William Shakespeare created characters that are among the richest and most humanly recognizable in all of literature. Yet he understood human personality in the terms available to his age – that of the now-discarded theory of the four bodily humors – blood, bile, melancholy and phlegm. These four humors were understood to define peoples’ physical and mental health, and determined their personality, as well.

Cabarrus College of Health Sciences will host “And there’s the humor of it,” a traveling exhibit exploring the role the four humors played in several of Shakespeare’s most beloved plays through beautiful imagery and rare books from both the National Library of Medicine and the Folger Shakespeare Library, and examining more modern interpretations of the four humors in contemporary medicine.

The language of the four humors pervades Shakespeare’s plays, and their influence is felt above all in a belief that emotional states are physically determined. Carried by the bloodstream, the four humors bred the core passions of anger, grief, hope, and fear — the emotions conveyed so powerfully in Shakespeare’s comedies and tragedies.

“The four humors were an early typology for human personality. Shakespeare uses them, even as he transcends them, to create the vivid characters whose emotions continue to fascinate and delight us,” said exhibit curator Gail Kern Paster.

The exhibit will be on display through Aug. 15 at the Cabarrus College of Health Sciences at the Information Resource Center. It will be open Sunday through Thursday 8 a.m.-4 p.m. and Fridays 8:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m.