William Shakespeare: You will never age for me, nor fade, nor die.
I have always derived great comfort from William Shakespeare. After a depressing visit to the mirror or an unkind word from a girlfriend or an incredulous stare in the street, I say to myself: 'Well. Shakespeare looked like shit.' It works wonders.
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date: Sometimes too hot the eye of heaven shines, And too often is his gold complexion dimm'd: And every fair from fair sometimes declines, By chance or natures changing course untrimm'd; By thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest; Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou growest: So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this and this gives life to thee.
Then of thy beauty do I question make,That thou among the wastes of time must go,Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake,And die as fast as they see others grow.
All men who repeat a line from Shakespeare are William Shakespeare
Since Shakespeare had a feel for revolutionary rhetoric, let’s all cry: “Peace, freedom and liberty!
Be not self-willed, for thou art much too fairTo be death’s conquest and make worms thine heir.
We will meet; and there we may rehearse mostobscenely and courageously.Shakespeare, Midsummer Night's Dream. Spoken by Bottom, Act I Sc. 2
Thou of thyself thy sweet self dost deceive.
LXXVSo are you to my thoughts as food to life,Or as sweet-season'd showers are to the ground;And for the peace of you I hold such strifeAs 'twixt a miser and his wealth is found.Now proud as an enjoyer, and anonDoubting the filching age will steal his treasure;Now counting best to be with you alone,Then better'd that the world may see my pleasure:Sometime all full with feasting on your sight,And by and by clean starved for a look;Possessing or pursuing no delightSave what is had, or must from you be took. Thus do I pine and surfeit day by day, Or gluttoning on all, or all away.