Some curiosities gathered from the net
re: John Dee & Shakspur
http://www.physorg.com/news9102.html
14 of Shakespeare's plays have Italian settings in which he put detailed knowledge of the country to good use.
And then I stole all courtesy from heaven,
And dress'd myself in such humility
That I did pluck allegiance from men's hearts,
Loud shouts and salutations from their mouths,
Even in the presence of the crowned king.
Thus did I keep my person fresh and new;
My presence, like a robe pontifical,
Ne'er seen but wonder'd at: and so my state,
Seldom but sumptuous, showed like a feast
And won by rareness such solemnity.
The skipping king, he ambled up and down
With shallow jesters and rash bavin wits,
Soon kindled and soon burnt; carded his state,
Mingled his royalty with capering fools
- Henry IV, part 1 | Act 3, Scene 2
Shakespeare was the first to refer to a pack of cards as a deck - in Henry VI, 1593:
"But whiles he thought to steale the single Ten, The King was slyly finger'd from the Deck."
CARD - the taper on which the points of the compass are marked under the mariner's needle
http://www.onlineshakespeare.com/glossaryal.htm
Abstract:
"This article examines Shakespeare's dramatic engagement with the game of chess and the established decorum of chess play. Focusing on the interrupted game in 5.1 of The Tempest, William Poole shows how Shakespeare's scene participates in a literary tradition that associates this aristocratic pastime with gambling, seduction, cheating, violence, class conflict, and civil disorder. Miranda and Ferdinand's dialogue over the chess board is contextualized through an analysis of chess games and chess metaphors in various medieval and early modern texts, including works by de Cessolis, Chaucer, Caxton, Greene, Chapman, Middleton, and Massinger and Fletcher. Poole also links the lovers' game with instances of marital discord elsewhere in Shakespeare's canon."
Poole, William "False Play: Shakespeare and Chess"
Shakespeare Quarterly - Volume 55, Number 1, Spring 2004, pp. 50-70
The Johns Hopkins University Press
http://muse.jhu.edu/cgi-bin/access.cgi?uri=/journals/shakespeare_quarterly/v055/55.1poole.html
As Prospero points out in The Tempest, the best games should be difficult to play 'lest too light winning make the prize light':
“Essentially the sonnet cycle is a big game, and that also irritates some modern critics and scholars who don’t like to see lyric poetry reduced, as they would see it, to mere game,” he added.
http://pr.tennessee.edu/alumnus/alumarticle.asp?id=595
http://www.utm.edu/staff/ngraves/shakespeare/
http://www.utm.edu/staff/ngraves/shakespeare/Gameboard.htm
'He'll be hang'd yet,
Though every drop of water swear against it
And gape at widest to glut him.'
(the Boatswain will be hanged yet even though every drop of water swears that he will drown),
-The Tempest Act 1, Scene 1 (Line 64).
-John