{"id":4936,"date":"2016-04-06T10:10:45","date_gmt":"2016-04-06T06:10:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/?p=4936"},"modified":"2016-04-06T11:11:02","modified_gmt":"2016-04-06T07:11:02","slug":"some-things-you-didnt-know-about-shakespeare","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/some-things-you-didnt-know-about-shakespeare\/","title":{"rendered":"Some facts you didn’t know about Shakespeare"},"content":{"rendered":"

Did you know that some people think England\u2019s beloved Bard never existed? According to one longstanding theory the literary masterpieces attributed to Shakespeare were actually written by Edward De Vere, Earl of Oxford. Find out more about this hypothesis and explore other interesting aspects of Shakespeare\u2019s life.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Shakespeare married an older woman who was three months pregnant at the time.<\/h4>\n

In November 1582, 18-year-old William wed Anne Hathaway, a farmer\u2019s daughter eight years his senior. Instead of the customary three times, the couple\u2019s intention to marry was only announced at church once\u2014evidence that the union was hastily arranged because of Anne\u2019s eyebrow-raising condition. Six months after the wedding, the Shakespeares welcomed a daughter, Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith followed in February 1585. Little is known about the relationship between William and Anne, besides that they often lived apart and he only bequeathed her his \u201csecond-best bed\u201d in his will.<\/span><\/p>\n

Shakespeare\u2019s plays feature the first written instances of hundreds of familiar terms.<\/h4>\n

William Shakespeare is believed to have influenced the English language more than any other writer in history, coining\u2014or, at the very least, popularizing\u2014terms and phrases that still regularly crop up in everyday conversation. Examples include the words \u201cfashionable\u201d (\u201cTroilus and Cressida\u201d), \u201csanctimonious\u201d (\u201cMeasure for Measure\u201d), \u201ceyeball\u201d (\u201cA Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream\u201d) and \u201clackluster\u201d (\u201cAs You Like It\u201d); and the expressions \u201cforegone conclusion\u201d (\u201cOthello\u201d), \u201cin a pickle\u201d (\u201cThe Tempest\u201d), \u201cwild goose chase\u201d (\u201cRomeo and Juliet\u201d) and \u201cone fell swoop\u201d (\u201cMacbeth\u201d). He is also credited with inventing the given names Olivia, Miranda, Jessica and Cordelia, which have become common over the years (as well as others, such as Nerissa and Titania, which have not).<\/span><\/p>\n

We probably don\u2019t spell Shakespeare\u2019s name correctly\u2014but, then again, neither did he.<\/span><\/strong><\/h4>\n

Sources from William Shakespeare\u2019s lifetime spell his last name in more than 80 different ways, ranging from \u201cShappere\u201d to \u201cShaxberd.\u201d In the handful of signatures that have survived, the Bard never spelled his own name \u201cWilliam Shakespeare,\u201d using variations or abbreviations such as \u201cWillm Shakp,\u201d \u201cWillm Shakspere\u201d and \u201cWilliam Shakspeare\u201d instead. However it\u2019s spelled, Shakespeare is thought to derive from the Old English words \u201cschakken\u201d (\u201cto brandish\u201d) and \u201cspeer\u201d (\u201cspear\u201d), and probably referred to a confrontational or argumentative person.<\/span><\/p>\n

Shakespeare wore a gold hoop earring\u2014or so we think.<\/span><\/strong><\/h4>\n

Our notion of William Shakespeare\u2019s appearance comes from several 17th-century portraits that may or may not have been painted while the Bard himself sat behind the canvas. In one of the most famous depictions, known as the Chandos portrait after its onetime owner, the subject has a full beard, a receding hairline, loosened shirt-ties and a shiny gold hoop dangling from his left ear. Even back in Shakespeare\u2019s time, earrings on men were trendy hallmarks of a bohemian lifestyle, as evidenced by images of other Elizabethan artists. The fashion may have been inspired by sailors, who sported a single gold earring to cover funeral costs in case they died at sea.<\/span><\/p>\n

Amongst the 80 languages Shakespeare\u2019s works have been translated into the most obscure must be the constructed language of Klingon.<\/span><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Did you know that some people think England\u2019s beloved Bard …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4937,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[731,33,35,34],"tags":[1837,182,1836,1834,1835,795],"class_list":["post-4936","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-whichbookwouldyouread-bookoftheweek-themes-themeoftheweek-quotes-inspirationalquotes","category-profesionalnews","category-studentnews-didyouknow-facts-interestingwords-interestingpeople-onthisday-interestingwordsandexpressions","category-teachernews-trainingconferences-didyouknow-facts-interestingwords-interestingpeople-onthisday-interestingwordsandexpressions","tag-april-2016","tag-english-book-in-georgia","tag-facts-you-didnt-know-about-shakespeare","tag-shakespeare","tag-some-facts-about-william-shakespeare","tag-william-shakespeare","cat_731","cat_33","cat_35","cat_34"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4936"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4936\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4940,"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4936\/revisions\/4940"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4937"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4936"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/englishbookgeorgia.com\/blogebg\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}