Mojo, Will, & Me

 You have undone a man of fourscore three,

That thought to fill his grave in quiet, --yea,

To die upon the bed my father died,

To lie close by his honest bones! but now

Some hangman must put on my shroud, and lay me

Where no priest shovels-in dust.—O cursed wretch,

That knew’st this was the prince, and wouldst adventure

To mingle faith with him!—Undone! Undone!

If I might die within this hour, I have lived

To die when I desire.

 -Shepherd

 The Winter’s Tale                                Act IV, scene iii, line 461

 

That’s a pretty wordy shepherd.

Fourscore three. That’s pretty old. Not quite as old as fourscore and seven, but still pretty old. Do you think that one of our favorite bardolaters got the idea for the start of he speech from here? Or was fourscore once a common expression. I surely do not know. Exciting to think that Will was present in the Gettysburg address though, isn’t it?

Where no priest shovels-in dust. That is to say unconsecrated ground. But no, not unconsecrated ground, it’s a place where no priest shovels dust in. I love his word work. I was going to call it wordplay, but it’s not play. It’s at a much higher level than play. But perhaps not work either. Word mastery. How’s that?

Ahhh, but are they really all his own words? We may never know.