell’d:
I have a heart as little apt as yours,
But yet a brain that leads my use of anger
To better vantage.

DUTCH:
Ik heb een hart, zoo min gedwee als ‘t uwe,
Maar ook een brein, dat, hoe mijn toorn ook zied’,
Zelfs dit ten beste stuurt.

MORE:
Thwartings=Demands imposed by
Cross=Oppose
Compleat:
Thwarting=Dwarsdryving, dwarsdryvende
To cross=Tegenstreeven, dwars voor de boeg komen, dwarsboomen, wederestreeven, kruisen

Topics: nature, work, respect, dignity

PLAY: Hamlet
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Hamlet
CONTEXT:
O, there be players that I have seen play and heard others praise (and that highly), not to speak it profanely, that, neither having th’ accent of Christians nor the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of nature’s journeymen had made men and not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably.

DUTCH:
Dat de gedachte bij mij opkwam enkele losse werklui, bij natuur in dienst, hadden menschen gemaakt en hadden ze niet goed gemaakt /
Dat ik wel denken moest of hier soms een van natuurs daglooners menschen had gemaakt en niet goed gemaakt, zoo afgrijselijk bootsten zij de menschheid na.

MORE:
Schmidt:
To strut=To walk with a proud gait or affected dignity
Journeymen= unskilled workers
Gait=manner
Compleat:
To strut out=Opgeblaazen zyn, ‘t hoofd om hoog en den buik uitsteeken
Struttingly=Verwaandelyk, hoogmoediglyk

Topics: nature, appearance, insult, intellect

PLAY: Twelfth Night
ACT/SCENE: 1.4
SPEAKER: Orsino
CONTEXT:
ORSINO
Dear lad, believe it.
For they shall yet belie thy happy years
That say thou art a man. Diana’s lip
Is not more smooth and rubious. Thy small pipe
Is as the maiden’s organ, shrill and sound,
And all is semblative a woman’s part.
I know thy constellation is right apt
For this affair.
Some four or five attend him.
All, if you will, for I myself am best
When least in company. Prosper well in this,
And thou shalt live as freely as thy lord,
To call his fortunes thine.

DUTCH:
Hoe min gewoel hoe liever; ‘t allerbest
Is de eenzaamheid. — Heb voorspoed op uw tocht,
En noem dan, vrij gelijk uw vorst, al ‘t zijne
Het uwe.

MORE:
Proverb: Never less alone than when alone
Proverb: He is never alone who is accompanied by noble thoughts

Belie=Misrepresent
Pipe=Voice
Semblative=Like
Constellation=Character, talent
Freely=Independently
Compleat:
Belie (bely)=Beliegen
Constellation=Gesternte, ‘t zamensterring, Hemelteken
Freely=Vryelyk

Topics: proverbs and idioms, imagination, independence, appearance, nature

PLAY: King Henry V
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: King Henry
CONTEXT:
KING HENRY
Even as men wracked upon a sand, that look to be washed off the next tide.
BATES
He hath not told his thought to the king?
KING HENRY
No. Nor it is not meet he should, for, though I speak it to you, I think the king is but a man as I am. The violet smells to him as it doth to me. The element shows to him as it doth to me. All his senses have but human conditions. His ceremonies laid by, in his nakedness he appears but a man, and though his affections are higher mounted than ours, yet when they stoop, they stoop with the like wing. Therefore, when he sees reason of fears as we do, his fears, out of doubt, be of the same relish as ours are. Yet, in reason, no man should possess him with any appearance of fear, lest he, by showing it, should dishearten his army.

DUTCH:
Want, al zeg ik dit tot u, ik geloof, dat de koning maar een mensch is zooals ik ben. Het viooltjen ruikt voor hem evenals voor mij

MORE:
Wracked=Wrecked
The element=The sky (Latin clementum ignis as a name for the starry sphere – or with a mixture of the sense of ‘air’)
Meet=Appropriate

Compleat:
Wrack (or shipwrack)=Schipbreuk
Affections=Emotions, feelings
Stoop=Another allusion to falconry. The hawk soars (mounts) and then descends (stoops)
To go to wrack=Verlooren gaan, te gronde gaan
Wrack ( the part of the ship that is perished and cast a shoar, belonging to the King)=Wrak van een verongelukt Schip
Wracked=Aan stukken gestooten, te gronde gegaan
Meet=Dienstig

Topics: nature, order/society, life

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 4.2
SPEAKER: Oliver
CONTEXT:
OLIVER
Good morrow, fair ones. Pray you, if you know,
Where in the purlieus of this forest stands
A sheepcote fenced about with olive trees?
CELIA
West of this place, down in the neighbour bottom,
The rank of osiers by the murmuring stream
Left on your right hand brings you to the place.
But at this hour the house doth keep itself.
There’s none within.
OLIVER
If that an eye may profit by a tongue,
Then should I know you by description.
Such garments, and such years. “The boy is fair,
Of female favour, and bestows himself
Like a ripe sister; the woman low
And browner than her brother.” Are not you
The owner of the house I did inquire for?

DUTCH:
Kan ooit een oog iets leeren van een tong,
Dan moet ik uit beschrijving u herkennen.

MORE:
Purlieus=Surroundings
Neighbour bottom=Adjacent valley
Osiers=Willows
Profit=Gain, benefit
Bestows=Behaves
Ripe=Mature, elder
Low=Shorter
Compleat:
Purlieus=(Purley, purlue) Zeker stukken gronds van de oude bosschen afgescheiden, op welken den Eigenaar mag jaagen en Herten of Reëen schieten
Osier=Een teen, tien, rysje, wisch
Profit=Voordeel, gewin, nut, profyt, winst, baat
To bestow=Besteeden, te koste hangen
Ripe=Ryp

Topics: nature, appearance, discovery

PLAY: The Merchant of Venice
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Shylock
CONTEXT:
SHYLOCK
To bait fish withal. If it will feed nothing else, it
will feed my revenge. He hath disgraced me and hindered
me half a million, laughed at my losses, mocked at my
gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled
my friends, heated mine enemies—and what’s his reason? I
am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands,
organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed
with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject
to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed
and cooled by the same winter and summer as a Christian
is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us,
do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if
you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you
in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew
wrong a Christian, what is his humility? Revenge. If a
Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by
Christian example? Why, revenge. The villainy you teach
me I will execute—and it shall go hard but I will better
the instruction.

DUTCH:
Als gij ons een messteek geeft, bloeden wij dan
niet? als gij ons vergiftigt, sterven wij dan niet? en als
gij ons beleedigt, zullen wij dan geen wraak nemen?

MORE:
If you prick us with a pin, don’t we bleed? If you tickle us, don’t we laugh? If you poison us, don’t we die? And if you treat us badly, won’t we try to get revenge? If we’re like you in everything else, we’ll resemble you in that respect

CITED IN EWCA LAW:
In a direct quotation or “borrowed eloquence” psychiatric injury also prompted Lady Justice Hale in Sutherland v Hatton and other appeals [2002] EWCA Civ 76 at [23] to differentiate it from physical harm saying: “Because of the very nature of psychiatric disorder … it is bound to be harder to foresee than is physical injury. Shylock could not say of a mental disorder, ‘If you prick us, do we not bleed?’” (https://www.counselmagazine.co.uk/articles/quote-or-not-quote-…)
CITED IN US LAW:
National Life Ins., Co. v. Phillips Publ., Inc., 793 F. Supp. 627 (1992) – in reference to commercial interests: “A corporation’s reputation interest is primarily commercial. To paraphrase Shylock, ‘If you prick them they do not bleed.’ Nor do corporations have the same intense interest in dignity that so defines society’s interest in protecting private individual plaintiffs.”

Hindered me=Lost me, cost me
Bargain=Deal, contract
Thwart=Frustrate, interfere with
Cooled my friends=Turned my friends against me
Compleat:
To hinder=Beletten, weerhouden, verhinderen
Bargain=Een verding, verdrag, koop
Thwart=Dwarsdryven, draaiboomen, beleetten
To wrong=Verongelyken, verkoten
He wrongs me=Hy verongelykt my. I was very much wronged=Ik wierd zeer veerongelykt.
To revenge=Wreeken. To revenge an affront=Een belédiging wreeken.

Topics: emotion and mood, misquoted

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Oberon
CONTEXT:
OBERON
That very time I saw (but thou couldst not)
Flying between the cold moon and the Earth,
Cupid all armed. A certain aim he took
At a fair vestal thronèd by the west,
And loosed his love shaft smartly from his bow
As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts.
But I might see young Cupid’s fiery shaft
Quenched in the chaste beams of the watery moon,
And the imperial votaress passèd on,
In maiden meditation, fancy-free.
Yet marked I where the bolt of Cupid fell.
It fell upon a little western flower,
Before milk-white, now purple with love’s wound.
And maidens call it “love-in-idleness.”
Fetch me that flower. The herb I showed thee once.
The juice of it on sleeping eyelids laid
Will make or man or woman madly dote
Upon the next live creature that it sees.
Fetch me this herb, and be thou here again
Ere the leviathan can swim a league.

DUTCH:
De hooge kluiz’naresse ging haar weg,
In maagdlijke overdenking, ongedeerd.

MORE:
Certain=Sure aim
Vestal=Virgin
Imperial=Majestic
Bolt=Arrow
Love-in-idleness=Pansy
Or man or woman=Either man or woman
Leviathan=Biblical sea monster
Compleat:
To take one’s aim well=Zynen slag wis neemen
Vestal=eene Vestaal, eertyds by de aaloude Romeynen een Nonne van de Godinne Vesta
Bolt=een Grendel, bout
He has shot his holt=Hy heeft zynen slag gedaan

Burgersdijk notes:
Op een Vestale. Onder de Vestale versta men eenvoudig de Maangodin, die zich in het westen, dat is naar den kant van Engeland toe, aan den heuvel vertoonde, niet Koningin Elizabeth, zooals men dikwijls gewild heeft. Het bloempjen, door Cupido’s pijl geraakt, „Liefde uit lediggang” heet in ‘t Engelsch Love-in-idleness; dit is een der volksnamen van het driekleurig viooltjen.

Topics: love, fate/destiny, nature

PLAY: King Henry IV Part 1
ACT/SCENE: 2.4
SPEAKER: Falstaff
CONTEXT:
Why, thou knowest I am as valiant as Hercules, but beware instinct. The lion will not touch the true Prince. Instinct is a great matter. I was now a coward on instinct.

DUTCH:
Instinct is een groote zaak; ik was lafaard uit instinct.

MORE:
Schmidt:
Beware=listen to, to take heed
Instinct=Natural impulse, knowledge not acquired by experience, but inborn

Topics: nature, courage

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 2.6
SPEAKER: Orlando
CONTEXT:
ADAM
Dear master, I can go no further. Oh, I die for food.
Here lie I down and measure out my grave. Farewell, kind master.
ORLANDO
Why, how now, Adam? No greater heart in thee? Live a
little, comfort a little, cheer thyself a little. If
this uncouth forest yield anything savage, I will either
be food for it or bring it for food to thee. Thy
conceit is nearer death than thy powers. For my sake, be
comfortable. Hold death awhile at the arm’s end. I will
here be with thee presently, and if I bring thee not
something to eat, I will give thee leave to die. But if
thou diest before I come, thou art a mocker of my labour.
Well said. Thou look’st cheerly, and I’ll be with thee
quickly. Yet thou liest in the bleak air. Come, I will
bear thee to some shelter, and thou shalt not die for
lack of a dinner if there live anything in this desert.
Cheerly, good Adam.

DUTCH:
Komaan, Adam, hoe is het? hebt gij niet meer hart
in ‘t lijf? Leef nog wat, verman u wat, vervroolijk u
wat! Als dit woeste woud iets wilds voortbrengt, zal
ik er spijs voor zijn, of het u als spijze brengen.

MORE:
Conceit=Conception, idea, image in the mind
Power=Vital organ, physical or intellectual function
Comfortable=Comforted
Well said=Well done
Cheerly=Cheerful
Anything savage=Game
Compleat:
Conceit=Waan, bevatting, opvatting, meening
Power (ability or force)=Vermogen, kracht
Comfortable=Vertroostelyk, troostelyk
Cheerful (chearfull)=Blymoedig, blygeestig
Savage=Wild

Topics: life, wellbeing, imagination, nature, proverbs and idioms

PLAY: All’s Well that Ends Well
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Countess
CONTEXT:
COUNTESS
If the living be enemy to the grief, the excess
makes it soon mortal.
BERTRAM
Madam, I desire your holy wishes.
LAFEW
How understand we that?
COUNTESS
Be thou blest, Bertram; and succeed thy father
In manners, as in shape! Thy blood and virtue
Contend for empire in thee; and thy goodness
Share with thy birthright ! Love all, trust a few,
Do wrong to none: be able for thine enemy
Rather in power than use, and keep thy friend
Under thy own life’s key: be checked for silence.
But never taxed for speech. What heaven more will
That thee may furnish, and my prayers pluck down,
Fall on thy head! Farewell, my lord;
‘Tis an unseasoned courtier; good my lord,
Advise him.

DUTCH:
Heb allen lief; schenk wein’gen uw vertrouwen;
Doe niemand onrecht; houd uw vijand eer
Door macht dan door haar uiting in bedwang;
Hoed als uw eigen leven dat uws vriends;
Dat men uw zwijgen, nooit uw spreken gispe!

MORE:
Proverb: Blood is inherited but Virtue is achieved
Proverb: Have but few friends though much acquaintance
Proverb: Keep under lock and key
Proverb: Keep well thy friends when thou has gotten them

Mortal=Fatal
Able=Have power to daunt (Be able for thine enemy)
Manners=Conduct
Blood=Inherited nature
Contend=Compete
Empire=Dominance
Rather than in power than in use=By having the power to act rather than acting
Checked=Rebuked
Taxed=Blamed
Furnish=Supply
Compleat:
Able=Sterk, robust
Manners=Zeden, manieren, manierlykheid
Check=Berispen, beteugelen, intoomen, verwyten
To tax (to blame)=Mispryzen, berispen
To furnish=Verschaffen, voorzien, verzorgen, stoffeeren, toetakelen

Topics: caution, trust, proverbs and idioms, still in use, nature

PLAY: Titus Andronicus
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Titus Andronicus
CONTEXT:
TITUS ANDRONICUS
Peace, tender sapling; thou art made of tears,
And tears will quickly melt thy life away.
What dost thou strike at, Marcus, with thy knife?
MARCUS ANDRONICUS
At that that I have killed, my lord; a fly.
TITUS ANDRONICUS
Out on thee, murderer! thou kill’st my heart;
Mine eyes are cloyed with view of tyranny:
A deed of death done on the innocent
Becomes not Titus’ brother: get thee gone:
I see thou art not for my company.
MARCUS ANDRONICUS
Alas, my lord, I have but killed a fly.
TITUS ANDRONICUS
But how, if that fly had a father and mother?
How would he hang his slender gilded wings,
And buzz lamenting doings in the air!
Poor harmless fly, That, with his pretty buzzing melody, Came here to make us merry! and thou hast killed him.

DUTCH:
Foei, schaam u, moord’naar! mij doodt gij het hart.
Mijn oogen zijn verzaad van ‘t zien van gruw’len

MORE:
Cloyed=Satiated
View=Perception
Becomes not=Is not becoming for
But=Only
Compleat:
To cloy=Verkroppen, overlaaden
To view=Beschouwen, bezien
Become=Betaamen
But=Maar, of, dan, behalven, maar alleen

Topics: life, regret, nature, error, guilt

PLAY: The Merchant of Venice
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Solanio
CONTEXT:
SOLANIO
Not in love neither? Then let us say you are sad
Because you are not merry— and ’twere as easy
For you to laugh and leap and say you are merry
Because you are not sad. Now, by two-headed Janus,
Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time.
Some that will evermore peep through their eyes
And laugh like parrots at a bagpiper,
And other of such vinegar aspect
That they’ll not show their teeth in way of smile
Though Nestor swear the jest be laughable.

DUTCH:
Natuur brengt soms toch rare snuiters voort:
Die knijpt voortdurend de oogen toe van ‘t lachen,
Als bij een doedelzak een papegaai;
En de ander heeft zoo’n uitzicht van azijn,
Dat hij van ‘t lachen nooit zijn tanden toont,
Al deed een grap ook de’ ouden Nestor schaat’ren.

MORE:
Laugh like parrots at a bagpiper=parrots were thought of as foolish, bagpipe music as melancholy.
Vinegar aspect=sour (‘sowr’) disposition.
Janus=A Roman God with two faces, one at the front and one at the back of his head (although not thought to have expressed contrasting moods). Janus was the god of beginnings duality, gates and doors, passages and endings.
Nestor, legendary wise King of Pylos in Homer’s Odyssey.
Compleat:
To sowr=Zuur worden, zuur maaken, verzuuren.
Sowred=Gezuurd, verzuurd. Sowrish=Zuurachtig.
To look sowrly upon one=Iemand zuur aanzien

Topics: emotion and mood, misquoted

PLAY: Antony and Cleopatra
ACT/SCENE: 5.2
SPEAKER: Cleopatra
CONTEXT:
CLEOPATRA
Think you there was or might be such a man
As this I dreamt of?
DOLABELLA
Gentle madam, no.
CLEOPATRA
You lie up to the hearing of the gods.
But if there be nor ever were one such,
It’s past the size of dreaming. Nature wants stuff
To vie strange forms with fancy, yet t’ imagine
An Antony were nature’s piece ’gainst fancy,
Condemning shadows quite.
DOLABELLA
Hear me, good madam.
Your loss is as yourself, great, and you bear it
As answering to the weight. Would I might never
O’ertake pursued success, but I do feel,
By the rebound of yours, a grief that smites
My very heart at root.

DUTCH:
Gij liegt, uw leugen schreit ten hemel. Maar
Leeft of leefde ooit een man als deze, droomen
Kan hem niet denken. Moog’ natuur vaak stof
Tot overvleug’ling der verbeelding missen,
Dacht ze een Antonius, fantasie moet wijken;
Niets zijn haar schimmen.

MORE:
Up to the hearing of the gods=Blatantly, that even the gods hear
Size of=Capacity of (dreams)
Wants=Lacks
Vie=Compete
Fancy=Fantasy
Overtake pursued success=Achieve desired success
Rebound=Reflection
Compleat:
Want=Gebrek
To vie=Om stryd speelen, yveren
Fancy=Inbeelding, verbeelding, neyging

Topics: imagination, achievement, nature

PLAY: Timon of Athens
ACT/SCENE: 1.1
SPEAKER: Poet
CONTEXT:
POET
Admirable: how this grace
Speaks his own standing! what a mental power
This eye shoots forth! how big imagination
Moves in this lip! to the dumbness of the gesture
One might interpret.
PAINTER
It is a pretty mocking of the life.
Here is a touch; is’t good?
POET
I will say of it,
It tutors nature: artificial strife
Lives in these touches, livelier than life.
PAINTER
How this lord is follow’d!
POET
The senators of Athens: happy man!
PAINTER
Look, more!
POET
You see this confluence, this great flood of visitors.
I have, in this rough work, shaped out a man,
Whom this beneath world doth embrace and hug
With amplest entertainment: my free drift
Halts not particularly, but moves itself
In a wide sea of wax: no levelled malice
Infects one comma in the course I hold;
But flies an eagle flight, bold and forth on,
Leaving no tract behind.

DUTCH:
Geen fijne boosheid
Vergiftigt éene comma van mijn voortgang;
Die vliegt eens aad’laars vlucht, koen, recht vooruit,
En laat geen spoor zelfs achter.

MORE:
Confluence=Gathering
Rough work=Draft
Beneath world=Earthly world
Amplest=Lavish
Entertainment=Welcome
Free drift=Inspiration, spontaneous thought
Levelled=Targeted
Infect=Affect
Tract=Trail
Compleat:
Confluence=Saamenvloeijing, t’saamenloop, toevloed
A rough draught=Een ruuw ontwerp
Ample=Wydlustig, breed
Drift=Oogmerk, opzet, vaart
Entertainment=Onthaal
Levelled at=Na gemikt, na gedoeld; levelling at=Een mikking, doeling

Burgersdijk notes:
Eeen zee van was. De hoogdravende dichter zinspeelt op schrijftafeltjes, die met was overtogen waren.

Topics: nature, life, imagination

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 1.6
SPEAKER: Iachimo
CONTEXT:
IMOGEN
‘He is one of the noblest note, to whose
kindnesses I am most infinitely tied. Reflect upon
him accordingly, as you value your trust—
Leonatus.’
So far I read aloud:
But even the very middle of my heart
Is warm’d by the rest, and takes it thankfully.
You are as welcome, worthy sir, as I
Have words to bid you, and shall find it so
In all that I can do.
IACHIMO
Thanks, fairest lady.
What, are men mad? Hath nature given them eyes
To see this vaulted arch, and the rich crop
Of sea and land, which can distinguish ‘twixt
The fiery orbs above and the twinn’d stones
Upon the number’d beach? and can we not
Partition make with spectacles so precious
‘Twixt fair and foul?
IMOGEN
What makes your admiration?
IACHIMO
It cannot be i’ the eye, for apes and monkeys
‘Twixt two such shes would chatter this way and
Contemn with mows the other; nor i’ the judgment,
For idiots in this case of favour would
Be wisely definite; nor i’ the appetite;
Sluttery to such neat excellence opposed
Should make desire vomit emptiness,
Not so allured to feed.

DUTCH:
t Ligt niet aan ‘t oog: toon aap of baviaan
Twee zulke vrouwen; hierheen zal hij lachen,
Naar de and’re grijnzend schreeuwen; niet aan ‘t oordeel:
Een idioot zou bij deez’ schoonheidskeur
Scherpzinnig zijn en wijs;

MORE:
Reflect=Consider
Orbs=Stars
Identical=Twinned
Unnumbered=Innumerable
Spectacles so precious=Eyes
Partition make=Draw distinction
Compleat:
To reflect=Overpeinzen, overwegen
Orb=Een kloot, rond, hemelkring
Partition=Een verdeeling, middelschot

Topics: reputation, trust, nature, intellect

PLAY: Troilus and Cressida
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Ulysses
CONTEXT:
ULYSSES
(…) O, when degree is shaked,
Which is the ladder to all high designs,
Then enterprise is sick! How could communities,
Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows! each thing meets
In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters
Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores
And make a sop of all this solid globe:
Strength should be lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead:
Force should be right; or rather, right and wrong,
Between whose endless jar justice resides,
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, an universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce an universal prey,
And last eat up himself. Great Agamemnon,
This chaos, when degree is suffocate,
Follows the choking.
And this neglection of degree it is
That by a pace goes backward, with a purpose
It hath to climb. The general’s disdained
By him one step below, he by the next,
That next by him beneath; so every step,
Exampled by the first pace that is sick
Of his superior, grows to an envious fever
Of pale and bloodless emulation:
And ’tis this fever that keeps Troy on foot,
Not her own sinews. To end a tale of length,
Troy in our weakness stands, not in her strength.

DUTCH:
O, is de rang geschokt,
Die ladder is naar elk verheven doel,
Dan kwijnt elke onderneming.

MORE:
Design=A work in hand, enterprise, cause
Degrees in schools=Academic standing
Brotherhoods=Guilds
Dividable=Dividing
Laurels=Emblem of exellence
Oppugnancy=Opposition
Sop=Lump of bread soaked in wine
Imbecility=Feebleness (not of mind)
Rude=Violent
Jar=Dispute, conflict
Includes itself in=Is subsumed by
Bloodless=Pallid
Emulation=Envy, jealousy
On foot=Upright
Compleat:
Design=Opzet, voorneemen, oogmerk, aanslag, toeleg, ontwerp
Brotherhood=Broederschap
Crowned with a laurel=Met laurier bekranst, gelaurierd
To oppugne=Bestryden, bevechten, tegenstreeven
Oppugnation=Bestryding, bevechting
A wine sop=Een wynsopje
Imbecility=Zwaklykheid, zwakheid
Rude=Ruuw, groof, onbehouwen, plomp, onbeschaafd
Jar=Krakkeelen, twisten, harrewarren, oneens zyn, kyven
Emulation=Haayver, volgzucht, afgunst

Topics: status, order/society, nature, respect, justice

PLAY: Troilus and Cressida
ACT/SCENE: 3.3
SPEAKER: Ulysses
CONTEXT:
ULYSSES
(…) For beauty, wit,
High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service,
Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all
To envious and calumniating time.
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,
That all with one consent praise new-born gawds,
Though they are made and moulded of things past,
And give to dust that is a little gilt
More laud than gilt o’er-dusted.
The present eye praises the present object.
Then marvel not, thou great and complete man,
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;
Since things in motion sooner catch the eye
Than what not stirs. The cry went once on thee,
And still it might, and yet it may again,
If thou wouldst not entomb thyself alive
And case thy reputation in thy tent;
Whose glorious deeds, but in these fields of late,
Made emulous missions ‘mongst the gods themselves
And drave great Mars to faction.

DUTCH:
Eén trek maakt heel de wereld saamverwant:
Eenstemmig prijst men nieuwgeboren pronk,
Ofschoon gemaakt, vervormd van oude zaken;
En heeft voor stof, met klatergoud bedekt,
Meer lof veil dan voor overstoven goud.

MORE:
Touch of nature=Natural trait
Gawds=Trivia
Laud=Praise
Overtop=Surpass
Emulous=Envying, rivalry
Faction=Taking sides
Compleat:
Gawd=Wisje-wasjes, beuzelingen
To laud=Looven, pryzen
Over-top=Te boven gaan, overschryden
Emulous=Naayverig, nydig
Faction=Samenrotting, saamenspanning, oproerige party, rot, aanhang, partyschap, verdeeldheid

Topics: nature, time, fashion/trends, vanity

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Lysander
CONTEXT:
HELENA
Do not say so, Lysander. Say not so.
What though he love your Hermia? Lord, what though?
Yet Hermia still loves you. Then be content.
LYSANDER
Content with Hermia? No. I do repent
The tedious minutes I with her have spent.
Not Hermia but Helena I love.
Who will not change a raven for a dove?
The will of man is by his reason swayed,
And reason says you are the worthier maid.
Things growing are not ripe until their season.
So I, being young, till now ripe not to reason.
And touching now the point of human skill,
Reason becomes the marshal to my will
And leads me to your eyes, where I o’erlook
Love’s stories written in love’s richest book.

DUTCH:
En heb ik ‘t oordeel nu van onderscheid,
Dan zij ‘t de rede, die mijn keus geleid’;
Die laat mij nu der liefde doen en wezen
In gouden lett’ren uit uw oogen lezen.,

MORE:
What though=What does it matter
Will=Desire
Ripe not=Don’t ripen
Point=Height (of human skill)
Marshal=Officer at arms; officer who established rank at ceremonies
O’erlook=Glance over, read; look over
Reason=Sense of judgement
Compleat:
Will=Wille
Marshal=een Marschalk

Burgersdijk notes:
In gouden lett’ren. Love’s stories, written in love’s richest book. Zooals hier Helena, wordt in Romeo en Julia Graaf Paris met een kostelijk boek vergeleken.

Topics: regret, love, rivalry, nature, reason

PLAY: Richard II
ACT/SCENE: 3.4
SPEAKER: Gardener
CONTEXT:
GARDENER
They are; and Bolingbroke
Hath seized the wasteful king. O, what pity is it
That he had not so trimm’d and dress’d his land
As we this garden! We at time of year
Do wound the bark, the skin of our fruit-trees,
Lest, being over-proud in sap and blood,
With too much riches it confound itself:
Had he done so to great and growing men,
They might have lived to bear and he to taste
Their fruits of duty: superfluous branches
We lop away, that bearing boughs may live:
Had he done so, himself had borne the crown,
Which waste of idle hours hath quite thrown down.

DUTCH:
Te gellé takken,
Die kappen wij, opdat de vruchttak leve;
Had hij zoo ook gedaan, hij droeg de kroon;
‘t Verlies is zijner tijdverspilling loon.

MORE:

At time of year=At appropriate times/seasons of the year
Confound=Spoil, destroy
Bear=Bear fruit
Waste of=Wasteful

Compleat:
Confound=Verwarren, verstooren, te schande maaken, verbysteren
To bear fruit=Vrucht draagen
To lop trees=Boomen snoeijen, kleine takjes afkappen

Topics: preparation, strength, nature

PLAY: Troilus and Cressida
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Ulysses
CONTEXT:
ULYSSES
(…) O, when degree is shaked,
Which is the ladder to all high designs,
Then enterprise is sick! How could communities,
Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows! each thing meets
In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters
Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores
And make a sop of all this solid globe:
Strength should be lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead:
Force should be right; or rather, right and wrong,
Between whose endless jar justice resides,
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, an universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce an universal prey,
And last eat up himself. Great Agamemnon,
This chaos, when degree is suffocate,
Follows the choking.
And this neglection of degree it is
That by a pace goes backward, with a purpose
It hath to climb. The general’s disdained
By him one step below, he by the next,
That next by him beneath; so every step,
Exampled by the first pace that is sick
Of his superior, grows to an envious fever
Of pale and bloodless emulation:
And ’tis this fever that keeps Troy on foot,
Not her own sinews. To end a tale of length,
Troy in our weakness stands, not in her strength.

DUTCH:
O neemt den rang slechts weg, ontspant die snaar,
En hoort, wat wanklank!

MORE:
Said to be one of President John Adams’ favourite quotes.

Observance=Respect to
Apply=Interpret
Reproof of chance=Reproach from events
Bauble=Insignificant
Boreas=North wind
Thetis=Sea goddess
Moist elements=Water and air
Perseus’ horse=Pegasus, the winged horse
Saucy=Impertinent
But even=Just
Toast=Piece of toast that was floated in wine
Knees=Knee timber, hard wood used for shipbuilding
Compleat:
Observance=Gedienstigheyd, eerbiedigheyd, opmerking, waarneeming
Apply=Toepassen
Reproof=Bestraffing, berisping
Bauble=Spulletje, grol
Saucy=Stout, onbeschaamd, baldaadig
The knees of a ship=De Knies of zystukken van een schip

Topics: status, order/society, nature, respect, justice

PLAY: Timon of Athens
ACT/SCENE: 4.3
SPEAKER: Timon
CONTEXT:
TIMON
That nature, being sick of man’s unkindness,
Should yet be hungry! Common mother, thou,
Whose womb unmeasurable, and infinite breast,
Teems, and feeds all; whose self-same mettle,
Whereof thy proud child, arrogant man, is puffed,
Engenders the black toad and adder blue,
The gilded newt and eyeless venomed worm,
With all the abhorred births below crisp heaven
Whereon Hyperion’s quickening fire doth shine;
Yield him, who all thy human sons doth hate,
From forth thy plenteous bosom, one poor root!
Ensear thy fertile and conceptious womb,
Let it no more bring out ingrateful man!
Go great with tigers, dragons, wolves, and bears;
Teem with new monsters, whom thy upward face
Hath to the marbled mansion all above
Never presented! —O, a root,—dear thanks!—
Dry up thy marrows, vines, and plough-torn leas;
Whereof ungrateful man, with liquorish draughts
And morsels unctuous, greases his pure mind,
That from it all consideration slips! (…)

DUTCH:
O, dat natuur, reeds ziek van ‘s menschen ondank,
Nog honger lijden moet!

MORE:
Mettle=Spirit
Puffed=Swollen, inflated
Hyperion=The sun
Ensear=Dry up
Upward face=Earth’s surface
Plough-torn leas=Ploughed fields
Liquorish=Sweet
Draughts=Drinks
Unctuous=Greasy
Compleat:
Full of mettle=Vol vuurs, moedig
Puffed up=Opgeblaazen, verwaand
Liquorish=Zoethout
Draught=Teig, dronk
Unctuous=Smeerig

Burgersdijk notes:
Reeds ziek van ‘s menschen ondank. De bedoeling is vooral: van ‘s menschen ondank walgend.

En ‘t blinde hazelwormpjen. In ‘t Engelsch: and eyeless venomed worm. De blindworm is bedoeld, waarvan ook in Macbeth als vergiftig dier gesproken wordt.

Topics: nature, pride

PLAY: Titus Andronicus
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER: Tamora
CONTEXT:
TAMORA
My lovely Aaron, wherefore look’st thou sad,
When every thing doth make a gleeful boast?
The birds chant melody on every bush,
The snake lies rolled in the cheerful sun,
The green leaves quiver with the cooling wind
And make a chequered shadow on the ground:
Under their sweet shade, Aaron, let us sit,
And, whilst the babbling echo mocks the hounds,
Replying shrilly to the well-tuned horns,
As if a double hunt were heard at once,
Let us sit down and mark their yelping noise;
And, after conflict such as was supposed
The wandering prince and Dido once enjoyed,
When with a happy storm they were surprised
And curtained with a counsel-keeping cave,
We may, each wreathed in the other’s arms,
Our pastimes done, possess a golden slumber;
Whiles hounds and horns and sweet melodious birds
Be unto us as is a nurse’s song
Of lullaby to bring her babe asleep

DUTCH:
Uit ied’re struik klinkt voog’lenmelodie;
De slang ligt in den zonn’schijn saâmgerold ;
De blaad’ren trillen in den koelen wind,
En teek’nen schaduwplekken op den grond.

MORE:
Boast=Display
Prince=Aeneas
Happy=Lucky
With=By
Compleat:
Boast=Geroem, gepoch
Supposed=Vermoed, ondersteld, gewaand

Topics: nature, wellbeing, love

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Helena
CONTEXT:
DEMETRIUS
I’ll run from thee and hide me in the brakes,
And leave thee to the mercy of wild beasts.
HELENA
The wildest hath not such a heart as you.
Run when you will, the story shall be changed.
Apollo flies and Daphne holds the chase.
The dove pursues the griffin. The mild hind
Makes speed to catch the tiger —bootless speed,
When cowardice pursues and valour flies.
DEMETRIUS
I will not stay thy questions. Let me go.
Or if thou follow me, do not believe
But I shall do thee mischief in the wood.

DUTCH:
Apollo vlucht en Daphne jaagt hem na;
De duif vervolgt den valk.

MORE:
Brakes=Thickets
The story=That Daphne was changed into a laurel tree to escape from Apollo
Hind=Doe
Bootless=Pointless
Compleat:
Brake=een Plaats daar Vaaren groeit
Hind=Hinde
Bootless=Te vergeefs, vruchteloos

Topics: nature, fashion/trends

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Celia
CONTEXT:
ROSALIND
Indeed, there is Fortune too hard for Nature, when
Fortune makes Nature’s natural the cutter-off of
Nature’s wit.
CELIA
Peradventure this is not Fortune’s work neither, but
Nature’s, who perceiveth our natural wits too dull to
reason of such goddesses, and hath sent this natural for
our whetstone, for always the dullness of the fool is
the whetstone of the wits. How now, wit, whither wander
you?
TOUCHSTONE
Mistress, you must come away to your father.
CELIA
Were you made the messenger?
TOUCHSTONE
No, by mine honor, but I was bid to come for you.

DUTCH:
Wie weet, misschien is ook dit niet het werk van Fortuin, maar van Natuur, die, bespeurende dat onze natuurlijke geest te bot is om over zulke godinnen te redeneeren, ons dezen botterik voor slijpsteen gezonden heeft; want steeds is de botheid van den nar de wetsteen der wijzen.

MORE:
Peradventure=Perhaps
Reason=Debate, speak of
Natural=Idiot (name for fools and clowns)
Dullness=Stupidity, bluntness
Wit, whither wander you=Saying use for those who talk without thinking
Compleat:
Peradventure=Bygeval, misschien
To whet a knife=een Mes wetten (of slypen)
Whet-stone=een Wetsteen, Slypsteen
Whetted=Gewet, gesleepen, scherp gemaakt
A natural fool=Een geboren gek
Dullness=Botheyd, stompheyd, domheyd, loomheyd, dofheyd, vadsigheyd

Topics: fate/destiny, intellect, nature

PLAY: Titus Andronicus
ACT/SCENE: 4.4
SPEAKER: Tamora
CONTEXT:
TAMORA
King, be thy thoughts imperious, like thy name.
Is the sun dimmed, that gnats do fly in it?
The eagle suffers little birds to sing,
And is not careful what they mean thereby,
Knowing that with the shadow of his wings
He can at pleasure stint their melody:
Even so mayst thou the giddy men of Rome.
Then cheer thy spirit: for know, thou emperor,
I will enchant the old Andronicus
With words more sweet, and yet more dangerous,
Than baits to fish, or honey-stalks to sheep,
When as the one is wounded with the bait,
The other rotted with delicious feed.

DUTCH:
Wees keizer, heer, in denken als in naam.
Taant ooit de zon, wijl muggen in haar dansen?
Zie, de aad’laar laat de kleine vogels zingen,
En wat zij er meê meenen, deert hem niet

MORE:
Careful=Worried
Stint=Stop
Giddy=Fickle
Honey-stalks=Clover
When as=When
Rotted=The rot (disease in sheep)
Compleat:
Carefull=Zorgvuldig, bezorgd, zorgdraagend, bekommerd
To stint=Bepaalen; bedwingen
Giddy=Duizelig.
Giddy-headed=Ylhoofdig, hersenloos, wervelziek
Rot=Een sterfte onder de schaapen door al te vochtig voedsel

Topics: nature, flattery, status

PLAY: Troilus and Cressida
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Ulysses
CONTEXT:
ULYSSES
Troy, yet upon his basis, had been down,
And the great Hector’s sword had lacked a master,
But for these instances.
The specialty of rule hath been neglected:
And, look, how many Grecian tents do stand
Hollow upon this plain, so many hollow factions.
When that the general is not like the hive
To whom the foragers shall all repair,
What honey is expected? Degree being vizarded,
The unworthiest shows as fairly in the mask.
The heavens themselves, the planets and this centre
Observe degree, priority and place,
Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,
Office and custom, in all line of order;
And therefore is the glorious planet Sol
In noble eminence enthroned and sphered
Amidst the other; whose medicinable eye
Corrects the ill aspects of planets evil,
And posts, like the commandment of a king,
Sans cheque to good and bad: but when the planets
In evil mixture to disorder wander,
What plagues and what portents! what mutiny!
What raging of the sea! shaking of earth!
Commotion in the winds! frights, changes, horrors,
Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
The unity and married calm of states
Quite from their fixture! (…)

DUTCH:
Als zich rang vermomt,
Schijnt hoog en laag door ‘t masker even hoog.
De hemel zelf, de sterren en dit centrum,
Slaan acht op rang en meerderheid en plaats
In stand, in loop, verhouding, jaartij, vorm,
In ambt, gewoonten, al wat orde heet;

MORE:
His basis=Its foundation
Down=Destroyed
Instances=Causes
Speciality=Obligations (mutual between ruler and subject)
Degree=Rank
Vizarded=Concealed, masked
Course=Trajectory
Proportion=Symmetry
Sphered=In its correct orbit
Medicinable=Curative
Ill aspects=Bad astrological influence; poorly appearance
Post=Hasten
Compleat:
Instance=Een voorval, voorbeeld, exempel; aandringing, aanhouding; blyk
Speciality=Een verbondschrift, of schuldbekentenis; als ook een al te gemeenzaame kennis
Degree=Een graad, trap
He did rise by degrees=Hy wierd trapswyze bevordert; The highest degree=De hoogste trap
Vizard=Een momaanzigt, mombakkus, masker
Course (way or means)=Wegen of middelen
Proportion=Evenredigheid, regelmaat
Sphere=Omloops-kring
That is out of his sphere=Dat is buiten zyne kreits
Aspect=Stargezigt; gezigt, gelaat, aanschouw
Post (expeditious way of travelling)=Post, een schielyke manier van reizen

Topics: law/legal, order/society, good and bad, nature

PLAY: The Merchant of Venice
ACT/SCENE: 5.1
SPEAKER: Lorenzo
CONTEXT:
LORENZO
The reason is your spirits are attentive.
For do but note a wild and wanton herd,
Or race of youthful and unhandled colts,
Fetching mad bounds, bellowing and neighing loud,
Which is the hot condition of their blood—
If they but hear perchance a trumpet sound,
Or any air of music touch their ears,
You shall perceive them make a mutual stand,
Their savage eyes turned to a modest gaze
By the sweet power of music.
Therefore the poet
Did feign that Orpheus drew trees, stones, and floods
Since naught so stockish, hard, and full of rage,
But music for the time doth change his nature.
The man that hath no music in himself,
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils.
The motions of his spirit are dull as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus.
Let no such man be trusted. Mark the music.

DUTCH:
Heeft iemand in zichzelve geen muziek; roert hem de meng’ling niet van zoete tonen; die man deugt tot verraad, tot list en roof.

MORE:
CITED IN US LAW:
In re Fraley, 189 Bankr. 398, 400 (1995). Court: “Moreover, should we not trust the debtors’ request to have music in his house? After all, ‘the man that hath no music in himself… let no such man be trusted.’”
People v. Ziegler, 29 Misc.2d 429, 436 (1961).

Feign=Imagine, invent
Stockish=Unfeeling
Erebus=place of darkness, hell
Affections=Natural disposition, mental tendency
Compleat:
Affection=Geneegenheid, toegeneegenheid, aandoening

Topics: emotion and mood, misquoted

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Helena
CONTEXT:
HELENA
Oh, I am out of breath in this fond chase.
The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace.
Happy is Hermia, wheresoe’er she lies,
For she hath blessèd and attractive eyes.
How came her eyes so bright? Not with salt tears.
If so, my eyes are oftener washed than hers.
No, no, I am as ugly as a bear,
For beasts that meet me run away for fear.
Therefore no marvel though Demetrius
Do, as a monster, fly my presence thus.
What wicked and dissembling glass of mine
Made me compare with Hermia’s sphery eyne?

DUTCH:
O ademloos maakt mij deze ijdle jacht!
Hoe meer ik smeek, hoe meer hij mij veracht.

MORE:
Fond=Foolish
Grace=Prayers answered
No marvel=No surprise
Eyne=Eyes
Compleat:
Fond=Toegeeflyk, involgend, mal
Grace of God=de Genade Gods
To grace=Vercieren, bevallig maaken
Graced=Begaafd
I marvel nothing at this=Ik verwonder my niet hierover

Topics: fate/destiny, appearance, nature

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Titania
CONTEXT:
TITANIA
These are the forgeries of jealousy.
And never, since the middle summer’s spring,
Met we on hill, in dale, forest, or mead,
By pavèd fountain, or by rushy brook,
Or in the beachèd margent of the sea,
To dance our ringlets to the whistling wind,
But with thy brawls thou hast disturbed our sport.
Therefore the winds, piping to us in vain,
As in revenge, have sucked up from the sea
Contagious fogs, which falling in the land
Have every pelting river made so proud
That they have overborne their continents.
The ox hath therefore stretched his yoke in vain,
The ploughman lost his sweat, and the green corn
Hath rotted ere his youth attained a beard.
The fold stands empty in the drownèd field,
And crows are fatted with the murrain flock.
The nine-men’s-morris is filled up with mud,
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green
For lack of tread are undistinguishable.
The human mortals want their winter here.
No night is now with hymn or carol blessed.
Therefore the moon, the governess of floods,
Pale in her anger, washes all the air,
That rheumatic diseases do abound.
And thorough this distemperature we see
The seasons alter: hoary-headed frosts
Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose,
And on old Hiems’ thin and icy crown
An odorous chaplet of sweet summer buds
Is, as in mockery, set. The spring, the summer,
The childing autumn, angry winter change
Their wonted liveries, and the mazèd world,
By their increase, now knows not which is which.
And this same progeny of evils comes
From our debate, from our dissension.
We are their parents and original

DUTCH:
(…) lente, zomer,
De gulle herfst, de stuursche winter ruilden
Van kleed; de wereld, gansch verbijsterd, kent
Hen, zelfs aan bloem en vrucht, niet uit elkaar;
En heel deez’ sleep van plagen komt alleen
Van onze oneenigheid, van onzen twist;
Wij hebben dien verwekt, dien voortgebracht.

MORE:
Forgeries=Lies
Rushy=Bordered with rushes
Ringlets=Dances
Brawls=Quarrels
Pelting=Paltry (or pelting)
Continent=Bank
Murrain=Diseased (murrain is a disease affecting sheep and cattle)
Nine-men’s-morris=An outdoor game
Quaint=Intricate
Lack of tread=Where nobody walks
Hiems=Winter god
Childing=Fruitful
Change=Exchange
Wonted=Usual
Liveries=Clothing
Mazèd=Bewildered
Debate=Dispute
Compleat:
Forgery=Een verdichtsel, verziersel
Brawl=Gekyf
Continent=Het vaste land
Murrain (murren)=Sterfte onder de beesten
Quaint=Cierlyk
To tread=Treeden, betreeden
Livery=een Lievry
Wonted=Gewoon, gewoonlyk
It put me in a maze=Het deed my versteld staan, het maakte my bedwelmd
Debate=Twist, verschil, krakkeel

Topics: suspicion, truth, time, nature

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 4.2
SPEAKER: Caius Lucius
CONTEXT:
CAIUS LUCIUS
Dream often so,
And never false. Soft, ho! what trunk is here
Without his top? The ruin speaks that sometime
It was a worthy building. How! a page!
Or dead, or sleeping on him? But dead rather;
For nature doth abhor to make his bed
With the defunct, or sleep upon the dead.
Let’s see the boy’s face.
CAPTAIN
He’s alive, my lord.
CAIUS LUCIUS
He’ll then instruct us of this body. Young one,
Inform us of thy fortunes, for it seems
They crave to be demanded. Who is this
Thou makest thy bloody pillow? Or who was he
That, otherwise than noble nature did,
Hath alter’d that good picture? What’s thy interest
In this sad wreck? How came it? Who is it?
What art thou?
IMOGEN
I am nothing: or if not,
Nothing to be were better. This was my master,
A very valiant Briton and a good,
That here by mountaineers lies slain. Alas!
There is no more such masters: I may wander
From east to occident, cry out for service,
Try many, all good, serve truly, never
Find such another master.
CAIUS LUCIUS
‘Lack, good youth!
Thou movest no less with thy complaining than
Thy master in bleeding: say his name, good friend.
IMOGEN
Richard du Champ.
If I do lie and do
No harm by it, though the gods hear, I hope
They’ll pardon it.—Say you, sir?

DUTCH:
Doch, welk een stam is dit ,
Van top beroofd? De puinhoop toont, dat dit
Een trotsch gebouw geweest is.

MORE:
Sometime=Once upon a time
Worthy=Grand
Defunct=Dead
Otherwise=Differently
Wreck=Ruin
Occident=West
Service=Employment
Compleat:
Somewhile=Te eeniger tyd
Worthy=Waardig, eerwaardig, voortreffelyk, uytmuntend, deftig
Defunct=Overleeden
To wreck or go to wrack=Verlooren gaan, te gronde gaan
Occident=Het westen
Service=Dienstbaarheid

Topics: nature, death, honour, virtue, work, loyalty

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 3
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Clifford
CONTEXT:
My gracious liege, this too much lenity
And harmful pity must be laid aside.
To whom do lions cast their gentle looks?
Not to the beast that would usurp their den.
Whose hand is that the forest bear doth lick?
Not his that spoils her young before her face.
Who ‘scapes the lurking serpent’s mortal sting?
Not he that sets his foot upon her back.
The smallest worm will turn being trodden on,
And doves will peck in safeguard of their brood.

DUTCH:
De kleinste worm verheft, getrapt, den kop

MORE:

Proverb: Tread on a worm and it will turn

Lenity=Mildness
Spoils=Seizes, hunts
Level at=Is aiming for
In safeguard of=To protect

Compleat:
Lenity=Zachtheid, zoetelykheid, gedweegzaamheid, slapheid
To spoil=Bederven, vernielen, berooven
Safeguard=Beschutting, bescherming

Topics: pity, mercy, nature, ambition, strength

PLAY: The Two Gentlemen of Verona
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Proteus
CONTEXT:
ANTONIO
Look, what thou want’st shall be sent after thee:
No more of stay! To-morrow thou must go.
Come on, Panthino: you shall be employ’d
To hasten on his expedition.
PROTEUS
Thus have I shunn’d the fire for fear of burning,
And drench’d me in the sea, where I am drown’d.
I fear’d to show my father Julia’s letter,
Lest he should take exceptions to my love;
And with the vantage of mine own excuse
Hath he excepted most against my love.
O, how this spring of love resembleth
The uncertain glory of an April day,
Which now shows all the beauty of the sun,
And by and by a cloud takes all away!

DUTCH:
O, hoe gelijkt toch deze liefdelente
Op eens Aprildags onbetrouwb’re pracht

MORE:
Shunned=Avoided
Take exceptions=Raise objection
Vantage=Advantage
Excepted=Objected
Compleat
To shun=Vermyden, ontwyken, ontvlieden
To take exception=Zich over iets belgen
Vantage=Toegift, toemaat, overmaat, overwigt

Topics: life, age/experience, love, nature

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Lysander
CONTEXT:
HELENA
Do not say so, Lysander. Say not so.
What though he love your Hermia? Lord, what though?
Yet Hermia still loves you. Then be content.
LYSANDER
Content with Hermia? No. I do repent
The tedious minutes I with her have spent.
Not Hermia but Helena I love.
Who will not change a raven for a dove?
The will of man is by his reason swayed,
And reason says you are the worthier maid.
Things growing are not ripe until their season.
So I, being young, till now ripe not to reason.
And touching now the point of human skill,
Reason becomes the marshal to my will
And leads me to your eyes, where I o’erlook
Love’s stories written in love’s richest book.

DUTCH:
Wie kiest een kraai, als hem een duif verschijnt?
De rede sture steeds den wil des mans;
De rede zegt mij: u behoort de krans.

MORE:
What though=What does it matter
Will=Desire
Ripe not=Don’t ripen
Point=Height (of human skill)
Marshal=Officer at arms; officer who established rank at ceremonies
O’erlook=Glance over, read; look over
Reason=Sense of judgement
Compleat:
Will=Wille
Marshal=een Marschalk

Burgersdijk notes:
In gouden lett’ren. Love’s stories, written in love’s richest book. Zooals hier Helena, wordt in Romeo en Julia Graaf Paris met een kostelijk boek vergeleken.

Topics: regret, love, rivalry, nature, reason

PLAY: Troilus and Cressida
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Ulysses
CONTEXT:
ULYSSES
Troy, yet upon his basis, had been down,
And the great Hector’s sword had lacked a master,
But for these instances.
The specialty of rule hath been neglected:
And, look, how many Grecian tents do stand
Hollow upon this plain, so many hollow factions.
When that the general is not like the hive
To whom the foragers shall all repair,
What honey is expected? Degree being vizarded,
The unworthiest shows as fairly in the mask.
The heavens themselves, the planets and this centre
Observe degree, priority and place,
Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,
Office and custom, in all line of order;
And therefore is the glorious planet Sol
In noble eminence enthroned and sphered
Amidst the other; whose medicinable eye
Corrects the ill aspects of planets evil,
And posts, like the commandment of a king,
Sans cheque to good and bad: but when the planets
In evil mixture to disorder wander,
What plagues and what portents! what mutiny!
What raging of the sea! shaking of earth!
Commotion in the winds! frights, changes, horrors,
Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
The unity and married calm of states
Quite from their fixure! O, when degree is shaked,
Which is the ladder to all high designs,
Then enterprise is sick! How could communities,
Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows! each thing meets
In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters
Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores
And make a sop of all this solid globe:
Strength should be lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead:
Force should be right; or rather, right and wrong,
Between whose endless jar justice resides,
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, an universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce an universal prey,
And last eat up himself. Great Agamemnon,
This chaos, when degree is suffocate,
Follows the choking.
And this neglection of degree it is
That by a pace goes backward, with a purpose
It hath to climb. The general’s disdained
By him one step below, he by the next,
That next by him beneath; so every step,
Exampled by the first pace that is sick
Of his superior, grows to an envious fever
Of pale and bloodless emulation:
And ’tis this fever that keeps Troy on foot,
Not her own sinews. To end a tale of length,
Troy in our weakness stands, not in her strength.

DUTCH:
t Gezag werd hier verwaarloosd; ziet, zoovele
Hier holle Grieksche tenten staan, zoovele
Partijen zijn er, even hol. En zoo
De veldheer niet den bijenstok gelijk is,
Waar elk inzaam’laar ‘t zijne brengt, hoe kan men
Ooit honig wachten?

MORE:
Design=A work in hand, enterprise, cause
Degrees in schools=Academic standing
Brotherhoods=Guilds
Dividable=Dividing
Laurels=Emblem of exellence
Oppugnancy=Opposition
Sop=Lump of bread soaked in wine
Imbecility=Feebleness (not of mind)
Rude=Violent
Jar=Dispute, conflict
Includes itself in=Is subsumed by
Bloodless=Pallid
Emulation=Envy, jealousy
On foot=Upright
Compleat:
Design=Opzet, voorneemen, oogmerk, aanslag, toeleg, ontwerp
Brotherhood=Broederschap
Crowned with a laurel=Met laurier bekranst, gelaurierd
To oppugne=Bestryden, bevechten, tegenstreeven
Oppugnation=Bestryding, bevechting
A wine sop=Een wynsopje
Imbecility=Zwaklykheid, zwakheid
Rude=Ruuw, groof, onbehouwen, plomp, onbeschaafd
Jar=Krakkeelen, twisten, harrewarren, oneens zyn, kyven
Emulation=Haayver, volgzucht, afgunst

Topics: law/legal, justice, respect, order/society, nature, learning/education

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 2.7
SPEAKER: Jaques
CONTEXT:
JAQUES
A fool, a fool, I met a fool i’ th’ forest,
A motley fool. A miserable world!
As I do live by food, I met a fool,
Who laid him down and basked him in the sun
And railed on Lady Fortune in good terms,
In good set terms, and yet a motley fool.
“Good morrow, fool,” quoth I. “No, sir,” quoth he,
“Call me not ‘fool’ till heaven hath sent me fortune.”
And then he drew a dial from his poke
And, looking on it with lackluster eye,
Says very wisely, “It is ten o’clock.
Thus we may see,” quoth he, “how the world wags.
‘Tis but an hour ago since it was nine,
And after one hour more ’twill be eleven.
And so from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,
And then from hour to hour we rot and rot,
And thereby hangs a tale.” When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer
That fools should be so deep-contemplative,
And I did laugh sans intermission
An hour by his dial. O noble fool!
A worthy fool! Motley’s the only wear.

DUTCH:
En dit geeft dan een sprookjen

MORE:
Proverb: Thereby hangs (lies) a tale
Proverb: Fortune favours fools

Motley=Multicoloured jester outfit
Set=Composed
Rail=To use reproachful language, to scold in opprobrious terms
Poke=Pouch or pocket
Lacklustre=Lacking radiance, gloss or brightness (Latin lustrare).
Dial=(Fob)watch
Poke=Pouch, pocket
Moral=Moralise
Deep=Profoundly
Chanticleer=Rooster
Compleat:
Motley=Een grove gemengelde
To rail=Schelden
To wag (to move or stir)=Schudden, beweegen
Poke=Zak
Lustre=Luyster
Dial=Wysplaat
To moralize=Een zedelyke uitlegging of toepassing op iets maaken
Deep=Diepzinnig

Topics: proverbs and idioms, still in use, blame, nature, time

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Lysander
CONTEXT:
LYSANDER
Content with Hermia? No. I do repent
The tedious minutes I with her have spent.
Not Hermia but Helena I love.
Who will not change a raven for a dove?
The will of man is by his reason swayed,
And reason says you are the worthier maid.
Things growing are not ripe until their season.
So I, being young, till now ripe not to reason.
And touching now the point of human skill,
Reason becomes the marshal to my will
And leads me to your eyes, where I o’erlook
Love’s stories written in love’s richest book.

DUTCH:
Wat groeit, bereikt zijn rijpheid schreê voor schrede
Mijn jeugd eerst nu de rijpheid van de rede.

MORE:
What though=What does it matter
Will=Desire
Ripe not=Don’t ripen
Point=Height (of human skill)
Marshal=Officer at arms; officer who established rank at ceremonies
O’erlook=Glance over, read; look over
Reason=Sense of judgement
Compleat:
Will=Wille
Marshal=een Marschalk

Burgersdijk notes:
In gouden lett’ren. Love’s stories, written in love’s richest book. Zooals hier Helena, wordt in Romeo en Julia Graaf Paris met een kostelijk boek vergeleken.

Topics: regret, love, rivalry, nature, reason

PLAY: Antony and Cleopatra
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Enobarbus
CONTEXT:
ENOBARBUS
Under a compelling occasion, let women die. It were
pity to cast them away for nothing, though between them
and a great cause they should be esteemed nothing.
Cleopatra, catching but the least noise of this, dies
instantly. I have seen her die twenty times upon far
poorer moment. I do think there is mettle in death,
which commits some loving act upon her, she hath such a
celerity in dying.
ANTONY
She is cunning past man’s thought.
ENOBARBUS
Alack, sir, no, her passions are made of nothing but
the finest part of pure love. We cannot call her winds
and waters sighs and tears. They are greater storms and
tempests than almanacs can report. This cannot be
cunning in her. If it be, she makes a shower of rain as
well as Jove.

DUTCH:
Dit kan geen listigheid van haar
zijn; en is het zoo, dan kan zij even goed regenvlagen
maken als Jupiter.

MORE:

Compelling occasion=Being forced by circumstances
Noise=Rumour
Poorer=More trivial
Moment=Reason
Mettle=Spirit
Celerity=Swiftness, alacrity
Cunnning=Skilful, artful
Jove=King of the Roman gods who commanded thunder, lightning and rain
Compleat:
To compel=Dwingen, aandryven, dringen
Noise=Geraas, getier, gerucht
Poor=(mean, pitiful) Arm, elendig
Moment=gewicht, belang. Of great moment=Van groot gewicht.
Of no moment=Van geen belang
Full of mettle=Vol vuurs, moedig
Celerity=Snelheid, spoed, haast
Cunning=Behendig
Jove=Jovus, Jupiter

Topics: nature, honesty

PLAY: Troilus and Cressida
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Ulysses
CONTEXT:
ULYSSES
Troy, yet upon his basis, had been down,
And the great Hector’s sword had lacked a master,
But for these instances.
The specialty of rule hath been neglected:
And, look, how many Grecian tents do stand
Hollow upon this plain, so many hollow factions.
When that the general is not like the hive
To whom the foragers shall all repair,
What honey is expected? Degree being vizarded,
The unworthiest shows as fairly in the mask.
The heavens themselves, the planets and this centre
Observe degree, priority and place,
Insisture, course, proportion, season, form,
Office and custom, in all line of order;
And therefore is the glorious planet Sol
In noble eminence enthroned and sphered
Amidst the other; whose medicinable eye
Corrects the ill aspects of planets evil,
And posts, like the commandment of a king,
Sans cheque to good and bad: but when the planets
In evil mixture to disorder wander,
What plagues and what portents! what mutiny!
What raging of the sea! shaking of earth!
Commotion in the winds! frights, changes, horrors,
Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
The unity and married calm of states
Quite from their fixure! O, when degree is shaked,
Which is the ladder to all high designs,
Then enterprise is sick! How could communities,
Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows! each thing meets
In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters
Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores
And make a sop of all this solid globe:
Strength should be lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead:
Force should be right; or rather, right and wrong,
Between whose endless jar justice resides,
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, an universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce an universal prey,
And last eat up himself. Great Agamemnon,
This chaos, when degree is suffocate,
Follows the choking.
And this neglection of degree it is
That by a pace goes backward, with a purpose
It hath to climb. The general’s disdained
By him one step below, he by the next,
That next by him beneath; so every step,
Exampled by the first pace that is sick
Of his superior, grows to an envious fever
Of pale and bloodless emulation:
And ’tis this fever that keeps Troy on foot,
Not her own sinews. To end a tale of length,
Troy in our weakness stands, not in her strength.

DUTCH:

Wordt elke rang verwurgd, dan volgt die chaos
Op dezen moord.
En deez’ miskenning is ‘t van al wat rang heet,
Die, als zij streeft omhoog te klimmen, telkens
Een stap teruggaat.

MORE:
Design=A work in hand, enterprise, cause
Degrees in schools=Academic standing
Brotherhoods=Guilds
Dividable=Dividing
Laurels=Emblem of exellence
Oppugnancy=Opposition
Sop=Lump of bread soaked in wine
Imbecility=Feebleness (not of mind)
Rude=Violent
Jar=Dispute, conflict
Includes itself in=Is subsumed by
Bloodless=Pallid
Emulation=Envy, jealousy
On foot=Upright
Compleat:
Design=Opzet, voorneemen, oogmerk, aanslag, toeleg, ontwerp
Brotherhood=Broederschap
Crowned with a laurel=Met laurier bekranst, gelaurierd
To oppugne=Bestryden, bevechten, tegenstreeven
Oppugnation=Bestryding, bevechting
A wine sop=Een wynsopje
Imbecility=Zwaklykheid, zwakheid
Rude=Ruuw, groof, onbehouwen, plomp, onbeschaafd
Jar=Krakkeelen, twisten, harrewarren, oneens zyn, kyven
Emulation=Haayver, volgzucht, afgunst

Topics: law/legal, justice, respect, order/society, nature, learning/education

PLAY: The Tempest
ACT/SCENE: 5.1
SPEAKER: Alonso
CONTEXT:
ALONSO
This is as strange a maze as e’er men trod,
And there is in this business more than nature
Was ever conduct of. Some oracle
Must rectify our knowledge.
PROSPERO
Sir, my liege,
Do not infest your mind with beating on
The strangeness of this business. At picked leisure
Which shall be shortly, single I’ll resolve you—
Which to you shall seem probable—of every
These happened accidents. Till when, be cheerful
And think of each thing well.
(to Ariel)  Come hither, spirit.
Set Caliban and his companions free.
Untie the spell.

DUTCH:
t Is ‘t vreemdste doolhof, waar een mensch ooit dwaalde.

MORE:
Maze=A labyrinth: “one encompassed with a winding m.”
Conduct of=Led, guided by (directed by nature)
Single=Privately, separately, alone
Resolve=To free from uncertainty or ignorance, to satisfy, to inform
Accidents=Unforeseen events
Infest your mind=Trouble, assail your mind
Compleat:
Maze=Doolhof, bedwelming
To resolve (to untie, to decide, to determine a hard question, a difficulty)=Oplossen, ontwarren, ontknoopen
Accident=Een toeval, kwaal

Topics: nature, plans/intentions, resolution, purpose

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 3.1
SPEAKER: Bottom
CONTEXT:
BOTTOM
I see their knavery: this is to make an ass of me, to
fright me if they could. But I will not stir from this
place, do what they can. I will walk up and down here
and I will sing, that they shall hear I am not afraid.
The ouzel cock, so black of hue
With orange-tawny bill,
The throstlewith his note so true,
The wren with little quill—
TITANIA
[Waking] What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?
BOTTOM
[Sings]The finch, the sparrow, and the lark,
The plainsong cuckoo grey,
Whose note full many a man doth mark
And dares not answer “Nay”—
For indeed, who would set his wit to so foolish a bird?
Who would give a bird the lie, though he cry “cuckoo”
never so?

DUTCH:
Ik ruik hun schelmerij; ze zouden een ezel van me
willen maken; me schrik willen aanjagen, als ze maar
konden.

MORE:
Proverb: Do not set your wit against a fool’s (a child)

Pun on ass=animal or burden and ass=dolt
A current saying it still ‘to make an ass (fool) of oneself’.
Ouzel or ousel cock=Blackbird
Throstle=Thrush
Quill=Reed pipe
Set wit to=Argue with
Give the lie=Call a liar
Compleat:
Owzel=een Meerl
Ass=Ezel. Een ezelachtig domheid=Dullness, great ignorance
He talks like an ass=Hy praat als een gek
Quill=een Schaft, pen
To give the lie=Loogenstraffen

Burgersdijk notes:
De koekoek, met dat woord. De woordspeling van cuckoo en cuckold, horendrager, komt bij Sh. meermalen voor.

Topics: proverbs and idioms, dignity, nature, deceit

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Iachimo
CONTEXT:
IACHIMO
The crickets sing, and man’s o’er-labour’d sense
Repairs itself by rest. Our Tarquin thus
Did softly press the rushes, ere he waken’d
The chastity he wounded. Cytherea,
How bravely thou becomest thy bed, fresh lily,
And whiter than the sheets! That I might touch!
But kiss; one kiss! Rubies unparagon’d,
How dearly they do’t! ‘Tis her breathing that
Perfumes the chamber thus: the flame o’ the taper
Bows toward her, and would under-peep her lids,
To see the enclosed lights, now canopied
Under these windows, white and azure laced
With blue of heaven’s own tinct. But my design,
To note the chamber: I will write all down:
Such and such pictures; there the window; such
The adornment of her bed; the arras; figures,
Why, such and such; and the contents o’ the story.
Ah, but some natural notes about her body,
Above ten thousand meaner moveables
Would testify, to enrich mine inventory.
O sleep, thou ape of death, lie dull upon her!
And be her sense but as a monument,
Thus in a chapel lying! Come off, come off:
As slippery as the Gordian knot was hard!
‘Tis mine; and this will witness outwardly,
As strongly as the conscience does within,
To the madding of her lord. On her left breast
A mole cinque-spotted, like the crimson drops
I’ the bottom of a cowslip: here’s a voucher,
Stronger than ever law could make: this secret
Will force him think I have pick’d the lock and ta’en
The treasure of her honour. No more. To what end?
Why should I write this down, that’s riveted,
Screw’d to my memory? She hath been reading late
The tale of Tereus; here the leaf’s turn’d down
Where Philomel gave up. I have enough:
To the trunk again, and shut the spring of it.
Swift, swift, you dragons of the night, that dawning
May bare the raven’s eye! I lodge in fear;
Though this a heavenly angel, hell is here.

DUTCH:
t Glipt los; geen Gordiaansche knoop voorwaar!
‘t Is mijn! ‘k Zal dit getuig’nis laten geven,
En overtuiging wekken in zijn borst,
Dat haar gemaal er dol van wordt.

MORE:
Underpeep=Peep out from under
Unparagoned=Without equal
Lights=Eyes
Windows=Eyelids
Tinct=Colour
Design=Plan
Arras=Tapestry
Meaner=Less important
Ape=Imitator
Dull=Heavily
Gordian knot=A ‘difficult’ knot which Alexander the Great cut through with a sword
Voucher=Evidence
Tereus=In Greek mythology, raped Philomel and cut out her tongue. She got her revenge on him and was turned into a nightingale by the gods
Compleat:
Paragon=Iets zonder weergaa
Tinct (teint)=Verf
Design=Opzet, voorneemen, oogmerk, aanslag, toeleg, ontwerp
Cloth of Arras=Tapissery
Mean=Gering, slecht
Voucher=1) (he that vouches one at law): eisscher
Voucher=2) (authentick deed, to prove an allegation): Echt bewys, om eene aanhaaling to bevestigen

Topics: nature, conscience

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 2.4
SPEAKER: Rosalind
CONTEXT:
ROSALIND
Alas, poor shepherd, searching of thy wound,
I have by hard adventure found mine own.
TOUCHSTONE
And I mine. I remember when I was in love I broke my
sword upon a stone and bid him take that for coming anight
to Jane Smile. And I remember the kissing of her
batler, and the cow’s dugs that her pretty chapped hands
had milked. And I remember the wooing of a peascod
instead of her, from whom I took two cods and, giving
her them again, said with weeping tears, “Wear these for
my sake.” We that are true lovers run into strange
capers. But as all is mortal in nature, so is all nature
in love mortal in folly.
ROSALIND
Thou speak’st wiser than thou art ware of.
TOUCHSTONE
Nay, I shall ne’er be ware of mine own wit till I break
my shins against it.

DUTCH:
Gij spreekt wijzer, dan gij zelf gewaar wordt

MORE:
Searching of=Probing
Caper=A leap, a spring, in dancing or mirth: “we that are true lovers run into strange –s,”
Folly=Foolishness
Ware=Aware; cautious
Compleat:
Caper=een Kaper, als mede een Sprong
Folly=Dwaasheid, zotheid, zotterny
Folly (Vice, excess, imperfection)=Ondeugd, buitenspoorigheid, onvolmaaktheid

Topics: love, wisdom, life, nature

PLAY: King Henry VI Part 3
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Clifford
CONTEXT:
My gracious liege, this too-much lenity
And harmful pity must be laid aside.
To whom do lions cast their gentle looks?
Not to the beast that would usurp their den.
Whose hand is that the forest bear doth lick?
Not his that spoils her young before her face.
Who ‘scapes the lurking serpent’s mortal sting?
Not he that sets his foot upon her back.
The smallest worm will turn being trodden on,
And doves will peck in safeguard of their brood.
Ambitious York doth level at thy crown,
Thou smiling while he knit his angry brows.

DUTCH:
Mijn hooge vorst, schud die te groote zachtheid,
Dit schaad’lijk medelijden van u af.
Wien werpen leeuwen zachte blikken toe?
Toch niet aan ‘t beest, dat in hun hol wil dringen.

MORE:

Proverb: Tread on a worm and it will turn

Lenity=Mildness
Spoils=Seizes, hunts
Level at=Is aiming for
In safeguard of=To protect

Compleat:
Lenity=Zachtheid, zoetelykheid, gedweegzaamheid, slapheid
To spoil=Bederven, vernielen, berooven
Safeguard=Beschutting, bescherming

Topics: pity, mercy, nature, ambition, strength

PLAY: Troilus and Cressida
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Ulysses
CONTEXT:
ULYSSES
(…) O, when degree is shaked,
Which is the ladder to all high designs,
Then enterprise is sick! How could communities,
Degrees in schools and brotherhoods in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable shores,
The primogenitive and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, sceptres, laurels,
But by degree, stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that string,
And, hark, what discord follows! each thing meets
In mere oppugnancy: the bounded waters
Should lift their bosoms higher than the shores
And make a sop of all this solid globe:
Strength should be lord of imbecility,
And the rude son should strike his father dead:
Force should be right; or rather, right and wrong,
Between whose endless jar justice resides,
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, an universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce an universal prey,
And last eat up himself. Great Agamemnon,
This chaos, when degree is suffocate,
Follows the choking.
And this neglection of degree it is
That by a pace goes backward, with a purpose
It hath to climb. The general’s disdained
By him one step below, he by the next,
That next by him beneath; so every step,
Exampled by the first pace that is sick
Of his superior, grows to an envious fever
Of pale and bloodless emulation:
And ’tis this fever that keeps Troy on foot,
Not her own sinews. To end a tale of length,
Troy in our weakness stands, not in her strength.

DUTCH:
Wat aangroeit tot een koorts. ‘t Is deze koorts,
Die Troje staande houdt, niet eigen sterkte.
In ‘t kort gezegd, wat Troje leven doet,
Is onze zwakte, niet zijn kracht en moed.

MORE:
Design=A work in hand, enterprise, cause
Degrees in schools=Academic standing
Brotherhoods=Guilds
Dividable=Dividing
Laurels=Emblem of exellence
Oppugnancy=Opposition
Sop=Lump of bread soaked in wine
Imbecility=Feebleness (not of mind)
Rude=Violent
Jar=Dispute, conflict
Includes itself in=Is subsumed by
Bloodless=Pallid
Emulation=Envy, jealousy
On foot=Upright
Compleat:
Design=Opzet, voorneemen, oogmerk, aanslag, toeleg, ontwerp
Brotherhood=Broederschap
Crowned with a laurel=Met laurier bekranst, gelaurierd
To oppugne=Bestryden, bevechten, tegenstreeven
Oppugnation=Bestryding, bevechting
A wine sop=Een wynsopje
Imbecility=Zwaklykheid, zwakheid
Rude=Ruuw, groof, onbehouwen, plomp, onbeschaafd
Jar=Krakkeelen, twisten, harrewarren, oneens zyn, kyven
Emulation=Haayver, volgzucht, afgunst

Topics: status, order/society, nature, respect, justice

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 2.5
SPEAKER: Amiens
CONTEXT:
Under the greenwood tree,
Who loves to lie with me
And tune his merry note,
Unto the sweet bird’s throat;
Come hither, come hither, come hither.
Here shall he see No enemy
But winter and rough weather

Who doth ambition shun
And loves to live i’ the sun,
Seeking the food he eats,
And pleased with what he gets,
Come hither, come hither, come hither:
Here shall he see
No enemy
But winter and rough weather.

If it do come to pass
That any man turn ass,
Leaving his wealth and ease,
A stubborn will to please,
Ducdame, ducdame, ducdame:
Here shall he see
Gross fools as he,
An if he will come to me.

DUTCH:
Al wie in ‘t groene woud
Van vredig leven houdt,
En graag een liedjen zingt,
Als ‘t vogelkeeltjen klinkt,
Die vlij’ zich hier neder, hier neder;
Niets, dat in ‘t veld
Hem grieft of kwelt,
Dan kou soms en ruw weder.

MORE:
Proverb: A bad bush is better than the open field

“Under the Greenwood Tree” has been used since, e.g. Name of a song, Novel by Thomas Hardy. The phrase is said to have originated from before Shakespeare’s time, in the Robin Hood balllads: ‘We be yemen of this foreste / Vnder the grene wode tre’.

Topics: provebs and idioms, still in use, nature, truth

PLAY: Romeo and Juliet
ACT/SCENE: 2.3
SPEAKER: Friar Lawrence
CONTEXT:
For naught so vile that on the earth doth live
But to the earth some special good doth give.
Nor aught so good but, strained from that fair use
Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse.
Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied,
And vice sometime by action dignified.

DUTCH:
Niets zoo gering van wat op aarde leeft,
Dat niet aan de aarde iets goeds, iets nuttigs geeft;
En niets zoo goed, dat, in verkeerde hand,
Zijn oorsprong niet, door ‘t misbruik, maakt te schand;
In ondeugd wordt door misbruik deugd verkeerd,
Door waardig handlen ondeugd soms geëerd.

MORE:
Schmidt:
Vile=base, bad, abject
Onions:
True birth=nature. (Revolts from=Rebels against nature)

Topics: nature, good and bad, virtue, abuse

PLAY: King Henry V
ACT/SCENE: 4.1
SPEAKER: Williams
CONTEXT:
COURT
Brother John Bates, is not that the morning which breaks yonder?
BATES
I think it be, but we have no great cause to desire the approach of day.
WILLIAMS
We see yonder the beginning of the day, but I think we shall never see the end of it.—Who goes there?

DUTCH:
Wij zien daar het begin van den dag, maar zijn einde
zullen wij, denk ik, wel nimmer zien. — Wie gaat daar?

MORE:

Topics: nature, time, conflict

PLAY: Antony and Cleopatra
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Menas
CONTEXT:
POMPEY
If the great gods be just, they shall assist
The deeds of justest men.
MENAS
Know, worthy Pompey,
That what they do delay, they not deny.
POMPEY
Whiles we are suitors to their throne, decays
The thing we sue for.
MENAS
We, ignorant of ourselves,
Beg often our own harms, which the wise powers
Deny us for our good, so find we profit
By losing of our prayers.
POMPEY
I shall do well.
The people love me, and the sea is mine.
My powers are crescent, and my auguring hope
Says it will come to th’ full. Mark Antony
In Egypt sits at dinner, and will make
No wars without doors. Caesar gets money where
He loses hearts. Lepidus flatters both,
Of both is flattered, but he neither loves,
Nor either cares for him.

DUTCH:
Wij dwazen bidden
Vaak om ons eigen leed, wat wijze machten
Tot ons geluk ons weig’ren; ‘t vrucht’loos smeeken
Is dan een zegen.

MORE:
Whiles we are suitors=While we are praying
Decays=Loses value
Auguring=Prophesying
Without doors=Outside
Compleat:
While=Een wyl, poos; terwijl
Between whiles=Bij tusschenpoozen, van tyd tot tyd
Decay=Voorval, afneeming, verwelking, veroudering, vermindering, ondergang
An augur=Een vogel-waarzegger
To augurate=Voorzeggen, voorspellen
Without=Van buyten, buyten

Topics: identity, fate/destiny, plans and intentions, nature

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 4.2
SPEAKER: Caius Lucius
CONTEXT:
CAIUS LUCIUS
Dream often so,
And never false. Soft, ho! what trunk is here
Without his top? The ruin speaks that sometime
It was a worthy building. How! a page!
Or dead, or sleeping on him? But dead rather;
For nature doth abhor to make his bed
With the defunct, or sleep upon the dead.
Let’s see the boy’s face.
CAPTAIN
He’s alive, my lord.
CAIUS LUCIUS
He’ll then instruct us of this body. Young one,
Inform us of thy fortunes, for it seems
They crave to be demanded. Who is this
Thou makest thy bloody pillow? Or who was he
That, otherwise than noble nature did,
Hath alter’d that good picture? What’s thy interest
In this sad wreck? How came it? Who is it?
What art thou?
IMOGEN
I am nothing: or if not,
Nothing to be were better. This was my master,
A very valiant Briton and a good,
That here by mountaineers lies slain. Alas!
There is no more such masters: I may wander
From east to occident, cry out for service,
Try many, all good, serve truly, never
Find such another master.
CAIUS LUCIUS
‘Lack, good youth!
Thou movest no less with thy complaining than
Thy master in bleeding: say his name, good friend.
IMOGEN
Richard du Champ.
If I do lie and do
No harm by it, though the gods hear, I hope
They’ll pardon it.—Say you, sir?

DUTCH:
En wat is uw verlies
Bij deze droeve schipbreuk? Hoe gebeurde ‘t?
Wie is hij? Wie zijt gij?

MORE:
Sometime=Once upon a time
Worthy=Grand
Defunct=Dead
Otherwise=Differently
Wreck=Ruin
Occident=West
Service=Employment
Compleat:
Somewhile=Te eeniger tyd
Worthy=Waardig, eerwaardig, voortreffelyk, uytmuntend, deftig
Defunct=Overleeden
To wreck or go to wrack=Verlooren gaan, te gronde gaan
Occident=Het westen
Service=Dienstbaarheid

Topics: nature, death, honour, virtue, work, loyalty

PLAY: As You Like It
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: First Lord
CONTEXT:
DUKE SENIOR
But what said Jaques?
Did he not moralise this spectacle?
FIRST LORD
Oh, yes, into a thousand similes.
First, for his weeping into the needless stream:
“Poor deer,” quoth he, “thou mak’st a testament
As worldlings do, giving thy sum of more
To that which had too much.” Then, being there alone,
Left and abandoned of his velvet friend,
“’Tis right,” quoth he. “Thus misery doth part
The flux of company.” Anon a careless herd,
Full of the pasture, jumps along by him
And never stays to greet him. “Ay,” quoth Jaques,
“Sweep on, you fat and greasy citizens.
‘Tis just the fashion. Wherefore do you look
Upon that poor and broken bankrupt there?”
Thus most invectively he pierceth through
The body of the country, city, court,
Yea, and of this our life, swearing that we
Are mere usurpers, tyrants, and what’s worse,
To fright the animals and to kill them up
In their assigned and native dwelling place.
DUKE SENIOR
And did you leave him in this contemplation?
SECOND LORD
We did, my lord, weeping and commenting
Upon the sobbing deer.
DUKE SENIOR
Show me the place.
I love to cope him in these sullen fits,
For then he’s full of matter.
FIRST LORD
I’ll bring you to him straight.

DUTCH:
Waarom zoudt gij ook
Naar dien bankroeten armen drommel omzien?

MORE:
Moralise=Draw morals from
Quoth=Said
Worldlings=Mere mortals
Velvet=Smooth, prosperous
Flux=Stream
Anon=Soon
Careless=Carefree
By=Past
Wherefore=Why
Mere=Absolute
Cope=Encounter
Matter=Substance, ideas
Straight=Immediately
Compleat:
To moralize=Een zedelyke uitlegging of toepassing op iets maaken
Quoth=Zeide
Worldling=Een waereldsch mensch, waereldling
Velvet=Fluweel
Flux=De vloed, loop; flux and reflux=Eb en vloed
Careless=Zorgeloos, kommerloos, achteloos, onachtzaam
Wherefore (or why)=Waarom
Mere (meer)=Louter, enkel
Cope=Handgemeen worden; ruilebuiten
Matter=Stoffe, zaak, oorzaak
Straightway=Eenswegs, terstond, opstaandevoet

Topics: advice, language, nature, life, order/society

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Hermia
CONTEXT:
DEMETRIUS
Disparage not the faith thou dost not know,
Lest to thy peril thou aby it dear.
Look, where thy love comes. Yonder is thy dear.
HERMIA
Dark night, that from the eye his function takes,
The ear more quick of apprehension makes.
Wherein it doth impair the seeing sense,
It pays the hearing double recompense.
Thou art not by mine eye, Lysander, found.
Mine ear, I thank it, brought me to thy sound
But why unkindly didst thou leave me so?
LYSANDER
Why should he stay, whom love doth press to go?
HERMIA
What love could press Lysander from my side?

DUTCH:
De nacht ontneem’ zijn werking aan ‘t gezicht,
Wel dubbel goed vervult het oor zijn plicht;
En wat het zintuig van ‘t gezicht verloor,
Hergeeft de nacht verdubbeld aan ‘t gehoor;

MORE:
Disparage=Vilify, be contemptuous of
Aby=Pay for, atone for
Compleat:
Disparagement=Verachting, verkleining, kleinachting
Recompense=Vergelding, beloning

Topics: skill/talent, love, nature

PLAY: Cymbeline
ACT/SCENE: 2.2
SPEAKER: Iachimo
CONTEXT:
IACHIMO
The crickets sing, and man’s o’er-labour’d sense
Repairs itself by rest. Our Tarquin thus
Did softly press the rushes, ere he waken’d
The chastity he wounded. Cytherea,
How bravely thou becomest thy bed, fresh lily,
And whiter than the sheets! That I might touch!
But kiss; one kiss! Rubies unparagon’d,
How dearly they do’t! ‘Tis her breathing that
Perfumes the chamber thus: the flame o’ the taper
Bows toward her, and would under-peep her lids,
To see the enclosed lights, now canopied
Under these windows, white and azure laced
With blue of heaven’s own tinct. But my design,
To note the chamber: I will write all down:
Such and such pictures; there the window; such
The adornment of her bed; the arras; figures,
Why, such and such; and the contents o’ the story.
Ah, but some natural notes about her body,
Above ten thousand meaner moveables
Would testify, to enrich mine inventory.
O sleep, thou ape of death, lie dull upon her!
And be her sense but as a monument,
Thus in a chapel lying! Come off, come off:
As slippery as the Gordian knot was hard!
‘Tis mine; and this will witness outwardly,
As strongly as the conscience does within,
To the madding of her lord. On her left breast
A mole cinque-spotted, like the crimson drops
I’ the bottom of a cowslip: here’s a voucher,
Stronger than ever law could make: this secret
Will force him think I have pick’d the lock and ta’en
The treasure of her honour. No more. To what end?
Why should I write this down, that’s riveted,
Screw’d to my memory? She hath been reading late
The tale of Tereus; here the leaf’s turn’d down
Where Philomel gave up. I have enough:
To the trunk again, and shut the spring of it.
Swift, swift, you dragons of the night, that dawning
May bare the raven’s eye! I lodge in fear;
Though this a heavenly angel, hell is here.

DUTCH:
Genoeg! Behoef ik meer?
Waartoe dit schrijven, dat in mijn gedacht’nis
Geschroefd, geklonken is?

MORE:
Underpeep=Peep out from under
Unparagoned=Without equal
Lights=Eyes
Windows=Eyelids
Tinct=Colour
Design=Plan
Arras=Tapestry
Meaner=Less important
Ape=Imitator
Dull=Heavily
Gordian knot=A ‘difficult’ knot which Alexander the Great cut through with a sword
Voucher=Evidence
Tereus=In Greek mythology, raped Philomel and cut out her tongue. She got her revenge on him and was turned into a nightingale by the gods
Compleat:
Paragon=Iets zonder weergaa
Tinct (teint)=Verf
Design=Opzet, voorneemen, oogmerk, aanslag, toeleg, ontwerp
Cloth of Arras=Tapissery
Mean=Gering, slecht
Voucher=1) (he that vouches one at law): eisscher
Voucher=2) (authentick deed, to prove an allegation): Echt bewys, om eene aanhaaling to bevestigen

Topics: nature, conscience

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Oberon
CONTEXT:
OBERON
I pray thee, give it me.
I know a bank where the wild thyme blows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows,
Quite overcanopied with luscious woodbine,
With sweet musk roses and with eglantine.
There sleeps Titania sometime of the night,
Lulled in these flowers with dances and delight.
And there the snake throws her enameled skin,
Weed wide enough to wrap a fairy in.
And with the juice of this I’ll streak her eyes
And make her full of hateful fantasies.
Take thou some of it and seek through this grove:
A sweet Athenian lady is in love
With a disdainful youth. Anoint his eyes.
But do it when the next thing he espies
May be the lady. Thou shalt know the man
By the Athenian garments he hath on.
Effect it with some care, that he may prove
More fond on her than she upon her love.
And look thou meet me ere the first cock crow.

DUTCH:
Daar werpt de slang vaak af haar glinsterhuid,
Dat kleed, dat nog niet ruimte een elf omsluit;
ik raak haar de oogen met dit bloemsap aan,
En vul haar ‘t brein niet ijdlen, dollen waan.

MORE:
Woodbine=Honeysuckle
Eglantine=Wild rose
Sometime of=For part of
Weed=Garment
Streak=Smear
Fond on=In love with
Compleat:
Hony-suckle=Geytenblad, memmetjes-kruyd, kamperfoely
Eglantine=Een egelantier
Weeds=Clothes
Streak=Bestreepen
To be fond of=Zeer met iets ingenomen zyn

Topics: nature, love

PLAY: Macbeth
ACT/SCENE: 1.5
SPEAKER: Lady Macbeth
CONTEXT:
Yet do I fear thy nature;
It is too full o’ th’ milk of human kindness
To catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great,
Art not without ambition, but without
The illness should attend it. What thou wouldst highly,
That wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false,
And yet wouldst wrongly win.

DUTCH:
doch ik ducht uw hart;
Dat is te vol van melk der menschlijkheid,
Om ‘t naaste pad te nemen.

MORE:
Milk of human kindness was invented by Shakespeare as a metaphor for a gentle human nature. (Shakespeare also refers to “milky gentleness” in King Lear.)
Schmidt:
Illness= Iniquity, wickedness
Holily=Piously, virtuously, agreeably to the law of God
Compleat:
Ill nature=Kwaadaardigheid

Topics: nature, ambition, invented or popularised, proverbs and idioms, still in use, good and bad

PLAY: King Lear
ACT/SCENE: 4.2
SPEAKER: Albany
CONTEXT:
GONERILL
I have been worth the whistle.
ALBANY
You are not worth the dust which the rude wind
Blows in your face. I fear your disposition.
That nature, which condemns its origin
Cannot be bordered certain in itself.
She that herself will sliver and disbranch
From her material sap perforce must wither
And come to deadly use.
Burgersdijk notes:
Weleer was ik nog ‘t fluiten waard. Een Engelsch spreekwoord zegt: „Het is een armzalige hond, die het fluiten niet waard is.”

DUTCH:
O Goneril,
je bent het stof niet waard dat ruwe wind
jou in ’t gezicht blaast./
Gij zijt het stof niet waard, dat de ruwe wind
U in ‘t gelaat blaast.

MORE:
Proverb: It is a poor dog that is not worth the whistling
Schmidt:
Dust (fig.)= for any worthless thing: “vile gold, dross, dust”
Sliver and disbranch=Detach, break or tear a branch from a tree
Wither and come to deadly use=Degenerate and die
Fear=Have concerns about
Compleat:
Disposition (of mind)=Gesteltenis van gemoed
Deadly=Doodelyk, gruwelyk

Topics: nature, insult, trust, loyalty, relationship

PLAY: Coriolanus
ACT/SCENE: 3.2
SPEAKER: Volumnia
CONTEXT:
VOLUMNIA
You might have been enough the man you are,
With striving less to be so; lesser had been
The thwartings of your dispositions, if
You had not show’d them how ye were disposed
Ere they lack’d power to cross you.
CORIOLANUS
Let them hang.
A PATRICIAN
Ay, and burn too.
MENENIUS
Come, come, you have been too rough, something too rough;
You must return and mend it.
FIRST SENATOR
There’s no remedy;
Unless, by not so doing, our good city
Cleave in the midst, and perish.
VOLUMNIA
Pray, be counsell’d:
I have a heart as little apt as yours,
But yet a brain that leads my use of anger
To better vantage.

DUTCH:
Ik heb een hart, zoo min gedwee als ‘t uwe,
Maar ook een brein, dat, hoe mijn toorn ook zied’,
Zelfs dit ten beste stuurt.

MORE:
Thwartings=Demands imposed by
Cross=Oppose
Compleat:
Thwarting=Dwarsdryving, dwarsdryvende
To cross=Tegenstreeven, dwars voor de boeg komen, dwarsboomen, wederestreeven, kruisen

Topics: nature, work, respect, dignity

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