Though I’m sure everyone marked their calendars weeks ago and need no reminding, today is William Shakespeare’s birthday—as best anyone can figure. Accordingly, it has been dubbed “Talk like Shakespeare Day” by…ah…by whoever it is that dubs these things.
[pause for fact checking]
Okay, apparently this observance was created by Richard M. Daley, the mayor of Chicago. Your guess is as good as mine what this guy’s motive was.
But whatever the reason, let’s just run with it. For the remainder of the day, speak only in Shakespearean prose. It’s only early modern English, after all. The link to the news stories above gives some pointers on how to stay in character and still get your point across. There’s even a few links to sites that will assist you in translating most common phrases.
My favorite is the random Shakespearean insult generator. In addition to the blog title, Here’s a few it spat our for me this morning:
Thou obscene ill-nurtured eunuch!
Thou arrogant toad-spotted malt-worm!
Thou reeky deformed bugbear!
Thou loggerheaded fly-bitten hedge-pig!
Thou lascivious boil-brained withered-hag!
Thou currish pox-marked strumpet!
Thou bawdy rump-fed bag of guts!
It reminds me of one of my favorite SportsCenter commercials (and goodness knows there’s a lot of good ones) starring Scott Van Pelt.
Come to think of it, he’s been in several of my favorites.
And in case you never saw Kenny Mayne’s short-lived episodes:
Yeah, this isn't one of my more cohesive posts, but I felt like I needed to throw another log on the fire. Don't want the interested masses to get bored and stop reading.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
Truly, Thou wayward clay-brained drunkard! This was interesting and I think I can have some fun with this. And I'll try to throw my log in soon.
ReplyDelete