Shakespeare

The word “Shakespeare” means used to refer to William Shakespeare, the English playwright and poet, or his body of work. In plain terms, refers to the famous English playwright, or, informally, to very eloquent writing.

“Shakespeare” is pronounced SHAYKS-peer (/ˈʃeɪkspɪɹ/ in IPA).

Here is “Shakespeare” used in a sentence: “They performed a scene from Shakespeare at the school festival.”

“Shakespeare” is a noun.

The word “Shakespeare” comes from Middle English. A Middle English surname meaning "spearman", from "shake" (to brandish) plus "spear".

“Shakespeare” is a fairly common word in modern English.

“Shakespeare” has 2 distinct senses listed in this dictionary. The most common is: used to refer to William Shakespeare, the English playwright and poet, or his body of work.

"Shakespeare" is the name itself, used for the playwright or his body of work, as in "studying Shakespeare". "Shakespearean" is the adjective, describing anything relating to him or in his style — a Shakespearean sonnet, a Shakespearean actor, or a downfall described as Shakespearean in scale.

A bard is a poet, and Shakespeare is called "the Bard" — or "the Bard of Avon", after the river that runs through his home town of Stratford-upon-Avon — because he is widely regarded as the greatest poet and playwright in English. Used with "the", the title refers to him alone.

The standard modern spelling is "Shakespeare". English spelling was not fixed in his era and early documents record several variants of the name, but today anything other than "Shakespeare" is treated as a misspelling.