“To be or not to be…” is probably the most famous quotation in the English language. Few note, however, that this phrase is not really ‘good’ English, either by modern or more antique standards. A more natural Present-Day English ‘translation’ might be “Should I be or should I not?” by analogy, for example, with the title of the Clash song “Should I stay or should I go?” which, in turn, would surely sound ridiculous rendered today as ‘to stay or to go?” “Being or not being” might be another more authentic-sounding, if somewhat over-existentialistic, contemporary rendition. Some interesting more modern-sounding paraphrase some street rapper came up with would more likely be even more appealing.

There is in fact, no good reason whatsoever why the preposition to should be attached to the idea of infinitives in English, as it invariably is, even in modern grammar books.

The tendency to use a preposition with an infinitive stemmed from an Anglo-Saxon dative use (indicating purpose or intention) and spread rampantly in Middle English, even to cases where no clear idea of purpose or intention was meant.

Nevertheless, the use of to+infinitive is still by no means universal in modern English and still tends to be employed primarily where some kind of intention is involved. Consider, for example, the difference between “I like to eat fruit” (i.e. “I think it is a good idea and make an effort to do so”) and “I like eating fruit” (“I enjoy it out of sheer self-gratification”). Or the newspaper headline use of to with no preceding finite verb to indicate intention or (by extension) mere futurity, as in “PM to open new talks with US.” Or more colloquial uses in popular culture such as Star Trek’s famous ‘to boldly go where no man has gone before; to seek out new worlds…’

In fact, to is not and never has been an integral part of the ‘infinitive’ in English. It is merely an appurtenance that has tended to attach to it as a matter of habit but has never quite attained the status of standardized convention. It is thus absurd to the point of churlishness to suggest that to should never be parted from its accompanying verb. To rewrite Star Trek’s ‘to boldly go’ as ‘to go boldly’ would be to exsanguinate the preposition of all its invigorating sense of thrusting out into worlds unknown, merely for the sake of obeisance to the supposed rhetorical diktats of a long-since dead language.

Arguably, there is no such thing as an infinitive in English. It makes no sense, therefore, to use the so-called infinitive-with-to to transform a verb into a subjective or objective noun, especially when we have a nominal –ing form of the verb that is specifically fit for this purpose.

The reason, of course, why people once did this and why it still persists, is the ghost of Latin, which, for such a long period of the history of the English language, was a constant devil on its shoulder, whispering unhelpful criticisms in its ear and undermining its self-confidence as a major world language in its own right.

Latin and neo-Latin languages use infinitives as substantive forms of the verb. Latin-worshippers of the Renaissance and the Enlightenment thus felt compelled to follow suit.

Why then, would Shakespeare, the greatest exponent of our national language, indulge in such fawning nonsense? Well, for one thing, Shakespeare, like all of us, was a child of his age and followed the fashions of his time. His greatness derives from the fact that he played—linguistically, dramatically, politically and psychologically—with these fashions much more than most dare do.

More interestingly, however, is the theory that Shakespeare deliberately put the fussily hypercorrect bad grammar of the schoolmaster into the mouth of his flawed, dithering, over-reflective male lead. “To be or not to be” sounds almost, when you think about it, like the beginning of a conjugation learnt by rote under the rod: the outset of a neurotically scholastic syllogism, not the foundation of a firm decision-making process.

Compare the tremulous self-conscious language of Hamlet’s most famous soliloquy, with the clipped confident imperatives (indistinguishable from bare infinitives in English) with which Fortinbras (whose name means literally ‘strong of arm’) closes the play.

“Let four captains

Bear Hamlet like a soldier to the stage,

For he was likely, had he been put on,

To have prov’d most royal; and for his passage,

The soldier’s music and the rite of war

Speak loudly for him.

Take up the bodies. Such a sight as this

Becomes the field, but here shows much amiss.

Go, bid the soldiers shoot.”

Such sturdy discourse, not a foppish imitation of Latin, was the kind of language that would go on, for good or ill, to make Britain great.