Shakespeare Quiz

Shakespeare has been successfully translated into more than 80 languages all over the world – including Klingon and Esperanto. He’s credited with bringing nearly 1,700 common words into the English language and forever changing the way we communicate and speak (and sometimes spell). Shakespeare achieved this by using words as new parts of speech (such as making a noun a verb), adding suffixes and prefixes, and even joining multiple words to create phrases with new meanings.

In honour of April being both his birth and death month and this year the 400th anniversary of his death, we’ve built a quiz to test your knowledge. Can you identify from which plays these common words and phrases originated?

Assassination

Wild-Goose Chase

What the dickens

Besmirch

The world is your oyster
Method to his madness

Love is blind

Bedroom

Eyeball

Moonbeam

Puking

Marketable

Bonus :

Wonder what Appella has in common with Shakespeare? Check out our previous blog to find out!

How many did you get? Check out the answers below!

Assassination:

Macbeth: Act I Scene VII, Macbeth

“If it were done when ‘tis done, then ‘twere well
It were done quickly: if the assassination
Could trammel up the consequence, and catch
With his surcease success; that but this blow
Might be the be-all and the end-all here… ”

Wild-goose chase:

Romeo & Juliet : Act II Scene IV, Mercutio

“Nay, if our wits run the wild-goose chase , I am done;
For thou hast more of the wild goose in one of thy wits than,
I am sure, I have in my whole five.”

What the dickens:

The Merry Wives of Windsor : Act II Scene II, Mistress Page

“I cannot tell what the dickens his name is…”

Besmirch:

Hamlet : Act I Scene III, Laertes

“The inward service of the mind and soul
Grows wide withal. Perhaps he loves you now,
And now no soil nor cautel doth besmirch
The virtue of his will: but you must fear,
His greatness weigh’d, his will is not his own”

The world is your oyster:

The Merry Wives of Windsor : Act II Scene II, Pistol

“Why, then the world’s mine oyster , which I with sword will open.”

Method to his madness:

Hamlet : Act II Scene II, Polonius

“Though this be madness, yet here is method in’t.”

Love is blind:

The Merchant of Venice : Act II Seven IV, Jessica

“But love is blind , and lovers cannot see
The pretty follies that themselves commit…”

Bedroom:

A Midsummer Night’s Dream : Act II Scene II, Lysander

“Then by your side no bed-room me de ny;
For lying so, Hermia, I do not lie.”

Eyeball:

A Midsummer Night’s Dream : Act III Scene II, Oberon

“Then crush this herb into Lysander’s eye;
Whose liquor hath this virtuous property,
To take from thence all error with his might,
And make his eyeballs roll with wonted sight.”

Moonbeam:

A Midsummer Night’s Dream : Act III Scene I, Titania

“To have my love to bed and to arise;
And pluck the wings from painted butterflies
To fan the moonbeams from his sleeping eyes:
Nod to him, elves, and do him courtesies.”

Puking:

As You Like It: Act II Scene VII, Jacques

“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.”

Marketable:

As You Like It : Act I Scene II, Celia

“All the better; we shall be more marketable .”

At Appella, we’re well into our second decade of shaking, shaping, bending, and compounding words to come up with creatively appropriate names for all kinds of circumstances.

To find out more about naming your brand with the Appella process, check out our website , find us on Facebook , and make sure to connect with us on LinkedIn.