Weekend self-care open thread: On the Ides of March

I cannot sufficiently express my love for the Bard of Avon.

Like many, I was exposed to William Shakespeare in high school freshman English. And from the moment I read his words, I was hooked. This is a man who had peerless insight into the human condition, and laid it bare in plays and poetry of exquisite depth and sensibility. In the world of the arts, he stands, for me, peerless. No other artist has met the standard he set, although many have come close. His unflinching dissection of humanity continues to inspire artists in all disciplines. There was art before Shakespeare, and art after Shakespeare. And to think all of this was done by a grammar school boy from a market town far from the metropole of London. (And yes. To the question of "Who wrote Shakespeare's plays?", the answer is simply, "Shakespeare". I have no truck with the elitist snobs who assert that this son of the middling sort could not possibly have had the education to write King Lear or The Tempest. That's the kind of snobbery which infects too much of our discourse on various subjects.)

For this weekend's self-care we shall have some selections from his plays, mostly focusing on his soliloquies, where his characters face the audience and expose their innermost thoughts.

Dream greatly, for men and women can do great things.

As always, dear friends, be ever kind, gentle, and joyful with yourselves and those around you.