Quick Script Tip!! Translate your lines!!

If all goes well, you won't be needing your script to remember your lines by the time August comes rolling around, but that shouldn't mean you won't be referencing it at all throughout Shakespeare Camp!! Throughout the week of camp, it's recommended you maintain, customize, and personalize your script!!

Write out the literal meanings and definitions of any phrases or words that are archaic or abstract. No Fear Shakespeare and Absolute Shakespeare are great resources for reference, but in the end, try to put it all into your own words.

"There is not one word apt"

During his writings, Shakespeare invented more than a thousand words and phrases now commonly used throughout our language. Scattered throughout his plays and poems were words which at the time were entirely new and weird, but are surprisingly common within our day to day conversation.

One example of this is from our own Midsummer's Night Dream, where Oberon is talking with Puck in Act III and Scene II. The earliest recording of the word "eyeball" is when Oberon commands Puck to "take from thence all error with his might // and make his eyeballs roll with wonted sight."

But obviously there are all sorts of other archaic words that didn't age quite as well. Some are just uniquely uncommon, while others are entirely unheard of in this day and age. In Act II and Scene I, the fairies continually wax on about different flowers, from "cowslip" to "woodbine" and "muskroses" with "eglantine." And even more later on, in Act III and Scene I, the mechanicals use all sorts of crude language, with Bottom singing about all sorts of nonsense such as "ousel-cocks" with "orange tawny bills!!"

But what about you guys? Do you have any particular lines that use any sort of weird word? Share it with us in the comments!! (If you want, grab that archaic dictionary or pull up a searchengine and find out it's definition!! Some of them have some very interesting history!!)