Welcome to the second and final episode of Master Shakespeare and myself as we discuss parallelism, and a few other matters. We begin in the Hall of Imagination in a Chicago wax museum at night.
Mr. Bartley: Master Shakespeare,There is still another meaning of parallelism that interests me. You and I are separated by more than four centuries. You wrote for the Elizabethan and Jacobean stage. I interpret your plays for Deaf audiences in the modern world. Our lives could hardly be more different.
Master Shakespeare: And yet here we stand, Master Bartley, engaged in conversation.
Mr. Bartley: We share a fascination with language and performance. You took stories from history, legend, poetry, and earlier plays, then transformed them for your audience. An interpreter also begins with an existing work and transforms it into another language for another audience.
Master Shakespeare: Are you suggesting, Mr. Bartley, that the playwright and the interpreter follow parallel paths?
Mr. Bartley: In certain respects, yes. Neither begins with emptiness. Both begin with material that must be understood, selected, shaped, and finally performed.
Master Shakespeare: Yet the interpreter must remain faithful to the play.
Mr re. searched translation. Bartley: Faithful, yes—but faithfulness does not mean replacing one word with one sign. That would be like taking your poetry apart brick by brick and then claiming that the pile of bricks is still the house.
Master Shakespeare: You return us to architecture.
Mr. Bartley: Because language has structure. Parallelism is one of the beams holding that structure together. The interpreter must discover which parts carry weight.
Master Shakespeare: And this discovery requires research.
Mr. Bartley: A great deal of it. The interpreter studies the play, examines modern-English versions, considers the character’s purpose, and determines how each thought relates to the next. Only then can the interpreter create a researched translation.
Master Shakespeare: The performance seen upon the hands begins long before the hands begin to move.
Mr. Bartley: That may be the most important lesson of all.
Master Shakespeare: Then parallelism has led us along many paths: balanced sentences, contrasting thoughts, mirrored characters, repeated situations, connected performances, and even lives separated by centuries.
Mr. Bartley: The word sounds technical, but the idea is deeply human. We understand one thing by placing it beside another. Life beside death. Love beside hatred. Action beside hesitation. Foolishness beside wisdom. One family beside another. One language beside another.
Master Shakespeare: One age beside another.
Mr. Bartley: And perhaps one storyteller beside another.
Master Shakespeare: Take care, Mr. Bartley. Continue speaking in that fashion and some listener may conclude that you and I are equals.
Mr. Bartley: No danger of that, Master Shakespeare. You had the larger vocabulary.
Master Shakespeare: And you possess indoor plumbing.
Mr. Bartley: Then perhaps history has treated us both fairly.
But consider these uses of parallelism from my play Richard the second,
I'll give my jewels for a set of beads,
My gorgeous palace for a hermitage,
My gay apparel for an almsman's gown,
My figured goblets for a dish of wood,
My scepter for a palmer's walking staff
My subjects for a pair of carved saints
and my large kingdom for a little grave."
And permit me to interject The opening paragraph of Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities - perhaps the best-known example of parallelism in literature outside of your works, Master Shakespeare. Parallelism here is shown by using "it was" to connect opposing ideas.
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way."Thank you
Master Shakespeare: Parallel interests, Mr. Bartley. Not identical—but, for this brief moment, traveling in the same direction.
Mr. Bartley,l et me briefly point out that Parallelism is found throughout both the Old and New Testaments of the Christian Bible by using this example. In this pair of verses from Psalm 24, there are two examples of what biblical scholars call synonymous parallelism, meaning that the idea of the first clause is repeated and rephrased with a parallel grammatical structure in the second clause to emphasize or amplify the point. I hope my example will make this clearer:
The earth is the LORD's and everything in it,
the world, and all who live in it;
for he founded it upon the seas
and established it upon the waters.
And Master Shakespeare, perhaps the greatest or most well-known of all uses of parallelism is by the great John Kennedy in his first inaugural address where he said–ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.
Mr. Shakespeare, I am going to pull a fast one on you and talk about a rhetorical device that also deals with numbers or the order of things, and I hope thatno one throws tomatoes at me: TRI-co-lon. TRI COLON– Note the TRI meaning three prefix at the beginning of the rhetorical device. This might even serve a little review.
SHAKESPEARE (pleased):
TRI COLON - A neat little word. Three beats in two syllables—already practicing what it preaches.
GEORGE:
All right, for listeners: a tricolon is a set of three parallel words, phrases, or clauses—three of the same “shape”—used for rhythm, emphasis, and memorability.
In plain English: a well-made list of three.
SHAKESPEARE:
Aye. The mind loves threes.
Beginning, middle, end.
Birth, life, death.
Knock, knock, knock.
GEORGE:
I knew you’d do that—three examples to explain the “rule of three.”
SHAKESPEARE:
Would you have me offer four? That way lies chaos.
GEORGE:
So why does three work so well? What’s the magic?
SHAKESPEARE:
Because one is a point.
Two is a choice.
Three is a pattern.
GEORGE:
That is… annoyingly perfect.
SHAKESPEARE:
I have practiced.
GEORGE:
Okay—if someone’s never heard the term tricolon, they’ve still heard the sound of it. It shows up in speeches, prayers, comedy, slogans… and in your plays.
SHAKESPEARE:
Most especially in speeches—where a speaker must seize the ear, then the mind, then the heart.
GEORGE:
All right, show me Shakespeare’s tricolon in the wild. Give me something famous.
SHAKESPEARE:
Then we go to Rome—where politics is theater and theater is politics.
Julius Caesar.
GEORGE:
Mark Antony.
SHAKESPEARE:
Aye. He begins his funeral speech with a tricolon so clean it could cut glass:
“Friends, Romans, countrymen—lend me your ears.”
GEORGE (smiling):
There it is. Three nouns. Same grammatical shape. And it feels like the crowd is being gathered into one body.
SHAKESPEARE:
Just so. The tricolon does three labors at once:
It includes the audience—“Friends.”
It names them as citizens—“Romans.”
It widens the embrace—“countrymen.”
He climbs a little ladder in three rungs, and the crowd climbs with him.
GEORGE:
So the order matters: it starts personal, then civic, then national.
SHAKESPEARE:
A wise ear you have, sir.
GEORGE:
And “lend me your ears” is practically a stage direction. He’s taking possession of attention. And by the way, in American Sign Language, the phrase lend me your ears would be simply signed as attention.
SHAKESPEARE:
Attention is the first currency of persuasion.
GEORGE:
Now, I can hear a listener saying: “Isn’t that just a list of three?”
What makes it tricolon rather than just… counting?
SHAKESPEARE:
Ah—here lies the craft.
A tricolon is not merely three things. It is three things in parallel—balanced in rhythm or structure.
If the shapes match, the ear relaxes and enjoys.
If the shapes mismatch, the ear stumbles.
GEORGE:
So it’s a list of three, but designed.
SHAKESPEARE:
Aye. Designed like a staircase, not stacked like firewood.
GEORGE:
Now I’ve heard of something called “tricolon crescendo”—where the three parts grow in intensity.
SHAKESPEARE:
Indeed. The third line often lands hardest—because by then the audience has learned the pattern and is waiting for the final strike.
GEORGE:
So the audience is subconsciously thinking, “Okay, I’ve heard one… I’ve heard two… now give me three.”
SHAKESPEARE:
Exactly. The third is the door closing.
GEORGE:
Give me an example of a tricolon crescendo—Shakespearean style.
SHAKESPEARE:
Let us make one together, rather than drown them in quotes.
Suppose a character is pleading for mercy. He might say:
“I ask your patience, I ask your mercy, I ask your love.”
The phrases match—I ask your…
And the feeling rises—patience to mercy to love.
GEORGE:
That’s great. And I can hear how an actor would say it.
SHAKESPEARE:
Yes—tricolon gives the actor a rhythm to inhabit.
It tells the breath when to push, when to pause, when to strike.
GEORGE:
All right, If I want to use tricolon in a podcast—what are the rules?
SHAKESPEARE:
Three rules—naturally.
GEORGE:
Of course.
SHAKESPEARE:
Rule one: Keep the three parts parallel—same grammatical shape.
Rule two: Make the three parts distinct—each adds something new.
Rule three: Let the third part be the landing—strongest word, clearest image, or biggest truth.
GEORGE:
Okay, I’m going to try one for an intro to my show. You judge it.
SHAKESPEARE:
With pleasure—and mild cruelty.
GEORGE:
“On this show, we chase stories, we chase voices, we chase the spark that makes art last.”
SHAKESPEARE:
Very near! You have parallel structure—we chase… three times.
But you can sharpen the last phrase so it hits like a bell.
Try:
“We chase stories. We chase voices. We chase the spark.”
Shorter. Cleaner. Stronger.
GEORGE:
Oh, I see—sometimes the tricolon works best when it’s not over-explained. But I still kinda like we chase stories, we chase voices, we chase the spark that makes art last better.
Shakespeare: but remember that the rhetorical device is a hammer, do not wrap it in velvet.
GEORGE:
Let me try another—more emotional:
“I’ve known praise, I’ve known blame, I’ve known the silence in between.”
SHAKESPEARE:
That is excellent.
Parallel—I’ve known…
Distinct—praise, blame, silence.
And the third surprises with an image. Well done.
GEORGE:
Thank you, Master Shakespeare. I’ll frame that compliment.
SHAKESPEARE:
Frame it, but do not worship it.
GEORGE:
Now, can tricolon be funny?
SHAKESPEARE:
Oh, exceedingly. Comedy loves threes because the third can twist.
One sets the pattern.
Two confirms it.
Three breaks it.
GEORGE:
So you can use tricolon to deliver a punchline.
SHAKESPEARE:
Indeed. The audience trusts the pattern—then you turn it sideways.
GEORGE:
Tricolon is composed of three parallel phrases that create rhythm and force. It’s memorable because the mind hears a pattern and wants its completion. And when the third beat lands, it feels inevitable.
SHAKESPEARE:
Well said. Three beats. One lesson.
GEORGE:
And I can’t resist ending with one of our own—
Friends, listeners, fellow night-owls: thank you for lending me your ears.
SHAKESPEARE:
A fine theft.
Until our next episode: keep your language alive—
because the old words are still turning in the new light.
SHAKESPEARE:
And remember: one is a point, two is a choice, three is a spell.
GEORGE (laughs):
Good night, Master Shakespeare.
Join us for the following episode of the Hall of Imagination. This has been George Bartley.
