"
Is brevity the soul of wit?
If so, then why's this bloody play so long
This phrase is used in Act-2, Scene-2, lines 86-92 in the famous play, Hamlet. It is spoken by one of its characters, Polonius. It goes thus; It is funny because Hamlet is Shakespeare's longest play. The play is not brief, and yet it contains this line stating that to be witty, a saying or a story should be short.