I. Lyric
poems
A. Short poems; intimacy and subjectivity; talking to oneself;
unpublished
B. turning inward; looking in the mirror—subject and
object;
C. drama in the changes of consciousness—thought and
feeling; emotion and motion
D. Strict conventions and verse forms—that provide
structure and meaning to the
inchoate feelings and permanence to their fleeting quality
E. People whose interiors are exposed are public persons
II. 3:10-3:20
Elizabeth, pp. 662, 687-8, 695-6
A. Bio and position—Elizabethan age
1.
Daughter of Henry VIII by Anne Boleyn
2.
Queen: 1558-1603---Elizabethan period
3.
Distinguished tutors, rigorous education
4.
Carried forward reformation after her Catholic sisterÕs
rule;
a)
ÒBloody MaryÓ persecuted Protestants and
her sister; and vice versa; Henry
persecuted Catholics; Mary Stuart, mother of King James, was Catholic and she
and Elizabeth were in mortal struggle
b)
Tried
to avoid civil war around religion and maintain her own precarious position in
power as well as expand and defend English power—especially against the
Cathlic Spanish—Armada story
5.
Rule of Women
a)
Norton
Introduction p. 662—Fifty
years of female rule but only reduction in the status of women generally
b)
Pressure
to marry and produce heir
c)
Marriage
game—Wife of Bath; she played suitors off one another and deferred
subordination and limitation of options it involved
d)
Wedded
to country; virgin queen; Virginia—mariolatry; Courtiers approached on
knees and professed courtly love; cult goddess--Gloriana, Astraea, Diana;
language of politics and language of love
6.
Ditchley Portrait
b)
In
1592, Elizabeth's former champion, Sir Henry Lee, sought to regain her favor
with lavish entertainment at his home in Ditchley, Oxfordshire. He had retired
from court two years earlier, having offended the queen by living openly with
his mistress. He commissioned this portrait to commemorate Elizabeth's visit
and forgiveness. The queen stands upon a map of England, with one foot resting
near Ditchley.
c)
As a
result of the cutting mentioned above, the sonnet on the 'Ditchley Portrait'
lacks the final word of each line. It celebrates Elizabeth's divine powers; a
jeweled celestial sphere hangs from the queen's left ear, signifying her
command over nature itself. É. The background of this portrait appears odd - it
is split between blue and sunny sky on the left, and black and stormy sky on
the right. This continues the theme of royal authority over nature.
7.
Ermine portrait
b)
1585,
by Nicholas Hilliard. É The sword of state rests on the table beside the queen
and symbolizes justice; she also holds an olive branch to symbolize peace.
B. The poems
1.
Doubt of Future Foes
2.
On MonsieurÕs Departure
C. Judi Dench as the Queen
2.
triumphant first performance of Romeo and Juliet starring
Shakespeare (Joseph Fiennes) as Romeo and his beloved, Viola de Lesseps, as
Juliet (Gwyneth Paltrow) who is married to a nobleman, Lord Wessex, (Colin
Firth). SheÕs disguised as Thomas Kent, a boy, whoÕs supposedly playing the the
female part because women were forbidden from the stage.
3.
But her disguise has been given away and Master of Revels
Tilney comes in to enforce the law.
4.
All subjects response to the Queen
5.
Viola curtseys rather than bows at first
6.
Queen covers for her—also her perception of reality
is what governs that of her subjects
7.
the queen knows something of a woman in manÕs role
8.
RJ, the play theyÕve seen can show the truth and nature of
love—poetry, feigning, falsehood is deeper truth
9.
Shakespeare invited to Greenwich; Elizabeth became patron
of his acting company
10.
Shakespeare in Love as humanist text;
a)
combines
historical accuracy and great scholarly erudition with fanciful invention and
distortion;
b)
a way to learn about history and
literature—facts and interpretations
c)
full
of hundreds of jokes like those in MoreÕs Utopia, only appreciated by those in
the select company of the knowledgeable
III. 3:20-3:30
Marlowe-Ralegh; innocence and experience
B. Who is Marlowe
2.
Pastoral Innocence
a)
City
and country
b)
Stages
of life cycle
3.
Y vs. A; I and E—2 contrary states of the soul
5.
RaleghÕs satire and irony
6.
Dangers of desire—adultery, jealousy, pregnancy, fortune,
damnation
7.
Which do they prefer
IV. 3:30-3:40
Ralegh 917-924
1.
Military hero—Cadiz, privateer
2.
Founder of Virginia Colony; brought back tobacco
3.
Courtly lover of Elizabeth—Cynthia and Ocean
4.
imprisoned in Tower for courting, impregnating and marrying
Lady in Waiting without ElizabethÕs consent
5.
Expeditions to Guiana—El Dorado—unsuccessful in
bringing back gold
6.
Beheaded, as was Thomas More, but by King James
B. The Lie
1.
Satire and Sarcasm
a)
Chaucer,
The Parson
b)
Hythloday
the explorer and victim of courts and politics
2.
Scepticism and realism, dispelling illusions: Bacon
a)
Go,
soul, the body's guest,
Upon a thankless errand;
Fear not to touch the best;
The truth shall be thy warrant:
Go, since I
needs must die,
And give the
world the lie.
Say to the court it glows
And shines like rotten wood,
Say to the church it shows
What's good, and doth no good:
If church and
court reply,
Then give
them both the lie.
Tell potentates, they live
Acting, by others' action;
Not lov'd unless they give;
Not strong, but by affection.
If potentates
reply,
Give
potentates the lie.
Tell men of high condition,
That manage the estate,
Their purpose is ambition;
Their practice only hate.
And if they
once reply,
Then give
them all the lie.
Tell them that brave it most,
They beg for more by spending,
Who in their greatest cost
Like nothing but commending.
And if they
make reply,
Then give them
all the lie.
Tell zeal it wants devotion;
Tell love it is but lust;
Tell time it meets but motion;
Tell flesh it is but dust:
And wish them
not reply,
For thou must
give the lie.
Tell age it daily wasteth;
Tell honour how it alters;
Tell beauty how she blasteth;
Tell favour how it falters:
And as they
shall reply,
Give every
one the lie.
Tell wit how much it wrangles
In fickle points of niceness;
Tell wisdom she entangles
Herself in over-wiseness:
And when they
do reply,
Straight give
them both the lie.
Tell physic of her boldness;
Tell skill it is prevention;
Tell charity of coldness;
Tell law it is contention:
And as they
do reply,
So give them
still the lie.
Tell fortune of her blindness;
Tell nature of decay;
Tell friendship of unkindness;
Tell justice of delay:
And if they
will reply,
Then give
them all the lie.
Tell arts they have no soundness,
But vary by esteeming;
Tell schools they want profoundness,
And stand too much on seeming.
If arts and
schools reply,
Give arts and
schools the lie.
Tell faith it's fled the city;
Tell how the country erreth;
Tell manhood, shakes off pity;
Tell virtue, least preferred.
And if they
do reply,
Spare not to
give the lie.
So when thou hast, as I
Commanded thee, done blabbing;
Because to give the lie
Deserves no less than stabbing:
Stab at thee,
he that will,
No stab thy
soul can kill!
(a) c. 1592
1.
What is our life? a play of passion,
Our mirth the musicke of division,
Our mothers wombes the tyring houses be,
When we are drest for this short Comedy,
Heaven the Judicious sharpe spector
is, 5
That sits and markes still who doth act amisse,
Our graves that hide us from the searching Sun,
Are like drawne curtaynes when the play is done,
Thus march we playing to our latest rest,
Onely we dye in earnest, that's no Jest.
V. 3:40-3:55
Shakespeare sonnets
A. Themes
1.
Time (12)
a)
Natural
cycles
b)
aging;
Youth and Age;
c)
Mutability
vs. durability
d)
BeautyÕs
intensity and frailty
2.
Gender (20)
a)
Idealistic
poems to young man—dark lady viewed as object of lust—Greek
platonic love
3.
Divided self; paradoxes; contradictions
a)
Desire
and guilt (129)
B. Verse structure
1.
Meter, variants
2.
Rhyme scheme and stanzas
1.
When I do count the clock that tells the time,
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night,
When I behold the violet past prime,
And sable curls all silvered o'er with white:
When lofty trees I see barren of leaves,
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves
Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard:
Then of thy beauty do I question make
That thou among the wastes of time must go,
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake,
And die as fast as they see others grow,
And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
Save breed to brave him, when he takes thee hence.
1.
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed,
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed:
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest 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.
1.
A woman's face with nature's own hand painted,
Hast thou the master mistress of my passion,
A woman's gentle heart but not acquainted
With shifting change as is false women's fashion,
An eye more bright than theirs, less false in rolling:
Gilding the object whereupon it gazeth,
A man in hue all hues in his controlling,
Which steals men's eyes and women's souls amazeth.
And for a woman wert thou first created,
Till nature as she wrought thee fell a-doting,
And by addition me of thee defeated,
By adding one thing to my purpose nothing.
But since she pricked thee out for women's pleasure,
Mine be thy love and thy love's use their treasure.
1.
Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore,
So do our minutes hasten to their end,
Each changing place with that which goes before,
In sequent toil all forwards do contend.
Nativity once in the main of light,
Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crowned,
Crooked eclipses 'gainst his glory fight,
And Time that gave, doth now his gift confound.
Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth,
And delves the parallels in beauty's brow,
Feeds on the rarities of nature's truth,
And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow.
And yet to times in hope, my verse shall stand
Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.
G. 62—self-love
H. 73—that time of year
I. 98—your absence
J. 105--Idolatry
K. 110—no more roving
L. 116—marriage of true minds
M. 128—fingers on lute
1.
Th' expense of spirit in a waste of shame
Is lust in action, and till action, lust
Is perjured, murd'rous, bloody full of blame,
Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust,
Enjoyed no sooner but despised straight,
Past reason hunted, and no sooner had
Past reason hated as a swallowed bait,
On purpose laid to make the taker mad.
Mad in pursuit and in possession so,
Had, having, and in quest to have extreme,
A bliss in proof and proved, a very woe,
Before a joy proposed behind a dream.
All this the world well knows yet none knows well,
To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.
When my love swears that she
is made of truth,
I do believe her, though I know she lies,
That she might think me some untutored youth,
Unlearned in the world's false subtleties.
Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young,
Although she knows my days are past the best,
Simply I credit her false-speaking tongue,
On both sides thus is simple truth suppressed:
But wherefore says she not she is unjust?
And wherefore say not I that I am old?
O love's best habit is in seeming trust,
And age in love, loves not to have years told.
Therefore I lie with her, and she with me,
And in our faults by lies we flattered be.
