[Exeunt Sibyl and her courtiers]
[Enter Ridao]
To read, or not to read,—that is the question:—
Whether 'tis nobler in the butt to suffer
The kicks and arrows of outrageous fortune
Or to take arms against a flock of bastards,
And by opposing end them?—To laugh,—to spit,—
No more; and by a spit to say we wet
The forehead of the Sibyl, and the thousand books she reads,
or says that she reads,—'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To piss her off,—to read;—
To read! perchance to write —ay, there's the point;
For in that damned reading the poems may come,
When we have pissed her off and kick her balls,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so big bollocks;
For who would bear the whips and blows of her,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's scorns,
The pangs of her sultry voice, the edition’s delay,
The stupidity of others, and the spurns
That patient merit of the idiot takes,
When he himself might his books make
With a bare blogger? Who would this sucking up,
To creep and sweat under a weary life,
But that the hope of fame after death,—
The undiscover'd honour, from whose bourn
No pretentious writer returns, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather silly, those ills we have
Than fly to others that we fuck not off?
Thus vanity does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of boldness
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of publication;
And enterprises of great pith and moment,
With this regard, their currents lose their weight,
And lose the name of writing.—Soft you now!
The fair Sibyl!—Jerk, in thy orisons
Kiss my ass and go to hell.
