Transcript of The Seven Ages Of Man poem written by William Shakespeare.
THE SEVEN AGES OF MAN POEM – What is The Seven Ages Of Man poem all about? A speech written by William Shakespeare.
This monologue, The Seven Ages Of Man, is written by William Shakespeare for the play As You Like It. This describes how Jacques divided the life of a man into seven stages. These are:
- Baby or infant
- School boy or child
- Lover
- Soldier
- Justice or judge
- Old man
- Extreme old age, again like a child
The speech is focused on the experience of men. It starts with being a helpless infant vomiting in the arms of his nurse and ends with extreme old age or second childhood. Why second childhood? It is because old men are dependent on others and have no teeth just like a child.
The Seven Ages of Man
Speech from William Shakespeare’s As You Like It, Act II scene vii
Jaques:
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 lined,
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 saved, 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.
Jacques is a melancholy lord. He is living in the Forest of Arden after being banished and his speech is about the changes a man experiences over the course of his life. Simply put, it is about the cycle of life from birth to death and having no way to escape it.
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