Did you know Shakespeare started writing the sonnets during Elizabethan lockdown?
All the theatres were shut because of plague.
So what’s a playwright to do?
Well, he penned Venus and Adonis, The Rape of Lucrece, and got started on his sonnet sequence.
I say “get started” because Shakespeare wrote the 154 sonnets over 2 decades.
I believe he wrote them in sequence, and I believe he wrote most of them during lockdown as England continuously shut down and reopened due to plague.
Although perhaps he didn’t write many sonnets in 1606, as that was the year he penned four of the greatest high tragedies in human history (including King Lear).
Were the sonnets addressed to a man or woman? Lover or patron?
This kind of academic gossip doesn’t interest me.
What interests me is how Shakespeare can say so much with so few words.
And my favourite sonnet of all is sonnet 29:
This video is my deep analysis of that sonnet, after 100-200, perhaps more, readings spread across my lifetime.
I’m always finding new things about about this sonnet, other sonnets, indeed the entirety of Shakespeare.
For just the reading alone, check out this video:
Also…
Have you listened to the latest Hardcore Literature Podcast?
It’s on Richard III.
Mild spoilers (though most know the story), so enjoy the play first before you listen.