An Introduction to the Sonnets by Philippa Watkins

Contents 3. Overview of the Sonnets: theme and subject 4. Summary of major themes 5. Summary of major themes contd. 6. Love, Sex and Marriage in Elizabethan England 7. The Role of Women in Elizabethan/Jacobean England 8. Form, style and structure 9. Writing about a sonnet 10. Summary of sonnets 1 – 6 11. Summary of sonnets 7 – 13 12. Summary of sonnets 14 – 17 13. Sonnet 1 and Sonnet 12 14. Sonnet 13 and Sonnet 18 15. Questions on the sonnets. Useful web links.

Shakespeare’s Sonnets – An Introduction OVERVIEW The word Sonnet originally meant ‘little song’. Published in 1609, the sonnets have come to be considered as an incomparable series of poems, which has no equal in the world of literature. Shakespeare wrote 154 sonnets, probably written between 1592 and 1598. Thomas Thorpe published them, probably without Shakespeare’s permission. The sonnets deal with themes such as the passage of time, love, beauty and mortality. The sonnets are divided into two groups. The first group of sonnets, numbers 1 – 126, is addressed to a man. These sonnets are mostly about pure love and devotion. ‘Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments’ (116. L1-‐2). The second group of sonnets, numbers 127 – 152, describes his love – or infatuation – for his dark mistress. The love in these poems is tainted or distorted by sexual attraction. ‘When my love swears that she is made of truth I do believe her though I know she lies’ (138. L1-‐2). The two concluding sonnets, 153 and 154, are a free translation or adaptation of classical verses about Cupid; some critics believe they serve a specific purpose – though they disagree about what this may be – but others may view them as perfunctory. There are many themes woven into the poems, however one of the key themes is that of love, and the many forms it takes: love between two men, love between a man and a woman, and love between a woman and a man. Love should also be considered in terms of religion, as some of the poems have quasi-‐religious language and themes. The Story the Sonnets Tell There are three characters in the sonnets: the ‘fair lord’, the ‘dark lady’ and the rival poet. The first group of sonnets is addressed to an unidentified young man -‐ the ‘fair lord’. His beauty needs to be preserved and so the first seventeen sonnets urge him to have children, so he will be preserved. In Sonnet 18, Shakespeare alters his viewpoint, and many of the remaining sonnets in this first group focus on the power of poetry and pure love to defeat death and ‘all oblivious enmity’ (55. L9). The second group of sonnets is addressed to the ‘dark lady’, who is promiscuous and scheming. Both the poet and his young man are obsessed with her, and the poet’s whole being is at odds with his insatiable ‘sickly appetite’ (147. L4). The language is filled with sexual imagery and tone is often distressed.

4 Summary of Major Themes

Love: Platonic vs Carnal • The divide between the first group of sonnets and the second group also mark a divide in two forms of attraction. • The love for the ‘fair lord’ is described without explicit sexual imagery which many critics argue suggests it is a platonic love. The ‘dark lady’ sonnets are full of sexual imagery suggesting it is a carnal lust he feels for her. • Platonic love is admired and celebrated while carnal love is condemned. • The contrast is seen in sonnet 144: ‘To win me soon to hell, my female evil Tempteth my better angel from my side And would corrupt my saint to be a devil Wooing his purity with her foul pride.’ Time • The sonnets begin with the narrator trying to defeat the ravages of time by suggesting the ‘fair lord’ marry and have children to preserve his beauty. • This idea is continued through sonnet 2, however by sonnet 18, he has comet to the conclusion that it is his writing that will immortalize the ‘fair lord’s’ beauty. ‘So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this and this gives life to thee.’ • Time worries him again in sonnet 90, where it becomes about suffering, and he urges the ‘fair lord’ to break with him: ‘Give not a windy night a rainy morrow’ • His own age causes him some concern: ‘But when my glass shows me myself indeed Beated and choppe’d with tann’d antinquity’ (62) ‘And wherefore say not I that I am old’ (138) ‘That time of year thou mayst in me behold, When yellow leaves, or none, or few do hang, Upon those boughts’ (73) Homoerotic Desire • This idea has been debated by a number of critics -‐ a fair amount arguing there is no homosexual desire shown in the sonnets. • Sonnets 1 – 126, it has been argued, however, are rife with homoerotic undertones. • In sonnet 20, the poet expressly laments the fact Nature has ‘prick’d thee out’. • In sonnet 29, the narrator complains about his ‘outcast state’ – maybe a reference to his fears about the nature of his love for the ‘fair lord’. • However there is no real sexual imagery in the sonnets and so critics have argued it is a platonic type of love, not a physical one. (This is open to debate.)

Desire, Lust and Love • Several sonnets warn about the dangers of lust, explaining that it is possible to mistake sexual desire for true love, and love itself causes us to lose our powers of perception. • Sonnet 129 makes this explicit: -‐and till action, lust Is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame, Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust; Enjoyed no sooner but despised straight; Past reason hunted; and no sooner had, Past reason hated, as a swallowed bait’ • It is worth noting that nothing like this is found in the sonnets to the young man. The profound hatred of sexuality does not occur in that context, where love is expressed as undying and lofty, although often mixed with sexual humour and puns. • Several sonnets equate being in love with being in a pitiful state; being alienated, being in despair and physical discomfort. • In Sonnet 137 – love is personified and made into a simpleton – it is accused of making him lose his perception and make mistakes. Selfishness and Greed • This is prevalent throughout – seen most in the narrator’s expectation of faithfulness from the fair lord and the dark lady. He is unfaithful himself, yet condemns the unfaithfulness of others. • The rival poet sonnets (79-‐86) capture the narrator’s jealousy of his fair lord having another admirer; the dark lady sonnets 133-‐134 do the same. Colour Symbolism • This is most obvious in the dark lady sonnets. The colour black is repeatedly used to describe the dark lady’s features, both physical and otherwise. • He gives her the evilness of ‘otherness’ that the colour black has often been associated with in Western society. • He does use colour in the earlier sonnets too: the ‘summer’s green’ and ‘the violet’ being compared to the silver and white of age. It is interesting that he juxtaposes the colours of youth with the absence of colour in age. • All three uses of the colour yellow are linked with the passing of time (sonnets 17, 73 and 104) while green is largely symbolic of youth.

Elizabethan and Jacobean attitudes to Sex, Love and Marriage

Elizabethans mistrusted passionate love, believing that it often cooled quite quickly and therefore to marry for love was considered foolish. The best marriages were made thoughtfully – that took into account the couple’s compatibility as much as the families’ wealth and status. The less wealthy, however, married pretty much the same way we do today. It was considered inappropriate to have sex outside of marriage – many of the beliefs still based on Christianity. Women were still considered inferior to men and it was accepted they would be at home with the children – as this was their primary purpose. Shakespeare’s society was a patriarchal one. It was male dominated, male controlled but totally dependent on women to sustain it through marriage, family name and children. As such the tension between same-‐sex desire and the social imperative to have children is often seen in Shakespeare’s works (especially the comedies). In the 16th and 17th century, England’s laws governing sex were numerous, punishing ‘unacceptable’ sexual acts with execution. These laws considered sodomy especially evil. It is important to be aware that in Early Modern England, sodomy was not simply about homosexuality; it was about sex acts that were not for procreation. It is also important to realise the law did not discriminate against a kind of person; rather the law and social standards regarding sexual acts only covered acts. What this means is that a person’s identity was not defined by sexuality (Smith, 1994). According to historical records, however, the laws were not rigorously enforced and very few hangings took place. It is thought, as very little evidence was needed, that monarchs used the law as a method of coercion. Ironically, King James 1, who was king when the Sonnets were published, had numerous affairs with men and in fact arranged for his lover, George Villiers, to be buried next to him. The Theatre was heavily influenced by Greek literature and so the ancient Greek perceptions about relationships between men are quite significant. In Ancient Greece sexual relationships between young men was considered favourable and often considered a purer kind of love.

The Role of Women The roles of women in society were very limited. The Elizabethans had very clear expectations of men and women, and in general men were expected to work and women to be housewives and mothers. Women were regarded as the weaker sex, not just physically but emotionally too. They were meant to be looked after – by husbands or alternatively, by fathers and brothers. Women were allowed to work, but only in certain roles – like maids, cooks. They were not allowed to act on stage or write for the public stage. Acting was considered dishonorable for women and women didn’t appear on stage until the 17th century. Women were not allowed to vote. They couldn’t inherit their father’s titles. The crown was the only exception to this. There was no divorce in Elizabethan times. If the couple wanted to separate then they needed to obtain an annulment, which, if granted, meant their marriage had been unlawful. However women did have a lot more freedom in Elizabethan times than previous generations had – and more than they would have again for some time. The Renaissance bought to Britain a new ideology, which regarded education as something essential for the human being. As a consequence, many wealthy and noble women in this period were highly educated.

8 Form, Style and Structure

What is a Sonnet? • With only a few exceptions – Sonnets 99, 126 and 145 – Shakespeare’s sonnets follow the established English form of the sonnet. • A sonnet is a poem consisting of 14 lines. • Each line has 10 stressed and 10 unstressed syllables – this is known as iambic pentameter. • There is a set rhyme scheme of: a b a b, c d c d, e f e f, g g. (Shakespeare does employ this.) • The rhymes can be aural or visual (sound the same or look the same) • The rhyme sequence is usually three quatrains (sets of four lines) with one couplet at the end. • It is usual for there to be pause for thought in the sonnet’s message and then the argument or theme of the sonnet to be summarized in the final rhyming couplet. (Many of Shakespeare’s couplets do not have this conventional effect.) The development of the sonnet • Shakespeare’s sonnets, taken together, are frequently described as a sequence. • The English sonnet sequence reached the height of its popularity in the 1590s. • Sonnets of the time were influenced by the 14th century Italian poet, Petrach. These sonnets were divided into two stanzas – the octave (the first eight lines) and the sestet (the final six lines). The rhyme scheme (abba,abba, cdecde or cdcdcd) is suited for the Italian language. • Petrarch’s sonnets were dedicated to an idealized lady named Laura glimpsed in a church and with whom he fell in love at first sight. • She was married to someone else and so, being ideally virtuous as well as beautiful, was permanently unavailable. • Petrarch made use of the conventions of courtly love so that his love for Laura explored ideas that love is excruciatingly painful; that the virtuous lady is cruel in rejecting the poet’s love; that love is a religion that ennobles the lover. • Petrarch’s sonnets were modified by the translations of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, who establishing the structure that Shakespeare came to use. This structure was suited better to writing in English. • Shakespeare was keenly aware of the Petrarchan conventions and often uses them, but just as often upends them. The vocabulary of discussing sonnets • The 14 line poem has two parts – the octave and the sestet (see above). • The octave often presents a problem or question or situation and the sestet answers it – a dialectical (discussion/ opposing) method. • In between the octave and the sestet there is often a shift, a changing of tone, called the volta (although you need to remember not ALL sonnets do this!)

sestet

Octave

9 Writing about a Sonnet Sonnet 129 The expense of spirit in a waste of shame

Is lust in action; and till action, lust

Is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame,

Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust,

Enjoy’d no sooner but despised straight,

Past reason hunted, and no sooner had

Past reason hated, as a swallow’d bait

On purpose laid to make the taker mad;

Mad in pursuit and in possession so;

Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme;

A bliss in proof, and proved, a very woe;

Before, a joy proposed; behind, a dream.

·· All this the world well knows; yet none knows well

·· To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.

Brief Commentary (focus on theme and use of terminology) This is one of Shakespeare’s most famous sonnets. In it he explores the reaction of the human psyche to the promptings of sexual urges. What stands out most in this sonnet is Shakespeare’s listing of adjectives described in the building up of desire: ‘murderous, bloody, full of blame,/Savage, extreme, rude, cruel ‘ which not only increases the pace of the sonnet but suggests a kind of frenzy which, emphasized by the image of the hooked fish: ‘a swallow’d bait’. This image of a frenzied animal expending its last vital energies enraged by being doomed by its own desire, links well to the narrator’s attitude to sex. It also connects to the Christian imperative for a virginal life and the focus of sex for procreation only. It is worth mentioning the structure of this sonnet as it does not fit the more common style of English sonnets. While the rhythm and the rhyme do follow the norms, the volta seems subtle. Rather than a thematic turn, the only change appears to be in attitude – from the rage and entrapment caused by the physical desire that is ‘past reason’, to a more emotional consequence where bliss leads to woe, and joy is something ephemeral and ‘dream’ like. The juxtaposition of passion with despair sums up the sonnets’ exploration of the dichotomy between sexual desire and love.

In this first grouping, the ‘procreation’ sonnets, the poet praises the beauty of the fair youth and urges him to have children as a way of immortalising his looks. Brief summaries Sonnet 1: This one has special importance, as it is the first. It appears to look both into the past and into the future. Many of the ideas of the later sonnets are sketched out here: the youth’s beauty, his vulnerability in the face of time, his potential for harm to the world and to himself, nature’s beauty – which is dull compared to his, the threat of disease, the folly of being miserly, the need to see the world in a larger sense than through one’s own restricted vision. Sonnet 2: The poet looks ahead to the time when the youth will have aged, and uses this as an argument to urge him to waste no time, and to have a child who will replicate him and preserve his beauty. The imagery of ageing used is that of siege warfare: forty winters being the besieging army, which digs trenches in the fields before the threatened city. The trenches correspond to the furrows and lines which will mark the young man's forehead as he ages. He is urged not to throw away all his beauty by devoting himself to self-pleasure, but to have children, thus satisfying the world, and Nature, which will keep an account of what he does with his life. Sonnet 3: The youth is urged once more to look to posterity and to bless the world by having children. Any woman would want him as a father to her child. Just as he reflects his mother's beauty, showing how lovely she was in her prime, so a child of his would be a record of his own beauty. In his old age he could look on this child and see an image of what he once was. But if he chooses to remain single, everything will perish with him. Sonnet 4: The youth is urged once again not to throw away his beauty. It is Nature's gift, but only given on condition that it is used to profit the world, that is, by handing it on to future generations. An analogy is drawn from money-lending: the usurer should use his money wisely. Yet the young man has dealings with himself alone, and cannot give a satisfactory account of time well spent. If he continues to behave in such a way, his beauty will die with him, whereas he could leave inheritors to benefit from his legacy Sonnet 5: This and the following sonnet are written as a pair. The poet laments the progress of the years, which will play havoc with the young man's beauty. Human life is like the seasons, spring, summer, autumn's maturity and fruition, followed by hideous winter. Nothing is left of summer's beauty except for that which the careful housewife preserves, the essence of roses and other flowers distilled for their perfume. Other than that there is no remembrance of things beautiful. But once distilled, the substance of beauty is always preserved. Therefore the youth should consider how his beauty might be best distilled. Sonnet 6: The youth is encouraged to defeat the threat of winter by having children. Ten children would increase his happiness tenfold. He would see his face ten times. Death would be defeated since he would live through his children, even if he died. He is far to beautiful to be destroyed by death and worms.

Sonnet 7: The poet explores another theme, different from those he has pursued in the preceding sonnets. He draws a simile between the rising and setting sun and youth and age. In the sunset of his days admirers will no longer surround the youth. Unless he has children to carry on the line and reflect his former beauty, he will vanish unknown into the murky depths of time. Sonnet 8: The theme of the youth's failure to marry and to have children is continued. A lesson is drawn from his apparent sadness in listening to music. Music itself is concord and harmony, similar to that which reigns in the happy household of father, child and mother, as if they were separate strings in music which reverberate mutually. The young man is made sad by this harmony because he does not submit to it. In effect it admonishes him, telling him that, in dedicating himself to a single life he makes himself worthless, a nonentity, a nothingness. Sonnet 9: The poet asks if it is fear of making someone a widow that causes the young man to refuse to marry. The argument is unsound, says the poet, for a beautiful youth must leave behind him a form or copy of himself, otherwise the world itself will endure widowhood, and yet have no consolation for its loss. For it will not be able to view the young man resurrected in the eyes of his children. If he persists in this single obduracy, it is an unforgivable shame, showing lack of love to others and equivalent to murdering himself and all his heirs. Sonnet 10: This is the first sonnet of the series in which the poet declares a personal interest in the youth, rather than the general one of desiring for the world's sake that it be not deprived of his progeny. Here there are two statements, firstly, that he wishes to have an opportunity to change his opinion of the youth (l.9), as implying that his (the poet's) better opinion is of some value; secondly he attempts the persuasive argument of 'for love of me' in order to produce a change in the youth's intentions. Neither of these amount to a declaration of love, although they do half imply it, for what is love if it is not reciprocated? In any case it is in some sense preparatory to the more impassioned statements of several of the sonnets which are to follow. Sonnet 11: This takes up the same argument as sonnet 1, and indeed it is a sonnet that can hardly stand on its own because 'if all were minded so' implies that we know already how the youth is minded to behave, information which we only derive from what has gone before. Sonnet 12: The slow and swift passage of time which brings all things to an end is described with such significant and devastating effect that mortality almost stares us in the face as we read it. The way in which the sense of the lines ends with the line itself is like the ticking of a clock or the inexorable motion of a pendulum as it beats from side to side. The significance of the placing of this sonnet here (12) (twelve hours of the day) as well as that of the 'minute' sonnet at 60 is difficult to determine, but at the very least it points to an ordering hand, which, like the clock itself, metes out the sequence of relevant events as they occur. Sonnet 13: This sonnet returns to the theme of procreation as a defence against death and ruin. It is interesting also that it is the first in the sequence that contains an open and unequivocal declaration of love: but, love, you are/. in l.1; and especially Dear my love in l.13. The persistent undertone of time's advance bringing winter, decay and death, continues. The young man is urged to shore up his house against this eventual fate. But what seems to emerge more than anything from this poem is the inevitability and sadness of this demise, contrasted with the love and beauty which stands up bravely to fight against it, and the tenderness of the poet's affection for the youth.

Sonnet 14: This sonnet introduces a variant of the procreation theme, tying it in with predictions of the future made, not through astrology (Astronomy), as would normally be expected, but through taking the youth's eyes as stars in the heavens which foretell the future. The comparison of stars with eyes is traditional love lore in which the beloved assumes the qualities of everything that is angelic and heavenly. Shakespeare implies here that the foreknowledge he has from the 'stars' of the youth's eyes surpasses that derived from traditional astrology. He asserts that truth and beauty are doomed forever unless the young man chooses to perpetuate his line by having children. Sonnet 15: The opening thought rings changes on the perennial theme of mortality which so much engrosses the poet's attention. He perceives the hand of doom in the minutiae of nature's processes, and extends the observation to bring it to bear on the beloved youth. Such beauty and perfection is in the young man that the whole world is warring against Time in an effort to prevent his gradual decline from youth into age and death. Yet the poet has an alternative also, that in his verse the youth will live and be immortalised and his beauty will remain eternally new. Sonnet 16: This seems to take its cue from the preceding sonnet, and the two together are in the form of a continuous meditation. Here the poet takes a step backwards from the declaration of promised immortality, for he has second thoughts and his verse (his pupil pen) is found to be inadequate to represent the young man as he really is, or to give a true account of his inner and outer beauty. Therefore the young man is urged once more to give himself away, in marriage, and thus to recreate himself. Sonnet 17: This is the final 'procreation' sonnet, in which the youth is urged to have a child so that he may live (forever?) both in that child, and in the verse which the poet writes celebrating his beauty. If he does not have a child, argues the poet, there will be no proof that he was as beautiful as the poet claims him to be, and his verse will be disbelieved.

The following three sonnets are ones that considered key in the opening 17. Read each of them and then pick one for closer study. Sonnet 1 From fairest creatures we desire increase, That thereby beauty's rose might never die, But as the riper should by time decease, His tender heir might bear his memory: But thou contracted to thine own bright eyes, Feed'st thy light's flame with self-substantial fuel, Making a famine where abundance lies, Thy self thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel: Thou that art now the world's fresh ornament, And only herald to the gaudy spring, Within thine own bud buriest thy content, And, tender churl, mak'st waste in niggarding: Pity the world, or else this glutton be, To eat the world's due, by the grave and thee. Sonnet 12 When I do count the clock that tells the time, And see the brave day sunk in hideous night; When I behold the violet past prime, And sable curls, all silvered o'er with white; When lofty trees I see barren of leaves, Which erst from heat did canopy the herd, And summer's green all girded up in sheaves, Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard, Then of thy beauty do I question make, That thou among the wastes of time must go, Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake And die as fast as they see others grow; And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

Sonnet 13 O! that you were your self; but, love, you are No longer yours, than you your self here live: Against this coming end you should prepare, And your sweet semblance to some other give: So should that beauty which you hold in lease Find no determination; then you were Yourself again, after yourself's decease, When your sweet issue your sweet form should bear. Who lets so fair a house fall to decay, Which husbandry in honour might uphold, Against the stormy gusts of winter's day And barren rage of death's eternal cold? O! none but unthrifts. Dear my love, you know, You had a father: let your son say so.

Sonnet 18 is one of the most famous sonnets of all time. It marks a change in thought as to how the beauty of the fair youth should be preserved. Sonnet 18 Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimmed, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st, Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st, So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Prepare an interpretation of one of the sonnets on the previous two pages. In your interpretation answer the following questions: • What is the sonnet about? • What can you say about its structure (think in terms of octave, sestet, quatrain, couplet, rhyme, rhythm and volta)? • What do you notice about the imagery used? • What does the sonnet you have chosen say about love? There is lots of help online for understanding the sonnets and full analyses. Useful links: http://www.shakespeare-‐online.com/sonnets/ • http://www.shakespeare-‐online.com/sonnets/1detail.html • http://www.shakespeare-‐online.com/sonnets/12.html • http://www.shakespeares-‐sonnets.com/sonnet/13 • http://www.sparknotes.com/shakespeare/shakesonnets/section2.rhtml (sonnet 18) • http://www.shakespeares-‐sonnets.com/ http://allpoetry.com/poem/8449723-‐The_Procreation_Sonnets__1_-‐_17_-‐by-‐ William_Shakespeare (all the procreation sonnets on one page)