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All Site ContentTaming of the ShrewAct IntroductionScene 2
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“Your honor’s players”
Cultural Context
Act Introduction,
Scene 2
Lines 126-133

An explanation of the phrase “Your honor’s players” in Introduction 2 of myShakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew.

Messenger

Your honor's players, hearing your amendment,    
Are come to play a pleasant comedy,
For so your doctors hold it very meet,    
Seeing too much sadness hath congealed your blood,    
And melancholy is the nurse of frenzy.    
Therefore they thought it good you hear a play
And frame your mind to mirth and merriment,    
Which bars a thousand harms, and lengthens life.    

The actors are a traveling troupe, but the Messenger speaks as if they are Sly’s own private acting company. Only the very wealthiest of noblemen could afford such a luxury.