William Shakespeare
- proper noun
- /ˈwɪljəm ʃeɪkˈspɪr/
:
William Shakespeare
- Are you the author of the plays of William Shakespeare?
Examples
-
A comedy by William Shakespeare.
-
It's a new comedy by William Shakespeare.
-
Study all the works of William Shakespeare.
-
The Tragedy of King Richard the Third by William Shakespeare.
-
Finch, this is a play by William Shakespeare.
-
So you are the famous William Shakespeare whose labors l have so enjoyed.
-
But in William Shakespeare's version, he is played as a hunchback.
-
And in 1623, he wrote the dedication to the collected works of the man we call William Shakespeare.
-
William Shakespeare, however, spent the remainder of his days, not in the playhouses of London, but in the small town of his birth, Stratford-upon-Avon, as a businessman and grain merchant.
-
Study all the works of William Shakespeare.
Synonyms
321
2.1
An English writer who wrote famous plays and poems in the 1600s
An old spelling of the name William Shakespeare
A famous English writer from Stratford-upon-Avon who wrote plays and poems
Surface Forms
Morphology
William + Shakespeare
This is a proper name referring to a specific historical person; the meanings of the constituents 'William' and 'Shakespeare' do not compose to yield the information that he was an English poet and playwright. Although learners can tell it is a person's name (given name + surname), they cannot infer the biographical or occupational meaning from the parts alone, so the expression is opaque.
Etymology
William Shakespeare may come from an old nickname that meant 'shake spear' — literally shake + spear, the image of someone waving a spear. That strong picture helps make the famous writer's name easy to remember today.