A Quote by Ishmael Beah

Shakespeare is absolutely big in Africa. I guess he's big everywhere. Growing up, Shakespeare was the thing. You'd learn monologues and you'd recite them. And just like hip-hop, it made you feel like you knew how to speak English really well. You had a mastery of the English language to some extent.

Ishmael Beah

Quote Topics

Absolutely Africa Big English English Language Everywhere Extent Feel Growing Growing Up Guess Had Hip Hip-Hop Hop How Just Knew Language Learn Like Like You Made Mastery Monologues Really Recite Shakespeare Some Speak Speak English Them Thing Up Well

Quote Author

Ishmael Beah
Sierra Leonean - Author
Born: November 23, 1980

It is no exaggeration to say that the English Bible is, next to Shakespeare, the greatest work in English literature, and that it will have much more influence than even Shakespeare upon the written and spoken language of the English race.

Lafcadio Hearn

Shakespeare's always been sitting on my back, since I began reading. And, certainly, as a writer, he's who I hear all the time. And he's almost indistinguishable now from the English language. I have no sense of what Shakespeare is like. I have no sense of the personality that is Shakespeare. I think, alone among writers, I don't know who he is.

Howard Jacobson

The revival of Hebrew, as a spoken language, is a fascinating story, which I'm afraid I cannot squeeze into a few sentences. But, let me give you a clue. Think about Elizabethan English, where the entire English language behaved pretty much like molten lava, like a volcano in mid-eruption. Modern Hebrew has some things in common with Elizabethan English. It is being reshaped and it's expanding very rapidly in various directions. This is not to say that every one of us Israeli writers is a William Shakespeare, but there is a certain similarity to Elizabethan English.

Amos Oz

I'm one of those people that feels that Americans that shouldn't do Shakespeare... The rhythms of the English language and the mannerisms of the English speech seems to work effortlessly with William Shakespeare, but when Americans do it, something seems stuck.

Nicolas Cage

Well, a lot of people within government and big business are nervous of Hip Hop and Hip Hop artists, because they speak their minds. They talk about what they see and what they feel and what they know. They reflect what's around them.

Afrika Bambaataa

There is certainly no one 'type' of writer who deliberately draws on Shakespeare. In fact, there's a strong argument that everyone writing in the English language is influenced by Shakespeare because, to a considerable degree, he shaped that language.

Matt Haig

You start learning English in fifth grade. I was 12. But even before then I was listening to American music. My neighbor was a really big hip-hop fan, so he taught me everything around hip-hop.

Ivica Zubac

English dramatic literature is, of course, dominated by Shakespeare; and it is almost inevitable that an English reader should measure the value of other poetic drama by the standards which Shakespeare has already implanted in his mind.

Lytton Strachey

But still it's like I said, when you hop in a cab in Italy and the guy doesn't speak English, uhh, you know, you have to start pointin' at things. You learn how to deal with it. What I'm tryin' to say is that it's not as convenient as touring in the states or say somewhere like Australia or even England where they speak the same language fluently.

Vinnie Paul

Often in America people would assume that [as an English actor] you've had some sort of deep, classical training, or that you're a Shakespeare enthusiast. I have zero interest in me performing Shakespeare.

Bill Nighy

I want to diversify a bit. I don't wanna throw myself into another big blockbuster or another big franchise anytime soon. So smaller films, just small little interesting parts, I think I'd even like to play around with some really good supporting roles and then develop into - I don't know just like feel my way into it a bit more. I don't know, I'd love to try some theater. That's my other thing. I'd love to do some Shakespeare.

Emma Watson

I feel more Irish than English. I feel freer than British, more visceral, with a love of language. Shot through with fire in some way. That's why I resist being appropriated as the current repository of Shakespeare on the planet. That would mean I'm part of the English cultural elite, and I am utterly ill-fitted to be.

Kenneth Branagh

I spent ten years in London; I trained there. But because I started in English, it kind of feels the most natural to me, to act in English, which is a strange thing. My language is Spanish; I grew up in Argentina. I speak to my family in Spanish, but if you were to ask me what language I connect with, it'd be English in some weird way.

Juan Pablo Di Pace

I have no idea what it would be like to be just one thing and speak one language. I feel enormously privileged to travel and be able to mingle and speak to people that, had I only known English, I wouldn't have been able to meet.

Cary Fukunaga

As far as getting work, no one thought I spoke English. It was absolutely ridiculous. I'd show up at a meeting and they'd be like, 'Oh my God, you speak English! That's so cool.' They didn't really know what to do with me.