Shakespeare's Richard III, Gloucester's Soliloquy, "Now is the Winter of Our Discontent"

Speech: “Now is the winter of our discontent”

by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

(from Richard III, spoken by Gloucester)

Gloucester:

Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this sun of York;
And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths;
Our bruised arms hung up for monuments;
Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings,
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visaged war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front;
And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,
He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.
But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks,
Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass;
I, that am rudely stamp'd, and want love's majesty
To strut before a wanton ambling nymph;
I, that am curtail'd of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deformed, unfinish'd, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me as I halt by them;
Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to spy my shadow in the sun
And descant on mine own deformity:
And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover,
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,
I am determined to prove a villain
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.
Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous,
By drunken prophecies, libels and dreams,
To set my brother Clarence and the king
In deadly hate the one against the other:
And if King Edward be as true and just
As I am subtle, false and treacherous,
This day should Clarence closely be mew'd up,
About a prophecy, which says that 'G'
Of Edward's heirs the murderer shall be.
Dive, thoughts, down to my soul: here
Clarence comes.

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Background

Wikipedia - Richard III

Analysis (from Phrase Finder)

Question: "What's the meaning of the phrase 'Now is the winter of our discontent'?"

Response: 'Now is the winter of our discontent' express the idea that we have reached the depth of our unhappiness and that better times are ahead.

Question: "What's the origin of the phrase 'Now is the winter of our discontent'?"

Response: 'Now is the winter of our discontent', is the first line of Shakespeare's Richard III, 1594. It needs to be read together with the second line of the play 'made glorious summer by this sun of York'. Shakespeare was using the summer/winter weather as a metaphor for the fortunes of tthe English House of York and its rivalry with the Plantagenets for the English throne. The 'sun of York' wasn't of course a comment on Yorkshire weather but on the 'son of York' Edward IV.

So, what Richard is saying is that we are now at the depth of the winter but the son of York (Edward) is like the sun of Summer and good times are on the way.

In this play Shakespeare presents an account of Richard's character that, until the late 20th century, largely formed the popular opinion of him as a malevolent, deformed schemer. Historians now view that representation as a dramatic plot device - necessary for the villainous role that Shakespeare had allocated him. It isn't consistent with what is now known of Richard III, who in many ways showed himself to be an enlightened and forward-looking monarch. The discovery of Richard's skeleton under a car park in Leicester has provided precise evidence of the extent of his deformity. While being somewhat curved Richard's spinal deformity has now been shown to have been exaggerated and deliberately faked in some portraits.

'Sun of York', not 'son of York'.

"Now is the winter of our discontent" are the opening words of the play and lay the groundwork for the portrait of Richard as a discontented man who is unhappy in a world that hates him. Later Shakespeare describes himself as "Deformed, unfinished, sent before his time into this breathing world, scarce half made up". He says that as he "cannot prove a lover" he is "determined to be a villain". Whether Shakespeare believed the propaganda against Richard or whether he was happy to use it for dramatic effect isn't clear.

It is clear that brooding malevolence that Shakespeare has Richard personify mirrors the playwright's view of the state of the English nation during the Wars of the Roses.

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Richard III (Shakespeare Resource Center)

"Now is the winter of our discontent...."

/ - - / - / - / - /

Now is the winter of our discontent

As Shakespeare often does, he uses a trochaic inversion to begin the speech; otherwise, the line scans normally. Note how Shakespeare uses metaphor in this line and the one that follows, comparing the Yorkist ascension to the throne to a change in seasons. Discontent in this context can either denote "dissatisfaction" or "sorrow"; given Richard's character, it is more likely the former.

- / - / - / - / - /

Made glorious summer by this sun of York;

The completion of the metaphor is arguably a line of strict iambic pentameter. This presumes that glorious is pronounced more like "GLOR-yus" than "GLOR-e-us," but the scansion would seem to indicate that intent. Sun is a pun in this line, playing upon the word son.

- / - / - / - / - /

And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house

In this straightforwardly iambic line, Richard extends the metaphor by comparing the erstwhile reign of Lancaster to the gloom of a cloudy sky, playing upon the "sun of York" line that precedes it. Lour'd—Shakespeare uses the apostrophe to signal that "loured" should absolutely not be pronounced as "louréd"—is an archaism (from the Middle English louren; probably deriving from Middle High German luren "to lie in wait") that meant "to look sullen; to frown upon." The reference to "our house" refers primarily to the family of York, although it could also play off one of its meanings as "the management of domestic affairs" (referring to the War of the Roses).

- - / / - - - / - / -

In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.

This line demonstrates another common occurrence in Shakespeare's blank verse, in which he begins an iambic line with a pyrrhic followed by a spondee. Sometimes it's used to reinforce meaning; other times, as it seems here, it merely adds a rhythmic changeup to the speech. The line also breaks up the iambic regularity by employing a feminine ending (an extra unstressed syllable). Notice also how Shakespeare uses ellipsis to omit the implied "are" in the line, helping to maintain the meter.

/ - - / / - - / - /

Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths;

This line employs a pair of trochaic inversions back to back. Victorious seems to warrant the same pronunciation as glorious in the second line above. As tasty and well known as this soliloquy is, its dramatic pitfall is that it's the opening speech of the play. Richard is serving as his own chorus here. So what we have over the course of the ensuing 23 lines is largely exposition of backstory and character. It may be well written, but it's still a character telling the audience everything they need to know to understand what's going to happen in the next five acts.

- / - / - / - / - /

Our bruiséd arms hung up for monuments;

Note in this line how the acute "e" (é) serves as another metrical road sign. Much like the apostrophe in "lour'd" signals the speaker not to pronounce the "ed" as an extra syllable, the é is the poet's way of ensuring that bruiséd is pronounced as two syllables rather than one. The phrase bruiséd arms in context can be read as a slight double entendre; it can refer to both weapons (as bruised's archaic meaning of "battered or dented") or limbs (as bruised's more traditional meaning of "contused or wounded").

- / - / - / - / - / -

Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings,

Another line, another feminine ending. Alarums here is an archaic version of alarms, which derives from the Middle English alarme (alarom) via the Middle French alarme, which in turn derives from the Old Italian all'arme (literally meaning "to the arms"). Richard's comparison also employs antithesis and alliteration in this construction and the one that follows.

- / - / - - - / - / -

Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.

Like its predecessor, this line employs a feminine ending; scanning the "to" as unstressed is debatable but makes sense given the construction and the sense of the line. This is also a great example of how Shakespeare tightly combines rhythm, sound, and rhetoric within an individual line. In addition to the stressed syllables of blank verse, Shakespeare uses both antithesis and alliteration to highlight the opposite ideas here. Dreadful contrasts delightful, and marches (denoting the drum-dominated compositions typically used to accompany soldiers in marching) contrasts measures (denoting more melodious and formal dance compositions)

/ / - / - / - / - /

Grim-visaged War hath smooth'd his wrinkled front;

The line begins with a spondee, but is otherwise straightforward iambic pentameter. This line begins a transitional turn in the speech, in which Shakespeare briefly employs personification to make war a humanized character. Richard will juxtapose that character against himself in the latter part of the soliloquy. Smooth'd in this context denotes "made even" with a connotation of "softened"; front means "forehead or brow."

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And now, instead of mounting barbéd steeds

In this strictly iambic line, Richard builds upon the overall theme of the soliloquy. War is retiring his spurs, so to speak, and Richard doesn't seem particularly overjoyed by recent developments. Barbéd is a term used only in the two Richard plays, and refers to horses being "armed and harnessed."

- / - / - / - / - / -

To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,

The line scans as straight blank verse with another feminine ending. Fright is used in the sense "to terrify," whereas fearful, rather than meaning "frightened" denotes "inspiring terror; dreadful."

- / - / - - - / - / -

He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber

This line hearkens back to the previous line of "dreadful marches to delightful measures" by invoking the metaphor of music and dance. To caper is "to leap or spring, in dancing or mirth." The effective use of imagery creates a diametric opposite to war and provides insight into Richard's view of recent events. Could there be any more disparate images than War as an armed horseman trampling his enemies and War as a courtier "in a lady's chamber" dancing?

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To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.

After beginning with a pyrrhic, the rest of the line plays out in iambs. Lascivious (from Middle English, from the Late Latin lasciviosus via Latin lascivus, "wanton") denotes "lewd, lustful." Pleasing here denotes "the pleasure; command or arbitrary will." Essentially War, who should be strewing death in battle, is instead dancing captivated by music. Note the word choice and sibilance in the middle of the line. Richard is bitter, and it's not just from current events, as betrayed by the turn that the soliloquy takes at this point.

/ / - / - / - / - /

But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks,

The heavy stresses of the initial spondee help to signal the aforementioned shift in subject. Richard's cynicism turns away from its disdain for peace and waxes introspective. This is where Shakespeare alludes to Richard's deformities, most notoriously the hunchback. Sportive means "amorous, wanton" in context. Trick (deriving from the French trique= "trick, deceit, treachery, cheating" via Latin tricari = "be evasive, shuffle") is used in its sense of "deception or mischief." The phrase is highly ironic given Richard's courtship of Anne in the next scene.

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Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass;

Depending upon the scansion and pronunciation, one could read the line as five iambs or as four iambs with an anapest substitution in the fourth foot. The natural tendency seems to elide the middle vowel sound so that the word sounds like "AM-rus," which is reflected above. Note how "court an amorous looking-glass" implies a bit of self-loathing in Richard's psyche, especially when coupled with Richard's lines in the second scene of Act I ("I'll be at charges for a looking-glass"). It doesn't take a therapist to decipher the body image issues at work here.

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I, that am rudely stamp'd, and want love's majesty

Metrically, this 12-syllable line is something of a puzzler. It could read as an alexandrine, but Shakespeare's overall body of verse doesn't really employ hexameter as a bona fide metrical variant. There are plenty of unavoidable stresses in the line, and it makes for some wildly speculative scansion toward the end. Rudely stamp'd means "roughly or crudely fashioned" here, while want means "lacking" rather than "desiring or feeling a need" given Richard's character.

- / - / - / - / - /

To strut before a wanton ambling nymph;

In contrast with this line's predecessor, the scansion here is textbook iambic pentameter. Richard shows more disdain for love and beauty by dismissing womankind as a "wanton ambling nymph" (wanton = "lustful," ambling = "moving affectedly; dancing," and nymph = "a beautiful woman").

/ - / - / - - / - / -

I, that am curtail'd of this fair proportion,

This line seems to scan as trochee/trochee/trochee/iamb/iamb with a feminine ending. The only stress that could go another way is the upbeat on "am"; everything else is dictated by natural emphasis. Curtail means "to lessen" (literally "to shorten" from curtal, "to dock an animal's tail" via the Middle French courtault). Fair denotes "pleasing or favorable" in this context, although its proximity to "cheated" in the next line brings to mind the connotation of "due or just" as a subtext. Proportion is synonymous with "shape."

/ - - / - / - / - / -

Cheated of feature by dissembling Nature,

As with most lines, natural inflections dictate the stresses here with the arguable inclusion of "by" as a strong beat. Note how the Richard's word choice in cheated implies that he deserves better. Dissembling (from Middle English dissymblen, deriving from the Middle French dissimuler via Latin dissimulare "to simulate") means "putting on a false face; effecting a pretence to conceal facts, intentions, or feelings" and also reflects a man at odds with Nature.

- / - / - / - / - /

Deformed, unfinish'd, sent before my time

In his line of straight pentameter, Richard states that he was prematurely born, which would explain some of his infirmities. On the other hand, Richard was known in his day as a sturdy, brave swordsman, which would lead one to believe that he wasn't so deformed after all.

- / - / - / / / - /

Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,

The "scarce half" comprising the spondee in the fourth foot could read equally well as an iamb. Scarce is synonymous with "barely" in context; the line builds on Richard's assertion that he was a premature baby.

- / - / - / - / - - -

And that so lamely and unfashionable

This line presents another metrical irregularity; Shakespeare rarely ends a line with a five-syllable word, much less on a three-syllable downbeat such as this. After four iambic feet, there are two ways to view the end of "unfashionable": either as a pyrrhic followed by a feminine ending, or the more controversial (among critical scholars, at least) interpretation of a tribrach—a trisyllabic foot consisting of three unstressed syllables. The reason that many scholars contest the very existence of the tribrach is that there always seems to be an alternative scansion for it, no matter the context (such as, in this case, scanning it as a pyrrhic in a line with a feminine ending). Building on the theme of the previous two lines, Richard reflects bitterly upon his deformities.

- / / - / - - / / -

That dogs bark at me as I halt by them;

The stresses here could fall a couple of ways. The swing stress here is "me"; I've scanned it as an upbeat because it's hard to pull off four consecutive unstressed syllables in the middle of a line. Halt means "to limp."

- / - - / / - / - /

Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,

Note the interesting play of the long-voweled "I" sound in this line. Piping time is another contrast of war and peace in this speech; the pipe has replaced the fife that accompanies soldiers. Richard hearkens back to the beginning of the speech to tie his disdain for peace in with his disdain for his stature.

- / - / - / - / - /

Have no delight to pass away the time,

Because Richard is not suited for love by appearance or nature, he can indulge in none of the delights of peace. All this part of the speech is leading up to his eventual rationale for his misdeeds, "And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover/To entertain these fair well-spoken days/I am determinéd to prove a villain/And hate the idle pleasures of these days." Richard, in addition to being a thoroughly rotten human being, is suffering from that ageless affliction of being a man of war in a time of peace.

- / - / - / - / - /

Unless to spy my shadow in the sun

There's little more to say about lines of regular iambic pentameter, except that this makes the ninth line out of the 27 that comprise this speech that are strictly iamb/iamb/iamb/iamb/iamb in construction. That makes a third of the selection. The remaining two-thirds exhibit some form of variation. Even early in his career, Shakespeare knows that line after line of unbroken blank verse would lull even the groundlings to sleep. This line also demonstrates Richard's self-aware sense of humor; it's as if he steps out of his soliloquy for a moment to share a joke about it with the audience. It's sort of the Elizabethan equivalent of acting into the camera.

- - / - - / - / - /

And descant on mine own deformity.

The scansion of the line largely depends on how one pronounces descant (meaning "to comment"); most dictionaries show either syllable as taking the stress, and we don't know how the Elizabethans would have treated it. The above scansion, however, makes the line a little less sing-song when following the previous one. From this point forward, the exposition inherent in the speech shifts from revealing setting and character to revealing the plot to come. Richard casts himself as villain by his own admission, and Shakespeare's words in his mouth ensure that history will always remember him that way first.

William Shakespeare - 5 Love Sonnets

Wikipedia - Shakespeare's Sonnets [a partial excerpt]

Shakespeare's Sonnets is the title of a collection of 154 sonnets accredited to William Shakespeare which cover themes such as the passage of time, love, beauty and mortality. It was first published in a 1609 quarto with the full stylised title: SHAKE-SPEARES SONNETS. Never before imprinted. (although sonnets 138 and 144 had previously been published in the 1599 miscellany The Passionate Pilgrim). The quarto ends with "A Lover's Complaint", a narrative poem of 47 seven-line stanzas written in rhyme royal.

The first 17 poems, traditionally called the procreation sonnets, are addressed to a young man urging him to marry and have children in order to immortalize his beauty by passing it to the next generation. Other sonnets express the speaker's love for a young man; brood upon loneliness, death, and the transience of life; seem to criticise the young man for preferring a rival poet; express ambiguous feelings for the speaker's mistress; and pun on the poet's name. The final two sonnets are allegorical treatments of Greek epigrams referring to the "little love-god" Cupid.

The publisher, Thomas Thorpe, entered the book in the Stationers' Register on 20 May 1609:Tho. Thorpe. Entred for his copie under the handes of master Wilson and master Lownes Wardenes a booke called Shakespeares sonnettes vjd.

Whether Thorpe used an authorised manuscript from Shakespeare or an unauthorised copy is unknown. George Eld printed the quarto, and the run was divided between the booksellers William Aspley and John Wright.

Structure

The sonnets are almost all constructed from three quatrains, which are four-line stanzas, and a final couplet composed in iambic pentameter ("5 feet of unstressed followed by stressed syllables." Ex, "da-DUM" repeated 5 times). This is also the meter used extensively in Shakespeare's plays.

The rhyme scheme is abab cdcd efef gg. Sonnets using this scheme are known as Shakespearean sonnets. Often, the beginning of the third quatrain marks the volta ("turn"), or the line in which the mood of the poem shifts, and the poet expresses a revelation or epiphany.

There are a few exceptions: Sonnets 99, 126, and 145. Number 99 has fifteen lines. Number 126 consists of six couplets, and two blank lines marked with italic brackets; 145 is in iambic tetrameters, not pentameters. There is one other variation on the standard structure, found for example in sonnet 29. The normal rhyme scheme is changed by repeating the b of quatrain one in quatrain three, where the f should be.

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Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

by William Shakespeare

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 dimm'd;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd;

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.

Wikipedia - Sonnet 18 [a partial excerpt]

Sonnet 18, often alternately titled Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?, is one of the best-known of 154 sonnets written by the English playwright and poet William Shakespeare. Part of the Fair Youth sequence (which comprises sonnets 1–126 in the accepted numbering stemming from the first edition in 1609), it is the first of the cycle after the opening sequence now described as the Procreation sonnets.

In the sonnet, the speaker compares his beloved to the summer season, and argues that his beloved is better. He also states that his beloved will live on forever through the words of the poem. Scholars have found parallels within the poem to Ovid's Tristia and Amores, both of which have love themes. Sonnet 18 is written in the typical Shakespearean sonnet form, having 14 lines of iambic pentameter ending in a rhymed couplet. Detailed exegeses have revealed several double meanings within the poem, giving it a greater depth of interpretation.

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Sonnet 116

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

by William Shakespeare

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove.

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wand'ring bark,

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

Within his bending sickle's compass come;

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error and upon me prov'd,

I never writ, nor no man ever lov'd.

Wikipedia - Sonnet 116 [a partial excerpt]

Shakespeare's sonnet 116 was first published in 1609. Its structure and form are a typical example of the Shakespearean sonnet. The poet begins by stating he should not stand in the way of true love. Love cannot be true if it changes for any reason. Love is supposed to be constant, through any difficulties. In the seventh line, a nautical reference is made, alluding that love is much like the north star to sailors. Love should also not fade with time; instead, true love lasts forever.

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Sonnet 29

When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes

by William Shakespeare

When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,

I all alone beweep my outcast state,

And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,

And look upon myself and curse my fate,

Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,

Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,

Desiring this man’s art and that man’s scope,

With what I most enjoy contented least;

Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,

Haply I think on thee, and then my state,

(Like to the lark at break of day arising

From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven’s gate;

For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings

That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

Wikipedia - Sonnet 29 [a partial excerpt]

Sonnet 29 is one of 154 sonnets written by the English playwright and poet William Shakespeare. It is part of the Fair Youth sequence (which comprises sonnets 1-126 in the accepted numbering stemming from the first edition in 1609). In the sonnet, the speaker bemoans his status as an outcast and failure but feels better upon thinking of his beloved. Sonnet 29 is written in the typical Shakespearean sonnet form, having 14 lines of iambic pentameter ending in a rhymed couplet.

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Sonnet 73

That time of year thou mayst in me behold

by William Shakespeare

That time of year thou mayst in me behold

When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang

Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,

Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.

In me thou see'st the twilight of such day

As after sunset fadeth in the west,

Which by and by black night doth take away,

Death's second self, that seals up all in rest.

In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire

That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,

As the death-bed whereon it must expire,

Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by.

This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong,

To love that well which thou must leave ere long.

Wikipedia - Sonnet 73 [a partial excerpt]

Sonnet 73, one of William Shakespeare's most famous sonnets, focuses upon the theme of old age, with each of the three quatrains encompassing a metaphor. The sonnet is pensive in tone, and although it is written to a young friend (See: Fair Youth), it is wholly introspective until the final couplet, which finally turns to the person who is addressed (the "thou" in line one).

Joseph Kau suggests that Samuel Daniel had a fair amount of influence on this sonnet and that Shakespeare's immediate source of the impresa, or motto, "Qua me alit me extinguit" came from Geoffrey Whitney's A Choice of Emblems (London, 1586)

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Sonnet 1

From fairest creatures we desire increase

by William Shakespeare

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,

Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel.

Though 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.

Wikipedia - Sonnet 1 [a partial excerpt]

Sonnet 1 is one of 154 sonnets written by the English playwright and poet William Shakespeare that were published in 1609 by Thomas Thorpe.  It is a procreation sonnet within the Fair Youth sequence. Nineteenth-century critics thought Thorpe might have published the poems without Shakespeare's consent; Sidney Lee called him "predatory and irresponsible." Conversely, modern scholars Wells and Taylor assert their verdict that "Thorpe was a reputable publisher, and there is nothing intrinsically irregular about his publication." Either way, this sonnet is considered the first in the sequence.

Analyzing the sonnets in this order allows for an underlying story of a love triangle to emerge. Sonnet 1 is part of the Fair Youth sonnets, in which an unnamed young man (the beloved) is being addressed by the speaker (the lover) and later sonnets also refer to a "dark lady" (thus they are called the Dark Lady sonnets). Patrick Cheney comments on this: 

"Beginning with a putatively male speaker imploring a beautiful young man to reproduce, and concluding with a series of poems – the dark lady poems – that affiliate consummated heterosexual passion with incurable disease, Shakespeare's Sonnets radically and deliberately disrupt the conventional narrative of erotic courtship". 

Because of this, Sonnet 1 instantly attracts interest as being a kind of introduction (or possibly an index) to the rest of the sonnets.

The 1st sonnet is also the first of the "procreation sonnets" (sonnets 1 – 17; including Sonnet 15 which, although it does not directly contain an encouragement to procreate is fully part of the sequence as it forms a diptych ("a hinged interweaving") with Sonnet 16—note Sonnet 16 starts with the word "But..."—which does), which urge this youth to not waste his beauty by failing to marry or reproduce. Joseph Pequigney notes:

"... the opening movement give[s the] expression to one compelling case... The first mode of preservation entertained is procreation, which is urged without letup in the first fourteen poems and twice again".

The identity of the beloved Fair Youth has remained a mystery, but most researchers believe there are two potential candidates for whom the dedication of the Fair Youth Sonnets was written: "Henry Wriothesley, third earl of Southampton (1573-1624), or William Herbert, third earl of Pembroke (1580-1630)". Both were patrons of Shakespeare but at different times – Wriothesley in the 1590s and Herbert in the 1600s. There is trouble finding out which earl it might have been because sonnets were in fashion in the 1590s but Shakespeare's were not published until 1609. [See: Identity of "Mr. W.H."]

Interpretation

In Sonnet 1, we begin to see the "love story" between the fair youth (beloved) and the speaker (lover) unfold, though not the typical "love story" of the Elizabethan era if read this way. However, each of Shakespeare's sonnets can still be read as separate from the other sonnets. In this sonnet, the speaker engages in an argument with the beloved/fair youth about procreation: "An agon, a dramatic struggle, develops between the speaker and the youth". Scholar Helen Vendler sums up Sonnet 1:

"The different rhetorical moments of this sonnet (generalizing reflection, reproach, injunction, prophecy) are permeable to one another's metaphors, so that the rose of philosophical reflection yields the bud of direct address, and the famine of address yields the glutton who, in epigram, eats the world's due".

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Biography of Shakespeare

from the Poetry Foundation

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Biography of Shakespeare

from Wikipedia [a partial excerpt]

William Shakespeare (/ˈʃeɪkspɪər/;[1] 26 April 1564 (baptised) – 23 April 1616)[nb 1] was an English poet, playwright, and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist.[2] He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon".[3][nb 2] His extant works, including some collaborations, consist of about 38 plays,[nb 3] 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and a few other verses, of which the authorship of some is uncertain. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright.[4]

Shakespeare was born and brought up in Stratford-upon-Avon. At the age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children: Susanna, and twins Hamnet andJudith. Between 1585 and 1592, he began a successful career in London as an actor, writer, and part-owner of a playing company called the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as the King's Men. He appears to have retired to Stratford around 1613 at age 49, where he died three years later. Few records of Shakespeare's private life survive, and there has been considerable speculation about such matters as his physical appearance, sexuality, religious beliefs, and whether the works attributed to him were written by others.[5]

Shakespeare produced most of his known work between 1589 and 1613.[6][nb 4] His early plays were mainly comedies and histories and these works remain regarded as some of the best work produced in these genres. He then wrote mainly tragedies until about 1608, including Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth, considered some of the finest works in the English language. In his last phase, he wrote tragicomedies, also known as romances, and collaborated with other playwrights.

Many of his plays were published in editions of varying quality and accuracy during his lifetime. In 1623, John Heminges and Henry Condell, two friends and fellow actors of Shakespeare, published the First Folio, a collected edition of his dramatic works that included all but two of the plays now recognised as Shakespeare's. It was prefaced with a poem by Ben Jonson, in which Shakespeare is hailed, presciently, as "not of an age, but for all time".[7] In the 20th and 21st century, his work has been repeatedly adopted and rediscovered by new movements in scholarship and performance. His plays remain highly popular today and are constantly studied, performed, and reinterpreted in diverse cultural and political contexts throughout the world.

Shakespeare's Sonnets

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THE SONNETS by William Shakespeare

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