September 1st, 2012 → 9:23 am @ // No Comments

The quote today is not from Shakespeare, but about Shakespeare.  The British Museum in London is staging a major exhibition of Shakespeare and his world right now – if I were wealthy, the trips I’d take!  As I am not independently wealthy, however, and can’t just hop on over to London for a random weekend of fun, I did the next best thing and ordered the books published in conjunction with the exhibition.  One of which is called Angels & Ducats: Shakespeare’s Money & Medals.  It is from there that the following quote is taken.  It claims that Shakespeare wrote his plays for the reward of gold.  I never really thought of that as Shakespeare’s motivation before, which I guess is ironic since I am an economist after all. 
(Note when reading below that Will Summers was Henry VIII’s jester.)

    “Did not Will Summers break his wind for thee?
    And Shakespeare therefore write his comedy?
    All things acknowledge thy vast power divine
    (Great God of Money) whose most powerful shine
    Gives motion, life.” – Thomas Randolph, Hey for Honesty, 1627

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