For the past few weeks in English class, we've been studying Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare.... was an interesting guy. Now we can't really understand that, I guess, because we speak so differently that Middle English sounds stuffy and formal, and we don't understand that.
So I'm going to provide you with a quick translation.
Middle English: "I do not bit my thumb at you, sir, but I do bite my thumb, sir."
Modern English: "Pfft, no, I'm not flicking you off. I'm just chewing on my thumb."
Yup.
And I keep speaking really properly, too. I wrote hath on my math homework, and I accidentally said thou to one of my friends.
Shakespeare's Influence: Getting us to speak like people from 500 years ago.
Yeah, we don't realise it but the words we use in everyday life is words that were made up by William Shakespeare. :)
ReplyDeleteMy teacher showed us a list of words he made up, and "undress" and "gloomy" were both on the list. It really is amazing.
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