What is the meaning of if music be the food of love play on?
‘If music be the food of love, play on’ is the famous opening line from Shakespeare’s comedy Twelfth Night. He asks for more music because he muses that an excess of music might cure his obsession with love, in the way that eating too much removes one’s appetite for food.
Which Shakespearean character says the lines if music be the food of love play on?
Orsino
The play’s opening speech includes one of its most famous lines, as the unhappy, lovesick Orsino tells his servants and musicians, “If music be the food of love, play on.” In the speech that follows, Orsino asks for the musicians to give him so much musical love-food that he will overdose (“surfeit”) and cease to …
What meter pattern is used in the example of music be the food of love play on?
The play opens with a line of iambic pentameter: ‘If music be the food of love, play on’ (Orsino, 1:1). If you count the syllables in this line, then read it aloud emphasising the second, fourth, sixth, eight and tenth syllables, you can see how it works.
What is the food of love in Shakespeare?
The first line of the play Twelfth Night, by William Shakespeare. The speaker is asking for music because he is frustrated in courtship; he wants an overabundance of love so that he may lose his appetite for it.
How is music the food of love?
It was believed that music was a tangible force that had the power to magnify and enhance your emotions: it was quite literally “food for the soul”. Love was seen as the emotion most susceptible to this, making music the “food of love”.
What is the word for dialogue that is sung between characters in a musical?
The adjective or adverb sung-through (also through-sung) describes a musical, musical film, opera, or other work of performance art in which songs entirely or almost entirely stand in place of any spoken dialogue.
What does Trochaic meter mean in poetry?
In English poetry, the definition of trochee is a type of metrical foot consisting of two syllables—the first is stressed and the second is an unstressed syllable. The pattern reads as DUH-duh, as in “LAD-der.” A line of poetry with this type of foot has a trochaic meter.