Discover the true essence of beauty where it overlaps with truth in our latest journey, guided by the timeless words of William Shakespeare in Sonnet 54. Are you ready to redefine beauty in your life? Join us as we peel back the layers of this seemingly simple poem to reveal a world where outer attractiveness is harmoniously balanced by the integrity and truth that radiate from within.
This episode isn't just a literary discussion; it's an introspective exploration of our contemporary beliefs about beauty and personal values. Together, we dissect each line, translating Shakespeare's eloquent language into a vernacular that resonates with today's audience. The rose and its canker blooms become symbols in our conversation, starkly contrasting fleeting beauty with enduring allure. Embrace this opportunity to reflect on how the values you hold dear define your own beauty, both inside and out, in a session that promises enlightenment well beyond the verse.
Discover the true essence of beauty where it overlaps with truth in our latest journey, guided by the timeless words of William Shakespeare in Sonnet 54. Are you ready to redefine beauty in your life? Join us as we peel back the layers of this seemingly simple poem to reveal a world where outer attractiveness is harmoniously balanced by the integrity and truth that radiate from within.
This episode isn't just a literary discussion; it's an introspective exploration of our contemporary beliefs about beauty and personal values. Together, we dissect each line, translating Shakespeare's eloquent language into a vernacular that resonates with today's audience. The rose and its canker blooms become symbols in our conversation, starkly contrasting fleeting beauty with enduring allure. Embrace this opportunity to reflect on how the values you hold dear define your own beauty, both inside and out, in a session that promises enlightenment well beyond the verse.
How much more doth beauty?
Speaker 1:Beauty is seen by that sweet ornament which truth doth give. Welcome to the Troubadour show. And today I'm going to be giving you another poetry reading and analysis. This one is Sonnet 54 by William Shakespeare. This is considered one of his more simple, straightforward poems, but I don't think that means that it's less worthy or less important. In fact, I think there's a lot we can get out of this poem and understand about this poem and apply to our own everyday lives.
Speaker 1:Part of what he's trying to say is a thing and an idea that we often hear today, as beauty is on the inside, not the outside. Or better put, I think, is beauty should match Beauty on the outside. Should match beauty on the inside Doesn't always and he talks about this, of course, but it should. It should be a beautiful person on the outside should be beautiful on the inside, and a beautiful person on the inside should try to be as beautiful on the outside as they can. And this isn't necessarily a prescription on how to live or get cosmetic surgery, but it's more about a feeling that we have as lovers or as people who are dating somebody. Hopefully, you're dating someone that you find beautiful on the outside and the inside and on the inside what he means, and I'll just give you this and then I will read the text and then we'll discuss it more as we go. But he gives basically, truth and integrity are key elements of being on the inside. On the inside, a beautiful person, to have truth and integrity and that's a pretty tall order for a lot of people, I think being integrity, having integrity with your own set of values and living and breathing your own set of values and views and approaches to life, and then staying with that. And integrity means integrating those things into your life. Okay, so let me do a reading of the poem and then we'll go kind of line by line. If you don't understand everything, that's okay. Every day usage you're not talking in these and thou's and doth's and such. Doth basically just means does. But we'll go through this and I'll kind of translate, give you some understanding of it and give you some things hopefully to think about of this idea of beauty being on the inside and the outside. What can that look like? You know, we hear this all the time. What are different ways of thinking about it? Okay, so let's go through this poem. I'll, like I said, I'll read it and then we'll talk about it.
Speaker 1:How much more doth beauty, beauty assume by that sweet ornament which truth doth give. The rose looks fair, but fairer. We at deem for that sweet odor which doth in it. Live the canker. Blooms have full, as deep a dye as the perfumed tincture of the roses hang on such thorns and play as wand on Lee when summer's breath their basket buds discloses, but for their virtue only, as their show they live unwood and unrest facted fade, die to themselves. Sweet roses do not sell. Of their sweet deaths are sweetest odors made. And so of you beauty is lovely youth. When that shall vade by verse, distills your truth. Okay, so that's it. 14 lines, pretty simple.
Speaker 1:Now we start off with this. I think enigma, this odd way of putting words together when he starts oh, so there's this kind of lament oh, you hear the poets do that a lot like a sigh and exclamation oh, oh, oh, oh. How much more doth beauty, beauty is seen by that sweet ornament which truth doth give. Now we can look at that. As you know, beauty seems so much more beautiful when it comes with honesty and integrity. But doth does beauty, beauty a seam by that sweet ornament which truth gives. So, again, we think about an ornament, something you put on the outside, something you put on the outside of a building, of a tree, to make you look better. It's, it's surface level, it doesn't go deep. So we want something that's deeper. How much more there's something more does beauty beauty is. Beauty is obviously beautiful looking good, but beauty, beauty is. He's trying to put these two words together To help us think about these things as inside and outside. So let's keep going, because he's now he has this kind of enigmatic way of speaking and then he's gonna give us a metaphor To kind of break it down and think about it.
Speaker 1:So a metaphor is a comparison of things. So we have, when we start this, this metaphor off. The rose looks fair, but Farer we it deems. We deem roses even more fair. So we like what they look like. It's like oh, this is beautiful rose, why don't you have this? I give this to a lover, but it looks fairer. We, we as humans, deem it fair for that sweet odor which doth, which does in it live. So because there's this odor that lives inside the, the rose that is part of it. Think of it as the comparison is the, the odor is like the truth and integrity on the inside, the, the character, the internal soul of a person, and the outside is the rose, looks fair. So again, you have a person. Think of. The comparison is rose to person. Rose is beautiful on the outside. A person is beautiful on the outside. The person he's talking to in this poem, odor, is the, the comparison of the analogy, of the metaphor, the relationship. The thing inside the human is the soul, the thing that lives within the human, which is the soul, the things you have, the outside, excuse me, the fair, and the outside look external, you, or look, looks beauty, and then the inside, the sweet odor comparison. So think of those two compared. So that's what the beginning of this rose metaphors doing.
Speaker 1:Now he continues with the canker blooms have full, as deep a dye as the perfume tincture of the roses. Now, a canker bloom is something you should look up. If you don't know what that is, I didn't know it was. I'm not a botanist, so there's stuff I'm not as a lot of stuff I don't know. So a canker bloom is, apparently is something I don't know if they still use this terminology, but it's something that especially. It's another word for a wildflower, but he's calling it a canker. Think about, like a canker sore. This is a you know bad thing, but it's something that Will have the perfumed. It'll look, it'll have as deep of dye. So it looks like it's got the same coloring as A rose, as the perfume tincture of the roses.
Speaker 1:But here's we continue the poem. Hang on such thorns and play as wanton Lee when summer's breath their mask. But it discloses. So we have this canker blue, again the cankers. Not a good thing. So we we already know that this is no rose, something's wrong with this canker blue.
Speaker 1:But he says that this canker bloom, which are again wild flowers, they have as full, a deep a dye as the roses, as the perfumed roses. So they look as like them, or they have, you know, deep color. Like them, they have the thorns, they play out in the summer. When we look at them with summer's breath, breath when the masked buds are Disclosing, that means they're opening up because summertime. But so he continues and the stands up or in the poem, but for their virtue only is their show. They live unwound and unrespected, fade Dye to themselves, whoo.
Speaker 1:So he's saying again that these flowers, these canker flowers he's looking at, they may look a little bit like a rose. They may have some of the colorings of a rose, but they are going to die unwound and unrespected by themselves. No one is going to love, and whoo W, oh, seduce, use them as part of the the aspects of love, because they're unrespected or they're going to be Unrespected, they're going to die alone. Now you know we're not going to get into botany. You could find different types of flowers, but the bullet. You know there's value to the different types of flowers, but the point is making is again, rose as think of it in a General sense.
Speaker 1:We think of the rose as the epitome of Beauty in the flower world. Now, I know a lot of people who don't agree with that, and that's totally fine, but we're in a poetic world here. We're in the realm of Shakespeare's imagination. He's talking about kinkered blooms, so hopefully you're not as a fan of kinkered blooms. Maybe they, and part of why he's saying there's a difference, though, is that the rose has the beauty on the outside right, it's got the deep dye and it's got the perfume. That's the key. Just like, so, when you're looking at a beautiful person, you should look at somebody who's got the beautiful on the outside, and they have the truth and integrity on the inside. Now, you may think that that's really hard to find something like that, someone like that yeah, it kind of is, but you know that's, they're out there, and Shakespeare found one himself and wrote a poem to him. Okay, so we're gonna continue. So again, this kinkered bloom is like a rose because it has the outside look of beauty, but it doesn't have the inside Fragrance, so they're gonna die alone.
Speaker 1:Now, by the way, I think there is some truth to that, you know. I will just say that if you look at a person's life and you think, oh, look, how beautiful they are and they have all these great things, people love them, they have boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, wife, whatever, and but if you learn that they're a bad person on the inside, I promise you that if they don't figure out how to become a better person over time, at better characters, soul, truth, integrity they're a life on the inside, even if you don't see it, even if they're really good at their show and Shakespeare puts it, they would they are living a miserable life. They're just not showing a tea, you just don't see it. But on the inside and on the outside of their life, if you were to put be a fly on the wall. When there is no show, when there is no Instagram, their life is miserable. I Believe that very deeply, that that's very true, that the internal soul is very important to how you experience the world.
Speaker 1:Okay, so here's the finishing of the net in the next sentence. So you get in, these canker blooms die by themselves. And then he continues sweet roses do not so. Of their sweet deaths are sweetest odors made. So when a sweet rose dies, unlike when a canker bloom dies, the canker bloom dies by itself, unwound and unrespected, you know, because it doesn't have people, just let it rot on the ground because it doesn't have the inner fragrance. But a sweet rose, no, no, no. When they die there they release odors. Shakespeare saying I don't know if this is biologically true, but they release extra odors as they die and Because of that their deaths are sweet. And there's because of their sweetest odors.
Speaker 1:And then the last two lines, which are always very important to a Shakespearean sonnet is he's answering this kind of overall question about Integrity, the internal, the external. And so of you, beauty is in lovely youth. When that shall fade by verse distills your truth. And I think by that. He's saying Beauty is in lovely youth. When your outer beauty fades, your inner truth and integrity will be Distilled think about distilling flowers into perfume will be distilled by my poetry now, that's pretty, you know, bold of Shakespeare say that, but it's true, I think. And because we're talking about this person, this lovely youth from 1590 or, yeah, 1590s or early 1600s, hundreds of years later. So Shakespeare, kind of, was correct that the beauty faded on that person and people say that this was a young man that Shakespeare was infatuated with.
Speaker 1:But nevertheless, we're talking about this poem, and so the perfume, the inspiration that this beautiful Person had and again this applies to a human, male, female, whatever, who you can apply this in your life. Who is that person to you? Who do you know? That's beautiful on the outside and beautiful on the inside, where they have that inner truth, and this poem encapsulates that feeling you might have. Okay, so it's. Again, I think it's a very simple poem for a Shakespearean sonnet, but it's unlocked by reading the entire thing, by thinking about the metaphor, which is roses that look beautiful on the outside they're. The reason we love them is because they also have the fragrance inside, whereas a kinker bloom has only the outer and not the inner. Okay, so I hope you enjoyed that. That is another troubadour solo show and if you have any questions, please leave a comment or, you know, go to tribadourmagcom. Thank you so much. I'll see you next time.