Quotes & Sayings About Portia In The Merchant Of Venice

After a few drinks, my mom would recite her lines as Portia in 'The Merchant of Venice' from her high school play. But I first discovered Shakespeare properly when I was about five. I used to look for the most complicated books I could find and pretend to be reading them. I wanted people to think I was smart. — Chris Adrian

After making my stage debut aged nine as Macduff's small son in 'Macbeth,' I had played a number of parts, from 'Twelfth Night's Viola to 'The Merchant Of Venice's Portia'. — Felicity Kendal

PORTIA
So doth the greater glory dim the less:
A substitute shines brightly as a king
Unto the king be by, and then his state
Empties itself, as doth an inland brook
Into the main of waters. Music! hark!

NERISSA
It is your music, madam, of the house.

PORTIA
Nothing is good, I see, without respect:
Methinks it sounds much sweeter than by day.

NERISSA
Silence bestows that virtue on it, madam.

PORTIA
The crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark,
When neither is attended, and I think
The nightingale, if she should sing by day,
When every goose is cackling, would be thought
No better a musician than the wren.
How many things by season season'd are
To their right praise and true perfection!
Peace, ho! the moon sleeps with Endymion
And would not be awaked.

- Acte V, Scene 1 — William Shakespeare