April 23rd, 2013 → 6:09 am @ Lea // No Comments

It’s Shakespeare’s birthday today, or at least, we think it’s his birthday today.  The earliest record we have of a William Shakespeare in Stratford-upon-Avon is of a baptism on April 26, and assuming he was born just a few days before the ceremony (as was custom), the logical deduction is that today is most likely his birthday.  Anyhow, in honor of William Shakespeare’s (likely) birthday, I thought I’d quote Sonnet 105 in full, where the bard talks about idolatry, and how a lover should not idolize his love, although by the end of the Sonnet, that is exactly what he is doing!

“Let not my love be called idolatry,
Nor my beloved as an idol show,
Since all alike my songs and praises be
To one, of one, still such, and ever so.
Kind is my love today, tomorrow kind,
Still constant in a wondrous excellence;
Therefore my verse, to constancy confined,
One thing expressing, leaves out difference.
‘Fair, kind, and true’ is all my argument,
‘Fair, kind, and true,’ varying to other words;
And in this change is my invention spent,
Three themes in one, which wondrous scope affords.
   ‘Fair,’ ‘kind,’ and ‘true’ have often live alone,
   Which three till now never kept seat in one.” – Sonnet 105