I'm not sure if this has been said prior to this drunk-and-can't-be-arsed-to-go-to-bed-because-my-girlfriend-is-away-tonight message, but I get really annoyed by the fact that Shakespeare is credited with 'inventing' so many words and phrases. As far as I can see, and most scholars concur, he was someone who wrote plays in West Midlands dialect at around about the same time that was becoming the commom parlance in England (I know this is a bit wishy-washy, to say the least, but bear with me) but why on earth does he seem to get credit for inventing virtually every single word or phrase? I remember reading an interview with the (ultra-pretentious) Martin Amis and he was pontificating at length about how he overheard a mum say to her child 'to get a wriggle on' and (I parphrase, but not by much) what a wonderfully, powerfully evocative phrase that was. My mum said that to me at least twenty years before. Shakespeare's plays may well be recordings of what people around him said, but please, for the love of whatever God or gods you may or may not believe in, let's not credit one man with inventing the bloody English language.
Okay, not unlikely, but I would kind of resent being compared to *this* woman.