“Our revels now are ended. These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits and Are melted into air, into thin air: And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, The cloud-capp’d towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff As dreams are made on, and our little life Is rounded with a sleep.”

English playwright, poet and actor

William Shakespeare was an English playwright, poet, and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the leading dramatist of the world stage. Often called England’s national poet and the Bard of Avon, he remains a central figure in English literature. His surviving work includes about 39 plays, 154 sonnets, and three long narrative poems, along with a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. His influence on English writing and drama has lasted for centuries, and his works continue to be studied and reinterpreted.