Laudator Temporis Acti

Palladas (Greek Anthology 10.72, tr. J. W. Mackail):

All life is a stage and a game: either learn to play it, laying by seriousness, or bear its pains.

The same, tr. W.R. Paton:

All life is a stage and a play: either learn to play laying your gravity aside, or bear with life's pains.

The same, tr. E.R. Dodds:

The world's a stage, and life's a toy:
  dress up and play your part;
Put every serious thought away—
Or risk a broken heart.

The same, tr. Tony Harrison:

Life's a performance. Either join in
  lightheartedly, or thole the pain.

The same, tr. Robert Bland:

This life a theatre we well may call,
  Where every actor must perform with art,
Or laugh it through, and make a farce of all,
  Or learn to bear with grace his tragic part.

The Greek original:

σκηνὴ πᾶς ὁ βίος καὶ παίγνιον· ἢ μάθε παίζειν
  τὴν σπουδὴν μεταθεὶς, ἢ φέρε τὰς ὀδύνας.

Among my notes is a list of articles on Palladas I've been meaning to read, and this is a good a place as any to keep it:

• Barry Baldwin, "Palladas of Alexandria: a Poet between Two Worlds," L'Antiquité Classique 54 (1985) 267-273
  
• C.M. Bowra, "Palladas and the Converted Olympians," Byzantinische Zeitschrift 53 (1960) 1-7, rpt. in On Greek Margins (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970), pp. 245-252
  
• C.W. Bowra, "Palladas and Christianity," Proceedings of the British Academy 45 (1959) 255-267; rpt. in On Greek Margins (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970), pp. 253-266
  
• C.M. Bowra, "Palladas on Tyche," Classical Quarterly 10 (1960) 118-128
  
• Alan Cameron, "Palladas and the Fate of Gessius," Byzantinische Zeitschrift 57 (1964) 279-292
  
• Alan Cameron, "Palladas and the Nikai," Journal of Hellenic Studies 84 (1964) 54-62
  
• Alan Cameron, "Palladas and Christian Polemic," Journal of Roman Studies 55 (1965) 17-30
  
• Alan Cameron, "Notes on Palladas," Classical Quarterly 15 (1965) 215-229
  
• William J. Henderson, "Epigrammatic Psogos: Censure in the Epigrams of Palladas," Acta Classica 51 (2008) 91-116
  
• Georg Luck, "Palladas: Christian or Pagan," Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 63 (1958) 455-468

Related posts:

• Palladas
  
• More Palladas
  
• Advice To a Self-Tormentor
  
• A Poem by Palladas
  
• Make Thee Merry
  
• The Descent of Man