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Shakespeare Quotes Quiz

Can you fill the blanks in these famous quotes from the works of William Shakespeare?
Quiz by Quizmaster
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Last updated: December 9, 2019
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First submittedAugust 9, 2012
Times taken57,720
Average score60.0%
Rating4.33
4:00
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Source
Quote
Hamlet
To be, or not to be, that is the question
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark
To thine own self be true
There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so
Romeo & Juliet
A rose by any other name would smell as sweet
O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo?
Parting is such sweet sorrow
A plague on both your houses
Richard III
Now is the winter of our discontent
My kingdom for a horse
Macbeth
Something wicked this way comes
Out, damn'd spot!
Sonnet 18
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day
Julius Caesar
Beware the ides of March
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears
The Merchant of Venice
All that glisters is not gold
King Henry VI
The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers
Give the devil his due
The Tempest
We are such stuff as dreams are made on
As You Like It
All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players
+9
Level 23
Sep 27, 2012
For some random reason, I always thought it was "Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your spears".... I guess it rhymes lol with the true answer.
+1
Level 65
Apr 15, 2023
I will quote this evermore
+1
Level 26
Sep 29, 2012
It's As You Like It, not As You Like.
+1
Level 12
Dec 21, 2012
Yeah it should be AS YOU LIKE IT
+4
Level 33
Jan 19, 2013
The lawyers quote was new to me... but you know... good advice. Hmm... maybe bankers 1st.
+8
Level 77
Aug 27, 2013
The only reason i knew that one is from an Eagles song from their Hell Freezes Over album called "Get Over It." The line is "...old Billy was right...let's kill all the lawyers...kill 'em tonight." I never knew who the heck Old Billy was...turns out "Old Billy" is Billy Shakespere. Weird.
+4
Level 55
Jul 22, 2014
I leanred something new... and really cool, too!
+1
Level 85
Jan 19, 2023
And we have "Limelight" by Rush and "Burning for You" by Blue Oyster Cult represented here. Any others?
+1
Level 77
Jan 13, 2015
It may seem good advice, but the character that speaks it is NOT a hero. It's not Shakespeare's actual sentiment.
+2
Level 44
Jan 23, 2015
shocked, but maybe you have not had experiences with weird people that love that quote and really want to murder lawyers (of course they will call one once they are caught) lol
+1
Level 71
Jan 16, 2021
Didn't know the quote, but I love it.
+2
Level 28
May 18, 2021
The only reasons I know it is because of the Crazy Ex-Girlfriend song: Don't Be A Lawyer (it's a bop)
+2
Level 68
Jul 31, 2013
Wow. I got 11 of them and I've only read his sonnets. I guess some of them have become more like sayings.
+6
Level 72
Nov 20, 2015
You'd be surprised how many popular sayings, and even words, were first used by shakespeare
+2
Level 51
May 15, 2014
Finally! A quiz in my field!
+2
Level 84
Jan 23, 2015
Thanks for accepting "glitters" for glisters! Had to look it up - never knew the original was actually glisters.
+3
Level 48
Oct 13, 2018
glitters is WRONG it's a misquote like alas, poor Yorrick i knew him...(no well)
+1
Level 76
Mar 7, 2023
Good thing you typed "wrong" in all caps so the rest of us knew.
+1
Level 65
Apr 28, 2015
I'm embarrassed by my failure in the Macbeth quotes, I only learned it twice in school....
+1
Level 60
Apr 29, 2015
Great quiz thank you. Annoyed that I missed one though - guess I haven't been paying the devil his due........
+1
Level 43
Aug 26, 2015
'let's kill all the lawyers' made me laugh out loud :'D
+1
Level 58
Sep 21, 2015
We all hate our lawyers ;( !
+1
Level 65
Mar 9, 2016
Macbeth has a lot of better quotes.
+1
Level 63
Nov 8, 2017
If that chick don' curdle your blood, you ain't got none.
+5
Level 38
Apr 12, 2020
"What, you egg!"
+1
Level 77
Aug 1, 2020
Come, you spirits

That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,

And fill me from the crown to the toe topful

Of direst cruelty, if that's all right with the rest of you.

+3
Level 84
Feb 28, 2017
Odd. For Richard III and "My kingdom for a ....", it wouldn't accept "beer", no matter how many times I typed it. :-P
+1
Level 71
Apr 29, 2017
Great quiz, I surprised myself getting 18/20 but many of these quotes although coined by Shakespeare have become sayings. I missed the "kill the lawyers" and missed 'Dreams' although I have heard it often enough.
+1
Level 37
Nov 8, 2017
Since Henry VI was English, wouldn't he have said: "... Let's kill all the Solicitors" or "Let's kill all the Barristers." ?
+4
Level 82
Aug 1, 2020
No, we use the term lawyer here too. Solicitors and barristers are types of lawyer.
+5
Level 53
Aug 3, 2020
Henry VI was also speaking 100 years or so before English was used in the Americas so probably fair to say that the American English term comes from the same source.
+3
Level 32
Oct 5, 2021
Also it's not King Henry who says that quote -- it's the rebel Jack Cade.
+3
Level 66
Nov 8, 2017
Whilst understandable, 'glitter' should probably not be allowed as a type-in, in a quotations quiz, where the idea is to get the quote right. I know glister is an archaic word for glitter, but it's still the only word that should be acceptable as the answer.
+2
Level 75
Aug 1, 2020
It must be from the New Revised Standard Shakespeare.
+1
Level 79
Aug 2, 2020
I tried glisten several times before realising my error and changing to glister
+1
Level 57
Nov 8, 2017
Thou shalt not to this quiz answer wrong
+2
Level 70
Jan 19, 2023
Hello Yoda
+8
Level 56
Nov 8, 2017
Outdoors Shop's Advertising.....

"Now is the winter of our discount tents"

A classic !

+1
Level 66
Dec 1, 2019
Disco tents?
+1
Level 56
Nov 8, 2017
No idea why, but I kept thinking that it was winter's day and not summer's day
+1
Level 84
Nov 8, 2017
In the answer stats, "Give the {devil} his due" is listed as Henry IV instead of Henry VI.
+1
Level 71
Nov 9, 2017
Henry IV, part 1.
+4
Level 68
Nov 9, 2017
Double, double toil and trouble, Fire burn and cauldron bubble... my favourite quote.
+1
Level 75
Oct 15, 2020
Henry VI, not King Henry VI.
+1
Level 44
Mar 8, 2021
How 'bout “Et Tu Brute, Heart of Gold, It's All Greek To Me, If Music Be The Food of Love - Play On and Knock Knock Who’s There”?
+1
Level 57
Apr 17, 2021
Midsummer:

"You painted barber pole!"

+2
Level 83
Jun 3, 2021
I thought it was painted maypole?
+1
Level 28
May 18, 2021
Give the devil his due is the only one I didn't know
+1
Level 70
Sep 4, 2022
"The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers"

Shakespeare once sued a man for 35 shillings (£175 today) and 10 pennies (£5) over grain he sold to the man and the debt not being repaid. The 10 pennies were apparently tacked on by Shakespeare's lawyer as damages. That amount is not nothing, but it does feel a bit overly litigious considering his success by this point in his life. I suspect there's more to it than a simple debt, but it's an interesting juxtaposition given the quote.

+1
Level 72
Jan 19, 2023
You could make a nice quiz out of pop culture titles that are quotes from Shakespeare. There's (1) "To Be or Not To Be," a comedy starring Jack Benny and Carole Lombard (remade by Mel Brooks and Anne Bancroft), (2) Kurt Weill's and Ogden Nash's song "Speak Low," which borrows from a line by Don Pedro in "Much Ado About Nothing," (3) Huxley's novel "Brave New World" ("The Tempest"), (4) the miniseries "Band of Brothers" ("Henry V"), and "Infinite Jest" by David Foster Wallace ("Hamlet"), just to name a few.
+1
Level 48
Jan 19, 2023
took this quiz with my mom got 100% then took with my sister and got 75%. she dumb as all get out. I'm talking about my sister not my mom. lol pronouns.... they used to mean something different.... now kids these days... im getting old...
+1
Level 48
Jan 20, 2023
update: took it with my other sister: we got 49%. The future is not female people... LOL
+1
Level 60
Jan 31, 2023
The actual quote from Romeo and Juliet is "That which we call a rose by any other word would smell as sweet." The way it's misquoted here would not fit into the iambic pentameter it was written in. But people say it that way all the time! :)