Shakespeare & His Indelible Ink
"Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea/ But sad mortality o’er-sways their power,/ How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea,/ Whose action is no stronger than a flower?" Sonnet 65
“Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea/ But sad mortality o’er-sways their power,/ How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea,/ Whose action is no stronger than a flower” — Sonnet 65.
Greetings all! This post is going to be a bit different from those that came before it. We are going to talk about Sonnet 65, but we’re also going to talk a bit about Shakespeare the man and his legacy. I also have a brief programming update.
I’ve spent the last few months taking classes to hone my Shakespearean expertise (Shakespertise, if you will), which has been wonderful. I took a Shakespeare and Physical Action workshop through the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts and completed the University of Birmingham Shakespeare Institute’s Spring Into Shakespeare course. I also attended a virtual roundtable with the American Shakespeare Center and read a few more Shakespeare books. Basically, my Shakes-sphere of knowledge is much sharper than it was a year ago (Sorry/not sorry; puns are a must when discussing the Bard). My Substack has also grown quite a bit as of late, and the Substack platform has added new features, so this seemed a good time for a re-launch.
But first, Sonnet 65.
The Shake-Scene
Sonnet 65 is one of Shakespeare’s meditations on Time. There are a variety of sonnets where Shakespeare is in conversation with Time or personifying Time, including Sonnets 5, 12, 15, 16, 19,1 60, 63, 64, 65, 100, 123, and 126. These all fall within the section of sonnets designated as being to the “Fair Youth,” which makes sense. Shakespeare’s sonnets to the Fair Youth plead him to procreate so that his beauty will last beyond his years. However, the dichotomy between the “Fair Youth” sonnets of 1-126 and the “Dark Lady” sonnets of 127-152 is probably a false one that’s a vestigial tail of some editor trying to come up with an order to put the sonnets in.
We do not actually know the order in which the sonnets were written, or even when. He probably started writing them around 1592 (very early in his career) and they were published in 1609 (very late in his career). As discussed above, many divide the sonnets into those to the “Fair Youth” and those to the “Dark Lady”, but all 126 attributed to the “Fair Youth” do not explicitly mention him. Some, like Sonnet 65, are more generically about “my love.”
And while Sonnet 65 does discuss “my love,” it is not specific to the Fair Youth. To me, this sonnet is about grief. The Shakespearean sonnet has three quatrains (a quatrain is four lines of alternating rhyme scheme, i.e. ABAB) culminating in a rhyming couplet. Typically, the line just before the couplet is what’s known as a “volta.” It is a turn or change in the thought or argument that clarifies the sonnet’s meaning.
The first quatrain in Sonnet 65 lays out the question considered in the sonnet by setting up the destructive power of Time against the frailty of beauty:
Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea
But sad mortality o’er-sways their power,
How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea,
Whose action is no stronger than a flower?
The second quatrain continues in this vein, ratcheting up the tension with stronger language (i.e. “wrackful siege of batt’ring days” suggesting a Troy-like war) and evoking more destructive imagery (i.e. destruction of rocks and steel):
O, how shall summer’s honey breath hold out
Against the wrackful siege of batt’ring days,
When rocks impregnable are not so stout,
Nor gates of steel so strong, but time decays?
The third and final quatrain asks what is to be done about Time running roughshod over beauty:
O fearful meditation! where, alack,
Shall time’s best jewel from time’s chest lie hid?
Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back?
Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid?
As a performance note, there is no gift like an “O” in Shakespeare. That’s where the emotion goes. Also, there isn’t a clear volta in this sonnet. In fact, I’d argue that the volta is an unexpressed thought that comes between the third quatrain and the rhyming couplet. That unexpressed thought leads the speaker to their final revelation:
O, none, unless this miracle have might,
That in black ink my love may still shine bright.
There’s ambiguity in these final lines, as well as in the sonnet as a whole. The speaker doesn’t clarify who or what “time’s best jewel” is or who or what “my love” is. The speaker also doesn’t clarify the use of the black ink (could be writing or sketches or even a tattoo). In many ways this sonnet is a call to the creator to fight on the side of beauty against the powerful enemy Time.
And for Shakespeare, this sonnet was incredibly prescient.
Shakespeare’s Legacy
Shakespeare’s legacy is not conventional. At the time he died, he was not nearly as well-known as the lead actor in his company (Richard Burbage). He was not buried in Poet’s Corner of Westminster Abbey. He was eventually commemorated there but not until over a century after his death. And the estate he built was razed long ago, leaving only a tree (and even that was moved).
Shakespeare’s “New Place” as it appears on tourists maps is (or isn’t) located in the center of Stratford-Upon-Avon. It was the largest house in Stratford, and Shakespeare likely walked by it as a child on his way to school. And in 1593, he decided to buy it.
It was early in Shakespeare’s career. He’d written The Comedy of Errors and Love’s Labour’s Lost, which were likely performed at The Theatre (owned by Burbage family) or the Rose Theatre. He’d also had commercial success with the epic poem Venus and Adonis (1593). But this was before Shakespeare became part owner of the company and built The Globe which opened in 1599.
But the purchase of the house wound up being quite Shakespearean indeed. He made the offer in 1593 but the purchase was not closed until 1597 because the eldest son of the homeowner murdered his father in an effort to prevent the loss of his inheritance. And, to lay tragedy upon tragedy, Shakespeare’s only son died before the home was purchased in 1596. In fact, Shakespeare’s direct line of descendants eventually ended with the death of his childless granddaughter.
But the Shakespeare’s moved into that property. He upgraded it with the addition of an ostentatious number of chimneys (given the chimney tax, that was a means of flaunting one’s wealth). It was at that house that Shakespeare died in 1616.
An eventual owner tore down the house to build a more in-fashion structure. This was before Garrick’s 100-year jubilee, so Shakespeare the man was not particularly famous. That second house was then demolished by a preacher after that jubilee made Shakespeare a celebrity in part because he was tired of people knocking on the door and asking to tour “Shakespeare’s house.” But the primary reason was he was bitter that the town wouldn’t lower his taxes. Out of spite, he left the rubble on the lot until he died. His widow then sold it to the Shakespeare Trust with the assistance of Charles Dickens and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. They purchased the property to keep it out of the grubby American hands of P.T. Barnum.
The one potential remnant of Shakespeare on the lot is an old mulberry tree. The original was sold by the preacher for its wood (there’s some irony in a religious figure attempting to bulldoze Shakespeare’s legacy). A cutting of that tree was replanted and grows on the land. Analysis of the tree has dated it to the time Shakespeare owned the property, so perhaps a small part of Shakespeare remains on the land.
As an aside, it is worth visiting the lovely garden that sits there now. They’ve marked out in the stone where different rooms would have begun and ended. There are flags amongst the flowers commemorating the plays and steel markers on the ground for each sonnet. There are even statues that incorporate the words and imagery into sculptures of Shakespearean characters.
So, there you have it. As Shakespeare predicted in Sonnet 65, although the blood and stone have long since been destroyed by Time, his words remain.
Speak the Speech, I Pray You
Bring Shakespeare’s words into your own life by:
Mourning the wilting of grocery store flowers;
Lamenting the physical sagging that inevitably accompanies aging; or
Getting that extra-special tattoo:
Additional Resources
Find a copy of the sonnet here.
Check out this wonderful resource “Shakespeare’s Words” to find where certain words are mentioned in the cannon here. The search are free and you get five free views of the specific passages.
Read more about Shakespeare’s poetry as discussed by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust here.
Listen to me talk about Sonnet 65 with the truly delightful hosts of the “Finding Good Bones” Podcast here.
Programming Update
As I mentioned above, I’ve spent a lot of this year honing my Shakespeartise (just go with it). I’m also nearly done with the Shakespeare-themed novel I’ve been drafting, which will free up time for me to be more consistent posting here. I’m so pleased that so many of you have subscribed and stuck with me through the bumpy discovery phase. Thank you!
Going forward, there will be one post a month where I cheekily break down the entirety of one Shakespeare play. We’ll keep it irreverent and accessible, and free! It will drop the first Thursday of the month (barring holidays — looking at you July— or Houston-based natural disasters). I’m also going to start recording the audio to drop along with the post, and posting that same audio to podcast platforms in case that’s your preferable method of content consumption. I also plan to re-release the audio of older posts as well starting with the most recent (which I am least embarrassed of) and ending with the oldest (which I might have serious cringe injury over).
On top of all of that, I will be releasing a bonus post each month for paid subscribers. The plan is to alternate between “Actor Insights” where I deep dive into a speech or scene and “Planning a Pilgrimage” where I discuss various Shakespeare-related places I’ve been and give tips on planning a trip. The first paid post will drop on June 20, 2024.
I love nerding out over Shakespeare and creating my funny little sketches, and your clicks and likes and nice notes are payment enough. But, if you wanted to financially support the Substack, I would be eternally grateful. If you are interested in financially supporting the Substack, there should be an “upgrade to paid” button in the top-right corner.
Thanks for “Shakesing” things up with me!
- LL
I’ve previously written on Sonnet 19, “Devouring Time” in the Substack “IGAF (Shakespeare’s Version)” published April 23, 2023.