Talk:William Shakespeare

Is he the world's greatest dramatist?

"William Shakespeare […] widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's greatest dramatist."

Does anyone else, by any chance, has a problem with this introductory sentence? Is it not, out of courtesy, the common usage to say "one of the greatest (in the world)" for anybody who stands out among his peers (especially an artist), even when a large majority would admit that, indeed, this person is the greatest in their opinions. I find the turn of phrase way too definitive for an encyclopedia.

I, for one, have seen plays written by Shakespeare and of course plays by other writers, and my take on it is that Shakespeare is not the author who moved me or impressed me the most. While writing this, I stumbled upon this very good article about what G. B. Shaw called "bardolatry". It is said in this piece that, among other great writers, Tolstoy, Wittgenstein and Voltaire not only didn't consider him the greatest, but disliked his works.

In any case, I think the first sentence should be changed to "William Shakespeare […] widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and one of the world's greatest dramatist", as I find the title of "greatest writer in the English language" not as outrageously presumptuous as the one of "world's greatest dramatist".

--Niouyouseur (talk) 15:40, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

Fwiw, some earlier discussions:

• Talk:William_Shakespeare/Archive_22#Edit_to_Intro
• Talk:William_Shakespeare/Archive_22#Shakespeare's_Reputation
• Talk:William_Shakespeare/Archive_22#Is_he_widely_regarded_as_the_greatest_writer_in_the_English_language?
• Talk:William_Shakespeare/Archive_22#Yeah,_not_even_‘by_many’_is_accepted_anymore Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:16, 17 October 2020 (UTC)

"bardolatry" is the practice of deifying Shakespeare. The fact that a word exists for it means a lot of people have done it. This is actually evidence in support of the current language - after all, whether he is objectively the best (and you haven't suggested who is better) is impossible to measure, and we can only address what other people have said. The fact that he has a few (well, add millions of schoolchildren) critics does not negate the fact that he is widely considered one of the best and the best; and has been for centuries. Further, I fail to see a better solution: "Shakespeare was a pretty good author but Tolstoy thought otherwise" is probably not a great alternative. If we fail to measure his immeasurable impact on Western culture and the English language, we are concealing the truth. This conversation is stale, but I still thought I'd add this since I cleaned up some vandalism here. ‡ Єl Cid of Valencia ^talk 20:31, 16 March 2021 (UTC)

"Gulielmus Shakspere" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Gulielmus Shakspere. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 November 7#Gulielmus Shakspere until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Soumya-8974 ^talk _contribs ^subpages 05:45, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 6 March 2021

Can you let me edit there is a grammar mistake 2A00:23C4:3883:6900:6CEA:2C16:1EF1:D139 (talk) 14:13, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

 Not done: requests for decreases to the page protection level should be directed to the protecting admin or to Wikipedia:Requests for page protection if the protecting admin is not active or has declined the request.

If there is a grammar error, please point it out here (and re-open the request) and an editor with appropriate permissions will happily fix it for you. Thanks J850NK (talk) 14:26, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

William Shakespeare

He was Great 16th Century Poet Ever in my Existence and have chance to see William Shakespeare's Poets Nub29339 (talk) 15:46, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

"Greene's attack is the earliest surviving mention of Shakespeare's work in the theatre. Biographers suggest that his career may have begun any time from the mid-1580s to just before Greene's remarks."

Should read

Green's remarks about an upstart crow possibly refer to Shakespeare, the tigers heart line is from from HenryVI. It is not the first mention of Shakespeare's works, in Green's Menaphon 1589 Nash states "English Seneca read by candle-light yields many good sentences, as Blood is a beggar, and so forth; and if you entreat him fair in a frosty morning, he will afford you whole Hamlets, I should say handfuls of tragical speeches"

(STC 12272,1589)