The Shakespeare Code

It’s best to read ‘Love Madness’ Part Fifteen first.

1592. ON TOUR

Shakespeare is in such a state of agitation and despair at Harry’s liaison with Amelia that he departs on a tour with Lord Strange’s Men on 13^th July, 1592 – a tour that takes in Bristol, Bath, Oxford, Coventry and Shrewsbury.

Tours give Shakespeare time to reflect on the situation – and the Sonnets become postcards that he can send back to Harry….

At this stage in his career, Shakespeare would not have had a horse to ride.

Like every other actor, he would have walked on foot from one town to the next.

44. (27) To Harry.

Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed,

The dear respose for limbs with travail tir’d,

But then begins a journey in my head

To work my mind, when body’s work’s expir’d.

Exhausted with pushing the props and costume wagon and then performing, I rush to bed to rest my aching limbs: but I begin a journey all over again in my mind.

For then my thoughts (from far where I abide)

Intend a zealous pilgrimage to thee,

And keep my drooping eye-lids open wide,

Looking on darkness which the blind do see.

My thoughts make a religious pilgrimage from where I am – far away – to you. These keep my exhausted eyelids wide open to the darkness that blind people continually experience.

Harry has become like a holy icon to Shakespeare. Shakespeare will use a lot of Roman Catholic iconography in the Sonnets to describe his love for Harry – another ardent Roman Catholic.

Save that my soul’s imaginary sight

Presents thy shadow to my sightless view,

Which like a jewel (hung in ghastly night)

Makes black night beauteous, and her old face new.

Except that my imagination gives an image of you to  my sightless eyes – like a sparkling jewel hung in hideous night which makes the black night beautiful and her familiar face new to me.

‘Black’ now = ‘ugly’ because he has broken with the dark-skinned Amelia – whose dark skin he had previously adored.

Lo thus by day my limbs, by night my mind,

For thee, and for my self, no quiet find.

So my limbs by day and my mind at night find no rest – because of you and because of me.

45. (28) To Harry.

How can I then return in happy plight

That am debarr’d the benefit of rest?

When day’s oppression is not eas’d by night,

But day by night and night by day opprest.

So how can I return to you in a good condition when I am robbed of the benefits of resting? The arduous work of travelling and acting by day is given no respite at night – in fact the day is oppressed by night and night oppressed by day.

And each (though enemies to either’s reign)

Do in consent shake hands to torture me;

The one by toil, the other to complain

How far I toil, still farther off from thee.

Day and night are natural enemies – but they make an alliance to torment me: the day gives me work to do and the night to think about how far I am away from you (Harry).

I tell the Day to please him thou art bright,

And do’st him grace when clouds do blot the heaven:

So flatter I the swart complexion’d night,

When sparkling stars twire not thou gild’st th’even.

I get on the good side of day by telling him that you, Harry, are bright in the same way he is – and take over as a shining sun when the skies are cloudy. I also flatter the dark-skinned night: when there are no stars in the sky you turn the night to gold.

[‘Swart’ is a pejorative word: black is no longer beautiful to Shakespeare.]

But day doth daily draw my sorrows longer,

And night doth nightly make grief’s length seem stronger.

But the days draw out my sorrow I am not with you. And the night deepens this long sorrow.

46. (144)

Two loves I have of comfort and despair,

Which like two spirits do suggest me still:

The better angel is a man right fair,

The worser spirit a woman colour’d ill.

I have two beings whom I love: one brings me comfort, the other one despair. The better one is an angel – a truly handsome, fair-skinned man – Harry.

The other is a devil – a woman whose skin is dark.

[Shakespeare is becoming racist…]

To win me soon to hell my female evil

Tempteth my better angel from my side,

And would corrupt my saint to be a devil,

Wooing his purity with her foul pride.

The female devil [Amelia] wants to consign me to hell – and does so by tempting my angel [Harry] away from me. She wants to turn my saint into a devil and corrupts his purity [heterosexual at least!] with her vile lust.

And whether that my angel be turn’d fiend,

Suspect I may, yet not directly tell,

But being both from me, both to each friend,

I guess one angel in an other’s hell.

Whether my angel has become a devil, I can suspect but not be certain about. But as they are both away from me – and friends with each other – I guess that my angel is now in the other’s hell, i.e. Harry has inserted his penis into Amelia’s vagina.

Yet this shall I ne’er know but live in doubt,

Till my bad angel fire my good one out.

But I cannot be certain about this till Amelia fires Harry out of her hell i.e. gives him a dose of her venereal disease.

So the very blackness which Shakespeare has so admired in Amelia now becomes a symbol of her evil.

Sexual jealousy has twisted Shakespeare up – as it was later to twist up the noble Othello.

The Sonnets show that Shakespeare experienced every single emotion that his characters experience. Even in Lear the mad king equates the genital region of women with hell.

BREAK-THROUGH…..

47. (42) To Harry.

This sonnet represents the turning point in Shakespeare’s emotional life…

That thou hast her it is not all my grief,

And yet it may be said I lov’d her dearly;

That she hath thee is of my wailing chief,

A loss in love that touches me more nearly.

Shakespeare states that the fact that Harry is having an affair with Amelia is not the main cause of his sorrow – though he loved Amelia passionately. It’s the fact that Amelia now possesses Harry – a loss in love that is more painful to him.

Shakespeare finally admits to himself that he is more in love with the boy than the girl.

Loving offenders, thus will I excuse yee:

Thou dost love her, because thou knowst I love her,

And for my sake even so doth she abuse me,

Suff’ring my friend for my sake to approve her;

Shakespeare finds a way of excusing the sexual behaviour of Harry and Amelia. He tells Harry that he is making love to Amelia because knows Shakespeare loves her. And it’s because of Shakespeare that Amelia, to abuse him further, allows Harry to ‘prove’ her – stamp her (as silver is marked) with his penis to show her worth.

If I lose thee, my loss is my love’s gain,

And losing her, my friend hath found that loss,

Both find each other and I lose both twain,

And both for my sake lay on me this cross.

Shakespeare tells Harry that if he loses him it will be Amelia’s gain – and though Shakespeare loses Amelia, Harry will find that loss. Harry and Amelia find each other and Shakespeare loses both of them – and so the two crucify him.

Catullus – the Latin poet Shakespeare knew well – claims he is crucified by his lover – Lesbia – whom he both hates and loves – and who lays him on a cross.

But here’s the joy: my friend and I are one.

Sweet flattery, then she loves but me alone.

Shakespeare converts the pain to joy by asserting that Harry and he are one person – a re-working of the Southampton family motto ‘Ung par tout’ = ‘All is one’. Consequently, Amelia is flattering Shakespeare: she loves him only.

NATURE STEPS IN….

Amelia became pregnant. On18^th October, 1592, she is married off ‘for colour’ to ‘one of the Queen’s musicians, Alfonso Lanyer, at St. Botolph’s, Algate .

She was pregnant with what turned out to be a son – ‘Henry’ – whether named after Henry Wriothesley or Henry Carey, Lord Hundson, or both, we don’t know….She may not have either!

There is evidence that Southampton later tried to help Alfonso get the hay-weighing patent for the City – and Alfonso later went on the Islands Campaign with Southampton and Essex, hoping for a knighthood.

It meant that Harry was now available…

Shakespeare headed straight back to Titchfield…

….with a Sonnet heralding his return….

The greatest poem ever written…..

To be revealed in the next Post!!!

To read ‘Falling in Love and Ovid’, Part 17, click: HERE