Barber, CL - Shakespeare and The Sonnets 1960

The Massachusetts Review, Inc.
Shakespeare in His Sonnets

Author(s): C. L. Barber
Source: The Massachusetts Review, Vol. 1, No. 4 (Summer, 1960), pp. 648-672
Published by: The Massachusetts Review, Inc.
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25086565 .
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C. L. Barber
in his Sonnets
Shakespeare
reads poetry knows a number

readers have been
but many
who
Everyonesonnets
of Shakespeare's
put off from the
well,
it raises and the
collection
questions
by the biographical
answers
of unsatisfactory
accumulation
by commen
proposed
sonnets not only include
tators. The
some of the most beautiful
whole
poems
ever written,
the
but they have
are the only poems we have which
they
of his own
additional
interest
Shakespeare
in his own
indeed
person?a
life,
often wish
ishing collection.
People
turn up from which we
ence might
that
wrote
out
aston
remarkable,
that a diary or correspond
could learn about Shakes
a
we
sonnets
in
the
of this
peare;
have,
fluke,
by
something
kind. But they are cast in the mold
of his age, not ours, and they
about circumstantial
facts. The who,
do not oblige our curiosity
are beyond
the
when
close
where,
knowing,
despite
tantalizing
ness
of
theories
1944,
by the
to Shakespeare's
the poems
life. The
many
personal
were
all expertly
in
that have been proposed
reviewed
in the hundreds
of pages of the New Variorum
Edition,
late Professor
Rollins,
Hyder
was
his conclusion
scholarship;
literary
of the name of 'evidence'
and probably
of biographical
of them,
tradition
even when
This
edition
under
shortened
is a somewhat
essay
to be
the Sonnets
published
general
of Francis
editorship
Company
1
Rollins
of
has
shortly
this barren
to assume?
led many
the question
version
of
in
Fergusson,
objective
"nothing
worthy
to substantiate
any
produced
ever will
be."1 Yet
nothing
of
the
of New
that
has been
speculation
see no answer?that
they
a master
the
the
by
the son
about
introduction
Laurel
the
Dell
to
the
Shakespeare,
Publishing
York.
summarized
(New York, 1951),
his
judgment
thus
in a brief
introduction
ix.
648

to Sonnets
in his Sonnets
Shakespeare
nets
is "What
discussed
is the story behind

them?"
not as poems but as evidence?and
The
poems are usually

insufficient
evidence
at that.
care about poetry usually
react to this tendency
who
as to what
a point of ignoring
all questions
the son
by making
to what
nets express
of Shakespeare's
life and attending
only
are
as
autonomous
in
achievements.
Shakespeare,
they
poetic
People
for
words
finding
at large:
the world
With
That
sonnets
poetry
could
when
wrought
sun
and moon,
evokes
often
what
in
of proud compare
with
earth
and
sea's
rich
gems,
April's first-born flowers, and all things rare,

heaven's air in this huge rondure hems. (21)
creations
of sound
in the language.
Fre
syllable
utterance
to experiences
everyone
and they
elation,
joy, dismay;
and
quently
they give compelling
in love?anguish,
goes through
realize with directness
and fullness
basic
conditions
which
love has to confront?the
fact of mortality,
ness of human beings,
their need of each other,
come unsought
and undeserved.
It is better
to lose
is loveliest
are products
of the brief golden
age of English
the magic
of the simplest, most
fundamental
things
are also,
in unforced
sonnets
be conveyed
words.
The
their
the most
among
form,
forthright
exquisitely
Such
within
love,
a couplement
Making
With
his
to read
the sonnets
of existence
the separate
the graces
that
for these universal
values
than
their poetry
them into riddles

about Shakes
by turning
to
But
off
consideration
of what
block
peare's
biography.
they
mean
as an expression
own experience
of Shakespeare's
is a
to
which
in
needless
leads
those many
sacrifice,
ignoring
practice
on the stresses of the
which
hinge
poet's
to losing an important
part of the meaning
can turn our backs on
the whole
collection. We
sonnets
and
life,
personal
and beauty
of
the unanswer
of fact, and read the poems not as tantalizing

able questions
clues
we
but as expression
we
of a man's
When
do
find
so,
experience.
a
not
a
tell
do
do
that, though
story, they
express
person
they
are gestures
of love, concern, disappointment,
anger
ality. They
649

The Massachusetts
Review
or
disgust,
know who
and candidly
That we cannot
profoundly
conveyed.
was actually
our
addressed
does not prevent
feeling
and understanding
the gestures. What
is communicated
in this
is not, of course, "the whole
truth about Shakespeare."
The
way
sonnets are only Shakespeare
at certain times in certain kinds of
a young man
or several
with
young men
relations,
(1-126),
a
woman
of loose morals
with
married
dark-complexioned
he is
And
in them we see Shakespeare
only where
(127-152).
to
in
other
rather
than
poetry
living by writing
living
people,
these
ways. But within
and it is an extraordinary
astonishing
selflessness
his personality,
limits, we do encounter
one. Shakespeare
like Keats,
exhibits,
a
others
He
realizes
with
capability."
"negative
or lack of self
even
desperate,
nets in relation
is sometimes
sometimes
sublime.
ugly,
to their author does not mean
as poetry;
their qualities
and
beauty?even
ing
a great
that
artist
his
I. "His
sugared
sometimes
son
at the
turning away from

on the contrary,
the poems gain mean
can see in
the ones most
familiar. We
in love,
encountering,
in
And
his
life.
and
part
temperament
into
substance
of
turned
the
poetry.
loved,
them
poignant,
look
To
sonnets
among
the predicaments
can see what
we
his private
of
he
friends."
in the sonnets was conditioned

expressed
Shakespeare
were
not
in
the poet's
had
life. They
the
by
special place they
not written
to friends,
for publication,
but to present
written
over several
at intervals
all together,
but singly and in groups
What
have
years. We
to "his sugared
vate
character
the two sonnets
in 1598
reference
unambiguous
Their
his
friends."
among
pri
private
for
in the circumstance
is reflected
that, except
a
were
in pirati
included
(138 and 144) which
Francis
Meres'
sonnets
cal anthology in 1599, they were not published until 1609, late
have been
of them must
in Shakespeare's
life, long after most
a
out by
This was the only edition,
written.
marginal
brought
or super
without
Shakespeare's
permission
clearly
publisher,
was
to
the pub
H."
"Mr.
W.
dedication
vision. The
cryptic
one
seems
edition
that
this
not
It
lisher's
likely
Shakespeare's.
650

in his Sonnets
Shakespeare
soon
was
established
in spite of Shakespeare's
sonnets
in
the decades
notice
of the
fame
so
were
little
known
in
1640
their
they
appearance:
following
out
to pretend
that he was bringing
ventured
that a publisher
a
in
of
issuing
rearranged
poems
Shakespeare
unpublished
version
of the 1609 text.
suppressed,
there is almost
for
no
sonnets
Shakespeare's
are often
are not
se
spoken of as his sonnet
such a production,
indeed
were
in the
begun
probably
in fact
quence,
they
though
at all. They
not one production
at its
in private
life was
the rage for sonnets
period when
was
sonnets
much
in
of
and
when
making
Shakespeare
height,
are a particularly
of
number
his plays. There
large
parallels
the sonnets,
those
between
and phrasing
in imagery
especially
Romeo
Labours
below
numbered
Lost,
100, and Loveys
and
well
A Midsummer
Juliet,
as the
These
facts
two narrative
that
suggest
between
1593
Nightys
Richard
Dream,
in 1592
poems
published
the bulk of the sonnets
and
1597. Many
above
numbered
were
and
as
II,
1594.
probably
of
them, however,
100 in the collection,
of those
including most
to the plays of the "problem"
seem later in style, with affinities
as some
and so may have been composed
later?unless,
period,
went
in
the
of
form
close
think, Shakespeare
through
rapidly
came more
in
which
the
the sonnet a development
slowly
larger
form of his plays.
composed
has made
C. S. Lewis
sonnet
was
a public
form
that the typical Renaissance

the point
. .was
sonnet.
"A good
of poetry.
like a good
the test is whether

the congregation
public prayer:
not
it
their
whether
it
inter
and
make
own,
'join'
provides
the
of
for
the
materials
compiler. The
esting
spiritual biography
like an erotic liturgy
ismore
whole
body of the sonnet sequences
can
than
sonnets
a series
of
are drastic
erotic
(and
confidences."2
unparalleled)
and very
Many
of
Shakespeare's
to this rule:
exception
relations.
in
But
private
to complicated
they refer
as elsewhere,
his sonnets,
he uses the current
idiom and goes
or
new
uses
it
rather than rebelling
it.
puts it to
beyond
against
2
English Literature in the Sixteenth Century (Oxford, 1954), 491.
651

The Massachusetts
out with
starts
He
sonnets
Review
of ceremonial
to
The
At
ceremony
perfect
praise,
seeking
say
of love's rite.
(23)
he makes
not
of passion,
astonishing
explorations
a story, or writing
a "confession,"
is telling
but be
out his life he encounters
in living
which
complications
intervals
because
cause
he
then become
the subjects of sonnets. Occasionally
the use of the
sonnet as part of the poet's
life seems to damage
it as art?we
sense distortion
sometimes
ulterior
purposes,
serving
especially
to the friend as patron, which
in the poems,
addressed
seek to
counter
an
the bid for patronage
of a rival poet
But
(78-86).
extraordinary
honesty
predominates.
II. The
To
for
read
through
the
surveying
as an Action
Sonnet
the sonnets
at a sitting,
though
does
it is useful
to
violence
they present,
topography
can
a
them and to the reader?it
sensation
of hot-house
produce
to
the
Each
each
needs
be
dwelt
on;
poem
requires
oppression.
kind of concentrated
attention
could have been given
which
when
they were received
singly or in small groups. To read and
is essential
reread
use
it makes
ticular
sonnets
of
development
ask for a
if we
are
to enjoy
the way each moves,
the
the
of the sonnet
par
form,
of sounds and images. The
design
the possibilities
in it of a
in them poetry
because
special sort of attention
an action,
for and to the
done
is, in a special way,
something
the activity
alone
Indeed
of the poetry
sometimes
beloved.
of the attitudes
the passivity
makes
endurable
by
expressed
the poet.
are wonderfully
generous
poems;
they
a
once personal,
at
is
The
and
beauty.
generosity
give meaning
at
the
world
the
the
and
selfless
glow upon
love,
impersonal,
to write. The
moment
when
poems
Shakespeare
began
golden
Many
create
of the sonnets
a world
resonant
with
the friend's
beauty:
art thy mother's glass, and she in thee

the lovely April of her prime;
back
Calls
Thou
652

in his Sonnets
Shakespeare
of thine age shalt see,

So thou through windows
this
of
wrinkles,
thy golden time. (3)
Despite
The
sonnets works
because
curious theme of the first seventeen
a friend to marry
occasions
and have children
provides
to urge
for saying simple things beautifully: how lovely April is; how
fine it is that age, in spite of wrinkles, has windows through
which
terest
cause
work
to see its golden

time renewed.
The
fulfillment
sexual
in the young man's
the creative
it is realized
by evoking
poet's vicarious
is not queasy
power
generally
in
be
at
in nature:
Those hours that with gentle work did frame
The
lovely gaze where every eye doth dwell....
(5)
The phrase "gentle work" is typical of the direct cherishing of

of
the processes
life. The
the destructiveness
about
feeling
of
death is equally direct:

For
never
To
hideous winter
time
resting
is no holding
back from
music
is
light
gracious,
on
summer
leads
and confounds
him
there....
(5)
or metaphors:
words
the
are
is sweet,
the buds of May
is winter,
is all
death
Time's
darkness,
scythe;
beauty
darling;
a flower. But the meaning
the usual things,
for example
of the
usual things is renewed:
There
sun's
Since
brass,
nor
stone,
obvious
nor
earth,
nor
boundless
sea,
But sad mortality o'ersways their power,

How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea,
Whose
action is no stronger than a flower. (65 )
That a flower is a fragile thing is familiar enough. But that a

flower
has
realization.
which
its own kind

It often
Shakespeare
comes
of power
too?this
that
the
happens
metaphorical
conveys
the
tenor
of his
as a
poignant
in
vehicle
our
love absorbs
chief attention, so that the love itself is left behind or fulfilled

in what
on the fact that "summer's

to.We
it is compared
dwell
all too short a date,"
that the earth devours
"her own
that the morning
flatters "the mountain
brood,"
tops with
lease hath
sweet
sovereign
eye,"
that black
night
is "Death's
second
653

self,"
and
The Massachusetts
"seals
up
as a summary
the
example,
in 97 and 98, "old December's
in rest."
all
Consider,
of the seasons
direct
Review
descriptions
bareness
every where,"
autumn
rich
in
"teeming
big with
summer
in
his
dress'd
all
and
crease," "proud-pied
trim,"
April,
at the lily's white"
and "praise
the deep Ver
when we "wonder
that can be
is full of value
of the rose." The world
million
at front-face.
of this gold
could get more
looked
Shakespeare
else in the golden
anyone
power of admiration.
into his poetry

had the greatest
To
than
he
because
age
or lines from the sonnets

is un
phrases
or
act
in
line
the
of
every
is,
phrase
reading,
an
movement:
when
you know a sonnet well,
isolated
quote
because
satisfying,
of a single
part
individual line, quoted alone, rings with the sound that it has
couplet,
abab,
cdcd,
efef,
is one utterance.
sonnet
in its proper place. Each

of the form is simple
never
varies
subtle. He
Shakespeare's
and
and also delicate
forthright
followed
from
three quatrains
by a
use
and
gg:
Why write I still all one, ever the same,

And keep invention in a noted weed,
That every word doth almost tell my name
Other
Elizabethan
ness.
sonneteers
showed
uses
not
Shakespeare
only
(it does tell his name!),
straight. He does not run his
form
the rhyme scheme. There

tences close with
the close
more
. . . ?
(76)
technical
restless
the Shakespearean
nothing
but for the most
part he uses
but
it
or
the
line endings
syntax against
are exceptions,
the sen
but normally
or else are balanced
of each quatrain,
within
the four line unit. Within
sentences,
gram
symmetrically
mar and thought
pause or turn at the end of the line;
typically
is rarely
the enjambment
where
they do run over,
emphatic.
more
not
the
does
outward
forms of varia
Shakespeare
exploit
tion because
within
the pattern
he
ismaking
astonishingly
beau
is like an
tiful designs with sound and syllable and cadence. He
sticks to the classical figures be

figure skater who
accomplished
cause what he cares about is what he can make
of each evolution.
(Shakespeare
for free-style
had,
after
all, unlimited
improvisations,
swoops,
opportunities
spins,
leaps.)
654

in the plays
sonnet
Each
Shakespeare
in his Sonnets
is different, but the difference is achieved not by changing the

framework of form but by moving in fresh ways within it.
wrote by quatrains.
In coming
It seems clear that Shakespeare
a sonnet by heart, you find yourself
it one
recalling
move
to
to
a
at
the
stuck
and
time
often
trying
quatrain
getting
not
a
does
link.
The
for
lack
of
next,
regularly
imagery
tangible
of
is the momentum
what does carry through
carry through;
to know
the
discourse.
The
to quatrain
is
quatrain
a
can
be
it
sort, though
simply
continuing
skater starts each evolution
The
by
figure
movement
from
a shift of some
usually
with
fresh
impetus.
an edge, and can move
to
from one evolution
off
from
kicking
another either by staying on the same edge of the same blade, or
from inside edge to outside
edge, or from left foot
changing
so
on?each
of these technical
and
inside to right foot outside,
moves
body.
about
a whole
focusing
living
gesture
praise Shakespeare's
People
one thing: one should add
one
of the balancing,
moving
each one
because
sonnets
that
each
is one motion
is
about
of three large
composed
serial move
different
very
(The
couplet.
to
the
ment
of 66 is a revealing
prove
rule.)
exception
to recognize
that in most
of the sonnets
It is important
the
or indeed even the musical
not
the
is
emotional
climax,
couplet
on
it ismade
so, either by Shakespeare's
leaning
climax; where
thing, the motion
sweeps and the shorter
normally
being
or by our giving
one
it unnecessary
it too heavily,
importance,
are
too
to
two
This
do
much.
let-down
that
asked
lines
feels
common
or over-reach
in the
is the most
defect
in the couplet
can
it
be
with
tactful
sonnets,
usually
reading
kept from
though
to
to
the
motion
and the
needs
One
attend
troublesome.
being
in the quat
which
the sonnet achieves
expansion
no
more
than a turning
is often
that the couplet
rains, realizing
at what has been
around at the end to look from a new vantage
imaginative
expressed.
The main line of the sonnet as Shakespeare writes

movement
patterned
rides the undulation
and reaching
by
rhythmical
out
of discourse,
of the meter,
in ardent
variations.
not
the
The
imagery.
remarkable
it is the
voice
power
gaining
or urgent or solemn gestures
defined
criticism
The
of our time has been
655

The Massachusetts
fascinated
out
the
Donne's
can explore
poetry
by carrying
experience
a
as
or conceit,
of
in
metaphor
implications
notably
in the sonnets
work.
does
Shakespeare
occasionally
by the way
something
like this?most
of
metaphors
day...
Review
73:
the glowing
tending metaphors
"That
of
perfectly
time
such
in the three paralleled
of year...
fire." But
the twilight
the progression
but
usually
ex
by
in 73 is most definitely not typical. He

not metaphorical
consistency.
like a metaphorical
something
it is not carried
through;
metaphors
to rhythmical,
responsible
starts with
sonnet
often
gram,
such
of
picked up, changed, mixed,
dropped ad lib while
is
The
pro
are
the sonnet
its strong course as an utterance.

One
often finds, as one
a
texture
that it holds
of
the
poem,
penetrates
particular
poetic
in
and sound several
almost
rhythm
together
by determinate
or
a
of
of
strains
cluster
which,
meaning,
ambiguities
dependent
are almost mutually
out logically,
A case in
exclusive.
worked
runs
point, which also will be of interest to us in considering

of Shakespeare
the poet urges
relationship
in 16, where
to the
that
friend
children
liker than your

of the friend "much
on
an
with
and then goes
extraordinarily
"lines":
tions
the
comes
he addresses,
can provide
reproduc
counterfeit,"
painted
rich use of the word
So should the lines of life that life repair,

thisTime's pencil, or my pupil pen,
Which
in inward worth nor outward fair,
Neither
Can make you live yourself in eyes of men.
of "lines
in the variety
of life" appears
of
suggestiveness
in
Variorum
commentators'
recorded
the
edition:
paraphrases
the "lines of life" can be the lines life etches on a face, or the
The
lines of descent in a genealogy, or the lines of the living pictures

presented by children, or the lines of children as living poems
or
to the mere written
lines of the "pupil
(as opposed
pen"),
as an echo at the back of the mind,
one
what
even, perhaps,
commentator
in urging
defends
of
that
"lines
unconvincingly
con
for "loins of life" (compare
the sonnet's
life" is a misprint
clusion:
"And
you must
live, drawn
by your
own
sweet
656

skill.").
in his Sonnets
Shakespeare
had a supremely
Shakespeare
can of course
such associations
To
ravel out
mind!
wandering
In an actual,
be misleading.
live
as
a
are
sonnet
such clustering
of
ideas
these
felt to
reading
are
not
out
the
of
mind
and
heart
gether,
sorted;
they
opening
us
into the plurality
riches. What
of the world's
from
keeps
a
to
in
standstill
is
the
flow
of
coming
walleyed
contemplation
as
the poem's movement

of the poet's love.
can instance
One
makes
most
in meaning
it gathers
in the
service
even more
a thick harmony
is "Bare
famous
dramatic
the poetry
places where
out of woolgathering
multiplicity?the
ruin'd choirs where
late the sweet birds
thanks toWilliam
sang,"
Seven Types
of Ambiguity.
at the outset of
discussion
Empson's
to stress,
What
criticism now needs
I think, is not the interplay of imagery but the interplay of

sound.
"bare
is the chord of vowels

and
(A case in point
ruin'd
in
sounded
three
successive
choirs,"
syllables?the
as from
much
solution.)
the much
metaphor
of
mystery
the wonderful
the
line
comes
from
Against
shall summer's honey breath hold out,

the wrackful
siege of battering days,
rocks
are
impregnable
not
so stout,
Nor gates of steel so strong but Time
flowing
are splendid lines?but
decays?
(65)
it is the design of sound that
o and u sounds
and
them,
open-breathing
consonants
"How
of
shall summer's
honey breath hold
carries
out" followed
"rocks
as
it holds
of metaphors
in
complex
to consider,
not a special case like 73, but
need
more
common
case where
is great
there
of
richness
not
is
but metaphorical
consistency
regarded:
When
chiefly
long,
this music
in
slow
We
O how
These
of "r's"
the
by the battering
One
impregnable."
as provision
metaphorically
the metaphor
further,
one
can
lines, with
understand
a siege?but
cannot "batter"
for
"wrackful"
summer's
one
honey
cannot
honey!
and
And
carry
the
as well
as the
have been
opposition,
battering,
lost by the time we get to "Time
decays."
Sound and rhythm
or
again and again give life to statements
summer-winter
657

The Massachusetts
figures
almost
which
otherwise
might
at random
from 97:
Review
be banal:
so in a quatrain
selected
How like a winter hath my absence been

From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year:
What
freezings have I felt, what dark days seen,
old December's
What
bareness everywhere!
(97)
A
rich use
sound
"Whtft
e sounds
of various
from
absence
the poignant
emerges:
as we encounter
is developed
the open a
and "freezings";
"thee"
in "fluting"
d<zrk d#ys"
in "^verywh<?re,"
of
same
in
sounds
e tones;
cavernous
against the prevailing

sounds present
the three vowel
seems
so that the bareness
to spread
out
the meter makes
than
"everywhere"
larger
feel
bareness"
"D<?c<?mber's
sense
the
includes
"everywhere"?and
two of its three syllables.
it would
Con
be in prose by stressing
sonants of course are also put to work
the
reinforcing
meaning,
to "/e/t,"
for example
and /reezing"
"oLi"
by linking "fleeting
can go on and
to "December,"
to "bareness."
"December"
One
once one starts looking
on in this fashion,
for such tangible
pat
to know where
to
it is not always
though
possible
cases that really matter
the line between
and cases that are
such texture
of physical
is
relations
among words
farfetched,
to the beauty
fundamental
of the
and the meaning
clearly
terns?and
draw
to quatrain,
shift from quatrain
like a skater
a new evolution,
newness
the
is
into
of
part
turning
or
we
often the sound of a fresh set of dominant
vowels;
again,
a sonnet
a set of sounds carried all through
sometimes
recognize
poetry.
we
When
to lean
to give
The
tune.
it its distinctive
sonnets
often
would
if it were
not
that
the
cadences
that hold feel
goes along with
as Donne's
to
is
isolated
be
felt
ing?the
rarely
separately,
we
so often
enters
If
into
the
motion.
whole
read them
but
is,
we
the
amused
virtuoso
alliteration
and
in isolation,
would
be
by
wit
in them
be "witty"
sound and
wit
assonance in lines like

old woes
new
wail
And
with
And
heavily from woe to woe tell o'er

sad account of fore-bemoaned moan.
The
my
dear
time's
waste....
(30)
658

in his Sonnets
Shakespeare
But when
"When
sounds
we
serve
as an integral part of the lovely

sonnet
sweet silent thought,"
the huddled
the pressure
of the past on the present
them
read
to the
sessions
of
to convey
or troubling
as a thickening
of speech. Where
we
feel
a twinge
of amusement, it is usually in combination with feelings dictated

by the underlying
as with
rhythm,
the ruefulness
of
that I am not thought.
But ah, thought kills me
...
(44)
are without
to suppose
that the sonnets
be wrong
are places where
romps,
Shakespeare
positively
with serious feeling:
but the fun is almost never unmixed
It would
humor.
There
Let not my love be call'd idolatry,

Nor my beloved as an idol show,
Since all alike my songs and praises be
To
of
one,
still
one,
such,
ever
and
so,
Kind ismy love today, tomorrow kind,

Still constant with a wondrous
excellence;
Therefore
verse
my
to constancy
confin'd,
thing expressing, leaves out difference.

Fair, kind, and true, is all my argument,
Fair, kind, and true, varying to other words.
One
This
gay whirl
in the sonnets,
...
is an extreme
the
of the repetition
example
same words
rolled
each
round,
added life because they fall differently
(105)
common
time with
each time within
the
In 105 this sort of fun is

in almost
progress.
poem's
indulged
a
in
celebration
of
moment's
carefree
confidence.
But
by itself,
even
as
near
a
which
to
as
is
we
105,
come, has its
jeu dyesprit
serious side, for it raises a question
about idolatry which
it does
not settle.
III.
"Two
loves
I have...."
The publisher who pirated the sonnets in 1640 changed the

pronouns
dressed
in 1 to
126
so as to make
to a woman;
he was
commentators
who have been
addressed
in these
love
the first
seem to be ad
the poems
of the many
editors
and
is
by the fact that a man
Whether
there was only one
troubled
poems.
659

Review
The Massachusetts
or
is
cannot be definitely
what
settled:
several,
or
friend
there was one role, of beloved
younger
a need
to
in
live
and
to
in
the
poet
"lover,"
corresponding
in the beauty
of a person
It is usually
another person.
through
sum of
we
the
sex that
of the opposite
incarnate,
experience,
But here we find that the twenty
and perfections.
life's powers
on
to a woman,
"the dark lady," dwell
five sonnets addressed
man,
is that
young
clear
that never
and the paradox

and falsehoods
imperfections
in the poems
she inspires physical
theless
desire;
is
a man,
exultant
there
contemplation
by contrast,
her
to
addressed
of
the be
loved's beauty and cherishing of his whole identity, but nothing

of specific bodily prurience. The "higher" love is expressed
a man
towards
both,
a woman.
to
Poems
the "lower"
towards
a strange
situation:
and troubling
with
into an affair by Shakespeare's
is lured
friend
in the
the poet's
concern,
134,
133,
144);
and
deal
moreover,
Shakespeare's
mistress
(40-42,
of anguished
the woman's!
midst
have
explanations
friend and mistress
Various
that the
of an exercise
in conventional
not
stood
would
up.
is to keep
humiliation,
been
offered.
are fictions
the man's
love,
not
It has been
created
but
sonneteering,
a fiction
by
especially
suggested
in the process
has
this notion
Shakespeare,
baffle
the sonnets
frequently
curiosity where
is
assumed
addressed
the
of things which
person
fiction,
our
satisfy
us by speaking
to know but to which we have no key. And much of what
is
defi
is most
the friend and the mistress
concerning
that
The
claim
conventional
passionate
sonneteering.
Sir
with which
to men were
addressed
conventional,
expressed
nitely not
sonnets
Henry
is
to allay Victorian
anxieties,
attempted
in
It is true that there was a cult of friendship
and stories set ideal friendship
and that writers
Lee
and others
not
true.
simply
the Renaissance,
between men above
ler, whose
judiciously
Elizabethans
book
The
Senses
this
and
other
explores
used the
term
thus Menenius,
in the Volscian
camp,
barrassment:
lanus
valuable
for a woman.
love
"lover"
Professor
Edward
of Shakespeareys
Hub
Sonnets
out
that
points
problems,
men
em
without
between
see
to get through
to
Corio
trying
does not hesitate
to say to a guard,
660

Shakespeare
in his Sonnets
was my
lover." Mf. Hubler,
fellow, Thy
general
that
the
further
makes
except
homosexuality,
others,
point
is never at issue in the plays,
for a passing
slur about Thersites,
as a
is more
either as a trait of character
or, what
revealing,
a striking
in the imagery
latent motif
(Marlowe's
plays provide
a
comedies
series
of places
do
in
We
get
Shakespeare's
contrast).
"I
tell
thee,
with
where boy actors play the parts of girls disguised as men;
but
convenient
in a theater where
this playful
transvestism,
boys
are never
never
shown a man
We
is
the
women,
queasy.
played
to be a woman. What
is dramatized
is the fun of
pretending
as
women,
young
Portia,
Rosalind,
Viola,
zestfully
acting
youths for a while and then falling back gladly and gracefully
into
This
their womanliness.
fundamental
same
sexes. The
Elizabethan
the
security
in Twelfth Night
Duke
not perversity,
but
reflects,
about
the
the
roles
of
security
game
the dramatist
permitted
to present
the
in the page Cesario's fresh
delighting
in love with
and so falling
responsiveness,
the
The
the woman
beneath
page's disguise.
of Shakespeare's
age was open to appreciating
quali
women
common.
in
have
This
and
openness
youths
youth and graceful

out knowing
it with
sensibility
ties which
probably goes with the fact that homosexuality had no place in

never was
their masculinity
in
life. Because
their hair long, dress in silks and ruffles,
could wear
for portraits
roses."
"leaning
against a tree among
social
Elizabethan
doubt, men
pose
These
in reading
sonnet
in mind
be kept
20,
"the
master-mistress
of
my passion"
Shakespeare
praises
feminine
for possessing
fickleness.
The
feminine
beauty without
should
facts
where
joke
bawdy
is masculine
at the end
acknowledges
to women;
and directed
that
the friend's
such
a pleasantry
sexuality
could
only be pleasant where physical relations of the poet with

were
the
out
of the question.
And yet the fact remains
that
a most unusual
one:
is
the relationship
"Mine
be
expressed
thy
use
their
treasure."
and thy love's
What
[women's]
love,
of capital and interest here proposes
is
metaphor
Shakespeare's
friend
that he should enjoy the whole

women
such
enjoy
is indeed
what
this
identity of the friend while
capital yields
the sort of relationship
of specific sexuality.
the sonnets
which
661

And
to the
The Massachusetts
friend
express, while
concerned
relationship
with
then do we
Why
pressed
which
whole
those
to the mistress
with
the use
an obverse
present
of her
than
rather
sexuality
love.
her
press
Review
are
read
so unusual?
In
sonnets
the
if the affections
the first
because
they
love
the
ex
ex
place,
kind of love
is love, a most
important
a
the
but here becomes
is ordinarily
part of
relationship
an unparalleled
with
fullness
and in
and is expressed
for
the
friend
rather
It is love by identification
tensity.
than
sexual
possession.
Such cherishing love is a leading part of full sexual love be

tween men
notably
which
where
and women.
And
it is central
and
between
in other
children:
parents
art thy mother's
says "thou
glass"
is
in
the mother's
the poet
place:
the
relations
of life,
sonnet
early
is followed
by
am old
My glass shall not persuade me I
So long as youth and thou are of one date.
(3)
one
(22)
In another place (37) he compares himself to a father who

"takes delight / To see his active child do deeds of youth."
sonnets
seventeen
of the first
theme
special
C.
"ever
whether
S.
Lewis
cared
asks,
man,"
("What
really
or
occasion
another man got married
gives Shakespeare
not?")
to
to cherish
the friend's
that,
and, beyond
identity
envisage
a process
the
of
which
in
idea
children,
having
by
generously,
as the poet throughout
one identity
the
in another,
is recreated
The
strangely
sonnets finds himself renewed in his friend.

The universality of the part of love which
the whole
makes
those
as congregation,
it easy for us to "join,"
most
and most
them
the
familiar
among
sonnets,
how
the poet expresses
ful, where
A lover's
consciousness.
his whole
ever
"thy
here becomes
the
in all
beauti
friend's
being galvanizes
is the same, who
experience
a winter
when
when
absence makes
the beloved,
(97),
sweet love remembered
such wealth
(29), when
brings"
"descriptions
of the fairest wights"
in "the
chronicles
of wasted
time" seem all to be prophecies of a present beauty

These
poems
make
one very
conscious
tion of experience by passion (e.g.
of
the active
(106).
transmuta
114), and of the lover's
662

in his Sonnets
Shakespeare
imagination straining at the limitations of physical existence:

"If the dull substance of my flesh were thought..."
(48).
can
with
the
loved
have a
person
Loving by identifying
it does not have for people
which
special scope for Shakespeare
who are not poets, because he can realize his friend's beauty and
in words.
the relationship
value
To
realize
it into
by turning
poetry gives a fulfillment which actually is physical, in that the

as utterance,
poem,
is a physical
act. That
in part,
least
I think,
the recurrent
seems
immortality
conferring
is never
named,
all,
left
so blank
with
that
emphasis
and
as
sonnets
the talk of
literally,
after
social
(It is because all this area is
have
of every
conjectures
the sustaining
the
friend,
empty?the
no determinate
is given
he
the curious
on
rather
identity, indeed no personality.

selves
the friend explains at
from death. Taken
rescuing the beloved
of a sonnet
the writing
provides a kind of physical union with
been
kind
free
about
to bemuse
the
them
friend's
iden
in the theme of immortality

is
tity.) But
reality
a
that the poet,
in the act of writing
the poem,
experiences
sense of triumphing
over
one with
lover's
time by becoming
as embodied
nature
in another
have
great
creating
being. We
dwelt on the comparison made in 16 between different kinds

of "lines of life." When the poet turns from urging children
on his friend to addressing him directly, he uses the same
to say that Death
shall not "brag
thou wand'rest
in
to
When
in
lines
eternal
thou
time
/
grow'st"
(18).
are of course
a universal
Such
claims
for poetry's
power
of the Petrarchan
reg
commonplace
tradition?Shakespeare
on mortal
links them with poignant,
inclusive
reflections
ularly
on mortality
in carpe diem
like
ity. In reflections
poems
metaphor
his shade
Marvell's
there
"Coy Mistress,"
on a kind of metaphysical
anyway,
render.
so
it may
Shakespeare's
"amongst
the wastes
sonnets
of
verging
cruelty, that dissolution will
as well
friend and the mystery
a suggestion,
is often
come, delightfully,
often
enhance
in sexual
the beauty
is more
sur
of his
of life in him by reflections that he

time must
go,"
like
"the
wide
and all its fading sweets" (19). The sense of helplessness

face of time
come
profound
and poignant
than
663

in most
world
in the
love
The Massachusetts
poetry,
tion. A
to no sexual
looks
resolu
Shakespeare
act
is thrown on resolution
in the creative
because
partly
Review
great
of poetry?and
weight
so on poetry's
in
Not
of immortality.
promise
a
as
in
in
after
made
claims
19,
concluding
couplet,
frequently,
on devouring
have not weight
Time,
enough
large reflections
to make
balance.
Not marble,
Of princes,
nor the gilded monuments

shall oudive this powerful
makes
us realize
where
we
in poetry
whereas
we
is just what
who,
beyond
difficulties
with
with
anew
are made
concern
The
a massive
a satisfying
But
earth
Eros
to realize
and
should
expect,
other
love
men,
expressed
can have
more
grows
the poems
is almost
arresting
in 74 and else
can be
preserved
earth."
and more
but
in the
live
if we
of another
identity
about it, from the man
think
created
other
identities.
are also
in the sonnets
And
the
congruous
in the plays. One difficulty,
obvious
as one
reads and rereads

in such a love as this,
asks the
Shakespeare
to the friend,
is that the action,
side. In 53,
all on the poet's
question,
is your
What
That
The
.. .
Tyrranos
the capacities demonstrated
which
55,
art's power
of survival;
how a man's
spirit
IV.
all
rhyme.
to feel
"the
like
poem
millions
poet's powers
he goes on to say,
whereof
substance,
of strange
are
shadows
as a dramatist
at once
you
made,
on you tend?
come
to mind
when
Describe Adonis, and the counterfeit

Is poorly imitated after you;
On Helen's cheek all art of beauty set,
And you in Grecian
tires are painted new.
It is clear
but
from
another.
come not from the

that the strange
shadows
friend,
costumes
the poet, who
him now in one role, now in
61 recognizes
this fact in answering
Sonnet
another
664

Shakespeare
in his Sonnets
question,
arresting
Is it thy will thy image should keep open

My heavy eyelids to the weary night?
The
conclusion
will,
not
is a troubled
that
recognition
it is the
poet's
the friend's:
For thee watch I, whilst thou dost wake elsewhere,
From me far off, with others all too near.
to answer for the friend that after all, not being

is tempted
a companion
he cannot beguile
the long night with
of images and words!
composed
are sonnets which
There
too, if only playfully,
recognize,
One
a poet,
that such identification as the poet feels with his friend involves
or self-love.
selfishness
who
is who:
"Sin
thinks
no
face
truth
of
such
a double-take
as to
exploits
.
.
.
all
mine
Me
eye, /
possesseth
so
no
is as mine,
true,
/ No
shape
comes
turn
The
with
the
third
Thus
of self-love
so gracious
account."
62
shows me myself
"But when
my
quatrain:
glass
Beated
and chopp'd with
tann'd antiquity...."
The
in 39, this time with "worth"
is played
and "self":
/
indeed,
same game
can
"What
mine own praise to mine own self bring? / And what

own when
I praise
It
thee?"
when we read a sonnet
of reasoning,
logic. But when we come to understand
mine
Shakespeare
what
they
is't but
is easy to dismiss
this sort
as sonneteer's
in isolation,
the sort of relationship

we realize
that these poems mean
is expressing,
sense of himself
The poet's
say in making
equations.
hinges on the identification: elation in realizing himself in the

friend's self ismatched by desolation when he is left in the lurch
of selflessness.
There
are a number
of poems
where
he proposes
to do anything, to set himself utterly at naught or injure him

self, if by so doing he can contribute to the friend's wishes and
give him meaning: "Upon thy side against myself I'll fight
. . .That
in losing
thou,
of my
"Speak
Commentators
Shakespeare
lameness,
have been
was
literally
me,
and
silly
lame;
shall
win
much
glory."
will
halt..."
straight
to conclude
from
enough
I
they have
argued
665

(88)/
(89).
this that
from "beated
The Massachusetts
and
Review
when
tann'd antiquity"
chopp'd with
in both
he was old. Of course
not
literal
the
but
incapacity
that he wrote
the
sonnets
cases what
is conveyed
that without
sense
poet's
is
the
younger friend he is nothing. Indeed the action of making

himself nothing is, for him, a way of making love real by
making the beloved everything.
With
the woman,
go
things
the other
just
way:
Shakespeare
makes love to her by telling her she is naught! At the best, he

that she attracts
tells her
of "fair"
more
(127);
him
even
commonly,
she is "black"
instead
though
he asks for favors in the same
breath that he tells her he loves her in spite of his five wits and
most
he spells out her false
commonly,
(141);
at the paradox
that "in the very
exclaims
refuse
of
him love her more
she somehow makes
deeds"
"the more
senses
his five
hood
[her]
I hear
and
see just cause of hate"

(150).
one wonders
in fact most
whether
and
These
of them
are outrageous
can have been
poems:
not off
sent to the poor woman?whether
of them were
many
to get
in hate and despite written
from a need
stage exercises
a
woman
out
the
that
since
of
To
tell
system.
poet's
something
as well
she may
let you put in among
the
is promiscuous,
seem
name
too
not
isWill
does
since your
rest, especially
(135),
a
a very
even
to
hardened
win
Several
way
profligate.
likely
she
a sequence
in which
poems,
151, present
degrading
notably
to her frees the poet for an impudent
and his relation
the woman
self-assertion:
phallic
thou betraying me, I do betray
nobler
part to my gross body's treason;
My
soul
doth
tell my body that he may
My
in
love; flesh stays no farther reason....
Triumph
For,
cannot
One
constellation
avoid
the conclusion
of relations
with
which
specific sexual love was disassociated

sonnet
144 summarizes
ing love:
the
other
"comfort,"
the other "a woman
have
of
course
been
of
colored
"despair,"
ill." The
variously
in the
that, for Shakespeare,
the sonnets are concerned,
from cherishing
and ador
these
one
one of
loves,"
"a man
fair,"
right
"two
psychological
most
interpreted,
666

implications
recently
by
Shakespeare
Dutch
Dr.
psychoanalyst,
that his
large
Conrad
has not
which
book,
of
Shakespeare's
cherishing
with
the mother's
role,
in his Sonnets
and
V. Emde
yet
a younger
a displaced
I understand
Boas.
sees in
been translated,
an identification
man
narcissism
which
in
the contemplation
of an ideal image
praising
enjoys
a
can
of the poet himself.
Such
evaluated
theory
only be rightly
of
the
which
its con
whole
system
thought
gives
by mobilizing
common
can
sense
I
But
that
the
see,
cepts meaning.
think,
sonnets
of a kaleidoscopic
reflect only one patterning
person
to a man or several
here is attached
which
ality: the tenderness
the beloved
men
been
in other
well,
might
felt for women.
And
resort
without
phases
to
of
life,
have
our
formulations,
psychoanalytic
as an artist can
in
qualities
help
sonnets.
in
the
James
expressed
of Shakespeare's
the attitudes
understanding
in
his own obsession
Joyce,
pursuing
knowledge
Shakespeare's
with
as a natural
the artist
in the sonnets.
the triangle
with
cuckold, was much preoccupied
a
as
for
double
In Ulysses,
emerges
shadowy
Shakespeare
for Stephen
the flickering
Dedalus:
and as an omen
Bloom
center
in the notion
that he was
about Shakespeare
suggestions
betrayed
as an artist
because
he would
see
rather
than do,
not
asserting himself in actual life but taking the lead in love from
in creating
the various
himself
persons
others, while
fulfilling
own
but he provides
of his plays. Joyce
is riding his
concerns,
on the sonnets which
a useful
the double
deal with
perspective
a way
to
In
where
find
40-42,
Shakespeare
struggles
infidelity.
of resolving in words the injury that his friend and mistress

have done him in deeds, the idea of his identification with his
friend
to a bitter
is carried
reductio
ad absurdum:
the joy, my friend and I are one;

Sweet flattery, then she loves but me alone.
But here's
These
strained
gestion
satisfy
and
tortured
interpretation
that the two
Shakespeare
tortuous
after
others
sonnets
adopt
and
abandon
(4*2)
one
the ironic sug

another,
including
as they do only
are behaving
to
vicariously:
667

Review
The Massachusetts
Loving offenders, thus I will excuse ye,

Thou dost love her, because thou know'st I love her,
And for my sake even so doth she abuse me,
Suff'ring my friend for my sake to approve her.
(42)
How much
simpler it would be if friend and mistress were
them
as these
sonnets
in a play!
bitter
are,
Indeed,
a response
to the humiliation
life has brought
men would
in the direction
of art. Most
bury the
both
of
they express
which moves
or else
in silence,
into
poetry.
injury
event
turns
turn
into
injury
The
very
anger.
Shakespeare
the
about
of writing
act
is a kind of acceptance of it?which
betrayal
effort
extraordinary
stances. Thus
to accept
the
excuses
"Those
the
goes with
even
friend
in such
circum
that liberty
wrongs
pretty
from
absent
thy heart,"
only
commits,
thou might'st
but yet
to exclaim
my
"Ay me,
poignantly,
a gesture
In 40 the poet attempts
of total self
seat forbear."
41
I am
/When
sometime
abnegation:
I do forgive thy robb'ry, gentle thief,
thou steal thee all my poverty;
Although
And yet love knows it is a greater grief
To bear love's wrong than hate's known injury.
Lascivious grace, inwhom all illwell shows,
Kill me with spites; yet we must not be foes.
The
metrical
whole
of "Lascivious
uttering
the anguish
and
with
fication
force
the
of
sonnet
a phrase
is mobilized
which
in
into
the
focus
grace,"
brings
identi
of Shakespeare's
continuing
encounters
artistic
poet's
sympathy
enjoyment
the friend. The
the closed ruthlessness of another living identity and remains

open
to it.
These
are disturbing and unsatisfying
power,
great
the
towards
because
they
We
experience.
in some of the sonnets
do
not
poems, despite
a
achieve
encounter
the
stable
same
where
their
attitude
irresolute
the young man's

dissolute
quality
are both rebuked
ness or vanity
and accepted
95, 84).
(e.g.
The poems are twisted on the rack of a sympathy
"beyond
good
668

in his Sonnets
Shakespeare
and evil," the sympathy which is organized in the plays, flowing

so that, as Eglington
it
phrases
is all in all."
the prince. He
and antagonists
into opposites
is the ghost
"He
in Ulysses,
Stephen
and
takes up the point:
Dedalus
He is, Stephen said. The boy of act one is the mature man of act five.
in Othello he is bawd and cuckold. He acts
All in all. In Cymbetine,
intellect is the hornmad lago cease
and is acted on. . . .His unremitting
moor
in
him
shall
that
the
suffer.8
lessly willing
are wild
and whirling
words,
Shakespeare
describing
in
them Joyce
But
and
his
through
preoccupations.
Stephen
out
drama.
much
how
the
needed
Shakespeare
brings
These
V.
The
Self-knowledge
most
of the sonnets which

satisfying
he
in love are those where
difficulties
speare's
to confront
primarily
in 35 we get,
Thus
recognition
Authorizing
Myself
of
impressive
in the numerical
texture
of
to him
excuses
about
for
the
himself.
a
friend,
and
faults, and even I in this,

thy trespass with compare,
corrupting,
most
late
reveals
Shake
the sonnet
that
All men make
The
love
what
in the midst
with
deal
is using
salving
thy
amiss.
come
explorations
order?poems
tone which
sets them
which
apart
and so were
. . .
in sonnets
have
which
are
complexity
from most,
though
not all, of the first one hundred,

probably
composed
the
I find most
those to the woman,
later. Among
satisfying
ones which,
of
the
define
of
hate,
hymns
cheapness
forbearing
one
to
of
the
hardest
the relation?cheapness
get
being
things
into poetry
(or indeed
to face up
to in any
fashion).
Symmetri
cal lies are laid out in 138, hers to him and his to her, tea for
two and two for tea:
I lie with her, and she with me,
Therefore
And in our faults by lies we flattered be.
8
Ulysses, Modern Library Edition,
210.
669

The Massachusetts
A
by Mr.
criticism
stimulating
sonnets
these
to
the
Review
Patrick
of
relates
of Hamlet
plays
sees this sonnet
and Cressida,
climaxed
rible of the whole
sequence,"
seems to me
of the pun on lie.4 "Grim"
Troilus
which
Cruttwell,
the
and
period
as "perhaps
most
ter
the
in the "grim seriousness"
I find the poem

wrong:
so. Where
more
as devastating,
the
honest
and
jaunty
woman
is
sonnets
to the
do become
there
grim,
completely
un
to
a
in
certain
resorting
simplification
falsifying
usually
measured
ends, but does not re
abuse, as in the couplet which
of love's fever in 147:
solve, the analysis
as well
I have sworn thee fair, and thought

art as black as hell, as dark as night.
For
Who
thee bright,
to a man,
of self-analysis
addressed
there is a
own
to
the
moral
involvement?
far deeper
poet's
facing up
no
seems
of passion
where
and to the paradoxes
morality
the
to
In
and
117-121
109-112
acknowl
poet,
apply.
longer
In the poems
on
infidelities
edging
morphic
responsiveness
his side,
confronts
directly
of his own personality:
Alas, 'tis true, I have gone here and there,

And made myself a motley to the view,
Gor'd mine own thoughts, sold cheap what
Made old offences of affections new. (HO)
Here
his
"made
a motley"
myself
and
humiliations,
in
suggests
111
ismost
the
poly
dear,
the actor's
and
impulse
asks
his
explicitly
Shakespeare
friend to forgive in him the "public manners" which are bred by

the "public means" from which he must provide for his liveli
hood:
comes
Thence
name
it that my
receives
brand,
almost thence my nature is subdu'd

To what itworks in, like the dyer's hand.
And
Commentators
nominious
have
status
of
emphasized,
the acting
indeed
profession
in this outward
circumstance
age, seeing
4The
(New York, 1955),
Shakesfearean Moment
the ig
exaggerated,
in the Elizabethan
the source of Shake
13-14.
670

in his Sonnets
Shakespeare
towards
his friend. No
doubt
speare's
self-disabling
humility
or
it was a factor, just as part of the appeal
of the young man
was
a
men
the poet did not have
young
superior birth,
heritage
and could enjoy
identification.
But
the temperament
through
an
actor
which made
and
is more
dramatist
funda
Shakespeare
as these
the matter
of status,
a
resonant
they present
complex,
is over-responsive,
in life,
purposes
than
mental
act unworthy
parts
sonnets
make
clear:
for most
which,
personality
on to
drawn
over-eager,
re
new
out
to avoid
in
living
and unable
lationships what has already been found shameful. His
fluidity,
to desire
and
openness
in 109 in the course of a moving
plea:
are de
his
unbearable
almost
scribed
to life,
believe, though in my nature reign'd

All frailties that besiege all kinds of blood,
That
it could so preposterously be stain'd
To leave for nothing all thy sum of good.
Never
sort of knowledge
of
in the plays
expression
The
finds
the heart
appears
special if limited intensity?the

in one's
moment
affections
there
most
the broken
life,
he asks
single
when
new,"
is value,
and
its turnings
in these sonnets
intensity involved
which
a
with
in seeing,
In the same
by Eros.
for making
"old offences
of
lines made
forgiveness
has the
Shakespeare
as well
as humiliation,
to recognize
that
courage
in "selling
what
is
cheap
dear":
true it is, that I
Most
Askance and strangely.
These blenches gave my
And worse essays prov'd
There
is no
set posture
have look'd on truth

But by all above,
heart another youth,
thee my best of love.
in these
poems
against
(HO)
morality
or
convention: if they simplified things by adopting a romantic or

in exploring
rationale,
they could not be so serious
see around
turns corners
that it cannot
and
the way passion
to the will.
moves
121 confronts
Sonnet
in directions
contrary
bohemian
of moral
in a frightening
way the break-down
categories
"
to
than
'Tis
be
vile esteemed...
better
vile
territory:
671

in this
.
I
No,
The Massachusetts
am
that
I am." The
pressure
in this sonnet
is so great
gories
whole group),
Review
on received
cate
experience
at
in others of this
(and
places
of
that it is impossible entirely to comprehend the
persons,
These
can apprehend
it obliquely.
In the dra
could
in several
present
Shakespeare
directly,
one
at
from
what here is looked
askance
vantage.
are
not
the greatest
himself
with
poems
reckoning
sonnets
Shakespeare
we
meaning?though
matic
form,
are. The
poems
wrote,
that gather
sensuous
have more
and
the poems which

each reader can make
own
They
?and
substance
generalize
his own.
and
profound
in life with
than
these
out
from
as
moving
they
a lover's delight
pieces;
inward-turning
that
love have more
his
But the sonnets
confronting
an astonishing
in self-expression.
achievement
in meaning
and beauty as we set one against another
grow
as we see the whole
to what
in relation
Shake
group
nature
are
so close to
have expressed
speare did in his plays. Few
poems
the heart and nerves as 120 the transformation
into
of suffering
compassion:
That you were once unkind befriends me now,
And for that sorrow which I then did feel
Needs must I under my transgression bow,
Unless
my
nerves
were
brass
or
hammer'd
steel.
For if you were by my unkindness shaken,

As I by yours, y'have pass'd a hell of time. . . .
O that our night of woe might have remember'd
My
deepest
sense,
how
hard
true
sorrow
hits.
see particularly
for identify
clearly how the capacity
a person
sometimes
and
loved,
disabling,
perplexing
also gives
his "deepest
how
sense,
humiliating,
Shakespeare
hard true sorrow hits."
Here
we
. . .
ing with
672


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Shakespeare in His Sonnets

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reads poetry knows a number

(New York, 1951),

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is the story behind

poems are usually

April's first-born flowers, and all things rare,

for these universal

them into riddles

of fact, and read the poems not as tantalizing

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turning away from

in the sonnets was conditioned

the two sonnets

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that the typical Renaissance

the test is whether

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art thy mother's glass, and she in thee

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of thine age shalt see,

to see its golden

The phrase "gentle work" is typical of the direct cherishing of

death is equally direct:

But sad mortality o'ersways their power,

That a flower is a fragile thing is familiar enough. But that a

its own kind

chief attention, so that the love itself is left behind or fulfilled

on the fact that "summer's

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into his poetry

or lines from the sonnets

in its proper place. Each

Why write I still all one, ever the same,

the rhyme scheme. There

tiful designs with sound and syllable and cadence. He

sticks to the classical figures be

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is different, but the difference is achieved not by changing the

The main line of the sonnet as Shakespeare writes

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in the three paralleled

in 73 is most definitely not typical. He

picked up, changed, mixed,

dropped ad lib while

its strong course as an utterance.

point, which also will be of interest to us in considering

liker than your

So should the lines of life that life repair,

lines of descent in a genealogy, or the lines of the living pictures

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the poem's movement

I think, is not the interplay of imagery but the interplay of

is the chord of vowels

shall summer's honey breath hold out,

Nor gates of steel so strong but Time

are splendid lines?but

it is the design of sound that

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How like a winter hath my absence been

against the prevailing