SONNETS 70-81
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Sonnet 70
That thou art blamed shall not be thy defect,
For slander�s mark was ever yet the fair,
The ornament of beauty is suspect,
A Crow that flies in heaven�s sweetest air.
So thou be good, slander doth but approve,
Their worth the greater being wooed of time,
For Canker vice the sweetest buds doth love,
And thou present�st a pure unstained prime.
Thou hast passed by the ambush of young days,
Either not assailed, or victor being charged,
Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise,
To tie up envy, evermore enlarged,
If some suspect of ill masked not thy show,
Then thou alone kingdoms of hearts shouldst owe.
Sonnet 70 continues the argument of sonnet 69, where the meaning of truth
and beauty was inverted under the influence of the idealistic youth whose
outward �parts� need �nothing� to make them perfect. But because his deeds
were inconsistent when reviewed in other�s thoughts, his mind had the �rank
smell of weeds�. The contradiction has its counterpart in the belief in a male
God as an ideal being. When a male God represents absolute goodness, the
illogicality frequently surfaces in the believers� evil deeds. Angelo�s lust for
holy Isabella in Measure for Measure is to the point.
In sonnet 70, the Poet argues that it is not a �defect� if the youth is
�blamed� (70.1) for the inversion of truth and beauty. The logic of truth and
beauty entails that �slander� will always �mark� the �fair�, and the �ornament
of beauty� is always �suspect�. Such suspicion is like a black �crow� in �heaven�s
sweetest air� (70.4).
So the Poet encourages the youth to �be good� (70.5), because ironically
the outcome of the slander is to �approve� the greater worth of his �outward
parts�. Because �Canker� is attracted to the �sweetest buds� (70.7), youth�s
idealistic beauty presents an �unstained prime� or ideal target.
The Poet�s irony is revealed when he wonders how the youth could have
survived unstained through his �young days� (70.9). How is it his beauty was
not �assailed� or, as the �victor�, he was not �charged� (70.10)? The �praise�
the youth received �cannot be so thy praise� because the effect of his selfish
beauty is to generate �envy, evermore enlarged� (70.12).
In the couplet, the �kingdoms of hearts�would only be the youth�s if he
did not arouse suspicion by having his eyes �masked�. How can he be praised
when praise of the ideal is so easily unmasked? He would be ideal if he were
not so susceptible to ill praise. Both of the youth�s eyes, the mind�s eye and
the eye of Eros, need to be focused on the same goal for heart�s �thought�
and �beauty� of mind to be reconciled.
The �their� at 69.4 and 70.6 is changed to �thy�by most editors, who miss
the reference back to �those parts of thee� in 69.1. As they do not understand
the Sonnet logic, editors alter �their� to �thy� to reinforce the idea that
Shakespeare had an intimate relation with a youth of his acquaintance. By
contrast, the word �end� (69.3) seems to be a genuine mistake. As �n� could
be inverted to form �u� in Jacobean typesetting, and in a number of cases is
inverted accidentally in Shakespeare�s works, then �end� is a miss-setting of
the three letters for �due�. Unlike the emendations driven by the editors�
inadequate understanding of the Sonnet philosophy, the compositors mistake
is a believable error.
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Roger Peters Copyright © 2001
Introduction
1-9
10-21
22-33
34-45
46-57
58-69
70-81
82-93
94-105
106-117
118-129
130-141
142-153
154
Emendations
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