MARCIEGAMBETTA

Marcie Gambetta

English 231

Sonnets by William Shakespeare

Reading Journal 4 – 1-50

9/8/14

 

FIRST THOUGHTS

 

At first I was a little apprehensive about reading the Sonnets.  While, I am a voracious reader, I do not necessarily enjoy reading Shakespeare’s work.  I think the Sonnets are love poems written to or about different people.  There are a lot of Sonnets and I don’t know if they tell a story or are independent of each other.

 

QUOTES

 

“Shall I compare you to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate” I liked this quote, because it is simplistic but is a great thing to say to someone that you love.  It is a popular quote and that’s why it stood out to me too.   I can picture a beautiful summer day with a soft breeze and the blue sky over head and spending time with the person you love.

 

“As a decrepit father takes delight to see his active child do deeds of youth,…” This quote was interesting to me because fathers do enjoy watching their children.  Watching children play and cavort is fun, even if we are too old to join in.  I was confused about why the father has to be decrepit though, that makes him sound more like a great grandfather to me.  

 

QUESTIONS

 

Will the Sonnets be difficult to read and understand?  The sonnets were difficult to read and understand.  There were some, that were much easier than others.  Even with the easier ones, I had to re-read them several times, think about them for a while, and take notes about what I thought I understood.

 

Are all of the Sonnets about or to the same person?  I am still a little unclear on this, but I think they are all about the same person, the friend/lover.  A few of them include a mistress along with the friend/lover, but the main topic is still the friend/lover.  They all seem to be written to the friend/lover letting them know all of the poets thoughts and feelings.  There is some debate that the friend and lover are different people but based on what I have read I do not think they are different.

 

VOCABULARY

 

  Niggarding

    Definition: miserly, stingy

    Sentence: The old man was niggarding his money and would not purchase luxury items.

 

  Dearth:

    Definition: Inadequate supply; scarcity; lack

    Sentence:  There is a dearth of good nurses at the hospital.

 

  Expiate:

    Definintion: to atone for; make amends or reparation for

    Sentence: The convict had to expiate for his crimes.

 

  Vassalage:

    Definition: homage or service required of a vassal

    Sentence: The servant had to complete his vassalage and then he could be released.

 

  Beweep:

    Definition: to weep over something

    Sentence:  It’s normal to beweep one’s foolish mistakes.

 

SUMMARY/RESPONSE

 

I was not looking forward to reading Shakespeare, I know many people love his work and are devoted fans, but for me it is a very hard read.  I was happy to find out that, even though I had to re-read the poems multiple times, I usually came to some understanding of what they were about.  It seemed to me that these poems may be fictional, rather than written to or about any one person. Some of the poems were redundant and in some of them I could see a relation to Shakespeare’s other works, like Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet.

 

In the first 1-17 Sonnets, the poet gave me the impression that he was a little obsessive about the friend and things that weren’t really any of his business.  I felt the poet was shallow and dwelt too much on the friend’s looks.  He was adamant that the friend have a child and he tried everything to persuade the friend.  The poet uses flattery, tells him how happy he would make a woman, how happy he would make the poet, the poet uses cruelty and meanness telling him how old and ugly he will be and that his bloodlines will die out.  The poet seems petulant at some points and tells the friend that if he loved him (the poet), he would show him by having a child.  The poet is selfish because he wants the friend to have the child to pass on his looks, to allow his bloodlines to live on, and to give the friend a kind of immortality.  If the friend were to have a child for these reasons it would be unfair to the child because it would make the child an object to be used for the aspirations of the friend and poet.  

 

In Sonnets 18-20 the poet seems to have moved on from pushing the friend to have a child to allow the friend immortality, to thinking he (the poet) can give the friend immortality through his poems.  The poet is again expressing how beautiful the friend is and is wanting to win the war with time by writing about him. The poet wishes the friend were a woman so they could be together, but since he is a man, the poet wishes the friend would allow a woman to enjoy the “treasure” of his body.

 

Sonnets 21-26 move on from the friend to a lover, I think it is the same friend as before.  The poet is writing to the lover because when they talk he gets nervous and cannot express himself properly.  The poet goes on to extol the beauty of the lover again but now he is also describing the depth of his love.  The poet expresses how his heart is in the lover’s hands and is asking the lover to be gentle.  The poet then says he cannot see into the lover’s heart but that his intentions and feelings are very clear.  By the 26th Sonnet, the poet seems to be getting obsessive again.  He is telling the lover how he is their servant and will serve them loyally.  He also doesn’t think he is good enough and says he will not tell anyone about his love until he is worthy of respect.

 

In the Sonnets 27-42 the relationship of the poet and the lover seems to be very bi-polar.  At first the poet is obsessing about the lover day and night and can’t get any rest.  Then the poet and the lover seem to have broken up and the poet is in a deep depression.  The poet is full of self-loathing and is upset about all of the things he never accomplished.   Next the poet discovers that the lover has cheated on him.  The poet feels tricked and disgraced.  After that, the poet forgives the lover and says everyone does bad things, but then backpedals by saying that he (the poet) is corrupting himself for excusing the wrongs of the lover.  The poet both loves and hates the lover.  The poet again forgives the lover and starts thanking them for all of the inspiration they have given the poet.  The lover and the poet make-up, and the poet thinks they are better off if they are apart, so that they can love each other more.  The lover starts cheating again and the poet is okay with it when it is just random women, but now the lover has cheated on the poet with the poet’s mistress.  The poet is sad and hurt at the loss of both the lover and the mistress, but the poet deludes himself again saying that since he and the lover are one, he has not really lost the mistress.

 

In Sonnets 43-50 the poet seems to settle down a little.  He is away from the lover but he thinks of them at night.  The poet is depressed again and missing the lover, he tells the lover that his thoughts and desires are always with them. The poet wishes he wasn’t made of flesh, but of thought, that way he could teleport himself to the lover.  At the end the poet becomes paranoid and insecure, thinking the lover will be stolen away and that he isn’t good enough for the lover.

 

The relationship does not seem that healthy, the poet is either over the top and obsessive or depressed and talking about how the lover is so much better than him.  These poems seem to be more about obsession and lust than love.  

 

There are many themes that could be discussed with these Sonnets but there were a couple of themes that stood out to me.  One was “Ravages of Time” because the author repeatedly discusses how the friend will not always be young and beautiful.  He describes how the friend will get old, ugly, and die.  Another theme was “Overcoming Adversity”, the poet at first has to overcome the fact that the friend doesn’t want to have children and move on.  Another adversity for the poet to overcome is the fact that the lover continually cheats on him and he has to find ways to deal with it, whether by becoming depressed or forgiveness.

 

I used Reader-Response to help analyze this text, that for me, was very difficult.  As I read I wrote summaries for each Sonnet and an explanation of what I had interpreted it was discussing.  I also wrote notes and questions to be answered.  This helped me to organize my thoughts and allowed my writing to come much smoother and quicker than normal. This was very helpful since, there were so many Sonnets, that I was able to refer back to my notes to help with the reading journal.

 

WORKS CITED

 

Shakespeare, William.  Shakespeare/s Sonnets.  Kindle Reading Library. 2012

Dictionary.  Dictionary.com LLC 2014 http://dictionary.reference.com/ 9/8/14