QUOTES FROM THE BARD

PLAY: All’s Well that Ends Well
ACT/SCENE: 1.3
SPEAKER: Countess
CONTEXT:
COUNTESS
I will now hear; what say you of this gentlewoman?
STEWARD
Madam, the care I have had to even your content, I
wish might be found in the calendar of my past
endeavours; for then we wound our modesty and make
foul the clearness of our deservings, when of
ourselves we publish them.
COUNTESS
What does this knave here? Get you gone, sirrah:
the complaints I have heard of you I do not all
believe: ’tis my slowness that I do not; for I know
you lack not folly to commit them, and have ability
enough to make such knaveries yours.
CLOWN
‘Tis not unknown to you, madam, I am a poor fellow.
COUNTESS
Well, sir.
CLOWN
No, madam, ’tis not so well that I am poor, though
many of the rich are damned: but, if I may have
your ladyship’s good will to go to the world, Isbel
the woman and I will do as we may.

DUTCH:
[D]e klachten, die ik over u hoorde, wil ik niet alle gelooven; ‘t is uit lankmoedigheid, dat ik het niet doe; want ik weet, dat het u niet aan dwaasheid ontbreekt om zulke streken te begaan, en dat gij handigheid genoeg hebt om ze uit te voeren .

MORE:
Slowness=Dullness of intellect or comprehension (OED)
Folly=Perversity of judgment, absurdity
Knaveries=Roguish tricks
Even=Make even, even out
Compleat:
Slowness=Traagheyd, loomheyd
Folly (vice, excess, imperfection)=Ondeugd, buitenspoorigheid, onvolmaaktheid
Knavery=Guitery, boertery
To even=Effenen, vereffenen, effenmaaken, gelykmaaken

Topics: insult, offence, integrity, truth, trust, gullibility