Shakespeare, busted.

I recently saw a show where a group of inner-city kids from Harlesden banded together to do a production of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.  The show was both entertaining and inspirational, especially after the play’s successful opening night.

“I’m going to read his sonnets,” exclaimed one enthusiastic young rapper, “and study them until I can understand the genius of the man.”

Well… here I am, on the other side of the Atlantic, teaching Shakespeare’s drama to gifted teenagers, and despite my college education I still have the same attitude toward The Sonnets that I had when I was in high school:  the poems are difficult and intimidating and not what I’m interested in reading.

Meanwhile, an underprivileged inner-city “gangsta” is studying them voluntarily.  I am ashamed.

So without further ado (about nothing, cough-cough), I begin my study of The Sonnets.  I hope to average one or two per week.

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,
Thyself 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. 

What I get out of it

We like good things.  Good things are good.  So when we find a beautiful person or a beautiful creature, we want it to “increase” or multiply so that there will be more beauty on the Earth and “beauty’s rose might never die.”  This is either Shakespeare’s Eugenics Manifesto or, more likely, his keen observation of human nature… don’t deny that you have, at some point in your life, looked at a person and thought, “gee, I hope he never has kids!”  …Anyway, “as the riper” or older beautiful person ages and dies, “his tender heir” should preserve his parents’ beauty.

Vanitas

“But thou,” Shakespeare continues, who are so wrapped up in your own beauty that you can’t see fit to share it with anyone, you are feeding the “flame” of your beauty “with self-substantial fuel”… becoming so consumed by your own vanity that you waste away, “making a famine where abundance lies, / Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel.”  By being so self-absorbed, you “mak’st waste” in trying to hoard your beauty for your own benefit (”niggarding” means “being extremely stingy”).

“Pity the world,” Shakespeare says, have mercy on us and share your beauty, which is “the world’s due.”  If you don’t, then go ahead, be a “glutton” and allow your beauty to be consumed not just “by the grave,” but by your own narcissistic attitude.

The tone of these remarks is personal, perhaps intimate… Shakespeare (or his persona in the sonnet) is expressing frustration and bitterness at, apparently, the rejection of his romantic advances.  In an emotional ultimatum, the poet argues that the poem’s object owes the world her “abundance” of beauty, else that beauty will be wasted in death.

Is it relevant?

One of the most common praises afforded the writings of Shakespeare is that this four-century-old language contains ideas and concepts that are as fresh and relevant today as they were then.  How, then, does this sonnet apply to our modern life?

Have you ever known anyone who was told they were being “selfish” because they had chosen not to have children?  Perhaps you’ve even heard someone accused of being “conceited” because they expressed little interest in romantic relationships with others.  Unfortunately, these judgemental attitudes are all too common… and Shakespeare, if this sonnet is any indication, agreed with such sentiments.

I could rant for a while about how no one has any right to criticize another person’s decisions regarding the size of their family (or lack of the same), and how the true selfishness lies within the heart of the person making the demands (in this case, the poet).  ”From fairest creatures we desire increase,” but if the fairest creatures do not wish to increase, we should leave them be.  I could rant about it, but… not today.

Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to the ground, I will lay thee before kings, that they may behold thee. — Ezekiel 28:17

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