In my early twenties I was fortunate enough to see Gielgud perform live in London. Wonderful.

The greatest Prospero.

Thank god we ever had Gielgud.

'The Tempest' is one of my favourite plays and I have sought out and listened carefully to several different versions. As far as I know, there is NO ONE, alive or dead, who has ever bettered THIS. John Gielgud's diction is better than music, and it perfectly transmits the beauty, the power and, of course, the meaning of the words.

I am reading this passage at my grandmother’s funeral soon. The Tempest was her favourite play, she inspired my love of English and Shakespeare.. I studied English at university. My daughter has a name from The Tempest, so it felt fitting.

i wish people spoke Shakespeare like this today

"I’ll break my staff. Bury it certain fathoms in the Earth. And, deeper than did ever plummet sound, I’ll drown my book." 🙌💙

The Greatest Stage Actor of them all.

Those who know Magic's true nature are blessed indeed to ferry the Bard's farewell spell across time. Gielgud is possessed by Prospero and this is the very sound of rapture. This particular passage reaches beyond the scope of petty humanity and puts a visage to the divine.

Good rendition

Would like to think Shakespeare played Prospero, as he did Hamlet’s ghost and old Adam. But he could not have played better than Gielgud.

How it’s done....

It starts at 1:30.

0:45 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, Ye 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. 1:35 Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes and groves, And ye that on the sands with printless foot Do chase the ebbing Neptune and do fly him When he comes back; you demi-puppets that By moonshine do the green sour ringlets make, Whereof the ewe not bites, and you whose pastime Is to make midnight mushrooms, that rejoice To hear the solemn curfew; by whose aid, Weak masters though ye be, I have bedimm'd The noontide sun, call'd forth the mutinous winds, And 'twixt the green sea and the azured vault Set roaring war: to the dread rattling thunder Have I given fire and rifted Jove's stout oak With his own bolt; the strong-based promontory Have I made shake and by the spurs pluck'd up The pine and cedar: graves at my command Have waked their sleepers, oped, and let 'em forth By my so potent art. But this rough magic I here abjure, and, when I have required Some heavenly music, which even now I do, To work mine end upon their senses that This airy charm is for, I'll break my staff, Bury it certain fathoms in the earth, And deeper than did ever plummet sound I'll drown my book. 3:12 | EPILOGUE Now my charms are all o'erthrown, And what strength I have's mine own, Which is most faint: now, 'tis true, I must be here confined by you, Or sent to Naples. Let me not, Since I have my dukedom got And pardon'd the deceiver, dwell In this bare island by your spell; But release me from my bands With the help of your good hands: Gentle breath of yours my sails Must fill, or else my project fails, Which was to please. Now I want Spirits to enforce, art to enchant, And my ending is despair, Unless I be relieved by prayer, Which pierces so that it assaults Mercy itself and frees all faults. As you from crimes would pardon'd be, Let your indulgence set me free.

SIR John G was so very youthful in that photo, don’t you think?

My favorite piece Of Literary Genius was SIR BILL MURRAY performing a “Rose By any other name” As an alley W I N O

Idiots comment on Shakespeare as if he were in anyway conscious of Woke.. Shakespeare is eternal ...