The American Violet Society

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Shakespeare and the Violet Words from the Bard of Avon
	I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine, With sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine: There sleeps Titania some time of the night, Lull'd in these flowers with dances and delight: And there the snake throws her enamell'd skin, Weed wide enough to wrap a fairy in. Midsummer Night's Dream
To be possess'd with double pomp, To guard a title that as rich before, To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, To throw a perfume on the violet, To smooth the ice or add another hue Unto the rainbow, or with taper light To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish Is wasteful and ridiculous excess. King John	O'you must wear yr rue with a difference. There's a daisy; I would give you some violets, but they withered all when my father died... Hamlet
		If music be the food of love, play on; Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, The appetite may sicken, and so die. That strain again! I had a dying fall: O'it came o'er my ear like the sweet sound That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour! Twelfth Night
Who are the violets now That strew the green lap of the new Come spring? Richard II