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Astrophel and Stella Sonnet

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For my sweet thoughts sometime do pleasure bring, But by and by the cause of my disease ... In short, the opening sonnet of Sidney's sonnet sequence is a very self ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: Astrophel and Stella Sonnet

1
Astrophel and StellaSonnet 1

A close-reading, a modern rendering, and some
historical/literary context
Mark Morton

First, lets start by reading the sonnet itself.

Louing in trueth, and fayne in verse my loue to
show,That she, deare Shee, might take som
pleasure of my paine,Pleasure might cause her
reade, reading might make her know,Knowledge
might pittie winne, and pity grace obtaine,I
sought fit wordes to paint the blackest face of
woeStudying inuentions fine, her wits to
entertaine,Oft turning others leaues, to see if
thence would flowSome fresh and fruitfull
showers vpon my sun-burnd brain.But words came
halting forth, wanting Inuentions
stayInuention, Natures childe, fledde step-dame
Studies blowesAnd others feet still seemde but
strangers in my way.Thus, great with childe to
speak, and helplesse in my throwes,Biting my
trewand pen, beating myselfe for spite,Fool,
said my Muse to me, looke in thy heart, and
write.

Lets begin by rendering the sonnet into
present-day English
Louing in trueth, and fayne in verse my loue to
show,
That she, deare Shee, might take som pleasure of
my paine,
Im a true lover, and Im glad to express my love
in poetry, so that she, my sweetheart, might get
some pleasure from my pain

Pleasure might cause her reade, reading might
make her know,Knowledge might pittie winne, and
pity grace obtaine,
Because pleasure might convince her to read my
poetry, and reading my poetry would make her know
about my emotional pain, and knowing about my
emotional pain might make her pity me, and pity
might help me get into her good books

I sought fit wordes to paint the blackest face of
woe
Because of all that (the pain, reading, knowing,
pitying, etc), I tried to find the best words to
express the darkest image of love anguish

Studying inuentions fine, her wits to
entertaine,Oft turning others leaues, to see if
thence would flowSome fresh and fruitfull
showers vpon my sun-burnd brain.
I studied excellent ideas, in order to entertain
her mind, and I turned the pages of books by
other poets, to see if some fresh and fertile
notions would flow from there to my brain, which
has been sunburned by her radiance.

But words came halting forth, wanting Inuentions
stayInuention, Natures childe, fledde step-dame
Studies blowes
But words only came forth haltingly, because they
lacked the support of genuine ideas and ideas,
which are the offspring of in-born talent, fled
from the impatient demands of hard work, which is
like a mere step-mother to in-born talent.

And others feet still seemde but strangers in my
way.
And worse yet, the metrical feet or rhythms of
the other poets who I studied just seemed to be
like strangers getting in my way.

Thus, great with childe to speak, and helplesse
in my throwes,Biting my trewand pen, beating
myselfe for spite,
As a result of these obstacles, I was full of
feelings that needed to be let out, rather like a
woman giving birth, but I was helpless in my
labour, I was biting my disobedient pen and
beating myself out of frustration

Fool, said my Muse to me, looke in thy heart, and
write.
When suddenly my muse (both my inner muse and my
sweetheart) said to me, You nitwit! Look in your
heart, and write what you find there!

Im a true lover, and Im glad to express my love
in poetry, so that she, my sweetheart, might at
least get some pleasure from my pain. Why?
Because pleasure might convince her to read my
poetry, and reading my poetry might make her know
about my emotional pain, and knowing about my
emotional pain might make her pity me, and pity
might help me get into her good books and so
because of all that (the pain, reading, knowing,
pitying, etc), Ive tried to find the best words
to express the darkest image of love anguish.
Ive studied excellent ideas, in order to
entertain her mind, and I turned the pages of
books by other poets, to see if some fresh and
fertile notions would flow from there into my own
brain, which has been sunburned by my
sweethearts radiance. But words only came forth
haltingly, because they lacked the support of
genuine ideas and ideas, which are the offspring
of in-born talent, fled from the impatient
demands of hard work, which is like a mere
step-mother to ideas. And worse yet, the metrical
feet or rhythms of the other poets who I studied
just seemed to be like strangers getting in my
way. As a result of these obstacles, I was full
of feelings that needed to be let out, rather
like a woman giving birth, but I was helpless in
my labour, and I was biting my disobedient pen
and beating myself out of frustration, when
suddenly my muse (both my inner muse and my
sweetheart) said to me, You nitwit! Look in your
heart, and write what you find there!

Now back to the original!
Louing in trueth, and fayne in verse my loue to
show,That she, deare Shee, might take som
pleasure of my paine,Pleasure might cause her
reade, reading might make her know,Knowledge
might pittie winne, and pity grace obtaine,I
sought fit wordes to paint the blackest face of
woeStudying inuentions fine, her wits to
entertaine,Oft turning others leaues, to see if
thence would flowSome fresh and fruitfull
showers vpon my sun-burnd brain.But words came
halting forth, wanting Inuentions
stayInuention, Natures childe, fledde step-dame
Studies blowesAnd others feet still seemde but
strangers in my way.Thus, great with childe to
speak, and helplesse in my throwes,Biting my
trewand pen, beating myselfe for spite,
Fool, said my Muse to me, looke in thy heart, and
write.

Now some other incidental points
In the line Louing in trueth, and fayne in verse
my loue to show, theres a pun on fayne.
The primary sense is fain, that is, gladly or
willingly. (In The Tempest, as the ship is
threatened by the storm, Gonzalo says, I would
fain die a dry death.)
But fayne also implies feign, meaning to
pretend or to deceive. (This sense still
exists in the fencing and boxing term, feint,
meaning to pretend to make one kind of blow,
while really preparing for another.

So when the speakers says, Loving in truth, and
fain in verse hes alluding to the fact that
when someone is in love, or at least when they
are writing about love, there is both truth and
falsehood or, to put it a better way, in love
there is authenticity and sincerity on the one
hand, but there is also artifice and posture and
convention on the other hand. There is both
true-ing and feigning.

The phrase she, deare Shee is historically
specific. What I mean is that there was a fad, in
the late sixteenth century, to use she as if it
were a noun rather than a pronoun. In other
words, she was sometimes used as a synonym for
Beloved. Shakespeare does the same thing in one
of his sonnets
And yet by heaven, I think my love as rare As
any he or she belied with false compare.

Note how one of the motifs in the poem is the
idea of progression, or perhaps of failed
progression. That is, the notion is that one
thing will lead to another, and then that to
another, and so on. This is used twice in the
sonnet
Pleasure might cause her reade, reading might
make her know,Knowledge might pittie winne, and
pity grace obtaine,
But words came halting forth, wanting Inuentions
stayInuention, Natures childe, fledde step-dame
Studies blowes
The reference to these failed or unhappy
progressions might very well be connected to the
idea of the neo-platonic ladder

Neo-Platonism was a philosophy that was popular
in the sixteenth century (and before). Its
difficult to summarize this philosophy, because
it was so pervasive and expounded by so many
Medieval and Early Modern thinkers, but in
essence it was the attempt to fuse the ideas of
Plato with Christianity.
The neo-platonic ladder was the idea that
humans could improve themselves by contemplating
the material world, and then moving upward step
by step to a contemplation of the divine world.

The basic idea of the neo-platonic ladder comes
from Platos dialogue called The Symposium. In
that dialogue, a character named Diotima puts
forth the basic stages of a kind of moral ladder
1. A young man discovers the physical beauty of
another man's body, and the "fruit of his love to
be beautiful conversation.
2. This young man then moves from loving one
beautiful body to understanding "the same beauty
which exists in all bodies.
3. Next, "he will find that the beauty that
exists in souls (is) more valuable than that in
the body.
4. After this, he comes to a what I will call a
multiplicity of knowledge. He understands many
things and "brings forth many beautiful and
magnificent theories and thoughts in a fruitful
philosophy.
5. And lastly, this man moves from this
multiplicity of knowledge to a "certain single
knowledge," which is the beholding of Beauty
itself. At this point, one is able to "see the
Beautiful itself, pure, clear, unmixed- not
infected with human flesh and color and a lot of
other mortal nonsense.
http//ccat.sas.upenn.edu/italians/resources/Amic
iprize/1997/

In this sonnet, though, the allusion to the
neo-platonic ladder seems somewhat ironic,
because the goal of the speakers climb is the
love of his sweetheart, not divine love.

There are other ironic elements in the sonnet,
too.
The sonnet is, in many ways, an anti-Petrarchan
sonnet.
But before I explain how its anti-Petrarchan,
lets first discuss what Petrarchan is.

Petrarchan is a kind of poetry or perhaps more
accurately, a kind of attitude found in some
poetry that dates back to Francesco Petrarch, a
fourteenth-century Italian poet.
http//petrarch.petersadlon.com/petrarch.html
(Petrarchan also refers to a sonnet with a
particular rhyme scheme usually abba abba cdc
dcd, but sometimes the last six lines have a
slightly different scheme.) http//www.ajdrake.com
/e252_fall_04/materials/guides/ren_petrarchan.htm
The attitude typically embodied in a Petrarchan
poem hinges on the speakers emotional state.

That emotional state is one in which the speaker
pines for the affection of his beloved, but she
disdains him. Thus he is left with nothing to do
with his emotional and creative energy except
write about it.
On the next slide, Ill copy a fairly typical
poem by Petrarch (in translation).

I find no peace, and have no arms for war, and
fear and hope, and burn and yet I freeze, and
fly to heaven, lying on earth's floor, and
nothing hold, and all the world I seize.
My jailer opens not, nor locks the door, nor
binds me to hear, nor will loose my ties Love
kills me not, nor breaks the chains I wear, nor
wants me living, nor will grant me ease.
I have no tongue, and shout eyeless, I seeI
long to perish, and I beg for aidI love
another, and myself I hate.
Weeping I laugh, I feed on misery,by death and
life so equally dismayedfor you, my lady, am I
in this state.

Obviously, the speaker in Petrarchs sonnet
attributes his anguished condition on his
disdainful beloved.
Note, as well, the many paradoxes and oxymoron's
in the sonnet, which are another feature of
Petrarchan poetry
burn and yet I freeze
eyeless, I see
weeping, I laugh

Petrarch had a huge and direct influence on
sixteenth-century poetry, especially in the first
half of that century. For example, it was then
that the English poet Thomas Wyatt began to
translate Petrarch
I find no peace, and all my war is done I fear
and hope, I burn, and freeze like ice I fly
aloft, yet can I not arise And nought I have,
and all the world I seize on,That locks nor
loseth, holdeth me in prison,And holds me not,
yet can I scape no wise Nor lets me live, nor
die, at my devise,And yet of death it giveth me
occasion.Without eye I see without tongue I
plain I wish to perish, yet I ask for health
I love another, and thus I hate myself I feed
me in sorrow, and laugh in all my pain. Lo,
thus displeaseth me both death and life, And
my delight is causer of this strife.

Before long, English poets moved from translating
Petrarch to imitating him, as in this 1557 sonnet
by Henry Howard, the Earl of Surrey
Alas, so all things now do hold their
peace,Heaven and earth disturbed in
no-thingThe beasts, the air, the birds their
song do cease,The nightes chair the stars about
do bring.Calm is the sea the waves work less
and lessSo am not I, whom love, alas, doth
wring,Bringing before my face the great
increaseOf my desires, whereat I weep and
singIn joy and woe as in a doubtful easeFor my
sweet thoughts sometime do pleasure bring,But by
and by the cause of my diseaseGives me a pang
that inwardly doth sting.When that I think what
grief it is againTo live and lack the thing
should rid my pain.

The fashion for the Petrarchan attitude became so
pervasive in sixteenth-century poetry, that it
eventually inspired a counter-movement
anti-Petrarchan sonnets.
Anti-Petrarchan sonnets either mock or reject the
conventions of Petrarchan sonnets.
Shakespeare, for example, entirely rejects the
notion of idealized (though unreturned) love that
is the subject of so many Petrarchan sonnets. You
can see this in the next slide, which features a
well-known sonnet by Shakespeare.

The expense of spirit in a waste of shame Is
lust in action and till action, lust Is
perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame,
Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust,
Enjoy'd no sooner but despised straight, Past
reason hunted, and no sooner had Past reason
hated, as a swallow'd 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.

Sometimes, though, Shakespeare doesnt reject the
idealized love, but he does reject the
conventions that Petrarchan poets used in
describing that love and their beloveds.
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun
Coral is far more red than her lips' red
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damasked, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound
I grant I never saw a goddess go
My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.

Whats interesting about the previous sonnet is
the fact that its highly ironic as it rejects
the conventional tropes that were used by
Petrarchan poets in their sonnets and yet it
ultimately doubles-back and re-affirms and
re-invigorates the love relationship itself (as
does, say, the bleak film Sid and Nancy).

I think you can sense the irony or
anti-Petrarchan attitude in the sonnet by
Sidney that began this presentation. But
ultimately the speaker in that sonnet is not
rejecting or mocking love. The speaker isnt
ironic about love itself, but rather ironic about
his own abilities, both as a lover and as a poet
(its also, to my knowledge, the earliest poem to
deal with writers block!). In short, the opening
sonnet of Sidneys sonnet sequence is a very
self-deprecating poem which is ironic,
considering that its one of the most amazing
poems ever written.