All the World's a Stage
by William Shakespeare
Monologue · public domain · free to perform · attribution required
All the World's a Stage
Jaques, As You Like It, Act 2 Scene 7, by William Shakespeare. Public domain. Intro and performance note by FreeSchoolPlays.com.
THE SPEECH IN PLAIN WORDS
Jaques is a gloomy, watchful lord living in exile in the forest. Someone has just said the world is full of misery, and he answers with a big idea: everyone is only an actor, and each life is a single play with seven scenes. He walks us through all seven ages of a person -- baby, schoolboy, lover, soldier, judge, shrinking old man, and finally a helpless second childhood. It is funny and a little sad at the same time.
THE MONOLOGUE
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms;
Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side,
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
PERFORMANCE NOTE
Play this as a person thinking out loud, not reciting a poem -- Jaques is amused by human beings, so let each of the seven ages get its own small physical color (the sighing lover, the pompous judge, the shaky old man). The engine of the speech is comparison; ride the momentum from one age to the next. Save your control for the final line, and let "sans everything" land quietly rather than loud -- the drop in energy is the whole point.
This is the full, unaltered public-domain text (US); the introduction and performance note are by Monologue.Network via FreeSchoolPlays.com. Free to perform -- a single credit line is the only requirement.
Audition prep notes
Full piece: 1 beat, ~211 words -- very short (Under 2 minutes), about 1 min at a natural pace.
Start with the objective
Before you run it, name your character's objective in one sentence: what do they want in this moment, and what is in the way of getting it easily? Pace, volume, and movement all follow from that one sentence, not the other way around.
Map the beats
The current text renders as a single continuous block, with no internal paragraph breaks to key off of. Build your own beat map instead: mark every point where the character's tactic or target shifts -- a new argument, a new realization, a change in who or what they are speaking to -- and treat each as its own beat.
Pacing for this length -- very short
Economy is everything at this length: cut any preparatory movement before your first line, and land the final beat cleanly rather than adding a button. Under 2 minutes, this often plays as one unbroken thought.
Delivery approach -- Verse / Poetic
Honor the line, not just the sentence: breathe at the end of a verse line even when the punctuation runs on, and let the meter carry the emotional pulse instead of fighting it with naturalistic pauses.
Framing for All ages
This piece is written to read across age groups. Start from the plainest version of the objective -- what the character wants, and why now -- before layering in the nuance your own age and experience bring to it.
Forensics eligibility -- Poetry Interpretation
This piece reads as Poetry Interpretation. That classification is illustrative only -- not official, not an NSDA, NCFL, or UIL certification. Always verify current eligibility with your event's own published rules before entering it in competition.
Generic coaching guidance for actors preparing this piece -- not a substitute for your director's or coach's notes.
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