The final Shakespearean word of the day is… zany
A zany was a Fool or a jester’s assistant, a bit like a clown. A Fool was paid to entertain the nobility.
Over the course of his writing career, Shakespeare’s ‘silly-Clownish’ characters (like Dogberry in Much Ado About Nothing) became much more ‘wise-Foolish’ (like Feste in Twelfth Night).
We really hope you have enjoyed our A-Z of Shakespeare over the last few weeks! If you fancy testing your knowledge then make sure you take our Shakespeare language quiz: http://ow.ly/10BIgV
Fare thee well!
This definition is taken from the Oxford Illustrated Shakespeare Dictionary, a unique dictionary to unlock the mysteries of Shakespeare’s world, words and language, compiled by renowned English language expert David Crystal and Shakespearean actor and producer Ben Crystal.