Literature

Summary of Seven Ages by Shakespeare

The poem at hand portrays the complete life cycle of humans through the stage and its activites. The stage has been meaningfully compared to the world. When an actor enters the stage the drama begins in the same way, when a baby is born the life journey begins. The baby spends most of his time crying and vomitng in the nurse's arms. Then, he moves towards his most exciting phase of childhood having a cheerful face but unwilling to go to school. Next comes the stage of a young lover who is engrossed in his beloved's passion. He burns like a furnace when he is unable to meet his beloved. He composes song praising his beloved's beauty. He is a responsible man in his fourth stage which has been compared to the life of a soldier. The traits of a soldier could be easily found in him. He makes strange promises and do die hard efforts to keep it up as his reputation is at stake. He runs after the short lived reputation. The fifth stage depicts of a wise man who takes decision after analysing from different perspective. There is a chabge in his physic. It has grown fatty around the belly. He carries stern face and keeps his beard to in formal cut. He gives a lot of advices with examples. The sixth stage is the beginning of degradation of his abilities. His muscles shrinks and the baritone becomes childlike voice which is shaky.The seventh and the last stage is that of a very old man who loses control on his body. His mouth is without teeth, lacks clear vision, the taste buds do not respond properly and even the digestive system becomes weak and his diet becomes very limited or even may live on liquids like a baby. He becomes dependent on others for everything. So, his last stage has been called as second childishness. As an actor exits from the play in the same way after his seventh stage, he departs from the world.