Shakespearean Insults

[stratego]

I know we aren't allow to insult each other on this site, but maybe the moderators will let us slide if you do it in style. So give me your best shakespearean insult, or semi-shakespearean insult. "Thou greasy, pig headed, mother f*****"

 

[superslug]

Shakespearean Insults
Shakespearean Insulter

 

[mad-bax]

My personal favourite..

"Why art thou then exasperate, thou idle immaterial skein of sleeve-silk, thou green sarsenet flap for a sore eye, thou tassel of a prodigal's purse, thou? Ah, how the world is pestered with such waterflies, diminutives of nature."

I also like...

"Sell your face for five pence and 'tis dear. "

 

[Rout]

'Wouldst thou not be glad to have the niggardly rascally sheep-biter come to some shame?' -Sir Toby - Twelfth Night

 

[Ozz]

I got banned for a Merchant of Venice reference.

 

[cgannon64]

Isn't Othello full of terrible racist insults?

 

[Raijer]

A flame by any other name...

 

[The Yankee]

I thumb my nose at you.

Somehow, that started a swordfight in Romeo and Juliet.

 

[Pontiuth Pilate]

Actually, "I bite my thumb at you", which was the Renaissance equivalent of flipping the bird, and in some areas [California, strangely enough] still means the same thing, if you flick your thumb off the bottom edge of your top teeth.

One wonders how the actors said the lines with their thumb between their teeth... or why they needed to

 

[onejayhawk]

Originally posted by The Yankee
I thumb my nose at you.
Somehow, that started a swordfight in Romeo and Juliet.

Not exactly. It weas a part of the running banter. Mercutio was out to bate a bull that day.

'Tis not so wide as a church door, nor so deep as a well, but 'twill do. 'Twill do.Same scene after getting stabbed.

J

 

[Loaf Warden]

Originally posted by Pontiuth Pilate
Actually, "I bite my thumb at you", which was the Renaissance equivalent of flipping the bird, and in some areas [California, strangely enough] still means the same thing, if you flick your thumb off the bottom edge of your top teeth.

Really? They still use it in California? That's kind of cool, I guess.

As far as old-fashioned/unusual curses go, I find I say 'piss-cutter' a lot. I got it from James Clavell's novel "Shogun", and I have no idea if it was ever really used by anyone in that era, but I do like the sound of it.

Rodrigues: "All they eat's raw fish, raw vegetables in sweet pickled vinegar. But life here can be a piss-cutter if you know how."
Blackthorne: "Is 'piss-cutter' good or bad?"
Rodrigues: "It's mostly very good but sometimes terribly bad. It all depends how you feel and you ask too many questions."

 

[The Yankee]

Well, nobody ever told me to pay attention when it was time to study Romeo and Juliet.

I guess the version here would be having your hand start at the bottom of your throat and scratching upward and forcing outward under the chin.

 

[The Yankee]

Originally posted by Loaf Warden


Really? They still use it in California? That's kind of cool, I guess.

As far as old-fashioned/unusual curses go, I find I say 'piss-cutter' a lot. I got it from James Clavell's novel "Shogun", and I have no idea if it was ever really used by anyone in that era, but I do like the sound of it.

Rodrigues: "All they eat's raw fish, raw vegetables in sweet pickled vinegar. But life here can be a piss-cutter if you know how."
Blackthorne: "Is 'piss-cutter' good or bad?"
Rodrigues: "It's mostly very good but sometimes terribly bad. It all depends how you feel and you ask too many questions."

Nice!

I really like Shogun!

 

[Richard III]

Originally posted by The Yankee



Nice!

I really like Shogun!

Jack: I really hated it. Not because it wasn't good, but because I was enraged to discover later that the story was virtually real (e.g. the shipwreck of Will Adams and his subsequent friendship with Shogun Tokagawa) but that the details were changed slightly, and that Clavell had the nerve to pass the whole thing off without any reference to the much more remarkable true story.

What an ass. (Clavell) Piss-cutter.

R.III

 

[Rout]

Shogun is one of the best books I have ever read! I didn't realise that about it being based on a true story R.III, although you can tell that it's based in a realistic (and fascinating) period of history, neh?.

 

[The Yankee]

It is about Tokugawa against Ishida Mitsunari before the Battle of Sekigahara in the year 1600, IIRC. But in the book, it's Toranaga vs. Ishido, mainly.

But, since I don't see much coverage of the time period outside of Kessen I and Shogun: Total War, I liked the book. Brought you a little closer into the time. Once I read the thing, I knew it was pretty much entirely based on what happened with the young heir to Hideyori (or was it Hideyoshi, I forget which, the Toyotomi family) and the power struggle by these daimyo.

 

[Richard III]

That's what pissed me off. I liked the book, so it seemed wrong somehow that so good a book should draw from so good a real story and leave the reader deluded into beleiving it was all imaginary.

Strange, I know, but it angers me all the same.

Richard Chamberlain sucked in the flick, though.

R.III


Rout, read this.

Bartelby's entry on the subject of Will Adams

 

[Loaf Warden]

I was lucky enough to know about William Adams before I read the book. I pretty much ignored the history, which I assumed was fudged beyond recognition anyway, and just enjoyed it as a work of fiction.

Actually, what bothered me most about the book was the horrible Japanese used in it. It's obvious Clavell didn't speak the language. That's one advantage for the movie; using Japanese actors meant they were able to at least get their own language right.

I thought Richard Chamberlain was an odd choice to play Blackthorne. The one English character in the whole story was played by an American, while the Portuguese characters were played by Britons, and the Dutch characters were played by Cockneys, if I recall. A British actor would probably have been more suited to the role of Blackthorne. (I seem to remember reading somewhere that Sean Connery was considered for the role. Though he is British, I'm glad he didn't get the part. I think he's a terrible actor.)

And to keep this from going completely off-topic, here's a web site that shows how to create your own Elizabethan insults:
http://www.renfaire.com/Language/insults.html

Thou droning flap-mouthed mammet!
Thou mewling fat-kidneyed nut-hook!
Thou yeasty onion-eyed foot-licker!