Sonnet 144

[Harry]

TWO loves I have of comfort and despair
Which like two spirits do suggest me still:
The better angel is a man right fair,
The worser spirit a woman, colour’d ill.
To win me soon to hell, my female evil
Tempteth my better angel from my side,
And would corrupt my saint to be a devil,
Wooing his purity with her foul pride.
And whether that my angel be turn’d fiend
Suspect I may, yet not directly tell;
But being both from me, both to each friend,
I guess one angel in another’s hell:
Yet this shall I ne’er know, but live in doubt
Till my bad angel fire my good one out.

This sonnet is the second one first printed in The Passionate Pilgrim in 1599. The other, of course, was 138 which we discussed earlier. And like 138, it's one of the "great" sonnets.

The contrast between the Youth and the Dark Lady is most vivid here, "The better angel is a man right fair,
The worser spirit a woman, colour’d ill." The woman is saddled with all the negative imagery possible, including VD in line 14. This is another sonnet discussing the affair between the Youth and the Dark Lady. The Poet blames the Dark Lady, never the Youth.

This sonnet is a major reason why I have contended that to the Poet sex is sin. The Youth, as far as the Poet is concerned, is pure love without any sexual overtones. The Dark Lady is nothing but sex. To me, it seems to make a lot more sense if I interpret it that way.

[shaxper]

What strikes me most about this sonnet is how the youth and dark lady are made to be embodiments of his male and female qualities. The male qualities are virtue and purity, while the female qualities are lustfulness and damnation, quite in keeping with English Renaissance sensibilities.

I wonder too, if his "angel" turned "fiend" might be the fear that he may become lustful towards the youth; becoming so corrupted by the dark lady that she corrupts his innocent love for the youth. Though I don't outright advocate the idea that Shakespeare was bisexual, the possibility does exist.

[Harry]

I don't know. I just don't find too many places where Shakespeare feared sexuality. We may wonder what that sexuality might have been, and I agree that neither homo- nor bi- is a correct description, but it wasn't in doubt in Shakespeare's mind.

And yes, that attitude toward male and female was a common one. I can find roots in medieval courtly love and in the New Testament, but the Renaissance added the rediscovery of classical texts which also played into this.

[shaxper]

Well, his fearing sexuality may not be the result of a healthy stance on the issue. In fact, if it was, there'd be no conflict with the dark lady. Sexuality is feared precisely because it is enticing and powerful. If it can corrupt the poet in one relationship, why not the other?

As for Shakespeare's take on sexuality, we still have no way of knowing how much of this is autobiographical. I personally choose to believe that the sentiments (if not the specific conflicts) come from within because they ring so powerfully and true, but there's no way to tell. Shakespeare may have simply been writing what his patron desired to read. In a sense, these Dark Lady/Youth poems read like Elizabethan moralities: Reject the sex and take up the pure love.

[Harry]

That's it, of course. Love good--sex bad. It fit in so well that it is hard to believe it wasn't intended.

But, yes, we don't know. That is what makes the wholle question fascinating. And, it certainly sounds like authentic emotion. But wasn't Shakespeare rather good at that in his plays?

I don't know--no one knows--just how autobiographical the sonnets are. They do seem awfully real.

[shaxper]

If they didn't, we wouldn't be reading them now

[The_Turtle]

I can't exactly follow you two. Do you claim that the youth and the lady represent the concepts of love and sex? That somehow Shsp makes them into symbols of chastity versus carnal love? That would explain why the love between men is purer because (shoving aside the entire homosexuality-issue) there is no sex involved. The poetry of WW I comes to mind.

[shaxper]

The_Turtle said:

I can't exactly follow you two. Do you claim that the youth and the lady represent the concepts of love and sex? That somehow Shsp makes them into symbols of chastity versus carnal love? That would explain why the love between men is purer because (shoving aside the entire homosexuality-issue) there is no sex involved. The poetry of WW I comes to mind.

Well I'm hesitant to claim anything in a Shakespeare sonnet with any certainty, but that is the jist of our little theoretical discussion. It's a neat little division: youth is pure love, completely devoid of sex, and the dark lady is complete lust with very little romantic love involved. The poet fears that the Dark Lady is corrupting im with lustfulness, so it stands to reason that the poet's love for the youth (which seems to be a symbol of all things pure within him) is also corrupted by this. Perhaps this is an indication that Shakespeare was confused and plagued by homosexual desires, though it isn't irrefutably clear.


Good to see you back, by the way!

[The_Turtle]

It is good to BE back, Shaxper. I lost touch when the posts on this board took a dramatic drop (pun intended)

What I am afraid of is that the discussion keeps fading in an exposition of polarities, or rather opposites. The youth and the lady can be discussed in a wide variety of these: love/lust, dark/light, intellect/sensuality, male/female, good/evil. What will happen, I fear, is that in the end we find ourselves in the middle of an enormous accumulation of symbolical meaning attached to the characters of the fair friend and the dark lady. This leads to a nice profile of the two personalities (with regard to the poet) of a 'supersonnetal' nature that in my experience obscures the joy to be found in each sonnet individually. Nevertheless, in this message I myself am at fault since I say nothing of either metrical quirks or Freudian wordplay. Perhaps I shall be back to correct my wrongs.

[shaxper]

(Yes. The Board has been rather "slow" as of late. I hope that changes)

As for your concerns about "supersonnetal" readings, we are, of course, just "shooting the breeze"; thinking out loud about what may or may not have existed in an intensely complex poem. It's always been my experience that I could walk away from a movie moved and crying while simotaneously deconstructing symbolic and thematic intent on the part of the director. An intellectual meaning doesn't need to override an emotional one. In fact, in the best of cases, an intellectual reading can bring about even more emotional power to the work. The poet, struggling with inner vices brought out by the dark lady and interfering with a perfect non-sexual love that he allows to represent all the goodness within him hits me like a ton of bricks.

Nevertheless, if the discussion is begining to feel like a runaway train to you, distancing us from the impact of the sonnet, feel free (if not compelled), to put us back on track. Bring up the points you'd like to raise about this sonnet, even if they're simply feeling and intuition. Personally, I'd love to see this sonnet through your eyes, so please indulge us

[The_Turtle]

Well, I'll give it a shot. It suddenly struck me that the line
"I guess one angel in another’s hell" might have a sexual overtone. The Dutch word 'Angel' (meaning 'Sting'(of a bee)) is sometimes used as a synonym for the male sex organ and perhaps Shakespeare meant it that way. When 'hell' is etymologically related to 'hole' my smutty metaphor is complete. The 'fire' in the last line could then be a venereal disease which -if I remember correctly- has been attributed to the Lady on more than one occasion.

Another thing I'd like to point out is the lady's supposed preoccupation with winning both men to hell. Does Shsp simply mean that she causes them to despair or does she really corrupt them? That would be a counterargument to their being in a homosexual affair, because in that time that would have been a certain passport to hell, right? So, they would already have been headed for damnation, no matter what some evil female would do unto them.

[Ganymede]

I read this sonnet to be about the Dark Lady corrupting the Youth, wooing him and thus damning him, much in the same way the Dark Lady attempts to woo and damn the speaker himself. Men in that time were told to be wary of women, who were symbolically tied to evil and the devil. Men, as men, were "naturally" closer to God.

The Renaissance view of homosexuality is complicated, mostly by the fact that homosexuality did not exist as it does today. Of course, acts that our society would label as homosexual did occur, but the label did not carry to those who acted. Actions themselves were symbolic-- whether you were the penetrator or the one being penetrated made a difference. Hence, young boys (youths) were seen as subordinate and in sexual congress stereotypically would play the submissive role (the role that women played as well). While such actions were frowned upon, it was not because of the act itself, but because of what it meant symbolically. The one being penetrated would be effeminized. Working in the opposite direction, Renaissance play boys who played women's roles were effeminized by their female garb and hence could be seen as wanton play-things for grown men.

Some people may have even seen sex between men (or between a man and a boy) as better than that between a man and a woman because a woman's body was seen as evil, and as having the power to corrupt and taint that of a man.

[shaxper]

The_Turtle said:

Well, I'll give it a shot. It suddenly struck me that the line
"I guess one angel in another’s hell" might have a sexual overtone. The Dutch word 'Angel' (meaning 'Sting'(of a bee)) is sometimes used as a synonym for the male sex organ and perhaps Shakespeare meant it that way. When 'hell' is etymologically related to 'hole' my smutty metaphor is complete. The 'fire' in the last line could then be a venereal disease which -if I remember correctly- has been attributed to the Lady on more than one occasion.

Another thing I'd like to point out is the lady's supposed preoccupation with winning both men to hell. Does Shsp simply mean that she causes them to despair or does she really corrupt them? That would be a counterargument to their being in a homosexual affair, because in that time that would have been a certain passport to hell, right? So, they would already have been headed for damnation, no matter what some evil female would do unto them.

Pretty good for "giving it a shot", I'd say Most of your argument makes a tremendous amount of sense. I'd add the "women as death's head" to your interpretation though; the idea that women were naturally sexual temptresses. Women = Sex = Death and damnation. Pretty straightforward for Renaissance sensibilities. Since the Dark Lady is apparently indiscriminately active, this only makes her worse. The lust and temptation she brings are the true enemy. Ganymede's reading makes a lot of sense too, of course. Either (and possibly both) are possible.

I suppose that leaves us with two good questions though:

1. IS she tempting the poet, or is he merely tempted and attributing these womenly temptress qualities to her?

2. Is she tempting both the Youth and the Poet, or is her tempting the poet affecting his relationship with the Youth? Traditionally, I believe the first choice is the preferred one. Other sonnets cover similar ground, though that doesn't eliminate the second possibility in this particular sonnet.


And again The_Turtle, if you feel like switching gears and talking more about emotional response rather than intellectual, feel free to do so! We're not a bunch of scholarly snobs here (at least not yet .

[MelanieS]

Here's some banal input from me.


TWO loves I have of comfort and despair
Which like two spirits do suggest me still:

-This "I" is Will, his two loves are his pal and
-the Dark Lady he is in love with:

The better angel is a man right fair,
The worser spirit a woman, colour’d ill.

-To win me soon to hell, my female evil
-Tempteth my better angel from my side,

In order to torture me, the woman "hits
on" my pal, trying to break up our mate-pal
friendship

-And would corrupt my saint to be a devil,
-Wooing his purity with her foul pride.

He was a regular cool guy, and my best pal,
now he's only thinking of her and our friendship
is shot to pieces.

-And whether that my angel be turn’d fiend
-Suspect I may, yet not directly tell;

I'm not sure they're really having an affair,
I think so, but can't be sure.

-But being both from me, both to each friend,
-I guess one angel in another’s hell:

But I suppose both are suffering from guilt,
not least because they are betraying me

-Yet this shall I ne’er know, but live in doubt
-Till my bad angel fire my good one out.

Says it all.

Yes, I know. I'm crude and banal.

MelanieS

[shaxper]

Actually, that was pretty good! That's how it's traditionally interpreted by most. Shaky's pretty dense though, so sometimes you have to just get to the heart of it in order to understand it, like you've done

Personally, once I figure out what's going on, I just have fun trying to play with other possibilities. Maybe he ALSO meant this or that? It's more of a game than anything, but his sonnets are so dense and calculated that I often wonder if he didn't have other meanings in mind, as well!

Thanks for the translation!