brush up your shakespeare 2025: our first check*in!!

so this year, i’ve decided to read (or re-read) through all of shakespeare’s plays alphabetically. as of today, i’ve read four and a half of them. :)

i’m going through alphabetically (see intro blog post here) according to the cambridge shakespeare guide, and i’m currently slogging through CORIOLANUS. (roman politics and war? blargh. but hamlet SOON, so i’m holding on to hope!)

BUT! the fun part, besides flipping pages quickly because it’s a play (and there’s explanatory notes on the left) is letting people on instagram VOTE on the quote from each play for me to illuminate.

(& by illuminate, i mean practice my handlettering; it’s a hobby.)

of course, i wish i had time to STUDY each play more and give a recap of my thoughts and feelings, but alas: i’m a woman of 90,000 hobbies, so perhaps another day. ;)

for now: please enjoy some of my favourite quotes from each play i’ve read so far and the accompanying quote (or two) i doodled for happy’s sake. :)

xo,

*hallie :)

i hadn’t read this one before, and bought the folger shakespeare library paperback edition; they’re taller than they used to be, but easy to read. and their notes and short summaries before each new scene are super helpful.

first up:

all’s well that ends well

some of my favourite quotes from this one:

  • “moderate lamentation is the right of the dead, excessive grief the enemy to the living.” (I.1. 57-58)

  • “had not lately you an intent—speak truly—to go to paris?” (I.3.228-229.)

  • “find what you seek, that fame may cry you loud.” (II.1.18-19)

  • “what i dare too well do, i dare not do.” (II.3.214)

  • “come, night; end, day” (III.2.139)

  • “mine eyes smell onions, i shall weep anon..” (V.3.365)

this “winning” quote doodled in my archer & olive 8×8” notebook with lots of black ink pens and markers and gellyroll pens for color on top. :)

this is the size of the folger editions i collected in high school and college. bonus feature of the kinuko craft paintings on the covers! alas, i don’t think they’re in print anymore. here’s the new big one with the non-illustrated cover. : /

antony & cleopatra

some of my favourite lines:

  • “if it be love indeed, tell me how much.”
    (act I, scene 1)

  • “give me some music—music, moody food
    of us that trade in love.”
    (II.5)

  • “let all the number of the stars give light
    to thy fair way.”
    (III.2)

  • “by jove that thunders!”
    (III.13)

  • “you gods will give us
    some faults to make us men.”
    (V.1)

again, that archer & olive 8×8” notebook, lots of pens and markers, some soufflé gellyrolls, and some colored pencils, too.

another re-read, but still without the kinuko craft cover. i’ve watched the kenneth branagh set-in-japan film with bryce dallas howard many times and even got to see a local kids’ group of actors perform it a couple years ago. :) new folger edition here.

as you like it

some of my favourite lines:

  • “what think you of falling in love?”
    ~rosalind, act I, scene 2

  • “cupid have mercy, not a word?”
    ~celia, act I, scene 3

  • “i do desire we may be better strangers.”
    ~orlando, act III, scene 2

  • “truly, i would the gods had made thee poetical.”
    ~touchstone, act III, scene 3

  • “’tis true a good play needs no epilogue.”
    ~rosalind, epilogue

yes; i picked two for this play. this one, because hello social anxiety and i just like being at home. doodled with more pens and gellyroll moonlights and soufflés.

and this one because, hello february with the best holiday of the year and i also wanted to start playing with holbein acrylic gouaches. (still learning!)

i got the barnes & noble trade paperback edition years ago. but you can get the folger one here. (the b&n version doesn’t have the scene recaps, but is in a readable format with some notes to the left for unfamiliar words; but no pictures.) and yes, i was reviewing fave quotes during the super bowl. (or “the superb owl party,” if you’d rawther.)

the comedy of errors

some of my favourite lines:

  • “i will go lose myself and wander up and down to view the city.” (I.2)

  • “stop in your wind, sir.” (I.2)

  • “this is the fairy land. o spite of spites,
    we talk with goblins, owls, & sprites.” (II.2)

  • “am i myself?” (III.2)

  • “with all my heart, i’ll gossip at this feast.” (V.1)

this shakespeare play is another twins/mistaken identity farce with a healthy amount of gaslighting and physical abuse. so the quote “am i myself?” sums up the play, better. but this quote is more ME. and reminds me of the line from the wonderful wizard of oz: “but a fairy country is extremely interesting when you get used to being surprised.”

n’kay.

wish me luck in making it through coriolanus…. then cymbeline, then HamLEt (yay!), but then i gotta get through the henrys… ;)

thitherward!!

xo,

*hallie :)

hallie bertling