the never ending wisdom of shakespeare

"Neither a borrower nor a lender be."- polonius, in hamlet

I was struck as i listened to yet another NPR article on how weird it is to be promoting debt accumulation in a monetary crisis by the fact that shakespeare anticipated our position in Hamelt. It has always seemed ironic to me that some of the most sage wisdom often quoted from Hamlet was conveyed through the mouth of Polonius.

Polonius is a derivtive of the old Comedia Del Arte character Dotore. Dotore was a cynical skewering of the idiocy of supposedly learned doctors of the middle ages. Polonius is portrayed throughout Hamlet as the old fool. He is long winded, pedantic, easily confused and often wrong. There is however, one bright moment for polonius, when he gives his son, Laertes advice before the young man goes off to college. It is in this speech that he gives the famous advice "to thine own self be true."

As i listened to the NPR article i began wondering if you could argue that, by putting the advice on borrowing and lending in the voice of the fool, Shakespeare might have been tuning into a modern economic truth. Our economists are now shouting at us to "Both a borrower and a lender be."