Critical Appreciation of the poem ‘ALL THE WORLD A STAGE ‘by William Shakespeare

                                    All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms;
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lin’d,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper’d pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well sav’d, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion;
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

(from As You Like It, spoken by Jaques to Duke Senior)

              Critical appreciation

Each person who honestly loves writing, is familiar with WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE , an exceptionally well known English writer ,actor and dramatist. In fact, “All the World a Stage “was not a verse ,but a monologue from the maestro’s ‘As  You Like It’. It is said by melancholy Jaques in Act 2  Scene 7.

Theme:

The main theme of this poem is the cycle of our life. It lets us know that every one of the people is simple character in the show which is played on the stage i.e on the planet. Man has seven distinct periods of life.

The man starts his subsequent on this stage as an infant kid who regurgitates in the arms of his clinical guardian and cries to be in the comfort of his mother

The second act starts right when he turns into a school going boy, who is unwilling to go to school and to take the responsibility of being a student.

The 3^rd act comes when he changes into a dear. For him there is absolutely no other place that can comfort him than the eyebrows of his lover.

The 4^th act depicts the man as a fighter for the nation. His facial hair portrays all those weird pledges that he requires to safeguard his nation and residents.

Then the 5^th act where he turns into justice, the one who knows what is good & what is right.

The 6^th stage comes into his life as he enters the stage of pantaloons where he has a high status in society, yet he is greedy for more.

After that the last stage comes for him to go through oblivion. No matter how hard he tries to remember things, he is just not able to.

Style:

There are 2 major poetic devices used in this poem- Simile and Metaphor.

‘Creeping like a snail’, ‘soldier….bearded like the pard’ –are the examples of simile.The entire poem itself is like a symbolism. Here men and women are portrayed as players   whereas life is portrayed as the stage.-these all are the examples of metaphor.

Special feature:

The tone of this poem is somber. It shows how at the end we all fall back into almost the same state we were in as an infant. The mood of this poem is very ‘matter of fact’ yet bleak. It conveys the message that ultimately we end up just as were to be beginning with helpless.

Your favorite line:  

The line which I like most is:

 ‘All the world’s a stage

And all the men and women merely players.”

Jaques, the speaker of this famous phrase in the play ‘As You Like It’. The meaning of this phrase is that this world is like a stage show and all human beings are merely actors who play their assigned roles in every day.

Why do you like this poem?

This poem takes me to two stages- melancholy and epiphany. When I read abot the second last and last stages of the man’s life, I realize that life is nothing but mere play. All we need to do is take birth and leave after performing all our duties. Personally , I feel that this poem also talks about the roles of other people in our life. They enter into our lives to teach us something new, and leave, gifting us a bunch of memories to dwell upon.