SONNETS

WITH INTRODUCTION AND
NOTES BY C. C. STOPES

ALEXANDER MORING LIMITED
THE DE LA MORE PRESS 298
REGENT STREET LONDON W 1904

2848

ARS8
1904

Copyl

SCORN NOT THE SONNET; CRITIC, YOU HAVE FROWNED,
MINDLESS OF ITS JUST HONOURS; WITH THIS KEY

SHAKSPEARE UNLOCKED HIS HEART; THE MELODY
OF THIS SMALL LUTE GAVE EASE TO PETRARCH'S WOUND;
A THOUSAND TIMES THIS PIPE DID TASSO SOUND;
WITH IT CAMÖENS SOOTHED AN EXILE'S GRIEF;
THE SONNET GLITTERED A GAY MYRTLE LEAF
AMID THE CYPRESS WITH WHICH DANTE CROWNED

HIS VISIONARY BROW: A GLOW-WORM LAMP,

IT CHEERED MILD SPENSER, CALLED FROM FAERY-LAND,
TO STRUGGLE THROUGH DARK WAYS; AND, WHEN A DAMP
FELL ROUND THE PATH OF MILTON, IN HIS HAND

THE THING BECAME A TRUMPET; WHENCE HE BLEW
SOUL-ANIMATING STRAINS-ALAS, TOO FEW!

Wordsworth.

INTRODUCTION

General Characteristics of the Sonnets. "Shakespeare's Sonnets" were entered on the Stationers' Registers on May 20th, 1609; but it was not until the nineteenth century that they received the attention they deserved. Then readers began to discover their wonderful beauty, and to realize that Shakespeare took the same place in relation to the development of lyric poetry that he had done in regard to the drama. He did not initiate the form, but he perfected it, and refined the material which he moulded into that form. One has only to read Shakespeare's Sonnets in comparison with those of his contemporaries to see how far he soars above most of them. The perfection of Shakespeare's art, the refinement of his æsthetic taste, the profundity of his philosophy, the dramatic intensity

of his feeling, the richness and variety of his imagery, and the delicacy of his musical ear, are nowhere more fully shown than in his Sonnets. They show no second-hand conventional imitation of Nature, but a close and loving worship.

The Sonnets have a further charm, peculiarly their own. In the plays we learn somewhat of the poet from the choice of subjects, the characterization and the treatment, from the recurrences and the fervours; from the imagery and the language. But the Sonnets show us not merely the Prosperos, the Jacques, the Antonios which Shakespeare created to speak in their own characters, but give us some conception of their creator, speaking in his own. Many critics deny that "Shakespeare unlocked his heart" in these poems, preferring to believe that they were mere literary exercises, improving on the efforts of other men ; or that they were allegorical or hermetic writings, surcharged with hidden philosophical meaning; or that they also were written in dramatic form, voicing the feelings and giving expression to the thoughts of several of his friends. It is difficult to understand how those who have studied these literary

1 See Mr. Wyndham's Introduction to "The Poems of Shakespeare," 1898.