Shakespeare
English
Alternative forms
- Shakspeare, Shakspere (obsolete)
Etymology
Common Middle English surname meaning "spearman", corresponding to shake (“brandish a weapon”) + spear.
Pronunciation
- (General American) IPA(key): /ˈʃeɪkspɪɹ/
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ˈʃeɪkspɪə/
- Hyphenation: Shake‧speare
Proper noun
Shakespeare
- A surname.
- William Shakespeare, an English playwright and poet of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries
- His works or media adaptations of his works.
Usage notes
- (William Shakespeare): Note that Shakespeare's manuscripts use a great many different spellings of his surname, too numerous to list here. (At the time, some name spellings were much more variable than today, see Spelling of Shakespeare's name for a list.)
Derived terms
Translations
English playwright
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Noun
Shakespeare (countable and uncountable, plural Shakespeares)
- (uncountable) Eloquent language, especially English; poetry.
- 1979 October 10, Russell Maker, “Highbrows Ruin Baseball's Language”, in Toledo Blade:
- This may not be poetry, but in competition with "Ryan has good velocity and excellent location" it is pure Shakespeare.
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- (countable) A playwright of the standing of William Shakespeare
- 1997 Vivien Allen, "Hall Caine: portrait of a Victorian romancer"
- Caine, he said, might be a budding Shakespeare but in Shakespeare's time all it took to put on a play was a barn, a crude stage, ...
- 1997 Vivien Allen, "Hall Caine: portrait of a Victorian romancer"
See also
- Category:English terms first attested in Shakespeare
Portuguese
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