What a piece of work is a man What a piece of work is a man "What a piece of work is man!" is a phrase within a soliloquy by Prince Hamlet in William Shakespeare's play of the same name. Hamlet is reflecting, at first admiringly, and then despairingly, on the human condition. The soliloquy, spoken in the play by Prince Hamlet to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern in Act II, Scene 2, follows in its entirety. Rather than appearing in blank verse, the typical mode of composition of Shakespeare's plays, the speech appears in straight prose: Hamlet is saying that although humans may appear to think and act "nobly"
What Is a Nation? to the reasons based on race, geography, history and so on. They argue that Renan maintains his intellectual background but subtly, i.e. the arguments he explicitly used in "What is a Nation?" are not consistent with his thinking. The concept of "daily plebiscite" would be ambiguous. They argue that the definition is an opportunist idealization and it should be interpreted within the Franco-Prussian War and in the midst of the dispute concerning the Alsace-Lorraine region. What Is a Nation? "What is a Nation?" ("Qu'est-ce qu'une nation?") is an 1882 lecture by French historian Ernest Renan (1823–1892), known for the statements