Love's Labour's Lost Famous Quotes

The words of Mercury are harsh after the songs of Apollo.

Armado ending the play in Act 5, Scene 2 — Mercury (oratory, business) has arrived in the form of the news of the French king's death, silencing Apollo (music, poetry). The play has moved from festivity into grief, and the line names the shift.

A jest's prosperity lies in the ear Of him that hears it, never in the tongue Of him that makes it.

Rosaline in Act 5, Scene 2, explaining why Katharine did not laugh at Berowne's joke — the joke succeeded or failed not by its quality but by its audience. It is also advice about how comedy works generally.

Beauty is bought by judgement of the eye, Not utter'd by base sale of chapmen's tongues.

Maria in Act 2, Scene 1, on genuine versus spoken beauty — 'chapmen' are merchants. Beauty assessed honestly by the eye is worth more than beauty praised by professional flatterers. The distinction runs through the play's critique of courtly language.

At Christmas I no more desire a rose Than wish a snow in May's new-fangled mirth.

Berowne in Act 1, Scene 1, on the suitability of things to their seasons — the argument is against forcing academic study in a season of life meant for love. He is making the case for natural pleasures over artificial constraint.

They are the books, the arts, the academes, That show, contain and nourish all the world.

Berowne in Act 4, Scene 3, arguing that women's eyes are the true source of all learning — the speech subverts the play's premise (study over love) by claiming that love is the deepest study. It is magnificent sophistry.

They have been at a great feast of languages, and stolen the scraps.

Moth in Act 5, Scene 1, on Armado and Holofernes — two characters who use elaborate language as a form of social pretension. Moth's insult is that they are not creators of language but scavengers of it.

Love's feeling is more soft and sensible Than are the tender horns of cockl'd snails.

Berowne in Act 4, Scene 3, arguing that love makes men more perceptive — the snail's horn is the most sensitive organ of the most tentative creature, and love exceeds even that. The image is characteristically extravagant.

Honest plain words best pierce the ear of grief.

Berowne in Act 5, Scene 2, after the news of the French king's death stops the play cold — the comedy's elaborate word-play suddenly appears inadequate, and the young men are told to earn their loves through genuineness, not performance.

Did not I dance with you in Brabant once?

Berowne to Rosaline in Act 2, Scene 1, opening their first exchange — a question that sounds casual but establishes an existing history. They have danced before, which means Berowne has been aware of her for longer than this scene.

A man of fire-new words, fashion's own knight.

Moth describing Armado in Act 1, Scene 1 — 'fire-new' means freshly minted, like metal from a furnace. A man of brand-new words is someone who constantly coins or imports fashionable phrases rather than speaking plainly.

The world was very guilty of such a ballad some three ages since.

Moth in Act 1, Scene 2, dismissing Armado's romantic sentiments as old-fashioned — the pageboy's wit is sharper and faster than everyone else's, and he deploys it against his employer without mercy.

Our wooing doth not end like an old play; Jack hath not Jill.

Berowne in Act 5, Scene 2, after the ladies have refused to accept the men's declarations — the play refuses its own genre's ending. 'Jack hath not Jill' is the conscious inversion of the comic formula.

Jack hath not Jill: these ladies' courtesy Might well have made our sport a comedy.

Berowne in Act 5, Scene 2, accepting that the play will not have the happy ending it has been building toward — 'Jack hath not Jill' is the anti-formula. The comedy that courtship promised has been deferred, not cancelled.

By the Lord, this love is as mad as Ajax: it kills sheep; it kills me, I a sheep: well proved again o' my side!

Berowne in Act 4, Scene 3, trying to argue himself out of his love for Rosaline by applying classical mythology — Ajax killed sheep when mad. The argument is absurd and Berowne knows it, which is the joke.

A lover's eyes will gaze an eagle blind; A lover's ear will hear the lowest sound.

Berowne in Act 4, Scene 3, cataloguing the enhanced perceptions of a man in love — sharper sight than an eagle, hearing finer than any natural listener. The excess is the point: love makes everything more.