20 Random facts about William Shakespeare
- William Shakespeare was born on 23 April 1564 and died on 23 April 1616, evidence suggests.
- More than 80 spelling variations are recorded for Shakespeare's name, from 'Shappere' to 'Shaxberd'.
- Shakespeare's name may have meant "Shaker of Spears," indicating warrior ancestry.
- Shakespeare, one of literature's greatest figures, never attended university.
- Many of Shakespeare's plays are based on others earlier plays, histories, and poems. This was common practice at that time.
- London football club Tottenham were formed in 1882, and originally named after Harry Hotspur - one of Shakespeare's characters in Henry IV.
- Shakespeare and his company built TWO Globe Theatres.
- During his life, Shakespeare wrote 37 plays and 154 sonnets.
- Sonnets are typically love poems, but Shakespeare's are often self-loathing, bitter, and even homoerotic.
- Although Shakespeare is usually considered an Elizabethan playwright, much of his greatest work was produced after James I took the throne. Thus, Shakespeare could be more accurately considered Jacobean.
- Macbeth is thought to be one of the most produced plays ever, with a performance beginning somewhere in the world every four hours!
- Elizabethan theatergoers could purchase apples and pears to eat during the show. These snacks were often thrown at the actors by dissatisfied members of the audience.
- Boys and men played all the parts in Shakespeare's plays.
- The motto of the Globe Theatre was totus mundus agit histrionem (all the world's a stage).
- The Globe burned to the ground on June 29, 1613, set fire by a cannon shot during a performance of Shakespeare's Henry VIII
- Based on textual evidence in the sonnets and some plays, some believe that Shakespeare was bisexual.
- Shakespeare's works contain the first ever recordings of 2,035 English words, including critical, frugal, excellent, barefaced, assassination and countless.
- Countless excellent phrases, now commonly used, occur first in Shakespeare, including one fell swoop, vanish into thin air, play fast and loose, be in a pickle, foul play, tower of strength, flesh and blood, be cruel to be kind, and with bated breath.
- Shakespeare's son, Hamnet, died in 1596. His daughter Susanna died in 1649. His younger daughter Judith had three children, but all died before their mother and without children. His granddaughter Elizabeth, daughter of Susanna, died childless in 1670, ending the William Shakespeare line.
- Shakespeare was buried in the Holy Trinity Church, Stratford-upon-Avon. He put a curse on anyone daring to move his body from that final resting place. His epitaph was:
Good friend for Jesus' sake forbear,
To dig the dust enclosed here:
Blest be the man that spares these stones,
And curst be he that moves my bones.
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