Why I’m Doing This
On March 22 2020, Sir Patrick Stewart posted on Instagram a video of himself reciting Shakespeare’s Sonnet 119 “Let not marriage . . ..” The reception was so enthusiastic that on March 23 Stewart posted again:
I was delighted by the response to my posting of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 116. It has led me to undertake what follows. When I was a child in the 1940s, my mother would cut up slices of fruit for me (there wasn’t much) and as she put it in front of me she would say: “An apple a day keeps the doctor away.” How about, “A sonnet a day keeps the doctor away”? So…here we go: Sonnet 1.
Stewart has proceeded to post a sonnet a day; as I write this on March 26, Stewart has posted sonnet 4 “Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend . . . ”.
As many have noted since the lock-downs and self-isolation of COVID-19 in 2020, Shakespeare’s life was marked by various incursions of the plague. Shakespeare was christened on April 26, 1564, at the Stratford Parish church; by July of that year the town, like most of England, was ravaged by bubonic plague. Waves of plague affected England all of Shakespeare’s life, resulting in multiple closures of the London theaters, in an effort to practice what we are calling “social distancing.” The theaters were closed in February 1564, the year Shakespeare was born, in 1593, in 1603–1604 the theaters closed for 11 months, again in July of 1606 (when Shakespeare was occupied with King Lear), and in 1608.[ref]Regarding the history of King Lear’s composition and initial performances, see the excellent 1606: A Year of Lear by James Shapiro.[/ref]
The summer of 1592 is almost certainly when Shakespeare wrote his long poem Venus and Adonis, published in 1593 when theaters were still closed because of the plague. That Shakespeare was acutely aware of the plague is clear from this passage of Venus and Adonis:
“Long may they kiss each other for this cure.
O never let their crimson liveries wear,
And as they last, their verdour still endure,
To drive infection from the dangerous year,
That the star-gazers, having writ on death,
May say the plague is banished by thy breath” (Venus and Adonis ll. 505–10)
I have for several years been working my own way through Shakespeare’s sonnets, making notes and annotating them as I read. This began as part of my preparation for my Ph.D. qualifying exams, continued as an aide to teaching, and then simply became an enjoyable meditative habit.
I thought to take Sir Patrick Stewart’s lead, and re-read and post about each of Shakespeare’s sonnets as Stewart reads them. I am by no means a Shakespearean scholar. I’m merely presenting my own idiosyncratic readings as I attempt to stave off depression and homesickness, not presenting a definitive reading. Moreover, I plan to follow Stewart’s example, and skip those I that don’t appeal, for whatever reason.
I’ve listed a number of resources related to Shakespeare’s sonnets, as well as a somewhat truncated Introduction to Shakespeare’s Sonnets, and of course a Works Cited list.
Resources for Enjoying Shakespeare’s Sonnets
Introduction to Shakespeare’s Sonnets
Link list of Sir Patrick Stewart’s sonnet readings on Instagram and Twitter
Index to Sonnet Posts
Sonnet 1
Sonnet 2
Sonnet 3
Sonnet 4
Sonnet 5
Sonnet 6
Sonnet 7
Sonnet 8
Sonnet 9
Sonnet 10
Sonnet 11
Sonnet 12
Sonnet 13
Sonnet 14
Sonnet15
Sonnet 16
Sonnet 17
Sonnet 18
Sonnet 19
Shakespeare’s Sonnets Works Cited