This is the audiobook edition of Everyday Shakespeare. After purchase, you will be able to download it to the John Murray Languages app or stream the audio on library.jmlanguages.com. Please note you will not be able to save the files to your computer. 

Shakespeare had an ear and hand that was able to capture our everyday thoughts and emotions, pin them to a page, and express them so well that still today they can make us feel stunned to be seen.

'Better three hours too soon than a minute too late.'
'Make not your thoughts your prisons.'
'Wisely and slow. They stumble that run fast.'
'And I have heard it said, unbidden guests are often welcomest when they're gone.'

With a quote for every day of the year, this beautiful book gathers the finest lines from the lesser-known corners of Shakespeare's plays and poems. While you may not be familiar with these 400-year-old phrases, you will be surprised by the immediate, easy resonance they have with modern day-to-day life and, hopefully, inspired to learn a few quotes, say them out loud, and drop them into conversation.

This audio edition is read by David, Ben and Hilary Crystal. Each quote is provided in standard British English, and then again in original pronunciation (OP), as it would have been spoken when it was first performed in the 1600s. The original pronunciation provides insight into the rhyming structure of some lines that are lost in modern pronunciation, as well as highlighting the similarities OP has to other varieties of English, notably the american 'ar' sound. The Crystals also draw attention to points of daily life, literary, linguistic, and theatrical interest through their entertaining commentary. They offer notes of context for anyone who wants to know who originally said the words, in which play, and why.

Shakespeare's words are a mirror for us to peer into, to see if any part of ourselves, familiar or strange, is visible. Each day as you read his lines, you'll get glimpses of loves you've known, jealousies you've felt, relationships you've had, and situations you've encountered that bring a smile - or a wince - of familiarity. Everyday Shakespeare shares the simple lines that encapsulate the wondrous complexity of life, and the enduring appeal of the Bard.

Shakespeare was not of an age, but for all time. Ben Jonson

Ben is an actor, author, creative producer, patron of Shakespeare Week, Associate Artist with the new Shakespeare North Playhouse, and curator of the ShakespeareEnsemble.com. His solo writing includes Lockdown Shakespeare (Bloomsbury, 2022), Shakespeare on Toast (Icon, 2008; nominated for the Educational Book of the Year Award 2010) and the four titles of the Arden Springboard Shakespeare series: Hamlet, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and King Lear.

David is Honorary Professor of Linguistics at Bangor University. His previous work on Shakespeare includes Pronouncing Shakespeare and Think on My Words: Exploring Shakespeare’s Language. He has written or edited many books and articles for scholarly, professional, and general readerships on the history and development of English, including The Stories of English, How Language Works, and Evolving English.

Ben and David have collaborated on several books: Shakespeare’s Words (Penguin, 2002), The Shakespeare Miscellany (Penguin, 2005) and The Oxford Illustrated Shakespeare Dictionary (Oxford University Press, 2015; shortlisted for the Educational Book of the Year Award 2016).