I admit I've never been a fan of Shakespeare. I took a course in college on all his literary works and I swear the only thing that got me through it was Sparknotes; I just couldn't grasp the language. But the first time I read and really understood Hamlet's to be or not to be soliloquy, I had to pause for a minute, it was practically spiritual.
Likewise, Yeats: the Second Coming, or Tennyson: Flower in the Crannied Wall, Blake: Auguries of Innocence, Shakespeare: Sonnet 94.. I could go on but I won't. I swear, every one of them gives me chills.
Or let's talk romance. Case in point, Shakespeare: Sonnet 97, or better yet, Sonnet 116. Or John Donne: The Good-Morrow, Edmund Spenser: One Day I Wrote Her Name, Elizabeth Browning: How do I love thee?
You just don't get poetry like this anymore. Let's allow the romantic in us to imagine, for a minute, that each of these poems was written to some lucky lady. And then I think of the boys I know, and can't imagine any one of them writing anything so beautiful. Sure, I've had letters written to me that made me go all gooey, and my ex even wrote me a song, but when you look at not just the depth of emotion, but the beautiful use of language, the allegories, the wit and perception that are such a part of the poems of yore, your modern man can't hold a candle to it.
And it really makes you wonder, is romance dead? Have we, with all our social norms and 'advanced ways', programmed the romance out of us? Roses are cliche, poetry is for pansies, and the most expensive gift trumps the most thoughtful gift. Or maybe language is dead? Why say "I love thee to the level of every day's most quiet need, by sun and candlelight" when a simple ilu is so much faster and only 3 characters long? I can't help but look scornfully at the girls who get giddy over a <3. How easily pleased we are..
It's a little hard not to feel a wee pang of regret for the romance of times gone by.
6 comments:
haha well it's a valid point u make.. i feel that perhaps poetry has 'evolved' and some of the new adaptations have sort of lost the plot.. its like modern art - i know it's taken great effort and someone probably loves it, but it just looks like a mess at first glance..
though perhaps expecting the men in ur life to compare to greats like shakespeare is perhaps expecting too much..
what?? im just saying...... :P
Yeah, like Gehan said, you're comparing the greatest literary minds with your network of dudes. Hardly a fair comparison :P In any case, I doubt they were as deeply appreciated then as they are now. The world moves on. Maybe people in the 22nd century will be all gooey over Justine Bieber's songs? Stranger things have happened.
Well i'm sure to some people Shakespeare was just 'one of the guys' too!
i thik i get what you mean. i'm yet to find a modern poet who inspires the way these really old fellas do.
Totally agree with Delilah. There are few modern poets to compare with those. :)
I have to say Shakespeare's sonnets made my mouth water. And I loved all those other poets.
There is something prohibitive about our attitude to poetry in this age, don't you think? Nobody writes it and it's become this thing that no one reads unless it's part of your texts? Or maybe that is my perception of the perception of poetry!
And yes, one never knows who is going to become the next great poet. Emily Dickinson lived her entire life as an eccentric recluse writing poetry in bits of paper and no one knew of her stuff till she died ;)That said, I am not much into reading the poetry of all and sundry either!
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