February 9th, 2012 → 7:35 am @ Lea // No Comments

“I’ll so offend to make offense a skill,
Redeeeming time when men think least I will.”  – Henry IV

In my day job I’m an economics professor, with a specialty in environmental and energy economics.  My love of Shakespeare hardly ever crosses into this domain, so I was quite surprised when, sitting at my desk in my office yesterday, reading a technical industry publication, I came across the above quote used in reference to the Solyndra debacle and the federal government’s loan guarantee program for renewable energy.  I actually don’t think this was the best use of a Shakespeare quote, because it requires knowing a bit about Prince Harry (think: wild child) and the context of his ascent to king as Henry V (think: reformed wild child) to fully understand the meaning here (and how many people reading technical energy publications know that??).  But for me at least, this was fun to come across.

If anyone out there sees other uses of Shakespeare in odd contexts in their daily lives, please pass the quotes along!  I’d love to hear them, and I may even start posting some of these “guest” quotes now and again on the website.