hi I'm John Green this is crash course
literature and you look great shall I
compare thee to a summers day now thou
art more lovely and more temperate Bab
William Shakespeare he knew how to
deliver a compliment that's right today
we're talking about Shakespeare's
sonnets collected and published in 1609
mr. Greene
what's a sonnet good question me from
the past in fact such a good question
that your 7th grade English teacher
answered it for you but apparently
you've forgotten a sonnet is a poetic
form consisting of 14 lines and there
are various ways to order the stanzas
and the rhyme scheme but the
Shakespearean stanza named for will not
because he invented it but because you
know he was the best at it consists of
three four line stanzas and a final
rhymed couplet so the rhyme scheme is a
b a b c d c d e f e f g g and the meter
in Shakespearean sonnets as in much of
Shakespeare's plays is iambic pentameter
which means that every line has ten
syllables consisting of five I am which
is just a fancy word for pairs of
unstressed and stressed syllables so a
line of a Shakespearean poem goes - duck
- duck - duck - duck - duck this turns
out to do something to english-speaking
brains that's just very catchy like a
lot of times pop songs are written in
Iams like a lot of times when we speak
we accidentally speak in them but when
I'm trying to remember the sound of
iambic pentameter
I just remembered John Keats his last
will and testament which was one line of
iambic pentameter my chest of books
divided among my friends so today we're
gonna look at the history and
controversy surrounding Shakespeare's
sonnets and we'll look at three
particular sonnets they're often known
by their first lines but they're also
known by numbers so we're gonna look at
sonnet 18
aka shall I compare thee to a summers
day sonnet 116 let me not to the
marriage of true minds admit impediments
and sonnet 130 my mistress's eyes are
nothing like the Sun so the sonnet got
its start like so many great things in
13th century Italy Dante got into it and
then Michelangelo let's go to the
thought-bubble so the most famous early
examples of sonnets will probably those
by Tetrarch he used a different
structure from Shakespeare and spent
most of his time talking about a woman
named Laura which
after pronounce Laura to make it fit the
meter anyway he barely knew Laura but
where did that stop men from
romanticizing women English sonnet
started in the sixteenth century and by
the 1590s there was a huge craze for
them kind of like the craze for boy
bands in the 1990s except with less
choreography and hair gel this is more
or less when Shakespeare started writing
them dates for his sonnets are pretty
inexact but actually that's the least of
our problems I mean we know almost
nothing about the poems except this
sweet rhyme scheme and that Shakespeare
wrote them and yes we are sure that
Shakespeare wrote them he also wrote all
of his plays although the earlier and
later plays were probably collaborations
okay that's settled so Shakespeare wrote
these sonnets 154 of them probably
sometime in the 1590s and early 1600s we
don't know if the speaker in the sonnets
is Shakespeare himself or some imagined
figure although it's widely assumed that
they're fairly personal as were most
sonnets and we don't know if these were
all the sonnets he wrote they're just
the ones we have and they might have
been intended for an audience of
everyone or just for the people they
were written for or for an audience of
no one however two of the sonnets showed
up in a collection in 1599 so he
definitely didn't keep them to private
and a contemporary describes him as
showing his quote sugared sonnets around
to his quote private friends and then in
1609 a reputable publisher Thomas Thorpe
published Shakespeare's sonnets never
before imprinted well except for those
two published earlier thanks
thought-bubble so the book is dedicated
to quote the only beginner of these
ensuing sonnets mr. WH all happiness and
that eternity promised by our ever
living poet wisheth that well wishing
adventurer in setting forth that is
dedication to sine T T or Thomas Thorpe
so we have no idea if the dedication was
actually Shakespeare's or if it was just
Thomas Thorpe and we don't have any idea
who mr. WH is although that hasn't
stopped scholars from trying to find out
we also don't know if Shakespeare wrote
the sonnets in the order they were
published in or if he wanted them to be
published in that order so as originally
published the first seventeen sonnets
are addressed to a young man telling him
to settle down and have kids and then
sonnets 18 to 126 are still concerned
with that young man
probably relatively few of the sonnets
have gendered pronouns which has caused
a lot of bother over the last four
hundred years but there's fairly
widespread agreement these days that in
these sonnets there is a
relationship between two men that is
passionate and possibly even erotic and
this bothered a lot of early editors so
much that some went to all the trouble
to change the pronouns from male to
female so does this mean that
Shakespeare was gay I don't know I
wasn't alive in the 17th century I also
think it's dangerous to read biography
into poetry also in 16th and 17th
century England passionate friendships
among men were common and they didn't
necessarily involve sex that said I
still think it's worth noting and
understanding that all of the most
romantic and loving of the sonnets are
those addressed to the young man like
sonnets 127 to 154 the ones addressed to
the so called black mistress are a lot
darker and no one's reading those at
weddings but about the black mistress or
dark lady who appears in those sonnets
we also don't know who she is
scholars have suggested royal waiting
women female poets at least one British
African brothel owner but we don't even
know if she was black as we used the
term today or just brunette in contrast
to the blonde young man but the dark
lady sonnets are more complicated than
the ones addressed to the young man the
speaker feels tormented and ashamed of
his sexual attraction to the woman and
even in the sonnets praising her he gets
as will sees some insults in like in son
at 144 he actually compares the two
muses he talks of having two loves the
better angel is a man right fair the
worser spirit a woman colored ill one
more thing to know although Shakespeare
was a beloved and popular playwright his
sonnets were not initially a hit like
that 1609 edition pretty much nobody
paid attention in fact for 200 years
whenever anyone wrote about the sonnets
it was to complain about how boring they
were one editor explaining why he didn't
reprint them in 1793 wrote that not even
quote the strongest act of parliament
that could be framed would make readers
like them and yet I quite like them like
Shakespeare manages to cram a lot of
emotion into his highly structured form
and maybe most importantly the sonnets
makes Shakespeare's case for why he
thinks poetry is important in the first
place that people die but poetry lives
on like in sonnet 55 Shakespeare writes
not marble nor the gilded monuments of
princes shall outlive all rhyme but you
shall shine more bright in these
contents than unswept stone b'smeared
with sluttish time and yet quick
sidenote shakespeare talks about
how bright this young man's memory will
shine but we know nothing about him the
poetry may last but people still don't
so okay let's move on to sonnet 18 now
if you've seen Shakespeare in Love you
know that Shakespeare wrote this for
Gwyneth Paltrow no he didn't and shall I
compare thee to a summers day the the in
question is that mysterious young man
basically sonnet 18 is one big extended
metaphor but the hook is that it's a
metaphor that the poet admits isn't
especially successful yes
the poet could compare his beloved to a
summers day but it turns out that this
comparison isn't really act like the
beloved is nicer than a summers day the
beloved has better weather really better
weather well I guess this was England so
yeah let's just go with it and there's
always something lousy about summer days
they're too hot or they're windy or if
they're perfect they're over too quickly
but that's not gonna be the case with
the beloved because just like in sonnet
55 the poet is going to immortalize the
beloved in this very poem fair by he
will make the young man perfect
eternally like a summer day might end
but the beauty of the beloved is going
to go on forever so long as men can
breathe or eyes can see and this wasn't
like Shakespeare being arrogant it was a
pretty common trope and Elizabeth in
verse this idea that human life was
temporary but that poetry is forever you
have to remember this was a time in
human history where mortality was
extremely common at all ages it's not
like the vast majority of people died
old there was a lot of chance involved
so it makes sense to draw a distinction
between the constant changing of
nature's seasons versus the eternality
of lines of poetry in the end of poem
that starts out saying that the beloved
is not like a summer's day turns out to
be a poem in praise not of the beloved
or of summer but of poetry itself but
there's one more brilliant twist in this
poem I mean look at the end
future-looking verbs like shall not fade
and nor shall brag give way to ones in
the conditional I can read and can see
and then to the present tense of lives
and gives so maybe Shakespeare is
admitting that poetry has its own limits
too and then there's sonnet 116 which is
the one you're most likely to hear at
somebody's wedding this one is also
addressed to the young man this is in
some ways the high point of
Shakespeare's love poetry although it's
perhaps a more insecure poem than its
seems at first here it's not poetry that
is the greatest thing ever although
Shakespeare definitely gives the tip of
his hat to his own writing but love
itself now just as in sonnet 18 there's
worry over the impermanence of human
life and beauty how rosy lips and cheeks
will be undone by time and death but hey
that won't matter because love will last
eternally or at least until the quote
edge of doom
that's what Shakespeare hopes anyway but
maybe he isn't certain because he's
playing some games with the language
here and he's showing how easily change
and fickleness can happen like when you
look at or read the poem notice how
easily words change and it alters -
alteration remover to remove maybe he's
worried that love might change - I mean
look at that first line love is not love
and look at all the nose and NORs and
Nevers in the poem but in the end he
does come to an emphatic conclusion he
says that if all the things he said
about love are an error quote I never
writ nor no man ever loved obviously he
has written and men have loved so his
defensive love is solid right well but
then remember the line love is not love
there are all kinds of explorations in
Shakespeare's work about what real love
is but for me at least the best line of
the poem is when he writes that love is
not times fool true love - Shakespeare
is not beholden to time it doesn't
answer to time it's somehow transcends
time and lastly let's take a brief look
at sonnet 130 one of the ones addressed
to the Dark Lady this on it is almost a
parody a send-up of Petrarch sonnets
about the lovely laura whom he barely
knew that weird Renaissance worship of
the person you met just one time 20
years ago and the constant exploration
of every facet of their beauty their
mouths their eyes their cheeks their
hair it gets a little overwhelming in
sonnet 130 Shakespeare simultaneously
does that and refuses to do it like if
he suggested that a summers day wasn't a
good enough descriptor of his beloved
now he's suggesting that if you compare
his mistress to any of the typical stuff
suns roses perfume she's going to fall
very short her breasts are the colour of
done her hair is like black wires
sometimes her breath smells this strange
descriptive aggression characterizes
many of the late sonnets where the poet
seems to feel ashamed about being
attracted to this woman but again
there's a twist at the end as there is
with every good sonnets final couplet
and yet by heaven I think
I love as rare as any she belied by
false compare Shakespeare isn't saying
look my mistress has onion breath
instead the speaker is saying all of you
other poets have been exaggerating like
crazy including past me if you were
actually going to describe people
realistically his lover would be as
beautiful as any other so take that
coral and perfume in summer days and for
me at least that humanization of the
romantic other is more romantic and
ultimately more loving than any summer's
day and plus she's gonna get to live
forever well not actually because we're
all gonna die even the species is gonna
cease to exist thanks for watching crash
course literature see you next week
well actually I can't guarantee that
I'll see you next week but I will so
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you