Essay by Enache Petronela Adina, 3-rd year, Gr. 1

Shakespeare’s sonnet - 66

Tired with all these, for restful death I cry,

As, to behold desert a beggar born,

And needy nothing trimm'd in jollity,

And purest faith unhappily forsworn,

And guilded honour shamefully misplaced,

And maiden virtue rudely strumpeted,

And right perfection wrongfully disgraced,

And strength by limping sway disabled,

And art made tongue-tied by authority,

And folly doctor-like controlling skill,

And simple truth miscall'd simplicity,

And captive good attending captain ill:

Tired with all these, from these would I be gone,

Save that, to die, I leave my love alone.

Critique of Sonnet 66

Theme: Weary of Injustice

Content: A magnificent sonnet reflecting on the injustices in the world that the author has grown weary of. A specious sonnet because it looks simple and monotonous on the surface yet it is redolent of Sonnet 91 in the way the author lists and detaches himself from the things that drive him to despair.

Tired with all these, for restful death I cry:

The author is weary of life. He's tired of the injustices he sees, the slings and arrows, of all these. And he cannot fix these things, which augments his despair. He's helpless. He has no personal control over them. They're things he is powerless to ameliorate.

As, to behold desert a beggar born,

Desert here means "virtue", something that is "deserved". But it's portrayed as a beggar born. There's no social justice because honest virtue, that which is deserved, is born a beggar. It is lowly, something looked down upon, something that isn't honoured for what it is. Good, honest virtuous desert has a hard life from the start. Behold demonstrates that the following list of things are those that he sees/beholds. The alliteration of behold and beggar born binds the victim to the injustice.

And needy nothing trimmed in jollity,

The first of the Injustices: Social injustice. Someone who is a needy nothing has jolly trimmings as well. Fine clothes, looking and feeling very pleased with himself. The same type of clothes horse as in Sonnet 91 with "their garments (though new-fangled ill)". The person who is a needy nothing has literally got all

the trimmings too. The alliteration of needy nothing emphasises the focus on the injustice.

And purest faith unhappily forsworn,

The second of the Injustices: Religious injustice. Faith is renounced and disavowed. The alliteration of faith with forsworn again binds the victim to the injustice.

And gilded honour shamefully misplaced,

Social injustice again: gilded honour like the trimmings of the needy nothing has-it-all. Like gilding the lily, those with honour can't get enough and gild what should already be enough. This is shamefully misplaced by those who claim to have honour. In a fair world things would be correctly placed but in the world Shakespeare is tiring of they're shamefully misplaced. The undeserving have and the virtuous have not.

And maiden virtue rudely strumpeted,

And again injustice. The virtuous maiden has been prostituted. Ugliness perverts beauty. This is another despairing characteristic of moral injustice that the great observer, Shakespeare, sees in the world that he lives and he is tiring of.

And right perfection wrongfully disgraced,

More moral injustice. Good, true, righteous people (like the maiden) are wrongly disgraced. And strength by limping sway disabled,. The important word here is sway. Sway, as used extensively in poetry, means "power", "governing authority", "state power". Here, it is limping sway: corrupt government, or at least corrupt authority. Strength is disabled by this debilitating, corrupt authority.

Something that should be able is instead disabled. Political injustice that the author looks upon with despair and without the position, authority or means to set it right.

And art made tongue-tied by authority,

Now it's getting personal. Art, something of profound interest to our hero is tongue-tied. This theme is repeated in other sonnets: "me tongue-tied" (80); "My tongue-tied muse" (85); "My tongue-tied patience" (140). The only person in Shakespeare's world who ever gets tongue-tied is himself. He is frustrated by his own art being tongue-tied by authority. Possibly a protest to the changes required by the Master of the Revels for any contentious matters in his works such as supporting Essex and the changes required to the play Sir Thomas More. A personal example of corrupt authority disabling strength and interfering with his own work: artistic injustice.

And folly, doctor-like, controlling skill,

Foolishness, with artificial clinical precision, controlling skill. The lunatics have taken over the asylum. The fools are in control. The skilled are being emasculated. More social injustice.

And simple truth miscalled simplicity,

Simple, plain, honest truth is disparagingly called simplicity.

And captive good attending captain ill.

Utterly brilliant line this. Extraordinary how he can convey so much lyric beauty with just 6 words. The Goody vs. The Baddy. Goodness is trapped, made captive by ill (evil/vile/etc.) that is not only despicable in its own right but is a captain, a person of authority. Not a King or Queen, just a captain, someone who can get high enough to exercise authority and abuse it before he's found out.

Captive good could well be perceived to be the decent author and Captain ill a person of higher social position yet of little or no worth. More social injustice.

Tired with all these, from these would I be gone,

The Injustice Sandwich. Line 1 starts with Tired with all these and the couplet starts with Tired with all these and there's been plenty of beef provided in the middle.

Save that to die I leave my love alone.

Good old Shakespeare. Back to what is his measure. What matters most to him. Not gilded honour with trimmings. Not some needy nothing. But a man of simple truth. A man who doesn't suffer fools gladly whatever gilded honour they ponce about with. A captive good. A man who values honesty, beauty and most of all his love who keeps him going despite all the corruption and injustices he observes in the world. And a love who he couldn't possibly contemplate leaving alone at the mercy of all this ugliness.

Analyses

Taedium vitae (tiredness of life) or the condition of world weariness, often accompanied by profound depression, was first described in the classical period. Seneca and Pliny both provide analyses and examples of the malaise, which could lead to the taking of one’s life. (Roman Law allowed taedium vitae as one of the few justifiable motives for suicide.) Seneca in De Tranquillitate describes the symptoms: “tedium and desultoriness of self and turmoil of the mind which is never at rest . . hopes are so constricted and without escape as to choke themselves.” The mind is forced to lament the age in which it lives (“de saeculo querens”) and “those afflicted are driven to death, because they find themselves in a vicious circle, able to seek nothing new. Life and the world itself become so tedious that they experience but dwindling pleasures; they ask, ‘How long can we keeping doing the same thing?’” 1 In his Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium Seneca takes issue with Epicurus who claims, ‘It is nonsense to pursue death because of taedium vitae’ (“ridiculum est currere ad mortem taedio vitae”), replying that the condition is one of contraries and of interminable but negative balance. He exclaims again, “To what end these things?” (“Quousque eadem?”), and continues,

“Will I wake or will I sleep? Will I eat or will I go hungry? Will I shiver or will I sweat? There is no end to anything, but everything is connected in a circle . . I do nothing new; I see nothing new; finally one tires of it all. There are many who think that to live isn’t bitter, just superfluous. Farewell.” 2

The classical precedents of the disease were well known in Shakespeare’s England. Robert Burton in The Anatomy of Melancholy quotes Seneca among others and cites Suetonius’ account of Claudius who had “a spice of this disease, for when hee was tormented with the paine of his stomacke, he had a conceipt to make away himselfe.” Burton’s is the most extensive contemporary account of the condition, typified by a vacillating between opposites, the disconsolate being the dominant, and by a weariness that finds its only relief in death.

Taedium vitae. Hence it proceeds many times, that they are weary of their liues, and ferall thoughts to offer violence to their owne persons, come into their mindes, taedium vitae is a common symptome . . they are soone tired with all things; they will now tarry, now be gone; now pleased, then againe displeased, now they like, by and by dislike all, weary of all . . discontent, disquieted, perplexed vpon every light, or no occasion, obiect: often tempted, I say, to make away themselues; Viuere nolunt, mors nesciunt [Seneca]; they cannot dye, they will not liue: they complaine, weepe, lament and thinke they lead a most miserable life, every poore man they see is most fortunate in respect of them, every begger that comes to the doore is happier then they are, they could be contented to change liues with them . . And so they continue, till with some fresh discontent they be molested againe, and then they are weary of their lives, weary of all, they will die.

From the classical period onwards there existed also the convention of writing out a balance sheet of the conditions of one’s life – or of the world, especially the political – before taking one’s life. Tabular lines of contrariety would be balanced across each other, often weighted towards the negative, a practice Shakespeare has observed exactly in Sonnet 66 by allowing its equipoised

lines to preempt the way he normally divides a sonnet’s argument. Also relevant to the sonnet is the sense found with taedium vitae of being inextricably trapped in a circle: as Seneca notes, “There is no end to anything, but everything is connected in a circle” (“Nullius rei finis est, sed in orbem nexa sunt omnia”). The taediosus’ customary circularity is imitated by the rhetorical circularity and repetition of sonnet’s opening and closing, “Tyr’d with all these.”

Sonnet 66’s rhetorical figures are those of Repetition and Obsecration. Each line opens with “And” and the lines’ insistent repetition causes the customary division between octet and sestet to be elided. The poet’s obsecration (“I cry”) is for “restfull death,” death that brings the fullness of rest and peace. The reason for the prayer is that the poet is “Tyr’d with all these.” A list of “these” elements follows, introduced by “As to behold,” meaning ‘these things such as one can behold.’ The first factor inducing taedium is “desert a begger borne;” in this world turned on itself anything deserving merit is ‘born a beggar,’ either receives no recompense or is shabbily treated or clothed as a beggar. (A beggar on a taediosus’ list was common, see Burton above, “euery beggar.”) The poet complains that “needie Nothing [is] trimd in iollitie.” “Nothing” is utter deprivation, totally in need; but in this age it is dressed up (“trimd”) in finery (“iollitie”) or it is decorated over (“trimd”) by revelry and laughter (“iollitie”). In this world religion or loyalty or even troth-vows (“faith”), that are simple and undefiled (“purest”), are sadly (“vnhappily”) denied or dishonoured or broken (“forsworne”). Rank or decency (“honor”) of the highest quality (“gilded” intends ‘golden’ rather than ‘gilded over’) is put to wrong purpose or placed in wrong hands (“misplast”); “virtue” that is unsullied and intact (“maiden”) is commonly (“rudely”) prostituted abroad or sold cheaply (“strumpeted”); “perfection” that is upright and unfallen (“right” with a hint of ‘correct’) is by contrast “wrongfully” (‘unjustly’ rather than ‘mistakenly’) sullied or made to fall (“disgraced”); power, even political power (“strength”) is made impotent (“disabled”) by hesitant authority and lame rule (“limping sway”). Cleverly the line with only 4½ feet itself limps.

In the poet’s world “arte” of any kind, artistic, scientific or even political, is rendered silent and ineffectual, even censored (“made tong-tide”) by “authoritie,” by misapplied power. “Folly,” traditionally the subject of misrule, is here like a master (“Doctor-like”), who rules over true knowledge (“skill”). Here “simple-Truth,” undivided and unadulterated truth (compare Sonnet 138.8, “simple truth supprest”) is defamed or wrongly titled (“miscalde”) “Simplicitie,” of the realm of the simpleton or fool. The list’s final item is “captiue-good attending Captaine ill:” goodness is held inextricably in the service of or is unable to escape from the clutches of dominant evil (“Captaine” can intend both dominant and Captain), the traditional symptom of taedium vitae.

The concluding couplet returns to the opening imprecation with the poet classically resolving to be quit of such burdens through death, “Tyr’d with all these, from these would I be gone,” but is prevented from so doing by the thought that, if he were to do so, he would leave his beloved forsaken: “Save that to dye, I leaue my loue alone.” On the tabula or balance-sheet the beloved outweighs all the factors that induced world-weariness in the poet.

Major Themes

Weary of Injustice

A magnificent sonnet reflecting on the injustices in the world that the author has grown weary. Someone who is a needy nothing has jolly trimmings as well. Fine clothes, looking and feeling very pleased with himself. The same type of clothes horse as in Sonnet 91 with "their garments (though new-fangled ill)". The person who is a needy nothing has literally got all

Religious injustice

Faith is renounced and disavowed. The alliteration of faith with forsworn again binds the victim to the injustice.

Time passing

It’s means that time is descrie here as “reckoning” but the poet still addresses the inevitability of its destruction of life.

Taedium vitae

From the classical period onwards there existed also the convention of writing out a balance sheet of the conditions of one’s life – or of the world, especially the political – before taking one’s life. Tabular lines of contrariety would be balanced across each other, often weighted towards the negative, a practice Shakespeare has observed exactly in Sonnet 66 by allowing its equipoised lines to preempt the way he normally divides a sonnet’s argument. Also relevant to the sonnet is the sense found with taedium vitae of being inextricably trapped in a circle: as Seneca notes, “There is no end to anything, but everything is connected in a circle”