Now Is The Winter Of Our Discontent Made Glorious Summer By This Sun Of York,
And All The Clouds That Loured Upon Our House In The Deep Bosom Of The Ocean
Buried.
Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this sun of York,
and all the clouds that loured upon our house in the deep bosom of the ocean
buried. Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths, our bruised arms
hung up for monuments, our stern alarums changed to merry meetings, our
dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visaged war hath smoothed his wrinkled front; and now, instead of
mounting barbed steeds to fright the souls of fearful adversaries,
he capers nimbly in a lady's chamber to the lascivious pleasing of a lute.
But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks, nor made to court
an amorous looking-glass; I, that am rudely stamped, and want love's majesty
to strut before a wanton ambling nymph; I, that am curtailed
of this fair proportion, cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
deformed, unfinished, sent before my time into this breathing world,
scarce half made up, and that so lamely and unfashionable
that dogs bark at me as I halt by them,-- why, I, in this weak piping
time of peace, have no delight to pass away the time,
unless to spy my shadow in the sun.
-- William Shakespeare (1564-1616), King Richard III
-- Act i, Sc. 1
