The Rape of Lucrece

by William Shakespeare

The Rape of Lucrece is a 1594 narrative poem. In 509 BC Lucretia was raped by the son of Tarquin the King of Rome. Lucretia was the wife of a Roman aristocrat. She committed suicide and her body was paraded around the Roman Forum. A revolt followed and the royal family was banished. Thus began the beginnings of the Roman republic. Shakespeare used this story as the basis for his poem.

Genres: Poetry, Shakespeare, Classics, Fiction, Plays, Historical Fiction, Literature

50 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1594

About the author

William Shakespeare was an English playwright, poet, and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon" (or simply "the Bard"). His extant works, including collaborations, consist of some 39 plays, 154 sonnets, three long narrative poems, and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. Shakespeare remains arguably the most influential writer in the English language, and his works continue to be studied and reinterpreted.
Shakespeare was born and raised in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire. At the age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children: Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith. Sometime between 1585 and 1592, he began a successful career in London as an actor, writer, and part-owner ("sharer") of a playing company called the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as the King's Men after the ascension of King James VI and I of Scotland to the English throne. At age 49 (around 1613), he appears to have retired to Stratford, where he died three years later. Few records of Shakespeare's private life survive; this has stimulated considerable speculation about such matters as his physical appearance, his sexuality, his religious beliefs, and even certain fringe theories as to whether the works attributed to him were written by others.
Shakespeare produced most of his known works between 1589 and 1613. His early plays were primarily comedies and histories and are regarded as some of the best works produced in these genres. He then wrote mainly tragedies until 1608, among them Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth, all considered to be among the finest works in the English language. In the last phase of his life, he wrote tragicomedies (also known as romances) and collaborated with other playwrights.
Many of Shakespeare's plays were published in editions of varying quality and accuracy during his lifetime. However, in 1623, John Heminge and Henry Condell, two fellow actors and friends of Shakespeare's, published a more definitive text known as the First Folio, a posthumous collected edition of Shakespeare's dramatic works that includes 36 of his plays. Its Preface was a prescient poem by Ben Jonson, a former rival of Shakespeare, that hailed Shakespeare with the now famous epithet: "not of an age, but for all time".

Reviews

[Ben · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's Shakespeare. I don't need to rave on about why this is excellent, but I'll settle for a little summary. In this poem, what is most important (and given the most of Shakespeare's words) is the reaction to the rape. The sorrow that is felt, the guilt, the anger, the despair. The lines themselves are so beautifully crafted; you feel that you could linger on them for half an hour each (which would, at 1906 lines, take you 953 hours, but 953 hours well spent!).

The reason that I'm giving this four stars instead of five, was in the failure of Shakespeare to keep up the humanity in the other characters. When Lucrece stabs herself, this is the reaction:

Stone-still, astonish'd with this deadly deed,
Stood Collatine and all his lordly crew

Not one goes to stop her; they just stand and watch her die, which given the length of time it must take for a stab wound to kill someone, is ridiculous, and inconsistent with Shakespeare's idea that love takes sacrifice as easily as a mouth takes water.

[Vaishali · Rating 1 out of 5]

Am I the only reader who disliked this self-absorbed, melodramatic swamp of a narrative?

Didn't hold my interest one bit. However, it did test my patience considerably. Somehow I didn't jump off a bridge by the 12th stanza.

With such a marketable title, why didn't he make this into a play?


.

[Théo d'Or]

Why, Collatine, is woe the cure for woe ?

Do wounds help wounds, or grief help grievous deeds ?

Is it revenge to give thyself a blow

For his foul act by whom thy fair wife bleeds ?

Such childish humour from weak minds proceeds :

Thy wretched wife mistook the matter so,

To slay herself, that should have slain her foe.

[Roman Clodia · Rating 4 out of 5]

'Come, Philomel, that sing'st of ravishment: / Make thy sad grove in my dishevelled hair.'

[Elentarri · Rating 4 out of 5]

*****SPOILERS*****


'The Rape of Lucrece' was published in 1594.  This tragic narrative poem is set just before the establishment of the Roman Republic in 509 BC, and is based on the events as described in Ovid's Fasti and Livy's History of Rome.  Shakespeare begins the poem with a short prose section ("The Argument") which summarizes the entire Roman story of Lucrece.  This is followed by the verse section which only deals with a portion of the story.  The poem's subject is the rape of the legendary Roman noblewoman Lucretia by the heir to Rome's throne and the fallout thereof (i.e. the suicide of Lucretia, the banishment of the royal family, and the founding of the Roman Republic).  The poem is an evocative study of shame, fear, love and pride. Shakespeare makes abundant use of animal imagery and literary devices to produce a emotive and tragic mini-epic verse rendition of the Rape of Lucrece.  A lovely poem, I just wish the original story had Lucrece seek vengeance or at least justice, and not killing herself.

[Ygraine · Rating 4 out of 5]

my thoughts keep returning to the line "life imprisoned in a body dead"; the image is a painting that depicts hecuba's grief at the death of priam and the sack of troy, the only image in which lucrece can find a mirror to her own grief, but the words are shared, belonging as much to lucrece and to lavinia as to the painted hecuba. these are narratives of female trauma, of continued existence in a body from which the self has been violently displaced, of lucrece's desire to destroy the flesh to free the suffering soul and of the impossibility of lavinia's voiceless, choiceless life.

[Randyy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Phenomenal insight into the psyche of victim and attacker. Beautifully written. Wonderful uses of figurative language that provokes thought. Still relevent and can be applied to present day

[Tori Samar · Rating 4 out of 5]

I count it a real reading victory to have finished and appreciated this poem considering it was what derailed me several years ago in my first attempt to read the whole Shakespeare canon. The military images, in particular everything related to the Trojan War, especially captured my imagination.

(Lit Life Patreon SIAY 2023-2024)

[Kay Pelham · Rating 5 out of 5]

Didn't think I'd like at all a story with this subject matter, but I was just wowed by it . Shakespeare's words, rhythm, and rhymes, plus listening to Richard Burton read it so perfectly, made this a truly metaphorical rendering of the story. The images and ideas kept me in the story and yet detached.

[Jazzy Lemon · Rating 5 out of 5]

A brutal and touching poem based on an historical event.

[Anand · Rating 4 out of 5]

This poem shows that Shakespeare knew how to write epic; this could also show why he did not stick to it in any sustained way, such as Spenser or Milton did, and why he chose the drama as his greatest mode. Tarquin’s psychological self-justification and torment, and Lucrecia’s traumatized soliloquizing, are brilliant in the minor-epic and show how the Shakespearean dramatic mode stretches and breaks the limits of the more “epic” story he is telling. The outward political story is how the personal crime of rape led to the downfall of the Roman kingdom. The poetic story is of how a man’s tormented lust drove him to what he knew would be his pain, and of a woman’s suffering that would lead to her shame and death. This dramatic, “poetic” story exists together with the political story, and this union of personal and political, which forms so much of the texture of Shakespeare’s drama, would be more successful, seamless, and vivid in the dramas. Nevertheless, in Lucrece there is not only a primer for this fusion of the personal and political but also an exquisite poem about a dark theme of serious import.

The poem begins thus:

From the besiegèd Ardea all in post,
Borne by the trustless wings of false desire,
Lust-breathèd Tarquin leaves the Roman host
And to Collatium bears the lightless fire
Which, in pale embers hid, lurks to aspire
And girdle with embracing flames the waist
Of Collatine’s fair love, Lucrece the chaste.

The poem begins with, and for some time sticks with, Tarquin in his pursuit and achievement of his sick desire. He is connected to fire and flame, and his lust will burn up Lucrece, and, in the end, will burn up himself and his kingship. “Trustless” and “false” he is, not only to a wife and host, but also to his people.

Rape does not seem to be treated overtly in the Shakespearean canon, except in here and in Titus Andronicus, and in both cases rape of a woman is tied to the rape of a country by tyrannical leaders. Sexual and personal violence is connected to personal violence. And in both works that violation must be avenged by the deposition of said tyrants in some manner. Brutus the “idiot” will become the republican hero who deposes the tyrants and brings in the republic of Rome. Titus, in his rage and madness, slaughters Tamora and Saturninus and their sons, paving the way for Lucius to bring new rulership.

(Both works, incidentally, relate to that greatest of tragedies, Hamlet, for while there is no rape, there is a kind of sexual immorality that is tied to political immorality, which the avenger, a “mad” hero who is displaced, must take the law into his own hands and depose the tyrant responsible for this sexual and political immorality).

That intense connection of the personal and the political lifts up Lucrece in a certain magnitude above Venus and Adonis, though the two poems are best read together and in relation to one another. Lucrece seems more brilliant in showing the tormented and conflicted mind at work, the troubled mind at work, the devastating power of tyranny and violence, and the uneasy victories one can achieve at the end of all of this pain and drama.

The meditation of Tarquin right up to the moment he is about to commit his crime, which runs from line 190 to 280, reminds me of something that a character like Macbeth would think of, or Brutus, as if this was the interim between the first motion he makes and the acting of his dreadful rape. The flow of it, in the rhyme royal (ababbcc) stanza, has a certain energy that goes beyond the restrictions and structures of the stanza:

“Fair torch, burn out thy light, and lend it not
To darken her whose light excelleth thine.
And die, unhallowed thoughts, before you blot
With your uncleanness that which is divine.
Offer pure incense to so pure a shrine.
Let fair humanity abhor the deed
That spots and stains love’s modest snow-white weed.
…………………………………………………………….
“What win I if I gain the thing I seek?
A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy.
Who buys a minute’s mirth to wail a week
Or sells eternity to get a toy?
For one sweet grape who will the vine destroy?
Or what fond beggar, but to touch the crown,
Would with the scepter straight be strucken down?
…………………………………………………………….
“Then, childish fear, avaunt! Debating, die!
Respect and Reason, wait on wrinkled Age.
My heart shall never countermand mine eye.
Sad pause and deep regard beseems the sage;
My part is youth, and beats these from the stage.
Desire my pilot is, beauty my prize;
Then who fears sinking where such treasure lies?”

Shakespeare will later master the workings of the mind in this sort of anguish and trouble, but here he creates something solid in the form of a minor epic. He works against the constraints of an older, more obviously “rhetorical” rhetoric, which he will later make more subtle, as the critic Sir Frank Kermode in Shakespeare’s Language argued. The orations and the rhetorical speeches thus are a preliminary to greater achievements and are superlative in their own right.

The intensity of the drama of course makes it clear that Tarquin is the guilty man who transgresses all right and conscience to win his lust, and afterward he is stricken with guilt for what he has done. The rest of the poem focuses on the trauma of Lucrece, and gives her the great oration against Night, Opportunity, and Time. We are given a painful yet touching portrait of a woman who has suffered a violation; perhaps this is the single Shakespearean work that seems to focus so intensely on the victim of this particular violation. The speech is both intensely rhetorical and intensely pained:

“O Opportunity, thy guilt is great!
’Tis thou that execut’st the traitor’s treason;
Thou sets the wolf where he the lamb may get;
Whoever plots the sin, thou ’point’st the season.
’Tis thou that spurn’st at right, at law, at reason,
And in thy shady cell, where none may spy him,
Sits Sin, to seize the souls that wander by him.

“Thou makest the vestal violate her oath;
Thou blowest the fire when temperance is thawed;
Thou smother’st honesty, thou murd’rest troth.
Thou foul abettor, thou notorious bawd,
Thou plantest scandal and displacest laud.
Thou ravisher, thou traitor, thou false thief,
Thy honey turns to gall, thy joy to grief.

“Thy secret pleasure turns to open shame,
Thy private feasting to a public fast,
Thy smoothing titles to a raggèd name,
Thy sugared tongue to bitter wormwood taste.
Thy violent vanities can never last.
How comes it, then, vile Opportunity,
Being so bad, such numbers seek for thee?
…………………………………���……………………….
“Guilty thou art of murder and of theft,
Guilty of perjury and subornation,
Guilty of treason, forgery, and shift,
Guilty of incest, that abomination—
An accessory by thine inclination
To all sins past and all that are to come,
From the creation to the general doom.

This repetition can feel strained for the reader not quite used to this, but it works as it shows the creation of a kind of language intended to cope with this pain. It reminds me of Marcus’ long speech in Titus Andronicus; at once it feels like the work of a poet who has not yet learned the silences and complexities of the mature work, and at the same time it is but the expressiveness of beauty and art responding to deep pain, of the ordering of chaotic emotional experience into flowing verse.

I think also of the works that show great aesthetic beauty in the depiction of and analysis of atrocity and crime. I think of the poetic prose and gorgeousness of Nabokov’s Lolita as it works through the sickened experience and mind of Humbert Humbert and of Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian as it embellishes the grisly violence of its brutish thugs in ornate and allusive language. Shakespeare would of course create his masterpiece of blood and crime in Macbeth, one of his most poetic and intense tragedies and plays. But it does bring me to think of that perennial question of how art, beauty, and crime relate to one another, especially with regard to such personal and heinous crime like this. Of course, Lucrece is more decorous than Nabokov’s or McCarthy’s novels, but still, the poem did make me think of that relation. In fact, the poem itself, through the ekphrasis of the painting of Troy, invites such a thought. It is a beautiful painting about one of the greatest devastations ever in legend; so Lucrece is a beautiful poem about one of the greatest personal devastations and moments ever in history.

Also, the psychology of trauma is closely and lucidly treated in the context of its Roman world of honor, shame, and appearance. This is, along with Titus Andronicus, the first of Shakespeare’s explorations of a world such as ancient Rome, a world that often did things differently from the relatively Christian world of Elizabethan England. Suicide, and the suicide of Lucrece, is not a damnable sin but a regaining of a kind of honor. Lucrece cannot help but feel guilty and defiled, though the poem makes clear, and the males agree, that she is completely innocent of any desire or intention. Thus, she must restore her honor, the honor of her household and her husband, by killing herself, and having her suffering avenged.

I think every Shakespearean reader should at least read Lucrece (and Venus and Adonis) not just to take up a completist project (though that is a worthy endeavor) but also to experience one of the treats of Elizabethan poetry, a work that was acclaimed in its time, lost some of its prominence, but which has enough merit and beauty to deserve serious attention. It is one of the best “minor epics” in its genre, I feel, and one of Shakespeare’s most interesting works. For in its pain and seriousness there’s an ever-present and beautiful sweetness.

[Salem]

nw jak ocenić czytałam do licencjatu

[Diana Long · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my first read of this work. Read along with the Audible version of the poem performed by the Marlow Professional Players. Excellent and enjoyable even though a dark subject.

[Katja Labonté]

Having read the detailed syllabus on Wikipedia, I didn’t think this was worth my reading, since I probably will dislike it (suicide is NOT an answer, people...).

[V Massaglia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a very powerful, beautiful, and moving poem. With the challenge of each stanza having seven lines in iambic pentameter, and its rhyme scheme of ababbcc, Shakespeare's use of language and metaphor is clear and surprisingly very approachable. It's an extremely sad poem and he brings the tragedy of events to life. The values of lust, loyalty, virtue, shame, and vengeance are explored in-depth with care.

When visiting the Minneapolis Institute of Arts (MIA) over the years, I've always been moved by a Rembrandt’s ‘Lucretia’: http://www.artsunlight.com/NN/N-R0009... The poem and painting truly compliment each other.

Background info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rape... and http://www.cummingsstudyguides.net/xR....

Favorite quotes:

“What win I, if I gain the thing I seek?
A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy.
Who buys a minute's mirth to wail a week?
Or sells eternity to get a toy?
For one sweet grape who will the vine destroy?
Or what fond beggar, but to touch the crown,
Would with the sceptre straight be strucken down?”

“Beauty itself doth of itself persuade
The eyes of men without orator.”

“But no perfection is so absolute
That some inpurity doth not pollute.”

“This earthly saint, adored by this devil,  Little suspecteth the false worshipper;  For unstain’d thoughts do seldom dream on evil.”

“She conjures him by high almighty Jove, By knighthood, gentry, and sweet friendship’s oath,  By her untimely tears, her husband’s love,  By holy human law, and common troth, By heaven and earth, and all the power of both,  That to his borrow’d bed he make retire, And stoop to honour, not to foul desire.”

“Mine enemy was strong, my poor self weak, / And far the weaker with so strong a fear”

“That life was mine which thou hast here deprived”


"Her contrite sighs unto the clouds bequeath’d
 Her winged sprite, and through her wounds doth fly
 Life’s lasting date from cancell’d destiny."

[Mariana]

La extraordinaria y emocionante narración del hecho vil y criminal que cometio Tarquino contra Lucrecia se convierte en una poesia de gran belleza a pesar de lo escalofriante de la historia.
El texto está basado en la leyenda del origen de Roma, las luchas por el poder y el papel de la mujer en la época. Muestra la miseria del hombre, sus bajezas, el poder, el abuso, mezclado en la historia romana que terminó con el reinado de los reyes en Roma y que propiciaron, por tanto la instauración de la republica romana.
Muchos datos los busque a medida que iba leyendo este mosaico de sentimientos y pasiones que escribio tan magistralmente Shakespeare. Es la primera obra que leo de este encumbrado escritor.
Siempre me pregunto que hace que un libro que permanece 5 años en mi biblioteca, me despierte el interes a leerlo..

[Stacy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The poetry is unmatched anywhere in literature. It's incredible. I gave this particular poem four stars only because of the terrible nature of it! Ugh!
Spoilers ******
It makes me so angry that she kills herself! She did nothing wrong! It just rips me apart, which I suppose is what a good (awful) book does. 🤷‍♀️ So heart breaking. Beautiful poetry.

[Joe · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not a very nice story

[Freya · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had intended to use this in my EPQ, but as it isn't strictly Classical literature I probably won't.
However, here are my general thoughts:

The emotion demonstrated by Lucretia and those around her in this poem is incredibly written. I felt her anger, pain, despair and that was purely due to the awesome figurative and descriptive language used by Shakespeare. I also loved how the personal crime of lust and rape was translated to a political crime- I think if he wasn't so talented at drama, Shakespeare could have been known for epic poetry. The connection was used throughout the poem to show reactions and to switch between characters, even the rapist. I felt that Lucretia's long laments were deeply poignant and painful, but as Shakespeare was attempting to imitate Greek tragic plays and an epic, the trauma was sometimes too melodramatic, or unbelievable: would the male characters really watch the suicide with no intervention? Other reviews I have read have compared the poem to 'Lolita', as the indulgent and beautiful writing is harshly juxtaposed by the quick and brutal crime itself, but I would disagree with that. Unlike 'Lolita', the writing cannot distract from the topic itself, as the trauma and pain is central to the poem.

I found it refreshing that Lucretia was believed and Tarquin is punished for his actions by those in power. Although I read it under the topic of 'women in Classical tragedy', I found a few parallels with "Tess of the D'Urbevilles" so would recommend it for studying that too! I didn't give it five stars as I think Shakespeare was swinging between epic and drama, and I felt it was a bit melodramatic at times.

[Eilidh Fyfe · Rating 2 out of 5]

some stars for word, much less for subject content i am exhausted with the continuous themes of violation of womens bodies xxxx

[Jacky Chan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm sorry, but my boy Bill's poetry really outshone his contemporaries (*cough* self-crowned laureate SPENSER *cough*) - there are some really breathtaking lines here (as elsewhere).

[Anastasija · Rating 3 out of 5]

Honor, virtue, power, and the devastating consequences of betrayal and violence; and the recognizable Shakespeare’s vivid imagery and deeply emotional monologues.

[A. · Rating 1 out of 5]

Honestly, I read this because I'm trying to work my way through everything written by Shakespeare that's still available. I just really don't like pretty words of an asshole trying to make rape sound nice, followed by pretty words of a traumatized woman who's convinced the only way to "fix" things after she's been raped is to kill herself. Different culture, different customs, different views of honour and certainly the position of women, but the way this particular story is framed in Roman history is very different from the way Shakespeare frames it. In Roman history, Lucretia's death is the catalyst for the Roman nobility to abolish the monarchy and establish the republic, as Tarquin's crime represents the excesses of a royal family that no longer respects their people. Lucretia's suicide leads directly to the rebirth of Rome.

Shakespeare, on the other hand, ends the story shortly after Lucretia's husband and father vow vengeance on Tarquin, and while there are references to the fall-out, Shakespeare just stops there. Tarquin's motivation, according to Shakespeare, is more out of a desire for Lucretia than his need to assert power over Lucretia's husband--Shakespeare skips over the more typical characterization of Tarquin as a man of excess and pride for whom this is not his first crime. In some respects, it's an interesting look at a man of one culture (Elizabethan England) writing a story based on another culture (pre-Republican Rome), over 1500 years distant from him, and using his own cultural assumptions to frame the motivations of the characters.

Overall, I didn't like the poem. I can find it interesting in some respects, but mostly, it's just depressing and frustrating to read and ends abruptly.

[Mythlee · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's a fairly sympathetic portrait of Lucrece, all things considered, and yet -- and yet --

The poem makes clear Lucrece is utterly blameless for the rape. It's all on Tarquin. Even her husband, her father, and their friends recognize this and believe her. But she doesn't believe it, not deep down inside where it counts. So the vast majority of the poem focuses on her torment and the building of her resolution to commit suicide.

That goes on too long for my taste; it feels artificial, almost mocking of her dilemma merely because it goes on so long. Shakespeare spends a full 30 stanzas on a piece of artwork in her home. (She goes over and looks at it; it's described in great detail, along with her reaction to it and interaction with it.)

As another example, I'd say her husband and father arguing over who has a greater right to mourn her also further trivializes her fate.

One horribly ironic detail stuck with me from my prior reading of the poem: Her maid is quickly and easily summoned once Lucrece is able to speak or cry out. Turns out that a single scream would have availed her much better than her attempt to plead and reason with Tarquin at length.

I'd forgotten the end of the poem - for all their talk of revenge, they merely banish the Tarquin. So Lucrece's death results in Rome becoming a republic (yay), but Tarquin does not seem sufficiently punished for the suffering he has caused.

[Olosta]

I confess, this was not an easy poem to read - both because of the content and because of the style it is written in. But it was a rewarding reading, at the end. Shakespeare brings here powerful images to life but also shows his craftsmanship. He selects a historical event (banishing the Roman Kings and establishing a Republic in the 6th century BC) and uses it is as a basis for a private affair that ultimately leads to the demise of the Roman Kingdom.
I found it very interesting, how he handled the subject of rape, of the perpetrator and the victim. Although the first part of the poem consist mainly of Tarquin's musings why he shouldn't violate Lucrece (but he still does), Shakespeare makes sure from the very beginning to establish Tarquin as a villain without any doubts. The second part takes us through Lucrece's monologue, where the reader again has no doubt that she is a victim an in no way to blame for what has happened. When her violation is revealed to her husband and other Roman nobles, they too see the blame solely in Tarquin, and disagree with her decision to take her own life to save her honour.
Although Lucrece is revenged at the end, Tarquin (and his whole fmaily) is "only" sent int exile - but I guess that is the appropriate solution of the plot for the times when the poem was written.

[Greg · Rating 3 out of 5]

My appreciation for Shakespeare has grown with listening to his works via audio. The readers, I think, get it so right, they get it in a way that my mind doesn't read it. So it's audio for me concerning Shakespeare! As for this poem, Lucrece's pain is especially visceral, but, as another reviewer here points out, it seems those watching Lucrece in pain, dying, don't help, simply perhaps for the sake of the poem/story itself. I just don't know.

[Vanessa J. · Rating 3 out of 5]

If the name of this poem doesn't tell you what it is about, then I don't know what will. This one was very moving and sad. Everything that has rape inside is something that will make me feel bad, because, I mean, it's rape. Filled with Shakespeare's amazing writing, a depressing tale that will make your heart go warm of pity.

Great done, William.

[Sandra Miksa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing dramatic, political, and emotional narrative poem.
I really admire how Shakespeare can make his dramatic poem gruesome and beautiful through his poetic language.
I love his portrayal of Lucrece and admire that he has given her a voice.
Honestly, this was really worth the read.

[Eyehavenofilter · Rating 3 out of 5]

You know it just saddens my heart that this is even a subject considered for a Shakespeare play. WTF?
I am so disappointed in you, William!

[Jake McAtee · Rating 3 out of 5]

‘What win I if I gain the thing I seek?
A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy.
Who buys a minute’s mirth to wail a week,
Or sells eternity to get a toy?