23th April 1616

Next Thursday is the 399th anniversary of the death of Shakespeare. To commemorate it I would like to share with you one of my favorite quotes from his plays.

SHYLOCK: I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions, fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?

The Merchant of Venice (Act 3 Sc I.)

Without forgetting:

HAMLET:To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To die, to sleep;
 To sleep: perchance to dream...

 The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (Act 3, Sc I)

And, do not even forget that it's also the Day of the Books; so, Read!