Marlissa Gerken 
All the World’s a Stage [PDF ebook] 
A literary topos

Seminar paper from the year 2002 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies – Literature, grade: 1, 0, Saarland University (Anglistik), course: Introduction to literature, language: English, abstract: “All the world’s a stage” is a phrase we usually associate with Shakespeare and his plays. Did Shakespeare coin this phrase, was it used by his contemporaries or do its origins in fact go back further? In how far was this concept of ‘the world being a stage’ taken up in post-Shakespearean times?
This paper is an attempt to find out the actual origins of this phrase and point out how it was used throughout the centuries.