Borrowing from the Bard?

[Randy]

We recently purchased a Cambridge edition of an 1896 publication of Shakespeare's Macbeth at a local library booksale.

Reading Act II, Scene IV, we came upon the following lines:

Old Man: Threescore and ten I can remember well:
Within the volume of which time I have seen
Hours dreadful and things strange, but this sore night
Hath trifled former knowings.

The words "Threescore and ten" stuck out. The similarity to "Fourscore and seven years ago" from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address came to mind. We recalled reading that Shakespeare was a favorite of Lincoln's, particularly Hamlet and Macbeth.

Looking online to see if anyone else had made this connection we came across the following article:

The Memorable Monosyllables of Lincoln's “Gettysburg Address” - Patch
https://patch.com/connecticut/.../the-me...tysburg...

Although the article has interesting information, we did not see a reference to the particular line found in Macbeth.

We wanted to share this information with Lincoln scholars who might be interested or have their thoughts on the subject.

[RJNorton]

Welcome to the forum, Randy! Your comments reminded me of a post that Scott (STS Lincolnite) made here.

[Eva Elisabeth]

The Bard (Shakespeare) borrowed from the Bible (too)...
Welcome to the forum, Randy!

[JMadonna]

Lincoln borrowed from Newhart

https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4526484/b...g-npc-1995

[L Verge]

(10-08-2017 08:02 AM)JMadonna Wrote:  Lincoln borrowed from Newhart

https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4526484/b...g-npc-1995

Love it and love Bob Newhart! Thanks for sharing.

[David Lockmiller]

(10-08-2017 08:02 AM)JMadonna Wrote:  Lincoln borrowed from Newhart

https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4526484/b...g-npc-1995

Pardon my logic, but at best this would have to be a reverse statement. Newhart was born after Lincoln died.

[Randy]

(10-06-2017 05:23 PM)RJNorton Wrote:  Welcome to the forum, Randy! Your comments reminded me of a post that Scott (STS Lincolnite) made here.

Dear RJNorton:

Thank you for the reference to the passage from the Bible - certainly is a possible explanation. In addition, I also found this other Shakespeare connection:

Shakespeare, Abraham Lincoln, and the president’s assassination
February 12, 2016 | By Esther French

Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln. Copyright 1894 by H.W. Fay. Folger Shakespeare Library.
Growing up on the frontier, Abraham Lincoln had few books to read in his early days—but among them were the works of Shakespeare, which Lincoln cherished throughout his life. The actor Joseph Jefferson later told the story of how Lincoln, as a young lawyer, successfully defended his father’s Illinois theater when a religious revival threatened to shut it down.

Lincoln did not often quote Shakespeare in his writings and speeches, but he liked to recite favorite passages from the plays in private, and once wrote about Macbeth in a letter to actor James Hackett. He enjoyed going to the theater, too, which in his day often meant Shakespeare.

Some days before his assassination, Lincoln read aloud from a speech from Macbeth about the death of Duncan the king, including the line, “after life’s fitful fever he sleeps well.” But it was another play about assassination, Julius Caesar, which helped shape the thinking of his killer, John Wilkes Booth.

In shooting Lincoln, whom he considered a tyrant like Julius Caesar, Booth expected to be admired like Brutus, Shakespeare’s “noblest Roman of them all.” (A 2006 biography of Booth was entitled American Brutus.) Another contemporary observer compared Lincoln’s long railroad journey home to Springfield, with the funeral train’s frequent stops in major cities, to Antony’s display of Caesar’s murdered body.

[ELCore]

(10-21-2017 03:21 PM)Randy Wrote:  Lincoln did not often quote Shakespeare in his writings and speeches, but he liked to recite favorite passages from the plays in private, and once wrote about Macbeth in a letter to actor James Hackett. He enjoyed going to the theater, too, which in his day often meant Shakespeare.

Lincoln wrote to Hackett twice in 1863, on August 17th and November 2nd. The latter is the source of my signature here.

[Steve]

Lincoln quoted from Shakespeare's play Othello in this 1848 letter:

http://abrahamlincoln.org/lincoln-speaks...ions-gone/