55 Best WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Quotes About COMEDY!

“To be, or not to be? That is the question!”

William Shakespeare was an English poet, playwright, and actor. Shakespeare was born in the 1500’s, but his plays are just as popular today as they were when he was alive! Some of Shakespeare’s most famous plays include:

Romeo And Juliet
Hamlet
The Tempest
Twelfth Night
Macbeth

…And many more.

Shakespeare was one of the best English writers of all time, and it’s easy to see why. His plays feature timeless quotes about life, love, relationships, and more.

Whether you’re interested in deep philosophical quotes about life, funny Shakespeare quotes, or hot and heavy Shakespeare quotes about love and romance, we’ve got you covered!

Without further ado, here are the best William Shakespeare quotes about comedy!

Table of Contents

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Comedy

“What you egg!” -William Shakespeare
“Thou cream faced loon.” -William Shakespeare
“You Banbury cheese!” -William Shakespeare
“I do desire we may be better strangers.” -William Shakespeare
“There’s no more faith in thee than in a stewed prune.” -William Shakespeare
“I must to the barber’s, monsieur; for methinks, I am marvellous hairy about the face: and I am such a tender ass, if my hair do but tickle me, I must scratch.” -William Shakespeare
“Virginity breeds mites, much like a cheese.” -William Shakespeare
“It is like a barber’s chair that fits all buttocks, the pin-buttock, the quatch-buttock, the brawn-buttock, or any buttock.” -William Shakespeare
“There’s no more faith in thee than in a stewed prune.” -William Shakespeare
“You are as a candle, the better burnt out.” -William Shakespeare
“You Banbury cheese!” -William Shakespeare
“I am sick when I do look on thee.” -William Shakespeare
“His wit’s as thick as a Tewkesbury mustard.” -William Shakespeare
“Thou damned and luxurious mountain goat.” -William Shakespeare
“Thine face is not worth sunburning.” -William Shakespeare
“Thou whoreson zed, thou unnecessary letter!” -William Shakespeare
“You are not worth another word else I’d call you knave.” -William Shakespeare
“The rankest compound of villainous smell that ever offended nostril.” -William Shakespeare
“Now I will believe that there are unicorns…” -William Shakespeare
“If music be the food of love, play on.” -William Shakespeare
“Thou sodden-witted lord! thou hast no more brain than I have in mine elbows.” -William Shakespeare
“I do bite my thumb, sir.” -William Shakespeare
“No legacy is so rich as honesty.” -William Shakespeare
“I do desire we may be better strangers.” -William Shakespeare
“More of your conversation would infect my brain.” -William Shakespeare
“Away, you starvelling, you elf-skin, you dried neat’s-tongue, bull’s-pizzle, you stock-fish!” -William Shakespeare
“Would thou wert clean enough to spit upon!” -William Shakespeare
“Go, prick thy face and over-red thy fear, / Thou lily-livered boy.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Funny Quotes

“It is like a barber’s chair that fits all buttocks, the pin-buttock, the quatch-buttock, the brawn-buttock, or any buttock.” -William Shakespeare
“More of your conversation would infect my brain.” -William Shakespeare
“Thou damned and luxurious mountain goat.” -William Shakespeare
“Thy sin’s not accidental, but a trade.” -William Shakespeare
“I must to the barber’s, monsieur; for methinks, I am marvellous hairy about the face: and I am such a tender ass, if my hair do but tickle me, I must scratch.” -William Shakespeare
“Mine eyes smell onions.” -William Shakespeare
“Go, prick thy face and over-red thy fear, Thou lily-livered boy.” -William Shakespeare
“You Banbury cheese!” -William Shakespeare
“I am sick when I do look on thee.” -William Shakespeare
“You are as a candle, the better burnt out.” -William Shakespeare
“Villain, I have done thy mother.” -William Shakespeare
“Thou sodden-witted lord! thou hast no more brain than I have in mine elbows.” -William Shakespeare
“I’ll beat thee, but I would infect my hands.” -William Shakespeare
“There’s no more faith in thee than in a stewed prune.” -William Shakespeare
“Thine face is not worth sunburning.” -William Shakespeare
“This woman’s an easy glove, my lord, she goes off and on at pleasure.” -William Shakespeare
“Thou art as fat as butter.” -William Shakespeare
“Would thou wert clean enough to spit upon!” -William Shakespeare
“I do desire we may be better strangers.” -William Shakespeare
“Come, thou monarch of the vine, Plumpy Bacchus with pink eyne!” -William Shakespeare
“If manhood, good manhood, be not forgotten upon the face of the earth, then am I a shotten herring (a herring which has spawned).” -William Shakespeare
“There live not three good men unhanged in England: and one of them is fat.” -William Shakespeare
“By my life, this is my lady’s hand: these be her very C’s, her U’s, and her T’s; and thus makes she her great P’s.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Time

“I wasted time, and now doth time waste me.” -William Shakespeare
“Reputation is an idle and most false imposition; oft got without merit, and lost without deserving.” -William Shakespeare
“What is past is prologue.” -William Shakespeare
“To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, To the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player, That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.” -William Shakespeare
“Your lordship, though not clean past your youth, have yet some smack of age in you, some relish of the saltiness of time.” -William Shakespeare
“Let’s take the instant by the forward top; For we are old, and on our quick’st decrees The inaudible and noiseless foot of Time Steals ere we can effect them.” -William Shakespeare
“The whirligig of time brings in his revenges.” -William Shakespeare
“Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back Wherein he puts alms for oblivion, A great-sized monster of ingratitudes. Those scraps are good deeds past, which are devour’d As fast as they are made, forgot as soon as done.” -William Shakespeare
“Old Time the clock-setter.” -William Shakespeare
“What else may hap, to time I will commit.” -William Shakespeare
“Thus we play the fool with the time and the spirits of the wise sit in the clouds and mock us.” -William Shakespeare
“Shorten my days thou canst with sullen sorrow, And pluck nights from me, but not lend a morrow; Thou canst help time to furrow me with age, But stop no wrinkle in his pilgrimage.” -William Shakespeare
“My glass shall not persuade me I am old, So long as youth and thou are of one date; But when in thee time’s furrows I behold, Then look I death my days should expiate.” -William Shakespeare
“O time, thou must untangle this, not I. It is too hard a knot for me t’untie.” -William Shakespeare
“Time goes on crutches till love have all his rites.” -William Shakespeare
“We see which way the stream of time doth run.” -William Shakespeare
“I that please some, try all, both joy and terror Of good and bad, that makes and unfolds error.” -William Shakespeare
“And, looking on it with lack-lustre eye, Says very wisely, “It is ten o’clock: Thus we may see,” quoth he, “how the world wags.”” -William Shakespeare
“Minutes, hours, days, months, and years, Pass’d over to the end they were created, Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave. Ah, what a life were this!” -William Shakespeare
“Much rain wears the marble.” -William Shakespeare
“Nothing ‘gainst Times scythe can make defense.” -William Shakespeare
“Ruin has taught me to ruminate, That Time will come and take my love away. This thought is as a death, which cannot choose But weep to have that which it fears to lose.” -William Shakespeare
“Short time seems long in sorrow’s sharp sustaining.” -William Shakespeare
“Make use of time, let not advantage slip; Beauty within itself should not be wasted: Fair flowers that are not gather’d in their prime Rot and consume themselves in little time.” -William Shakespeare
“See the minutes, how they run, How many make the hour full complete; How many hours bring about the day; How many days will finish up the year; How many years a mortal man may live.” -William Shakespeare
“Though I look old, yet I am strong and lusty; for in my youth I never did apply hot and rebellious liquors in my blood; and did not, with unbashful forehead, woo the means of weakness and debility: therefore my age is as a lusty winter, frosty but kindly.” -William Shakespeare
“Do you set down your name in the scroll of youth, that are written down old with all the characters of age?” -William Shakespeare
“What, keep a week away? Seven days and nights, Eightscore-eight hours, and lovers’ absent hours More tedious than the dial eightscore times! O weary reckoning!” -William Shakespeare
“Have you not a moist eye, a dry hand, a yellow cheek, a white beard, a decreasing leg, an increasing belly? Is not your voice broken, your wind short, your chin double, your wit single, and every part about you blasted with antiquity?” -William Shakespeare
“We have seen better days.” -William Shakespeare
“A man loves the meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age.” -William Shakespeare
“Defer no time, delays have dangerous ends.” -William Shakespeare
“Time’s the king of men; he’s both their parent, and he is their grave, and gives them what he will, not what they crave.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes From Romeo And Juliet

“O, swear not by the moon, th’ inconstant moon, That monthly changes in her circled orb, Lest that thy love prove likewise variable.” -William Shakespeare
“Young men’s love then lies Not truly in their hearts but in their eyes.” -William Shakespeare
“Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health, Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is! This love feel I, that feel no love in this.” -William Shakespeare
“O, I am Fortune’s fool!” -William Shakespeare
“Go wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast.” -William Shakespeare
“O, here Will I set up my everlasting rest, And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars
“From this world-wearied flesh. Eyes, look your last! Arms, take your last embrace! and, lips, O you The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss A dateless bargain to engrossing death!” -William Shakespeare
“What, drawn, and talk of peace? I hate the word. As I hate hell, all Montagues, and thee.”
“A plague o’ both your houses!” -William Shakespeare
“I must be gone and live, or stay and die.” -William Shakespeare
“For never was a story of more woe than this of Juliet and her Romeo.” -William Shakespeare
“I defy you, stars[.]” -William Shakespeare
“My bounty is as boundless as the sea, My love as deep. The more I give to thee, The more I have, for both are infinite.” -William Shakespeare
“Love is heavy and light, bright and dark, hot and cold, sick and healthy, asleep and awake- its everything except what it is!” -William Shakespeare
“This bud of love, by summer’s ripening breath, May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet.” -William Shakespeare
“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet.” -William Shakespeare
“My only love sprung from my only hate! Too early seen unknown, and known too late! Prodigious birth of love it is to me, That I must love a loathed enemy.” -William Shakespeare
“Why then, O brawling love! O loving hate! O any thing, of nothing first create.“ -William Shakespeare
“Give me my Romeo; and, when he shall die, Take him and cut him out in little stars,
“These violent delights have violent ends And in their triumph die, like fire and powder, Which, as they kiss, consume.” -William Shakespeare
“O heavy lightness, serious vanity, Misshapen chaos of well-seeming forms, Two households, both alike in dignity In fair Verona, where we lay our scene From ancient grudge break to new mutiny Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Friendship

“But where there is true friendship, there needs none.” -William Shakespeare
“He with thee doth bear a part. / These are certain signs to know / Faithful friend from flattering foe.” -William Shakespeare
“That which I would discover / The law of friendship bids me to conceal.” -William Shakespeare
“To mingle friendship far is mingling bloods.” -William Shakespeare
“Madam, you wrong the King’s love with these fears; / Your hopes and friends are infinite.” -William Shakespeare
“By the Lord, our plot is a good plot as ever was laid; our friends true and constant: a good plot, good friends, and full of expectation; an excellent plot, very good friends.” -William Shakespeare
“I rais’d him, and I pawn’d / Mine honour for his truth; who being so heighten’d, / He watered his new plants with dews of flattery, / Seducing so my friends; and to this end / He bow’d his nature, never known before.” -William Shakespeare
“The presence of a king engenders love / Amongst his subjects and his loyal friends, / As it disanimates his enemies.” -William Shakespeare
“To set a gloss on faint deeds, hollow welcomes, / Recanting goodness, sorry ere ’tis shown; / But where there is true friendship, there needs none.” -William Shakespeare
“Thou common friend, that’s without faith or love- / For such is a friend now; treacherous man, / Thou hast beguil’d my hopes; nought but mine eye Could have persuaded me.” -William Shakespeare
“To me, fair friend, you never can be old.” -William Shakespeare
“Good company, good wine, good welcome, can make good people.” -William Shakespeare
“There is flattery in friendship.” -William Shakespeare
“Good my friends, consider / You are my guests.” -William Shakespeare
“That I will here dismiss my loving friends, / And to my fortunes and the people’s favour / Commit my cause in balance to be weigh’d.” -William Shakespeare
“Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all To envious and calumniating time.” -William Shakespeare
“There is a devil / haunts thee in the likeness of an old fat man; a tun of man is thy companion.” -William Shakespeare
“That I will here dismiss my loving friends, / And to my fortunes and the people’s favour / Commit my cause in balance to be weigh’d.” -William Shakespeare
“Friendship is constant in all other things / Save in the office and affairs of love.” -William Shakespeare
“My good friends, I’ll leave you till night.” -William Shakespeare
“If thou wilt lend this money, lend it not / As to thy friends; for when did friendship take / A breed for barren metal of his friend?” -William Shakespeare
“Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, / Grapple them unto thy soul with hoops of steel.” -William Shakespeare
“Keep thy friend, under thy own life’s key.” -William Shakespeare
“All friends shall taste / The wages of their virtue, and all foes / The cup of their deservings.” -William Shakespeare
“Nature teaches beasts to know their friends.” -William Shakespeare
“Thy friendship makes us fresh.” -William Shakespeare
“Warwick, these words have turn’d my hate to love; / And I forgive and quite forget old faults, And joy that thou becom’st King Henry’s friend.” -William Shakespeare
“I desire you in friendship, and I will one way or other make you amends.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes On Life Lessons

“It is a wise father that knows his own child.” -William Shakespeare
“There is no darkness, but ignorance.” -William Shakespeare
“Let life be short; else shame will be too long.” -William Shakespeare
“Men are April when they woo, December when they wed; maids are May when they are maids, but the sky changes when they are wives.” -William Shakespeare
“Desire of having is the sin of covetousness.” -William Shakespeare
“And this our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything.” -William Shakespeare
“My words fly up, my thoughts remain below: Words without thoughts never to heaven go.” -William Shakespeare
“Love sought is good; but given unsought is better.” -William Shakespeare
“One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.” -William Shakespeare
“Many a good hanging prevents a bad marriage.” -William Shakespeare
“We know what we are, but know not what we may be.” -William Shakespeare
“Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful.” -William Shakespeare
“A peace is of the nature of a conquest; for then both parties nobly are subdued, and neither party loser.” -William Shakespeare
“Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once.” -William Shakespeare
“When we are born, we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools.” -William Shakespeare
“We are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep.” -William Shakespeare
“If money go before, all ways do lie open.” -William Shakespeare
“Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Life

“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.” -William Shakespeare
“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.” -William Shakespeare
“Beware the Ides of March.” -William Shakespeare
“How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child!” -William Shakespeare
“I cannot tell what you and other men Think of this life; but, for my single self, I had as lief not be as live to be In awe of such a thing as I myself.” -William Shakespeare
“There where my fortune lives, there my life dies.” -William Shakespeare
“Thy life’s a miracle.” -William Shakespeare
“Life’s but a walking shadow, A poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more: It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” -William Shakespeare
“Let me be that I am and seek not to alter me.” -William Shakespeare
“It is silliness to live when to live is torment; and then have we a prescription to die when death is our physician.” -William Shakespeare
“We are such stuff as dreams are made on and our little life is rounded with a sleep.” -William Shakespeare
“Now is the winter of our discontent.” -William Shakespeare
“O gentlemen, the time of life is short! To spend that shortness basely were too long, If life did ride upon a dial’s point, Still ending at the arrival of an hour.” -William Shakespeare
“Let life be short: else shame will be too long.” -William Shakespeare
The sands are number’d that make up my life; Here must I stay, and here my life must end.” -William Shakespeare
“Is this a dagger which I see before me, the handle toward my hand?” -William Shakespeare
“Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” -William Shakespeare
“Full fathom five thy father lies, of his bones are coral made. Those are pearls that were his eyes. Nothing of him that doth fade, but doth suffer a sea-change into something rich and strange.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Love

“For stony limits cannot hold love out, And what love can do that dares love attempt.” -William Shakespeare
“Did my heart love till now? Forswear it, sight! For I ne’er saw true beauty till this night.” -William Shakespeare
“Do thou but close our hands with holy words, Then love-devouring death do what he dare; It is enough I may but call her mine.” -William Shakespeare
“Where love is great, the littlest doubts are fear; when little fears grow great, great love grows there.” -William Shakespeare
“The course of true love never did run smooth.” -William Shakespeare
“Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.” -William Shakespeare
“But love is blind, and lovers cannot see The pretty follies that themselves commit.”
“Lovers ever run before the clock.” -William Shakespeare
“One half of me is yours, the other half yours—Mine own, I would say; but if mine, then yours, And so all yours.” -William Shakespeare
“If music be the food of love, play on.” -William Shakespeare
“Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.” -William Shakespeare
“And when love speaks, the voice of all the gods makes heaven drowsy with the harmony.” -William Shakespeare
“I, Beyond all limit of what else i’ th’ world, Do love, prize, honour you.” -William Shakespeare
“Love hath made thee a tame snake.” -William Shakespeare
“Excellent wetch! Perdition catch my soul, but I do love thee, and when I love thee not, chaos is come again.” -William Shakespeare
“They do not love that do not show their love.” -William Shakespeare
“A heart to love, and in that heart, Courage, to make’s love known.” -William Shakespeare
“A heaven on earth I have won by wooing thee.” -William Shakespeare
“If thou remember’st not the slightest folly That ever love did make thee run into, Thou hast not loved.” -William Shakespeare
“O mistress mine, where are you roaming? O, stay and hear; your true love’s coming,
That can sing both high and low: Trip no further, pretty sweeting; Journeys end in lovers meeting, Every wise man’s son doth know.” -William Shakespeare
“So are you to my thoughts as food to life, Or as sweet-seasoned showers are to the ground.” -William Shakespeare
“Nor did I wonder at the lily’s white, Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose; They were but sweet, but figures of delight Drawn after you…” -William Shakespeare
“Oh, love’s best habit is in seeming trust, And age in love loves not to have years told.” -William Shakespeare
“O! how thy worth with manners may I sing, When thou art all the better part of me?” -William Shakespeare
“Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved.” -William Shakespeare
“Those lines that I before have writ do lie, Ev’n those that said I could not love you dearer. Yet then my judgment knew no reason why My most full flame should afterwards burn clearer.” -William Shakespeare
“I can express no kinder sign of love, than this kind kiss.” -William Shakespeare
“O heaven, O earth, bear witness to this sound And crown what I profess with kind event If I speak true! If hollowly, invert What best is boded me to mischief! I Beyond all limit of what else i’ th’ world Do love, prize, honor you.” -William Shakespeare
“Love goes by haps; Some Cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.” -William Shakespeare
“When you depart from me sorrow abides, and happiness takes his leave.” -William Shakespeare
“Silence is the perfectest herald of joy. I were but little happy if I could say how much.—Lady, as you are mine, I am yours. I give away myself for you and dote upon the exchange.” -William Shakespeare
“Beshrew your eyes, They have o’erlooked me and divided me. One half of me is yours, the other half yours— Mine own, I would say. But if mine, then yours, And so all yours.”
And breathe or eyes can see, so long lives this, and this gives life to thee.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes From Plays

“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.” -William Shakespeare
“Who ever loved that loved not at first sight?“ -William Shakespeare
“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.” -William Shakespeare
“My salad days, When I was green in judgment: cold in blood, To say as I said then! But, come, away; Get me ink and paper: He shall have every day a several greeting, Or I’ll unpeople Egypt.” -William Shakespeare
“Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.” -William Shakespeare
“The worst is not, So long as we can say, ‘This is the worst.’” -William Shakespeare
“But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.”
“Good night, good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow, That I shall say good night till it be morrow.” -William Shakespeare
“Neither a borrower nor a lender be; for loan oft loses both itself and friend.” -William Shakespeare
“The play ‘s the thing wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the king.” -William Shakespeare
“My Oberon! What visions have I seen! Methought I was enamoured of an ass.” -William Shakespeare
“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate.”
“When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept: Ambition should be made of sterner stuff.” -William Shakespeare
“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet”
“If music be the food of love, play on.” -William Shakespeare
“Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more, Or close the wall up with our English dead!” -William Shakespeare
“By the pricking of my thumbs, Something wicked this way comes. Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Happiness

“But O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man’s eyes.” -William Shakespeare
“There’s little of the melancholy element in her, my lord: she is never sad but when she sleeps; and not ever sad then; for I have heard my daughter say, she hath often dreamt of unhappiness, and waked herself with laughing.” -William Shakespeare
““But here’s the joy my friend and I are one… Then she loves but me alone.” -William Shakespeare
“There is tears for his love, joy for his fortune, honor for his valor, and death for his ambition.” -William Shakespeare
“Twixt two extremes of passion, joy and grief, Burst smilingly.” -William Shakespeare
“As little joy, my lord, as you suppose You should enjoy were you this country’s king, As little joy you may suppose in me That I enjoy, being the Queen thereof.” -William Shakespeare
“I wish you all the joy you can wish.” -William Shakespeare
“The treasury of everlasting joy!” -William Shakespeare
“My joy is death-Death, at whose name I oft have been afeard, Because I wish’d this world’s eternity.” -William Shakespeare
“It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves.” -William Shakespeare
“Love sought is good, but given unsought, is better.” -William Shakespeare
“There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.” -William Shakespeare
“How sweet is love itself possess’d, When but love’s shadows are so rich in joy!” -William Shakespeare
“Lay aside life-harming heaviness, And entertain a cheerful disposition.” -William Shakespeare
“Silence is the perfectest herald of joy I were but little happy, if I could say how much.” -William Shakespeare
“If this be so, the gods do mean to strike me To death with mortal joy.” -William Shakespeare