William Shakespeare Persuasive Presentation M. K. McLaughlin

“The plays taken collectively establish Shakespeare as the foremost literary talent of his own Elizabethan age and even more impressively, as a genius whose creative achievement has never been surpassed in any age.” A. C. Bradley William Shakespeare- Persuasive Presentation

All high schools in the U.S. require the study of Shakespeare. Critic “In the literature of the world, nothing so rare, so huge, so full of wondrous excellence has ever appeared again.” George Wright Fact

Truth To be or not to be, that is the question. Neither a borrower nor a lender be The readiness is all The seven ages of man.

Ninety five percent of all universities in the English speaking world require a course in WS for a degree. Many foreign as well. Critic “Shakespeare was...the greatest genius the world ever saw for the tragic stage.” John Dennis Fact

Truth Age cannot wither her nor custom stale her infinite variety. All that lives must die. Answer me in one word. Parting is such sweet sorrow. Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once

All English speaking libraries contain more volumes of and about WS than those of any other writer. Critic “Shakespeare’s plays give us the other harmony of prose.” John Dryden Fact

Truth Brevity is the soul of wit. Thus conscience doth make cowards of us all. All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players on it. Catch a cold.

There are numerous libraries of Shakespeare (only) worldwide; in U.S., the Folger, Huntington, and Mercer Shakespeare libraries. Critic “Shakespeare’s range of reference is astonishing.” Bernard Beckerman Fact

Truth As cold as any stone. As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport. Et tu, Brute? To thine own self be true.

In any given year, there are around 200 professional productions of the plays in the English speaking world generating 50 million in profit. Amateur productions too numerous to count. Profits in the hundreds of millions. Critic “The most complete man of the theatre for all time” G. E. Bentley Fact

Truth The milk of human kindness The quality of mercy is not strained A rose by any other name would smell as sweet Frailty, thy name is woman.

The plays have been turned into operas, ballets, films,videos, and radio scripts. They have been translated into 156 languages. Critic “Shakespeare was the Homer or father of our dramatic poets.” John Dryden Fact

Truth The sound and the fury Is this a dagger that I see before me? But screw your courage to the sticking place and we’ll not fail. As one who loved not wisely, but too well.

Next to the writer of the BIBLE, Shakespeare is the most frequently quoted author in the English language. “ No other writer had such a mode of conveying thought and feeling to a great portion of the audience” Charles Lamb Fact Critic

Truth Young men’s love then lies not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes. When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions. Great floods have flown from simple sources. There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so

Shakespeare’s works outsell anything else sold in any English language bookstore in the world. “Few dramatists can lay claim to the universal reputation of William Shakespeare” Robert F. Wilson Fact Critic

Truth Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown. Neither a borrower nor a lender be. The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers. The course of true love never did run smooth. Kindness nobler ever than revenge.

Shakespeare’s own contemporaries, Jonson, Marlowe, Beaumont,Donne, and Fletcher all acknowledged him as a genius. “He was not of an age, but for all time.” Ben Jonson Fact Critic

Truth What a piece of work is a man. We are such stuff as dreams are made on and our little life is rounded with a sleep.