Sonnet 129

If you’re of a mind to, read both these sonnets slowly. Which one do you prefer?


1.

Th’ expense of Spirit in a waste of shame
Is lust in action; and till action, lust
Is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame,
Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust;
Enjoy’d no sooner but despised straight;
Past reason hunted; and, no sooner had,
Past reason hated, as a swallow’d bait
On purpose laid to make the taker mad:
Mad in pursuit, and in possession so;
Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme;
A bliss in proof, and proved, a very woe;
Before, a joy proposed; behind, a dream.
All this the world well knows; yet none knows well
To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.


2.

Th’ expence of Spirit in a waste of shame
Is lust in action, and till action, lust
Is periurd, murdrous, blouddy full of blame,
Sauage extreame, rude, cruell, not to trust,
Inioyd no sooner but dispised straight,
Past reason hunted, and no sooner had
Past reason hated as a swollowed bayt,
On purpose layd to make the taker mad.
Made In pursuit and in possession so,
Had, hauving, and in quest, to haue extreame,
A blisse in proofe and proud and very wo,
Before a ioy proposd behind a dreame,
All this the world well knowes yet none knowes well,
To shun the heauen that leads men to this hell.


The first version is a modernized version of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 129. Editors over the centuries have updated much of the original spelling and punctuation seen in version 2. As a result, subtle and perhaps not-so-subtle changes in meaning have been forced upon the poem, which now has veered somewhat from what Shakespeare had intended.

So argue Robert Graves and Laura Riding in a short essay entitled “A Study in Original Punctuation and Spelling,” found in the back of my softcover version of the Sonnets. (My book has the poems in their original punctuation and spelling.)

Now, I’m a word nerd, and I read this essay enraptured. The authors begin by discussing the importance of punctuation and spelling, and to punctuate this they spell out the meaning behind a poem of e. e. cummings. You know, that dude we all read in grammar school whose poems never have capitals and often form pictures the way the words and sentences are laid out on a page, and so forth.

But to return to Shakespeare, let’s compare the two versions of Sonnet 129. I ain’t no English lit major, so I’m not going to deconstruct either version. Look up the essay if you’re into that sort of thing; again, I found it interesting, I thought they made their points. I prefer version 2, and I’ll offer some notes from the essay.


- Elizabethans had no typographical v, thus heaven is heauan and savage is sauage. Good to know. On first reading I had some doubts. Perhaps Shakespeare was coining new words or bringing words in from French or something. Perhaps he’s using an Old English word no longer in use. Or maybe it’s the queer spelling of the time. Now you and I know.

- Without knowledge of that u-v thing, however, that proud in line 11 is read as “proud” and not “proved.” Let the reader beware.

- Swallow’d needs to remain swallowed, with the note that Shakespeare often intended the –ed suffix to be a separate syllable. Thus, it should be a three-syllable word, not a two-syllable word some future editor changed it to.

- How much better is the word “murdrous” than the word “murderous”? To me, the former, found in version 2, contains a note of primal menace not found in its later equivalent. Know what I’m saying?

- How about that word “blouddy”? According to the authors of the essay, it should sound more like “blue dye” than our word which sounds like “bluddy.” Immediately I’m transplanted into Elizabethan England pronouncing that word in the original.

- See where that editor put a comma after “bloody”? I like version 2 much better. Compare “blouddy full of blame” to “bloody, full of blame.” Different shading, no?

And on and on. The authors of the essay go in and mention about twenty or thirty more instances.

But they’re preaching to the choir. Me.