All The World’s A Stage By William

Shakespeare
Every individual, who is a fan of Literature, knows about William Shakespeare. There is
absolutely no one in the field of Art, who doesn’t know about him. William Shakespeare
was a very popular English poet, actor as well as a playwright. He is the one, who has
brought us fine scripts like Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet. His poem, All The World’s A
Stage, gained immense popularity, right when it was written and introduced to the
readers of his time.

Historical Perspective
All The World’s A Stage is a poem written by William Shakespeare. In fact, it was not a
poem earlier, but a monologue from the maestro’s As You Like It. This monologue is said
by Melancholy Jaques in Act II Scene VII. As the speech begins, seven different stages
of a man’s life are all that can come into your mind. Each and every word is so
beautifully written that you can actually imagine everything that is written, just like a
movie running in front of your eyes.
The seven stages of a man’s life also refer to The Seven Ages Of Man. These ages are:
infant, school going boy, lover/husband, soldier/fighter, justice/ability to understand the
right and wrong, Pantalone (greediness and high in status) and old-age.

In this poem, Shakespeare has compared life with a stage. He has used different words
to beautify the poem in a wonderful way. He has taken this concept from medieval
philosophy, which showed glimpses of several different groups as the seven deadly sins
for theological reasons. Theology is the study of God’s nature as well as religious belief.

All The World’s A Stage Structure

There are two major poetic devices used in this poem – simile and metaphor.
Simile examples in the poem: ‘creeping like a snail’; ‘soldier… bearded like the pard’; etc.

Metaphor examples in the poem: The entire poem itself is more like symbolism; men
and women are portrayed as players whereas life is portrayed as the stage.
Repetition is another figure of speech used in this poem; words like sans, age, etc. are
repeated.

The poet has used a narrative form to express his innermost emotions about how he
thinks that the world is a stage and all the people living in it are mere players or
characters. These characters go through seven different phases in their lives.

As All The World’s A Stage begins, you are dragged to a stage. It is like you are the
audience, and you are watching a drama on the stage, right in front of your eyes.
All The World’s A Stage tells you that all the men and women are mere characters in the
drama, which is played on the stage (in the world). ‘They have their exits and their
entrances’; this means that all the people take birth and then die after a certain period of
time.
When the man enters into the world, he has seven different ages or phases to go
through. When he goes through these ages, he has to play different roles. These roles
depict a man as a son, his responsibilities as a brother, father, husband, fighter for the
nation, etc.

The man begins his act on the stage as an infant; he pukes in the arms of his nurse and
cries to be in the comfort of his mother.
The second act starts right when he turns into a school going boy, who is unwilling to go
to school and unwilling to take the responsibility of being a student.

The third act , then comes when he turns into a lover; his lover is the only person he
sees dancing in front of his eyes. For him, there is absolutely no other place that can
comfort him, than the eyebrow of his lover.

The fourth act of All The World’s A Stage portrays the man as a soldier or a fight for the
nation. His beard depicts all those strange oaths that he takes to protect his country
and all the men and women living in it. No doubt he quarrels, but he also maintains his
dignity to create and develop his reputation in front of others around him. This is
perhaps the toughest stage in his life.
Then comes the fifth act, where he turns into justice, the one who knows what is good
and what is right. At this stage, he is perhaps the best person to approach to find out
who is correct and who is wrong.
The fifth stage comes into his life as he enters the stage of Pantalone, where he has a
high status in society, yet he is greedy for more. This stage does not remain for long in
his life.

Alas! The last stage comes for him to go through oblivion. No matter how hard he tries
to remember things, he is just not able to. When he enters old-age, he turns into a child
again. Slowly, he begins losing his teeth, his vision, the taste in his mouth and the love
or greed for everything that he once wanted in his life.

Personal Commentary
All The World’s A Stage takes you to two stages – melancholy and epiphany. When you
read about the second last and last stages of the man’s life, you realize that life is
nothing, but mere play. All you need to do is take birth and leave, after performing all
your duties. Why do you need all the fame, name and money? Why do you want to have
everything in life, when you would have absolutely nothing at all by the end of your
‘play?’
Personally, I feel that this poem also talks about the roles of other people in your life.
Just like you are playing your part, so are they! They enter into your lives to teach you
something new, and leave, gifting you a bunch of memories to dwell upon.

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