What's your favorite Shakespeare play?

I believe Shakespeare's works are fairly universal, taught in schools around the world, with enjoyable themes for everyone. I'd just like to know people's favorites and why : )

My favorite play of his is Twelfth Night. Aside from the delicious homosexual themes, anyone that knows me knows I'm a sucker for intrigue of roles between the sexes and any blending therein. Plus gems like:

[color=#f660ab]Feste: "Why, sir, her name's a word; and to dally with that word might make my sister wanton. But indeed words are very rascals since bonds disgraced them."

Viola: "Thy reason, man?"

Feste: "Troth [Truthfully], sir, I can yield you none without words, and words are grown so false, I am loathe to prove reason with them.

Heeeee, I just love it!

On a different note, my least favorite play is Romeo and Juliet. While I do find much of the iconic writing beautiful (I sometimes recite the balcony scene), I find the love story, the premise of its occurrence, and the behavior of the characters unrealistic and simply appalling. This has gotten many a head swivel for me, as I am a silly, romantic girl and most people think I would love that play. But it is pretty much a good source of everything I detest about a sickeningly bad and ingenuine love story.

And on a 100% completely different note, my favorite play of all is Cyrano de Bergerac by Edmond Rostand. José Ferrer does my favorite depiction of his character, and does him damn good justice. Plus the balcony scene just melts my heart and does other, less wholesome things to my body.

Spoiler:

[color=#f660ab]"These, my dear sir, are things you might have said had you some tinge of letters or of wit to color your discourse. But wit, not so. You never had an atom. And of letters, you need but three to write you down. A-S-S. Ass."

Can't wait to hear everyone's thoughts!

I am NOT into Shakespeare. I prefer reading non-fiction. But I have a good impression of Tempest even though I have never read it in detail. The idea of being someone extremely powerful manipulating people behind the scenes is very attractive to me. And the ending where the main character breaks the fourth wall, relieves himself of his magic is quite amusing to me as well. Perhaps I admire the king's ability to make good use of power. He knows how to wield it, he also knows when to relieve himself of it.

ED: Consider myself fluent in English, but I have never ever read any Shakespearean play in full. It is a fallacy to say that having a mastery of English means having to appreciate or master English literature.

As one could guess by my username, my favorite Shakespearean play has to be The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. There is just so much about this story that I absolutely love; the characters, the dramatic irony throughout, Hamlet's gradual descent into insanity--I love it all. The story revolves around getting revenge, which is a pretty played out tune by today's standards, and it shows that such actions only result in your own demise. Kind of a whole "You'll get what's coming to you" kind of moral.

When looking at it this way, this is probably why I enjoy the story of Sweeney Todd--a story that is strikingly similar to Hamlet--so much. As someone who has always had a strange infatuation with tragedies, I can't help but love a story that revolves around someone seeking revenge another where, in doing so, they end up being the cause of others' deaths and ultimately their own. And it's that justifiable death of the protagonist that I always find interesting. To an extent, there's a part of me always "rooting" for the protagonist in such stories, but on the other side there is also a part of me that is really disturbed by--and to a lesser extent fearful of--them. Whenever Hamlet is confronting another person, I'm always on pins and needles, almost scared of what he may do, and it's that sense of fear and anxiety that I always enjoy throughout the story.

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[color=#006FFF]As far as personal favorite lines, I'm not sure I can think of many but I do always like the line said as Hamlet poisons Claudius: "Here, thou incestuous, murderous, damnèd Dane,Drink off this potion. Is thy union here? Follow my mother."

As far as memorable and favorite lines go for Shakespearean plays, I'd have to say I have the most for Romeo & Juliet. Mostly because I love the 1996 film from Baz Luhrmann and have watched it several times, but my favorite lines all being within Act 3, Scene 1 which consists of Mercutio and Tyblat's deaths.

Of course the favorite, famous, line from Mercutio being "Help me into some house, Benvolio, Or I shall faint. A plague o' both your houses! They have made worms' meat of me: I have it, And soundly too. Your houses!"

But my favorite lines are probably in the exchange between Romeo and Tybalt at the beginning of the scene, and the lines before Tybalts ultimate demise.
"Alive, in triumph! and Mercutio slain! Away to heaven, respective lenity, And fire-eyed fury be my conduct now! Now, Tybalt, take the "villain" back again, That late thou gavest me; for Mercutio's soul Is but a little way above our heads, Staying for thine to keep him company: Either thou, or I, or both, must go with him."

I really don't know why, but I don't enjoy reading Shakespeare. I mean, his works are genius, but every time I try to read his plays or works, I don't get confused as much as I just dislike the dialogue. It just irks me to read it like that, although there are probably updated versions that probably took away the charm Shakespeare had in the dialogues in his plays. It's my personal opinion so far, but I'll try to read more of his works.

I would have to say Romeo and Juliet, that sort of political tension and rivalry that went on between families during that time is what fascinates me.

A Midsummer Night's Dream, short and full of comedy, and most importantly a happy ending for everyone. Except for the amazon queen, maybe.

I have not read much of his work. I have only read Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, and Hamlet. I selected Hamlet because I enjoyed the inner conflict that Hamlet was experiencing. I prefer science fiction although I have been trying (and failing) to broaden my horizons.

I especially enjoy the line "Perchance to dream: ay there's the rub" from Hamlet's Soliloquy and just how in-depth that line can be read. I was surprised to find out that one of my favorite songs is directly derived from that line; by name and by lyrics.

I went to an actual play about Shakespeare's Twelfth Night and a Midsummer Night's Dream... Can't say that they enthralled me as much as the depth and complexity of Romeo and Juliet. Hamlet would be the only other play of Shakespeare's that I know of, and I didn't like it.

Not that very knowledgeable but of the choices Hamlet is the story I know most about and have enjoyed reading what I have read so gave that one my vote. =P

Hamlet must be very popular. Though I must admit that I too chose Hamlet over all of the other choices. Other than Hamlet, I read Romeo & Juliet and Othello. I have three scenes from Hamlet that I enjoyed very much. My first favourite would be the ending where Hamlet and Claudius got into a duel, followed by the tragic ending of the two characters and the invasion of the King of Norway.

The second scene that I enjoyed would be the beginning of the play where Horatio and the guards encountered the ghost of King Hamlet. The suspense of this scene got me excited and the actions of the characters upon facing the ghost was comedic in a way since they could not do anything to the ghost but run away from it. Horatio, despite himself being against the fact about the existence of ghosts, decided to confront the ghost since the ghost is his friend's father.

My third favourite scene of the play would be the scene where Hamlet was in charge of directing a play, and when Claudius saw the play Hamlet had directed, his reactions were priceless as one of the scenes in the play Hamlet directed was a re-enactment of his brother's murder of which he had committed in order to get the throne. He left the stage in silence, then pleading for forgiveness even though the act that he had committed cannot be forgiven. Hamlet had the chance to kill Claudius at this point, but refused to do so. For someone to be so determined to kill the man that killed his father, he bailed out thinking that killing him this way is not the right way. But killing him regardless of what way was never the right thing to do.

That's pretty much the memorable scenes I can remember from Hamlet.