Suggestive of the work of William Shakespeare (1564-1616), English dramatist and poet, born and buried in Stratford-upon-Avon.
When George Bernard Shaw stated that he had a better mind than Shakespeare, he may have been right, but Shakespeare stands for more than the intellectual brilliance so dominant in Shaw. Nobody has ever been another Shakespeare. He stands alone. Mt. Everest among foothills. But certain qualities of perception, a certain breadth of understanding, an ability to give life to an enormous variety of human characters, a certain grandeur of poetic expression can be said to be Shakespearean.
Shakespeare wrote 154 sonnets in a rhyme scheme known as Elizabethian or Shakespearean.
He also wrote 36 plays. They were immesely popular in his lifetime and made him a fairly rich man, but plays were not considered 'literature' then. He created a wide range of memorable characters---Falstaff, Hotspur, Hamlet, Lear, Iago, Shylock, Portia (my favorite), Juliet, Lady Macbeth and many others.
No other writer has given us so many memorable passages of dramatic poetry, rich in psychological insight, expressive of human emotion, and just plain beautiful.
"Shakespearean" alludes to the deepest thoughts spoken by the widest range of characters in the most eloquent and appropriate language.
~Facts on File Dictionary of Historical and Cultural Allusions".
