Between the Lines
(San Francisco Chronicle, August 19, 1990)
By Patricia Holt
START QUOTING HIM NOW: Look up that vaguely Elizabethan quote that's
been nagging you in a delightful a reference called "Brush Up Your
Shakespeare" by UC Berkeley professor Michael Macrone (Harper & Row; 235
pages; $15), and instant wisdom is yours. Here we learn that “what the
dickens" from "The Merry Wives of Windsor” refers not to Charles but to
Satan, whereas Hamlet's complaint, “there's the rub,” originally
referred to an obstacle in lawn bowling. A gem...
Patricia Holt is book editor for The Chronicle.
