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Shakespeare
Titles

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Overall
Clowns, Fools and Jesters
Titles
Characters

Shakespeare: Titles

Overall

This section considers Shakespeare's works as a whole, and the individual plays in that context.

Number of plays in the First Folio (1623) Click to show or hide the answer
The only one in the First Folio that was not written entirely by Shakespeare Click to show or hide the answer
Play of 1607 or 1608, not included in the First Folio: scholars believe Shakespeare wrote about 50% of it (the second half) Click to show or hide the answer
Collaboration with John Fletcher, 1613, not included in the First Folio Click to show or hide the answer
Lost play, written before 1598 – possibly a sequel to one of the surviving comedies [Love's Labour's Lost], or an alternative title for another surviving play (Much Ado about Nothing, or All's Well that Ends Well) Click to show or hide the answer
Lost play, known to have been performed by the King's Men in 1613, attributed to Shakespeare by John Fletcher (1653); based on a character in Don Quixote. A production staged in Los Angeles in 2002 used a 1611 manuscript entitled The Second Maiden's Tragedy, usually attributed to Thomas Middleton but which one Shakespeare expert had identified as being the missing play Click to show or hide the answer
1796 play by William Henry Ireland, purporting to be a lost work of Shakespeare Click to show or hide the answer
Maximum number of plays that Shakespeare may have had a hand in (not including the one named immediately above!) Click to show or hide the answer

Notes:

  1. Of the 36 First Folio plays, all but one (Henry VIII) were entirely by Shakespeare. There are also two more collaborations (not in the First Folio), and two "lost" plays. So the number of plays he had a hand in is between 36 and 40, and the total number he wrote in their entirety is between 35 and 37
  2. The second impression of the Third Folio (1664) added seven plays to the original 36. One was Pericles Prince of Tyre, but the other six are not now believed to have been by Shakespeare. They are:

Locrine, The London Prodigal, The Puritan, Sir John Oldcastle, Thomas Lord Cromwell, and A Yorkshire Tragedy

Nobody knows for certain which play Shakespeare wrote first, but it was probably one of these seven:

Titus AndronicusAll's Well that Ends Well The Two Gentlemen of Verona
Love's Labours LostThe Taming of the Shrew Henry VI Part II
The Comedy of Errors   

The last play that Shakespeare wrote in its entirety (probably) Click to show or hide the answer
The last of the 36 First Folio plays to have been written Click to show or hide the answer

Note: Henry VIII and The Two Noble Kinsmen were both written around 1613–14, in collaboration with John Fletcher. Henry VIII was included in the First Folio (1623), but The Two Noble Kinsmen was not

Shakespeare's replacement as the principal playwright of the King's Men, and (probably) his collaborator in Henry VIII and The Two Noble Kinsmen Click to show or hide the answer
Probable collaborator in Pericles, Prince of Tyre Click to show or hide the answer
Shakespeare's shortest play Click to show or hide the answer
Shakespeare's longest play Click to show or hide the answer
Shakespeare character with most lines (in one play)
Comic character in Henry IV, Henry V and Merry Wives of Windsor (the only Shakespeare character to appear in three plays; also speaks more lines, in total, than any other) Click to show or hide the answer
Place named twice in titles (Merchant of, and Othello the Moor of) Click to show or hide the answer
Only British place named in a title Click to show or hide the answer
Only animal named in a title Click to show or hide the answer

Clowns, Fools and Jesters

Possibly the most popular characters in Shakespeare – among question setters, if not audiences. In which plays did the following appear?

Costard – a swain (country bumpkin) at the court of Navarre; arrested in the first scene for flouting the king's proclamation that all men of the court avoid the company of women for three years, he proceeds to make fools of them all (along with Moth the page and Jaquenetta, a country wench) Click to show or hide the answer
Feste – referred to as "a fool that the Lady Olivia's father took much delight in", elsewhere only as "Fool" or "Clown" Click to show or hide the answer
Grumio – a manservant, who joins with his master in making his marriage a mockery, dressing himself up madly and being his only companion to the ceremony Click to show or hide the answer
Launce and Speed – servants to the title characters; the former is not the brightest, and often mixes up his words; the latter is rarely quiet, and given to endless wordplay Click to show or hide the answer
Launcelot Gobbo – a quick–witted young fellow who teases his blind father, pretending to be someone else Click to show or hide the answer
Lavatch – a poor servant to the Countess of Roussilon, who never answers a question directly if he can get some mileage out of the answer Click to show or hide the answer
Peter – a servant who begs the musicians to play some merry music for him, in the play's most tragic scene, and taunts them when they refuse Click to show or hide the answer
Pompey Bum – a pimp in a thriving Viennese brothel, who claims to be a mere "tapster" (bartender) and has a large rear end Click to show or hide the answer
Thersites – a foul–mouthed Greek servant, and the most determinedly unpleasant person in all of Shakespeare; essentially a licensed fool Click to show or hide the answer
Touchstone – jester to Duke Frederick, and a mocking mirror to the affectedly melancholy Jaques Click to show or hide the answer
Trinculo – jester to the King of Naples, who plots with the king's butler (with whom he shares a taste for liquor) Click to show or hide the answer
Yorick – deceased court jester, described as "a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy" Click to show or hide the answer

Titles

This section covers detailed questions about the plays themselves.

Details the tortuous (but ultimately successful) courtship of Bertram, the son of a Spanish countess, by the countess's low–born ward Helena Click to show or hide the answer
Set in the forest of Arden Click to show or hide the answer
"All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players": Jaques, a cynical nobleman (one of the principal characters), in
Ends with the marriage of the two principal characters, Rosalind and Orlando
Features two pairs of male twins – Antipholus and his servant Dromio, both of Syracuse, and their twin brothers Antipholus and his servant Dromio, both of Ephesus – and much confusion concerning their identities Click to show or hide the answer
The only Shakespeare play to mention America (by that name)
"We came into the world like brother and brother; And now let's go hand in hand, not one before another" is the last line of
Volumnia, Virgilian and Young Martius are (respectively) the mother, wife and son of the title character, in Click to show or hide the answer
Guiderius and Arviragus – both legendary and possibly historical characters – are sons of the title character in Click to show or hide the answer
The courtiers Rosencrantz and Guildenstern appear in Click to show or hide the answer
"Neither a borrower nor a lender be", and (three lines later) "This above all: to thine own self be true": Polonius to his son Laërtes, in
"For this relief much thanks; 'tis bitter cold / And I am sick at heart." Francisco, on being relieved by Bernardo at the end of his watch, in the opening scene of
"The play's the thing / Wherein I'll catch the conscience of the King"
Owen Glendower, who boasts that he can "call spirits from the vasty deep" appears in Click for more information Click to show or hide the answer
Focuses on events immediately before and after the Battle of Agincourt Click to show or hide the answer
Catherine and Alice converse in French in
Was insulted (probably mistakenly) by a gift of tennis balls from Charles, the Dauphin of France – an actual historical incident
The phrase "band of brothers" first appears in
"First thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." Dick the Butcher in Click to show or hide the answer
"To gild refined gold, to paint the lily ... is wasteful and ridiculous excess" (giving rise to the phrase "to gild the lily") Click to show or hide the answer
Suppressed by the British government during the reign of George III Click to show or hide the answer
The Earl of Gloucester has his eyes gouged out, for helping the title character to escape (by the Duke of Cornwall and his wife, who is one of the title character's daughters) in
"How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child" (spoken by the title character)
Double, double toil and trouble; / Fire burn, and caldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake, / In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt, and toe of frog, / Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind–worm's sting, / Lizard's leg, and howlet's wing,––
For a charm of powerful trouble, / Like a hell–broth boil and bubble
Double, double toil and trouble; / Fire burn, and caldron bubble.
Click to show or hide the answer
"By the pricking of my thumbs / Something wicked this way comes" (providing titles for, respectively, Agatha Christie and Ray Bradbury)
"Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow ... " – soliloquy on learning of his wife's death
The cat Graymalkin appears (as the familiar of the First Witch) in
Mainly set in Vienna; concerns the villainous behaviour of Angelo – deputy to ... Click to show or hide the answer
... Vincentio, the Duke of Vienna, who also appears disguised as Friar Lodowick
The novice nun Isabella pleads with Angelo for mercy, on behalf of her brother Claudio (who's been found guilty of sleeping with a woman out of wedlock); he agrees, on condition that she surrenders her virginity to him (she refuses, obviously)
Mistress Overdone (a brothel–keeper), Pompey Bum (her pimp), Elbow (a simple constable) and Froth ("a foolish gentleman") appear in
Lancelot Gobbo and Old Gobbo appear in Click to show or hide the answer
Portia's suitors made to choose between three caskets (according to a condition of her father's will)
"All that glisters is not gold / Often have you heard that told"
"The quality of mercy is not strained"
Sir John Falstaff, his followers Bardolph, Pistol and Nym, Sir Hugh Evans (a Welsh parson) and Doctor Caius (a French physician) appear in Click to show or hide the answer
Written, according to tradition, at the request of Queen Elizabeth I Click for more information
Set in "Athens, and a wood near it" Click to show or hide the answer
Features three separate plots, tied together by the marriage of Theseus (Duke of Athens) and Hippolyta (Queen of the Amazons)
Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Moth and Mustard Seed are fairies in
Features a troupe of actors known as the Mechanicals, whose members include: Peter Quince, a carpenter; Nick Bottom, a weaver; Francis Flute, a bellows–mender; Robin Starveling, a tailor; Tom Snout, a tinker; Snug, a joiner
"the course of true love never did run smooth"
Set in Messina, a city on the island of Sicily; centres on two romances, both featuring soldiers in the ranks of Don Pedro, Prince of Aragon. One involves Claudio and Hero, daughter of Leonato, Governor of the city; the other involves Benedick and Hero's cousin Beatrice (a 'protofeminist'). Ends in the marriage of Beatrice and Benedick Click to show or hide the answer
Dogberry, the "self-satisfied night constable" with an inflated view of his own importance
Subtitled The Moor of Venice Click to show or hide the answer
"the green–eyed monster" is a description of jealousy, from
"That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet" Click to show or hide the answer
Only Shakespeare play with an animal in the title Click to show or hide the answer
Begins with an "induction", in which a mischievous nobleman tricks a drunken tinker named Christopher Sly into thinking that the play is for his benefit
Gremio (one of Bianca's suitors), Grumio (Petruchio's servant) and "A Pedant" appear in
Ferdinand and Miranda are young lovers in Click to show or hide the answer
The spirit Ariel appears in
The song that begins "Where the bee sucks, there suck I" appears (sung by Ariel) in
"O brave new world, That has such people in't" (spoken by Miranda)
Subtitled What You Will Click to show or hide the answer
"If music be the food of love, play on". First line of
Set in Illyria (which is actually an ancient term for part of the Balkan peninsula, to the north of the Adriatic Sea)
Malvolio, Sir Toby Belch and Sir Andrew Aguecheek appear in
Twins Viola and Sebastian are shipwrecked together in
Shakespeare calls for a dog in Click to show or hide the answer
Who is Sylvia, what is she? is a song by Schubert, set to a serenade from
Silvia (daughter of the Duke of Milan) and Julia are beloved by the respective title characters, in
Polixenes, King of Bohemia, and his son Florizel, are characters in Click to show or hide the answer
Leontes and Hermione, King and Queen of Sicily, and their daughter Perdita (who lives as a shepherd girl in Bohemia, unaware of her royal lineage) are characters in
A statue comes to life at the end of
Includes the stage direction "Exit pursued by a bear"
Set in the kingdoms of Sicily and Bohemia
The Delphic Oracle is called upon to bear witness to the fidelity of the Queen of Sicily, in

Eponymous Characters

"Frailty, thy name is woman!" Click to show or hide the answer
"The rest is silence" (dying words)
"Let Hercules himself do what he may, The cat will mew, and dog will have his day"
"I am as constant as the Northern Star" Click to show or hide the answer
"Cry Havoc! And let slip the dogs of war"
"Let me have men about me that are fat"
Dies before the end of Act III
"My salad days, / When I was green in judgment, cold in blood..." Click to show or hide the answer
Cognomen given to Gaius Marcius, a legendary Roman warrior, in recognition of his exceptional valour in a Roman siege of the Volscian city of Corioli; he was subsequently exiled from Rome and murdered at the instigation of the Volscian general Aufidius Click to show or hide the answer
Described (in the Dramatis Personae) as King of Britain Click to show or hide the answer
Cloten (whose mother is named in the Dramatis Personae simply as 'Queen') is the unpleasant stepson of
Suggests The Mousetrap as the title of a 'play within the play', which is actually called The Murder of Gonzago Click to show or hide the answer
Goneril, Regan and Cordelia are the three daughters of Click to show or hide the answer
"I am a man more sinned against than sinning"
Thane of Glamis Click to show or hide the answer
Mistress Page and Mistress Ford are (Mistress Quickly is servant to another character) Click to show or hide the answer
Suffocates his wife (Desdemona), in the mistaken belief that she has been unfaithful Click to show or hide the answer
Says of himself that he "loved not wisely but too well"
"A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse!" Click to show or hide the answer
"How my achievements mock me!" Click to show or hide the answer
Valentine and Proteus are Click to show or hide the answer

© Haydn Thompson 2017–23