Shakespeare Was Wrong: Not Everyone Lives Both Pride and Fear

A grammatical shift from “and” to “or” reveals the divided truths of human existence—and the unifying certainty of death

By Ibrahim Kegbegbe

“Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more.”
— William Shakespeare, Macbeth (Act V, Scene V)

These enduring lines from Shakespeare’s Macbeth carry the weight of centuries—not just in literary brilliance but in their raw existential force. Delivered by Macbeth as he mourns the death of Lady Macbeth, the passage is more than poetic lamentation. It is a distillation of the human condition, rendered in metaphor, motion, and meaning.

In just a few short lines, Shakespeare captures the ephemeral nature of life—a performance with noise and movement, staged and fleeting, ending in silence. The imagery is vivid: life is a shadow, unsubstantial and passing; a poor player, an amateur actor on life’s stage who performs with misplaced confidence and anxious gestures, only to vanish when the play is done.

But it is the grammar of this passage that offers an even more intriguing avenue of interpretation—one I have found deeply thought-provoking. The phrase:

“That struts and frets his hour upon the stage…”

—joins the verbs “struts” and “frets” with the conjunction “and”, suggesting that human beings do both. They strut in vanity, power, and pride—and simultaneously fret in worry, fear, and futility. It’s a dualistic portrayal of the human experience: all of us are both proud performers and anxious actors, caught in a moment of performance that leads nowhere.

But what if we altered this structure? What if the line read instead:

“That struts or frets his hour upon the stage…”

This small grammatical shift opens up a radically different philosophical vision—one I find deeply compelling. In this version, life is not a shared mixture of pride and anxiety, but a divided spectrum of human experience. Some strut. Others fret. Some ascend the stage adorned in wealth, ego, and performance. Others appear burdened, hesitant, consumed by hardship, poverty, and uncertainty.

Yet regardless of how one performs—whether in the bold strut of the pompous or the quiet fret of the oppressed—death is the equalizer. The actor, whether triumphant or trembling, is eventually “heard no more.” The performance ends. The applause fades. The curtain falls for all.

A Philosophical Pause: The Conjunction as Metaphor

This re-imagining of Shakespeare’s line is not merely a matter of grammar; it is a philosophical choice. The word “and” suggests that all humans carry both pride and fear within. The word “or” proposes that we live distinct, often unequal lives—one characterized by power, the other by pain. One thrives in visibility, the other struggles in obscurity.

Yet both destinies converge at a single truth: mortality. The king and the servant, the billionaire and the beggar, the idolized and the invisible—all become voiceless shadows in the end. Death collapses all distinctions. It does not ask how loud your applause was or how ornate your costume. It simply calls time.

Society’s Stage and the Illusion of Permanence

In our modern world, we are surrounded by strutters—those who dominate social platforms, command boardrooms, or build empires. But alongside them are the fretters—those who hustle quietly, who question their purpose, who fear tomorrow. Society often celebrates the former and overlooks the latter. Yet Shakespeare, even in the 17th century, saw through this illusion. He knew that the show ends the same way for everyone.

To live, then, is to recognize that the stage is not ours to own—it is merely ours to occupy, briefly. The wise do not live in denial of death; they live in awareness of it. They do not measure a life by applause but by authenticity, conscience, and contribution.

Toward a Life of Meaning

Whether we strut or fret, the imperative remains the same: to live meaningfully. Shakespeare’s lines, especially when viewed through this grammatical reinterpretation, urge us to reflect not only on the brevity of life but on its substance. Are we acting with purpose, or merely performing to be seen? Are we consumed by pride or weighed down by fear? Or are we mindful that both paths lead to the same silence?

The hour on the stage is short. Whether we strut or fret, let us do so not with arrogance or anxiety, but with intent. With awareness that though the performance is temporary, its impact can be eternal.