the winter of our discontent

Cultural  

1. A phrase from the historical play King Richard the Third, by William Shakespeare; it describes a civil war in England.

---

Discover More

“The winter of our discontent” has come to suggest disaffection in general. The phrase served as the title for a book by John Steinbeck.

Example Sentences

“Now is the winter of our discontent/Made glorious summer by this sun of York.”

From New York Times

I understood its real value at that evening’s “Richard III” performance, in which Colm Feore, as the title character, delivered the play’s famous first line — “Now is the winter of our discontent/Made glorious summer by this son of York” — in what he later told me had been a whisper.

From New York Times

In role, Hughes stepped into the middle of the party, veering through the revelers to deliver the play’s famed opening speech: “Now is the winter of our discontent,” he began.

From New York Times

He began speaking into his prop phone; had someone passed by, they could have heard him reciting Shakespeare: “Now is the winter of our discontent …”

From Seattle Times

Shakespeare’s Richard, Duke of Gloucester, opened a play lamenting “the winter of our discontent … made glorious summer by this son of York.”

From Seattle Times