There comes a time in every professional’s life when the standard work email simply will not do. When “Following up on this” and “Per my last message” no longer carry the weight of your righteous irritation. When “Hope this finds you well” feels like a limp handshake and “Best” sounds more passive than aggressive.
Enter William Shakespeare, the original master of drama, passive-aggression, and overly long sentences. The Bard knew how to craft a message that both praised and insulted with precision, like a verbal dagger wrapped in velvet. Why not channel a bit of his theatrical flair into your daily correspondence? After all, if you must suffer through office life, you might as well do it in iambic pentameter. Forsooth, what better way to confuse, impress, and mildly terrify your coworkers than with the language of the greatest playwright in history?
Crafting a Proper Salutation
Forget “Dear Sir or Madam” or “To Whom It May Concern.” These are the opening lines of someone who expects their email to be ignored. Instead, try something with a little more gravitas:
- “Most Esteemed Colleague,”
- “O Noble Recipient of This Missive,”
- “Hark! To the Keeper of the Financial Spreadsheets,”
Even if you’re just chasing a timesheet or confirming a Zoom link, why not open with a line that makes your recipient feel like a minor noble at a grand banquet? Better yet, address them as if they were a beloved but slightly disappointing character in a historical epic:
- “Most Honoured but Frequently Absent Associate,”
- “To the Esteemed Keeper of PowerPoints and Spreadsheet Woes,”
- “O Sovereign of the Punctual Yet Perpetually Unavailable,”
For added flair, consider a poetic flourish to set the tone for the chaos you’re about to unleash:
- “Thou art the wind beneath my quarterly earnings, the spreadsheet to my pivot table.”
- “Ye who doth multitask with the vigour of a caffeinated squirrel, hear my plea.”
Mastering the Art of Passive-Aggression
The key to a Shakespearean work email is to say exactly what you mean while also saying the exact opposite. It’s all about the balance of tone. Consider the following:
Modern: “Just following up on this.”
Shakespearean: “Pray, hast thou given thought to mine humble request, or hast it perished, neglected, like a letter left to moulder in the rain?”
Modern: “As I mentioned previously…”
Shakespearean: “As once I spake, when the moon was full and the deadline nigh…”
Modern: “Per my last email…”
Shakespearean: “As penned in my prior missive, when the air was sweet and the coffee plentiful…”
It’s all about stretching the metaphor until it quivers under the weight of its own pretension. This is not the time for brevity. Make every word a tiny soliloquy of barely restrained frustration.
Flattery, With a Hint of Insult
Shakespeare was a master of backhanded compliments, the art of praising while clearly implying the opposite. This is a valuable skill for dealing with office nemeses or that one person who always replies-all unnecessarily.
- “Thy skills are beyond compare, matched only by thy talent for prolonging even the simplest of meetings.”
- “Though I envy the fortitude with which thou ignorest deadlines, I find myself in need of thy long-promised input.”
- “May this message find thee well, though I suspect it shan’t, given thy recent form.”
Or perhaps you need something a bit more pointed:
- “Thou art as reliable as a WiFi signal on a stormy sea.”
- “Thy punctuality is matched only by thine aversion to the ‘Reply All’ button.”
- “Thou hast the vision of a PowerPoint designer using Comic Sans.”
For those truly special colleagues, consider a compliment that slowly unravels into a curse:
- “May thy calendar be forever full, and thine inbox never clear.”
- “May your coffee be strong, and your WiFi eternally stable, though thy ideas waver like a Windows 95 screensaver.”
- “May thy PowerPoint transitions be as smooth as thy excuses for missing deadlines.”
Close Like a Hero (or a Villain)
No Shakespearean missive is complete without a dramatic, perhaps slightly ominous sign-off. Remember, your aim is to leave your reader feeling slightly uneasy about their life choices.
- “Yours in perpetuity, though perhaps not if these delays persist,”
- “Thine ever in mild exasperation,”
- “I remain, despite all evidence to the contrary, yours faithfully,”
Or, if you’re feeling especially dramatic:
- “With a heart full of woe and an inbox full of nonsense,”
And for the truly dramatic:
- “Yours, like a WiFi signal, ever flickering between connection and despair.”
For the extra flourish, consider a line that hints at a long memory and a penchant for grudges:
- “Forever in the shadow of thy forgotten attachments,”
- “Yours, like a ghost in the spreadsheet, haunting the margins,”
- “With the silent rage of a printer jam at 4:59 PM,”
To Email, or Not to Email?
Channeling Shakespeare in your work emails isn’t just about injecting a bit of fun into the daily grind. It’s about reclaiming the lost art of the letter, the carefully worded note, the perfectly timed verbal jab. In a world of bullet points and Slack messages, why not stand out as the Bard of the boardroom?
So go forth, dear reader. Confound your colleagues. Baffle your boss. Write work emails that will echo through the halls of corporate history—or, at the very least, get a few confused replies.
And if all else fails, remember: there is always the option to sign off with “Thus with a single click, I send my woes into the digital void.”
Born and raised in Sheffield, Kerry Freeman is an unrepentant tea addict, cat enthusiast, and lifelong expert in the art of looking busy while doing the bare minimum. By day, she works as a minion in a government department (no, not one of the cute yellow ones with dungarees). By night, she brings her wicked sense of humour to untypicable.co.uk, where she fearlessly tackles life’s nonsense with sharp wit, historical references, and the occasional inappropriate joke.
Kerry has no children (by choice, obviously), but she does have a cat, which is basically the same thing but with more attitude and fewer school runs. When she’s not writing, you’ll probably find her at a historical re-enactment, enthusiastically pretending she’s living in another century—preferably one with fewer emails and better hats.