How to Cite Shakespeare in MLA Format

Citations can be one of the major headaches of writing a paper or book report. All those little details can be so confusing! To make matters worse, there's no one set formula for every source--how you make your citation depends heavily on where your source is coming from. For most sources, MLA format dictates that page numbers are cited, but for a source such as Shakespeare, a page number isn't very helpful because there's so many editions and anthologies that contain Shakespeare's plays. Therefore, with Shakespeare and other verse plays, the citation form is different.

Instructions

    • 1

      Italicize or underline the name of the play. This doesn't need to be done for every Shakespeare quote, but you must make it obvious very early in your paper what play you are quoting from.

    • 2

      Surround quoted text that is three lines or less by quotation marks. Use a slash (/) to denote where breaks occur in the verse.

      One of the most quoted passages from Shakespeare is, "All the world's a stage, / And all the men and women merely players" (2.7.138-39).

    • 3

      Separate quoted passages from the rest of the text if the passage is longer than three lines. Do not use quotation marks. Instead, begin on a new line and indent 10 spaces. The quote should appear as it does in the source's text.

      All the world's a stage

      And all the men and women merely players:

      They have their exits and their entrances;

      And one man in his time plays many parts,

      His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,

      Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms. (2.7.138-43)

    • 4

      Cite the act, the scene, and the lines the information or quote you are citing came from. Place these three numbers in parenthesis, separated by periods with Arabic numbers. See steps 2 and 3 for examples of how this should look.

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