As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, / I must not look to have; but, in their stead, / Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honour, breath, / Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare not" (5.3.25-28).
William ShakespeareRead
If it will feed nothing else, it will feed my revenge.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Revenge can be a powerful motivator, even if it offers no other benefits.
This quote from Shakespeare reflects the deep emotional drive that revenge can instill in an individual. It suggests that the desire for vengeance can sustain a person, even when there are no positive outcomes associated with it. The intensity of this feeling overshadows other aspects of life, highlighting how powerful human emotions can shape motivations and actions.
Themes
RevengeMotivationEmotionHuman Nature
In practice
Example use cases
During a speech on the consequences of actions, one might invoke this quote to illustrate the darker side of human desires.
More from William Shakespeare
All quotes βLove bears it out even to the edge of doom.
William ShakespeareRead
Good company, good wine, good welcome, can make good people.
William ShakespeareRead
Absence doth sharpen love, presence strengthens it; the one brings fuel, the other blows it till it burns clear.
William ShakespeareRead
Lord, Lord, how this world is given to lying!
William ShakespeareRead
Give it an understanding, but no tongue.
William ShakespeareRead
Similar quotes
Every man must define his identity against his mother. If he does not, he just falls back into her and is swallowed up.
Camille PagliaRead
Sometimes, waking early before the others, wandering the rooms wrapped in a blanket or drinking my tea in the empty kitchen, I had that most rare of feelings, the sense that the world, so consistently overwhelming and incomprehensible, in fact has an order, oblique as it may seem, and I a place within it.
Nicole KraussRead
Reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else.
George OrwellRead
I don't think pandemics make us afraid of death, I think they make us afraid of oblivion. They force us to grapple with the futility of effort. Also they make us barf which isn't fun either... Wash your hands, cover your coughs, and find a way to hold in balance the futility of effort with the necessity to struggle.
John GreenRead
All my writing is about the recognition that there is no single reality. But the beauty of it is that you nevertheless go on, walking towards utopia, which may not exist, on a bridge which might end before you reach the other side.
Marguerite YoungRead
All of us share this world for but a brief moment in time. The question is whether we spend that time focused on what pushes us apart, or whether we commit ourselves to an effort -- a sustained effort -- to find common ground, to focus on the future we seek for our children, and to respect the dignity of all human beings.
Barack ObamaRead