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Plutarch wrote 'Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans' (also called Parallel Lives or Plutarch's Lives) somewhere around the second century AD and Shakespeare wr
by baristaGeek 10y ago
Plutarch wrote 'Lives of the Noble Greeks and Romans' (also called Parallel Lives or Plutarch's Lives) somewhere around the second century AD and Shakespeare wrote 'Antony and Cleopatra' in 1606. Shakespeare took 'some' inspiration from Plutarch. Plutarch wrote in Greek, Shakespeare in Elizabethian English.
Here's Thomas North's translation of Plutarch's work:
"...she disdained to set forward otherwise but to take her barge in the River Cydnus, the poop whereof was of gold, the sails of purple, and the oars of silver, which kept stroke in rowing after the sound of the music of flutes, howboys, cithernes, viols, and such other instruments as they played up in the barge.
Here's Shakespeare's work:
"The barge she sat in like a burnished throne,
Burned on the water_ the poop was beaten gold;
Purple the sails and so perfumed that
The winds were lovesick with them; the oars were silver,
Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made
The water which the beat to follow faster,
As amorous of their strokes"
This is definitely no coincidence. What's more interesting is that even though it's almost a fact that Shakespeare had Plutarch open while writing this, we can actually see him doing some creative work. He added some alliteration, and for some reason we humans love to listen to a series of words that all start with the same sound.
- conistonwater 10y agoMark Forsyth's Elements of Eloquence uses exactly this example for alliteration, the resemblance between your comment and what he wrote is uncanny. >:( > “The thing about this is that it’s definitely half stolen. There is no possible way that Shakespeare didn’t have North open on his desk when he was writing. But also, Shakespeare made little changes. That means that we can actually watch Shakespeare working. We can peep back 400 years and see the greatest genius who ever lived scribbling away. We can see how he did it, and it’s really pretty bloody simple. All he did was add some alliteration.” Excerpt From: Forsyth, Mark. “The Elements of Eloquence: How to Turn the Perfect English Phrase.”
- baristaGeek 10y agoIndeed. I'm just summarizing what I read. Nothing uncanny about it :)
- StavrosK 10y agoSo you're saying you had your Forsyth open while writing that comment...
- gerbilly 10y ago>All he did was add some alliteration. No that's not all he did, he also included some striking images, the throne, the perfumed sail, the lovesick wind ...
- conistonwater 10y agoThat's within the style of that book, it has a very light tone and doesn't take itself all that seriously. That paragraph is specifically about alliteration, and I'm sure Forsyth wouldn't actually disagree with you.