Poetry for Students, Volume 35

You Like It, which was probably written in 1599,
is the last of Shakespeare’s light romantic
comedies.

The year 1600 is often cited as the marker for
a new maturity and complexity in Shakespeare’s
plays, beginning with the printing ofThe Trag-
edy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark in 1600.
Twelfth Night, or What You Will, in 1601, is the
first of the darker comedies. Several of the great
tragedies followed, includingThe Tragedy of
Othello, the Moor of Venice(1602–1603),The
Tragedy of King Lear, (1604–1605,)The Tragedy
of Macbeth(1606), andThe Tragedy of Antony
and Cleopatra (1607–1608). In 1609, Shake-
speare became an investor in the Blackfriars
Theatre, where many of his plays had been
staged.

After 1610, Shakespeare returned to Strat-
ford and semi-retirement. But he continued to
write plays, includingThe Tempest(1611), which
was largely composed in Stratford. Throughout
his career as a playwright, Shakespeare was also
composing poetry, including several hundred
sonnets. Although he began creating sonnets
early in his writing career, Shakespeare contin-
ued revising his sonnets during the 1590s and
through the early 1600s, finally publishing the
entire sequence in 1609.

Shakespeare died April 23, 1616, and is
buried at Stratford-upon-Avon.

Poem Text

All the world’s a stage, And all the men and

women merely players.

They have their exits and their entrances,

And one man in his time plays many parts,

His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,

Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.

Then the whining schoolboy with his satchel

And shining morning face, creeping like snail

Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,

Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad

Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then, a soldier,

Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,

Jealous in honour, sudden, and quick in quarrel,

Seeking the bubble reputation

Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the

justice,

In fair round belly with good capon lined,

With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,

Full of wise saws and modern instances;

And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts

Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,

With spectacles on nose and pouch on side,

His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide

For his shrunk shank, and his big, manly voice,

Turning again toward childish treble, pipes

And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,

That ends this strange, eventful history,

Is second childishness and mere oblivion,

Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

Poem Summary

Opening Statement: Lines 1–4

In the first several lines of ‘‘Seven Ages of Man,’’

the speaker asserts that all men and women are

players on a stage. Shakespeare compares meta-

phorically the world to a stage, on which all peo-

ple play many roles throughout their lives. (The

phrase,All the world’s a stage,is the English trans-

lation of the Globe Theatre’s Latin motto:Totus

mundus agit histrionem.) The speaker’s point is

that all men and women assume different roles

as they live out their lives, with each person play-

ing the role required for any given age. All men

and women enter the stage—the world—the same

way, by being born, and all exit the same way, by

dying. Thus, all men and women have the same

experience of aging. Regardless of social stand-

ing, employment, economic condition, every per-

son is born and dies. The speaker ends this

opening statement at line 4 by noting that each

man will play seven roles during his life.

Infant: Lines 4–5

The first stage of seven occurs immediately after

birth. Shakespeare gives the infant a small part,

only part of line 4 and line 5. The infant cries and

vomits. During the sixteenth and seventeenth

century, mortality rates among babies and

young children were high. The crying and vomit-

ing in infancy was to be celebrated, because it

proved the child was still alive. The baby’s nurse

is probably a wet nurse, hired to breastfeed the

child and care for him, given that most women of

social rank did not breastfeed or care for their

infants. This first stage of life is the briefest.

Schoolboy: Lines 5–8

The schoolboy whines as he leaves for school

each morning. He carries his books and papers

in his satchel. His face is scrubbed clean by his

mother, who prepares him for the day. The

schoolboy is compared to a snail that creeps

amongst the vines, because he goes as slowly as

Seven Ages of Man