Shakespearean Logic Puzzle

Celebrate Shakespeare’s birthday! For the occasion I thought it might be fun to create an original logic puzzle in honor of the Bard.  There is a template to help you organize the clues.  Click on it to enlarge and print a copy if you need one.  Answers are at the bottom of the post.  Enjoy!

Five Shakespearean actors live and work in London. Two are women.  Each will perform in a different play this season. One play is “The Taming of the Shrew.”  Each performance will be in a different location including the Shakespeare Globe Centre in New Zealand (SGC-NZ) and at the BBC studios near London.  Determine the first and last name of each actor, their current role, the location of this season’s play, and which play each performed in last season—one of which was “Measure for Measure.”  

1.  1. Actors include the one who plays in “Othello,” the woman who will perform in Oregon, and the one named Yorke who is sporting the red rose this season.

2.      2. One actor who has a role in a comedy this year performed in a tragedy last season; a second's current and last season roles feature characters in historical plays; and a third who has chosen Celtic plays for both seasons. 

3.      3. The actor who warns his lord to beware the green-eyed monster is not Evelyn or O’Dowd. Last year’s woman who portrayed a woman playing a man playing a woman will not perform in the UK this year.

4.      4. One performer’s first and last names have the same vowels. The last letter of one's first name begins their last name.

5.      5. This year DeBonne will plead for mercy in North America; Henry Duke of Hereford deposes under the Southern Cross; Tyler will not need to use a passport.

6.       6. Liam is not Yorke; Rome never played a princely role; Canada will resound with the wooing of “gentle Kate.”

7.      7. Arnold will lunch frequently with BBC’s Fidele.

Answers:  Evelyn Yorke—Bolingbroke—SGC-NZ—King Henry IV, Pt. 1; Howard Arnold—Iago—Globe/London—Measure for Measure; Liam O’Dowd—Petruchio—Stratford, ONT—Hamlet; Sybil DeBonne—Portia—Ashland, ORE.—As You like It; Tyler Rome—Imogen—BBC—Macbeth.                                                                                                                                          ©2013 “ettsme”

Silk Screen Philosophy

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A few days before we left southern California for the frigid Midwest, we stopped for lunch at the Library Alehouse in Santa Monica.  While waiting for our food I glanced at a neighboring table, focusing on a young man sporting a tee shirt which read:  What if the Hokey Pokey IS what it’s all about?  What indeed? 

That got me thinking of the many tee shirt sayings I’ve seen in the last few years.  A short walk on the Venice Beach boardwalk provides visual and philosophical ideas worth pondering for weeks! All sorts of messages reveal all variety of viewpoints.  For years I’ve seen catalogs virtually teeming with pity sayings, silk screened on cotton blends.  I have decided to share a few samples I have cobbled together in the spirit of “Philosophy for the Masses.”

All tee shirt statements have been created in the spirit of fun only. I include some of my own idle thoughts while others are are based on quotations. The library tee shirt paraphrases the wise words of my former library director.  In the ten samples attached I chose graphics that came from “free to use” GOOGLE images or the clip art included with my MS 2010 PowerPoint software.  No commercial use is intended.

There are many other possibilities. Some un-illustrated ideas follow. Some come from catalogs, ever a source of revenue for the Postal Service.  What favorite sayings can you add  to benefit the tee shirt wearing world?

From Signals—visit website for details (www.signals.com):  1. Let’s Eat Grandma; Let’s Eat, Grandma; Commas Save Lives. 2. I dream of a society where a chicken can cross the road without its motives questioned. 3. I’m on the endangered species waiting list.

From Northern Sun—visit website for details especially because I am not a customer and have no commercial history with this company (www.northernsun.com):  1. I may be getting old but I DID get to see all the COOL bands. 2. Gardening is cheaper than therapy and you get tomatoes. 3. The Lifestyle you ordered is currently out of stock. 4. Well-behaved women seldom make history.

Some famous quotations itching for a cotton/polyester blend:  1. Angels fly because they take themselves lightly. (G.K. Chesterton) 2. Seek Simplicity…and Distrust It. (Alfred North Whitehead) 3. Wisdom has two parts—Having a lot to say, and Not saying it. 4. Accessing information is almost as good as knowing things. (from “Oliver’s Travels”) 5.  Truth—something you don’t have to lie about. 6. What is a Friend? A single soul dwelling in two bodies. (Aristotle) 7. Cui bono? (Cicero) 8. I will make it a felony to drink small beer. (Shakespeare, “King Henry VI”) 9. There was never yet philosopher that could endure the toothache patiently. (Shakespeare, “Much Ado About Nothing”) 10. AGE—is a personal choice. 11. The Chicken came first. 12. A great ox stands on my tongue. (Aeschylus, “Agamemnon”) What does that mean!?!