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QUOTES FROM THE BARD

And then the whole quire hold their hips and laugh

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Puck
CONTEXT:
PUCK
Thou speak’st aright.
I am that merry wanderer of the night.
I jest to Oberon and make him smile
When I a fat and bean-fed horse beguile,
Neighing in likeness of a filly foal.
And sometime lurk I in a gossip’s bowl
In very likeness of a roasted crab,
And when she drinks, against her lips I bob
And on her withered dewlap pour the ale.
The wisest aunt telling the saddest tale
Sometime for three-foot stool mistaketh me.
Then slip I from her bum, down topples she,
And “Tailor!” cries, and falls into a cough,
And then the whole quire hold their hips and laugh,
And waxen in their mirth, and neeze, and swear
A merrier hour was never wasted there.
But, room, fairy! Here comes Oberon.

DUTCH:
En heel de kring, die eerst nog in de hand
Wou proesten, giert van ‘t lachen, en roept uit:
„Dat was daar van de preek een mooi besluit!” —
Maar, elfjen , daar komt Oberon! Op zij!

MORE:
Gossip’s bowl=Christening cup that would have held caudle (spiced ale), passed around to celebrate a birth. It later became linked to drunken, gossiping women.
Crab=Crab apple
Sad=Serious
Quire=Choir, troupe
Waxen=Increase
Neeze=Sneeze
Wasted=Spent
Compleat:
Gossip=Een dooophefster, gemoeder, peet
A drinking gossip=Een zuipster, dronkene slet
A tattling gossip=Een labbei, kakelaarster
To waste=Verwoesten, verquisten, verteeren, vernielen, doorbrengen
Quire=Een koor

Topics: manipulation, deceit
Categories: , |

Either I mistake your shape and making quite, or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Fairy
CONTEXT:
FAIRY
Either I mistake your shape and making quite,
Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite
Called Robin Goodfellow. Are not you he
That frights the maidens of the villagery,
Skim milk, and sometimes labour in the quern
And bootless make the breathless housewife churn,
And sometime make the drink to bear no barm,
Mislead night-wanderers, laughing at their harm?
Those that “Hobgoblin” call you, and “sweet Puck,”
You do their work, and they shall have good luck.
Are not you he?

DUTCH:
Erken ik wèl uw wijs van doen, uw leest,
Dan zijt ge wis die sluwe, plaagsche geest,
‘t Kahoutertjen.

MORE:
Proverb: Robin Goodfellow

Making=Substance
Shrewd=Mischievous
Villagery=Villages
Skim=Steal
Quern=Mill
Bootless=Pointless
Barm=Froth on beer
Compleat:
A good fellow=Een Vrolyke quant
Making=Maaksel
Shrewd=Loos, doortrapt, sneedig, vinnig, fel
Skim=Schuymen, de schuym afneemen
Quern=een Hand meulen
Bootless=Te vergeefs, vruchteloos
Barm=Gest

Topics: proverbs and idioms, appearance, manipulation, deceit

Categories: , , , |

I will condole in some measure. To the rest.

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Bottom
CONTEXT:
BOTTOM
What is Pyramus? A lover or a tyrant?
QUINCE
A lover that kills himself, most gallant, for love.
BOTTOM
That will ask some tears in the true performing of it.
If I do it, let the audience look to their eyes. I will
move storms. I will condole in some measure. To the
rest. Yet my chief humour is for a tyrant. I could play
Ercles rarely, or a part to tear a cat in to make all
split.
The raging rocks
And shivering shocks
Shall break the locks
Of prison gates.
And Phoebus’ car
Shall shine from far
And make and mar
The foolish Fates.
This was lofty! Now name the rest of the players. This
is Ercles’ vein, a tyrant’s vein. A lover is more
condoling.

DUTCH:
Als ik het doe, laten de toeschouwers dan hun zakdoeken klaar houden; ik zal stroomen laten vergieten; ik zal aandoenlijk wezen, dat het liefhebberij is. — Nu de volgenden;

MORE:
True performing=If it is performed well/properly
Look to their eyes=Be careful with their eyes
Condole=To mourn (Bottom means make the audience weep)
Humour=Tendency, inclination (to play)
Ercles=Hercules
Rarely=Excellently
Tear a cat=Rant and rave
Condoling=Grieving
Compleat:
To condole with one=Iemands rouw beklaagen
Humour (or disposition of the mind)=Humeur, gemoeds gesteldheid
Rarely well=Zeer wel, ongemeen wel

Topics: grief, persuasion, manipulation

Categories: , , |

I’ll put a girdle round about the Earth in forty minutes

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 2.1
SPEAKER: Puck
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.
PUCK
I’ll put a girdle round about the Earth
In forty minutes.

DUTCH:
Een veertigtal minuten, en ik ben
Den aardbol driemaal oni.

MORE:
Three of the moons of the planet Uranus are named after characters from the play, one of them being Puck, which is appropriate in light of this quote. (The others are Oberon and Titania.)

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
Put a girdle round=Go around
Girdle=Circle
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

Topics: manipulation, nature

Categories: , |

That will ask some tears in the true performing of it

PLAY: A Midsummer Night’s Dream
ACT/SCENE: 1.2
SPEAKER: Bottom
CONTEXT:
BOTTOM
What is Pyramus? A lover or a tyrant?
QUINCE
A lover that kills himself, most gallant, for love.
BOTTOM
That will ask some tears in the true performing of it.
If I do it, let the audience look to their eyes. I will
move storms. I will condole in some measure. To the
rest. Yet my chief humour is for a tyrant. I could play
Ercles rarely, or a part to tear a cat in to make all
split.
The raging rocks
And shivering shocks
Shall break the locks
Of prison gates.
And Phoebus’ car
Shall shine from far
And make and mar
The foolish Fates.
This was lofty! Now name the rest of the players. This
is Ercles’ vein, a tyrant’s vein. A lover is more
condoling.

DUTCH:
Dat zal een traan of ettelijk kosten, als het natuurlijk
gespeeld wordt. Als ik het doe, laten de toeschouwers
dan hun zakdoeken klaar houden;

MORE:
True performing=If it is performed well/properly
Look to their eyes=Be careful with their eyes
Condole=To mourn (Bottom means make the audience weep)
Humour=Tendency, inclination (to play)
Ercles=Hercules
Rarely=Excellently
Tear a cat=Rant and rave
Condoling=Grieving
Compleat:
To condole with one=Iemands rouw beklaagen
Humour (or disposition of the mind)=Humeur, gemoeds gesteldheid
Rarely well=Zeer wel, ongemeen wel

Topics: grief, persuasion, manipulation

Categories: , , |

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