Sometimes, you know exactly how you feel but have no idea how to say it. You might be writing a message to someone you love, working through a disappointment, or cheering on a friend who’s making a fresh start. The feeling is there. The words take a little longer.
That’s where William Shakespeare comes in. His characters wrestle with love, jealousy, hope, heartbreak, and uncertainty—feelings that remain familiar centuries later. You don’t need to remember your English classes to recognize yourself in a line about missing someone or finding the courage to move forward.
These 50 William Shakespeare quotes still hit home today. Each comes with a plain-language meaning and a suggestion for when to use it, whether you’re writing a heartfelt card, looking for a thoughtful caption, or trying to put your own experience into words.
Table of Contents
- William Shakespeare Quotes About Love
- William Shakespeare Quotes About Life
- William Shakespeare Quotes About Friendship
- William Shakespeare Quotes About Courage
- Funny and Witty William Shakespeare Quotes
William Shakespeare Quotes About Love
1. “The course of true love never did run smooth.” — Lysander, A Midsummer Night’s Dream
2. “If music be the food of love, play on.” — Duke Orsino, Twelfth Night
3. “Speak low, if you speak love.” — Don Pedro, Much Ado About Nothing
4. “Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.” — Helena, A Midsummer Night’s Dream
5. “Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.” — Olivia, Twelfth Night
6. “Hear my soul speak: The very instant that I saw you, did my heart fly to your service.” — Ferdinand, The Tempest
7. “There’s beggary in the love that can be reckoned.” — Antony, Antony and Cleopatra
8. “The sight of lovers feedeth those in love.” — Rosalind, As You Like It
9. “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.” — Juliet, Romeo and Juliet
10. “With love’s light wings did I o’erperch these walls, for stony limits cannot hold love out.” — Romeo, Romeo and Juliet
William Shakespeare Quotes About Life
11. “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.” — Jaques, As You Like It
12. “To be, or not to be, that is the question.” — Hamlet, Hamlet
13. “We are such stuff as dreams are made on; and our little life is rounded with a sleep.” — Prospero, The Tempest
14. “Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage.” — Macbeth, Macbeth
15. “Be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon ’em.” — Malvolio, reading a letter written by Maria, Twelfth Night
16. “When we are born we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools.” — King Lear, King Lear
17. “The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together.” — First Lord, All’s Well That Ends Well
18. “The time of life is short! To spend that shortness basely were too long.” — Hotspur, Henry IV, Part 1
19. “You cannot, sir, take from me anything that I will not more willingly part withal—except my life, except my life, except my life.” — Hamlet, Hamlet
20. “I love long life better than figs.” — Charmian, Antony and Cleopatra
William Shakespeare Quotes About Friendship
21. “I count myself in nothing else so happy as in a soul remembering my good friends.” — Bolingbroke, Richard II
22. “Keep thy friend under thy own life’s key.” — Countess of Rossillion, All’s Well That Ends Well
23. “Thy friendship makes us fresh.” — Charles, Henry VI, Part 1
24. “To me, fair friend, you never can be old.” — The poetic speaker, Sonnet 104
25. “Friendship is constant in all other things save in the office and affairs of love.” — Claudio, Much Ado About Nothing
26. “Most friendship is feigning, most loving is folly.” — Amiens, As You Like It
27. “There is flattery in friendship.” — The Constable of France, Henry V
28. “That which I would discover the law of friendship bids me to conceal.” — Proteus, The Two Gentlemen of Verona
29. “The band that seems to tie their friendship together will be the very strangler of their amity.” — Enobarbus, Antony and Cleopatra
30. “But where there is true friendship, there needs none.” — Timon, Timon of Athens
William Shakespeare Quotes About Courage
31. “Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt.” — Lucio, Measure for Measure
32. “Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once.” — Julius Caesar, Julius Caesar
33. “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more.” — King Henry, Henry V
34. “But screw your courage to the sticking place, and we’ll not fail.” — Lady Macbeth, Macbeth
35. “I dare do all that may become a man. Who dares do more is none.” — Macbeth, Macbeth
36. “Boldness be my friend.” — Iachimo, Cymbeline
37. “For courage mounteth with occasion.” — Duke of Austria, King John
38. “All things are ready if our minds be so.” — King Henry, Henry V
39. “There is a tide in the affairs of men which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.” — Brutus, Julius Caesar
40. “The readiness is all.” — Hamlet, Hamlet
Funny and Witty William Shakespeare Quotes
