The Bard

"...Think of what that arch-knave Shakespeare says--a plague on him, his toys come into my head when I should think of other matters. Stay, how goes it?


'Cressid was yours, tied with the bonds of heaven;
These bonds of heaven are slipt, dissolved, and loosed,
And with another knot five fingers tied,
The fragments of her faith are bound to Diomed.'..."

From "Kenilworth"
(Queen Elizabeth speaking)

William Shakespeare died on April 23, 1616; mid-fiftyish.  He is buried at Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-on-Avon.  He has been honored with a monument in Poet's Corner of Westminster Abbey, and in the States, his likeness stands near Sir Walter Scott in statue form along the Literary Walk in New York's Central Park.  This statue was cast by sculptor John Quincy Adams Ward in 1870.  Ward is best known for the full length statue of George Washington that stands in front of Federal Hall on Wall Street.

http://www.nycgovparks.org/sub_your_park/historical_signs/hs_historical_sign.php?id=9772

Poet's Corner - Westminster Abbey

On Monday, December 20, 1784, Samuel Johnson's remains were buried in Westminster Abbey. Johnson, who died a week earlier (on the 13th), joined several other illustrious poets/writers interred or memorialized in Poet's Corner. Geoffrey Chaucer was the first poet buried there. Others include John Dryden, Lord Tennyson, and Robert Browning.

Memorials includes such famous poets/writers as John Milton, William Blake, Robert Burns, and, of course, Sir Walter Scott. Scott himself is buried in Dryburgh Abbey, near his Abbotsford.