AS YOU LIKE IT
A monologue from the
play by William
Shakespeare
- JAQUES: All the world's a stage,
- And all the men and women merely players;
- They have their exits and their entrances,
- And one man in his time plays many parts,
- His acts being seven ages. At first, the infant,
- Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
- Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel
- And shining morning face, creeping like a snail
- Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
- Sighing like a furnace, with a woeful ballad
- Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
- Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
- Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
- Seeking the bubble reputation
- Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
- In fair round belly with good capon lined,
- With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
- Full of wise saws and modern instances;
- And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
- Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
- With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
- His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
- For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
- Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
- And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
- That ends this strange eventful history,
- Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
- Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
MORE MONOLOGUES BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE |
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