Shakespeare’s sonnets are difficult poems. I’ve been working on them for a number of years now, to produce an edition. Often, you think that you’ve understood them, but then – as you start modernising spelling and punctuation, and trying to pin down what each word signifies – the meaning starts to slip away from you, or become more complicated. What remain, however, are striking images seared into the memory: summer blossoms battered by spring winds; ruins; autumn trees, stripped of leaves; waves beating on a pebbled shore; love as a fever from which the sufferer does not want to be cured, or a prison to which they have committed themselves. This project uses images as a way of responding to Shakespeare’s sonnets. Three different groups (graduates of Storying Sheffield, residents of Painted Fabrics Sheltered Housing, and participants the Youth Justice System training scheme) have worked with me, an artist (Annie Beech), and three poets (Mark Doyle, Sally Goldsmith, and Ella Kent) to produce visual and verbal responses to Shakespeare’s sonnets. In particular, we focused on those which portray the passing of time, or which depict the way that it is possible to be caught between attraction to, and repulsion from, a lover who is neither trustworthy nor conventionally beautiful. Many thanks to Luisa Golob and Cassie Kill from Art in the Park, who have collaborated on this project; the Faculty of Arts and Humanities at the University of Sheffield, which funded these activities through the Arts Enterprise scheme; the artist and poets, Annie, Mark, Sally, and Ella; our volunteers, Matt Harris, Alex Mack, and Ellie Smale; Carol Fordham (from the Youth Offending Team) and Ann Bradshaw (from Sheffield Homes). However, the biggest thanks of all goes to the participants: Peter Frith, Kay Hudson, Karen Leger, and Neil Simpson; Mavis Biggerstaff, Gladys Dowling, Marjorie Potts, Mary Pridmore, Esme Race, Margaret Rush, and Aileen Trott; and Adam, Ashley, Danny, James, Kasim, Luke, Paul, and Theo. ‘You shall shine bright... in these contents’.

Cathy Shrank

University of Sheffield June 2012

Talking to Shakespeare, 2012

Nah then lad!

Put down tha tranklements, tha books, tha quill,

sit thissen dahn, sit thissen still.

Dus tha want a cuppa, I’ll mash!

What were tha on abaht in all them sonnets?

Girded? We’d say togged and tarted up,

but not in doublets and hose –

just flat caps, pinnies, ordinary clothes.

Besmeared? We’d say mucky –

nah, wipe tha feet –

dun’t traipse mud across floor,

t’owd lass cleaned up afore you come.

Yer not much different to Yorkshire folk

Come in, enjoy a laugh and a joke!

Residents and neighbours of Painted Fabrics

The Allotment

We had an allotment at Rivelin –

there was the river for the kids to paddle in,

to catch tadpoles.

He grew chrysanths –

I loved the yellow ones, the bronze ones.

People used to buy them –

Can we buy some off you?

We used to go on the tram.

We once had a picnic up there –

Mum made Sunday dinner on a primus stove.

Esme Race

Sonnet 1

From fairest creatures we desire increase, That thereby beauty’s rose might never die, But as the riper should by time decease, His tender heir might bear his memory: But thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes, Feed’st thy light’s flame with self-substantial fuel, Making a famine where abundance lies, Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel. Thou that art now the world’s fresh ornament, And only herald to the gaudy spring, Within thine own bud buriest thy content, And, tender churl, mak’st waste in niggarding: Pity the world, or else this glutton be,

To eat the world’s due, by the grave and thee.

William Shakespeare

Peace

I love Kew –

you go over the top, down the path, turn off to the left

and there is the Chinese House – pale wood.

Going in, it’s tranquil, I feel at peace.

It is simple,

I can sit in there and relax.

Mary Pridmore

Cornwall

Cornwall is my favourite place on Earth –

I sketch there.

Go along the country lane, then park the car,

walk as far as you like –

over the headland from Newquay

via West Pentire to Crantock.

There are yellow flowers and red poppies,

I’m stunned by carpets of these flowers.

Breathtaking!

Aileen Trott

Measuring time

We measure time

clock the hands and face

of our loves

mark the rate of steady decay

beauty is eternal

once it is captive

love conquers all

we cannot say

the same of us.

Neil Simpson

Sonnet 12

When I do count the clock that tells the time, And see the brave day sunk in hideous night; When I behold the violet past prime, And sable curls are silvered o’er with white; When lofty trees I see barren of leaves, Which erst from heat did canopy the herd, And summer’s green all girded up in sheaves Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard: Then of thy beauty do I question make That thou among the wastes of time must go, Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake, And die as fast as they see others grow,

And nothing ’gainst Time’s scythe can make defence Save breed to brave him, when he takes thee hence.

William Shakespeare

A year in your company

Elderflower tree of our garden end

Big, strong; holding life

As I labour

Aghast and aglow.

Buds push

Bursting forth

And I labour

Your bark sustains me.

The sky fills with leaves

Your flowers

Heaven’s scent floods my nostrils,

I get drunk on your champagne.

Berries plump,

Leaves turn crisp

And fall

And fall.

A year

Your shadow

Canvas to a life.

Ellie Smale

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer’s lease hath all too short a date; Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimmed, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature’s changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st; Nor shall Death brag thou wand’rest in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st.

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

William Shakespeare

Spring Promises

Spring Promises

Have Shortcomings

Frost in May

Grey Days

Summer’s Whisper

Quietened

Likewise

Bright January Day

Spring up False Hopes

Making Dead Promises.

Every Season

Issues Hope and Threats

In Turn

There is no Growth

Without Decline

Nor Decline

Without Growth.

They are Nature’s

Twins,

Both Born within

Us.

Neil Simpson

Learning to Dance

I loved dancing at Fred Holmes’,

top of Wood Street.

Upstairs there was a dance hall,

snooker underneath.

I went every night but Sunday.

I loved the tango, the foxtrot,

did a lot of jitterbugging.

During the war they took the railings down

round Hillsborough Park.

When we were in our early teens, we got in –

learned to dance on the bowling green in the dark –

one, two, together.

Esme Race

Sonnet 55

Not marble, nor the gilded monuments Of princes shall outlive this pow’rful rhyme, But you shall shine more bright in these contents Than unswept stone, besmeared with sluttish time. When wasteful war shall statues overturn, And broils root out the work of masonry, Nor Mars his sword, nor wars quick fire shall burn The living record of your memory. ’Gainst death and all oblivious enmity Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room, Ev’n in the eyes of all posterity That wear this world out to the ending doom.

So, till the judgement that yourself arise, You live in this, and dwell in lovers’ eyes.

William Shakespeare

Sixty years

Sixty years have turned

– Fair to Grey –

– Blue to Pale –

– Future to past –

– First to last –

and time made still of hectic days.

Peter Frith

Sonnet 60

Like as the waves make t’wards the pebbled shore, So do our minutes hasten to their end, Each changing place with that which goes before, In sequent toil all forwards do contend. Nativity, once in the main of light, Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crowned Crookèd eclipses ’gainst his glory fight, And Time that gave doth now his gift confound. Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth, And delves the parallels in beauty’s brow, Feeds on the rarities of nature’s truth, And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow. And yet to times in hope my verse shall stand, Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.

William Shakespeare

Blowing a dandelion clock

1 – A full head of hair

2 – snipped into an asymetric youthful cut

3 – now reveals itself as a receeding hairline

4 – which can now only be described as baldness

5 – a fringe remains around the back of your head.

6 – A single strand stands alone

7 – The clock stopped at 7 o’clock

Kay Aitch

The songster sings still

The songster sings still,

Tyres roll lightly on tar

The songster sings louder

The tyres are silent

The peace shattered with broken springs and rattle.

The songster finds his mate

and together they sing.

I hear your voice! I am

Listening!

This din!

This moment!

Songster made silent of time

still singing in a hollow of quiet. –

Peter Frith

Sonnet 73

That time of year thou mayst in me behold When yellow leaves, or none, or few do hang Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang. In me thou seest the twilight of such day As after sunset fadeth in the west, Which by and by black night doth take away, Death’s second self that seals up all in rest. In me thou seest the glowing of such fire That on the ashes of his youth doth lie, As the death-bed, whereon it must expire, Consumed with that which it was nourished by.

This thou perceiv’st, which makes thy love more strong, To love that well, which thou must leave ere long.

William Shakespeare

On the wall

there’s a painting of Lockerbrook Farm –

my husband was warden there before we married.

I hadn’t had much to do with the country –

I’d never camped in my life!

I went as a volunteer.

The first morning I got up,

made a drink,

went out of the front door

which overlooked Ladybower.

I thought “Where is it?”

Mist and cloud in the bottom.

As the day went on it lifted –

and there it was!

His ashes are going back there –

That’s where you’re going Dad,

you’re going back to Lockerbrook!

Mary Pridmore

Compliments to my lover

His hair is not to be ignored

Big, solid, clumpy,

As wonderful as cauliflower!

With hair like this I never shall be bored.

His singing

Ah! Joyous and full of life!

Twists and burns, stroke and burns,

Cutting like a knife.

Ellie Smale

Sonnet 130

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips’ red; If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks, And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound; I grant I never saw a goddess go: My mistress when she walks treads on the ground. And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare.

William Shakespeare

After Shakespeare, Sonnet 130

Her eyes are as green as the tops of

Plastic semi-skimmed milk bottles,

Her skin is as smooth as in those

Adverts for smooth skin; her hair is

A torrent of delicate chestnut

Splashing about her shoulders like

Something you'd see in a shampoo ad.

Her laugh is music as clear

As windows cleaned with Windex,

Her smile is as radiant

As one of those old-fashioned bulbs

(not the energy saving ones).

Her movements are graceful, rapid and light,

Like those new hoovers with the rotating ball mechanism.

Matt Harris

Your eyes are currants

Your eyes are currants

Bright, sharp, perhaps

a little dry.

A swan’s neck’s fine

But no good on you.

I can the difference

Between a waltz and a walk:

Your walk is fine.

Apples belong on trees

not cheeks.

Alabaster is good for

making statues,

too white and brittle

for you,

Mistress.

You are not

a Plastic Toy

nor Plaster Madonna.

Those are

Manufactured Goods

Blood flows through

You

More than a Work

of art.

Neil Simpson

eyes like spinning cartwheels in a lake

my gaze is sucked into the vortext, into the darkness of your

thoughts

the deep red labyrinths inside your head lure me in

a dense forest of thought I find there, shadows and twisted shapes

but in the centre I glimpse the sunshine that is at your heart.

Kay Aitch

Sonnet 144

Two loves I have, of comfort and despair, Which like two spirits do suggest me still: The better angel is a man right fair; The worser spirit, a woman coloured ill. To win me soon to hell, my female evil Tempteth my better angel from my [side] And would corrupt my saint to be a devil, Wooing his purity with her foul pride. And whether that my angel be turned fiend Suspect I may, yet not directly tell, But being both from me, both to each, friend, I guess one angel in another’s hell. Yet this shall I ne’er know, but live in doubt, Till my bad angel fire my good one out.

William Shakespeare

Two Loves I Have of Comfort and Despair (I)

Meet Jimmy, 34 years old. Fresh out of crack,

he hits up the street looking for a raise.

He finds a well dressed man in an alley.

Pulling out his knife, he moves in, but suddenly

his conscience comes into play…

Hey! Leave him! He’s an innocent man!

He’s worked hard to get his money!

And you don’t want to go to jail –

He looks defenceless!

Don’t listen, rob him.

You need the money for crack.

You’re a crack head and you need a hit.

But you don’t need to live like this,

you could go and get help,

have a better life, get healthy,

move abroad and run a cocktail bar by the sea.

You’re never going to go abroad.

You need the crack.

You’re living in fantasy land.

But you’ll save up cash from staying off crack!

Get clean! Get back to reality!

Two Loves I Have of Comfort and Despair (II)

Meet Tom, twenty-two years old.

Fed up with his girl,

he decides to pick up a hooker.

He approaches a girl on a corner,

invites her into his car,

but then has a sudden change of heart…

You don’t want to do this!

You might catch a disease,

and pass it on to your girl.

That would break her heart in two.

Hush your mouth!

You’re already here, just carry on.

And this girls hot,

you’ve gone too far to say no.

It’s wrong and you might get caught!

Then you will end up in jail.

Save the money, spend it on your girl,

take her to the flicks and get her nails done…

Yeah but then you’re still paying anyway,

you might not even get laid,

just get your money out

and pay that prossie next to you.

She’s dirty, you don’t want her,

think about diseases like Chlamydia.

Your girl deserves better,

and it’s not all about about the sex.

Two Loves I Have of Comfort and Despair (III)

Meet Stan, 19 years old.

Stranded in the suburbs after being let down by a friend,

he’s faced with a five mile walk home in the dark.

As he sets off, he passes a car that’s easy to break into.

Bending the door with his bare hands

all of a sudden he hears the voices of his conscience…

Hey! The walk would be better

than going to jail.

Don’t worry,

you’ll get away with it pal.

There’s always a chance

of getting caught.

Then drive through the field –

there’s no one there.

Don’t be daft

it’s more obvious to drive through the field.

Stop yapping

just go for it.

You’re a dumbass.

Sonnet 147

My love is as a fever longing still For that which longer nurseth the disease, Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill, Th’ uncertain sickly appetite to please. My reason, the physician to my love, Angry that his prescriptions are not kept, Hath left me, and I desperate now approve Desire is death, which physic did except. Past cure I am, now reason is past care, And frantic mad with evermore unrest; My thoughts and my discourse as madmen’s are, At random from the truth vainly expressed:

For I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright, Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.

William Shakespeare

Owl

I was a Brown Owl and a Tawny Owl.

If I were an animal I’d be an owl –

I don’t know why.

There’s something lovely about their faces

and I aspire to being wise.

Aileen Trott

From Venus and Adonis

Look, the world’s comforter, with weary gait, His day’s hot task hath ended in the west. The owl (night’s herald) shrieks, ’tis very late, The sheep are gone to fold, birds to their nest,

And coal-black clouds, that shadow heaven’s light, Do summon us to part, and bid goodnight.

William Shakespeare

Using Shakespeare to engage with young adults in the criminal justice system, my first priority was how to make the work meaningful and relevant to their lives. I chose to focus on Sonnet 144, where the narrator describes a love triangle consisting of himself and two angels: one god and one bad. The group engaged well with the idea that each individual has their own good and bad angels, like a good and bad conscience, who argue against each other to influence the individual about moral dilemmas. The group came up with scenarios, and then gave a voice to each angel as they argued their cases to persuade the individual of the best course of action. Ask yourself, in each case, whose voice is most persuasive? What choice did the narrator make in the end?

Mark Doyle

Some of the participants found the whole idea of reading Shakespeare and his archaic words – which most had not studied at school – quite a barrier. This led into a discussion about their own Sheffield language and how it also seemed to be dying out. I therefore decided to offer them the possibility of giving him a talking to in Yorkshire! Through this we were able to refer back to the sonnets, look at difficult words and meanings, and try to translate them, producing our own Yorkshire fourteen-line ‘sonnet’.

The other individual pieces of writing were composed orally. The sonnets we had looked at with Cathy were focused on place, memory, and the passing of time, and how they can live on through poetry. Speaking voices often have a natural poetry, and the words recorded here are lightly edited from the participants talking about places they loved, in order to preserve them.

Sally Goldsmith

The writing workshop explored poetic strategies used in two of the sonnets which participants had chosen to depict through their artwork the previous week: Sonnet 12 (‘When I do count the clock that tells the time’) and Sonnet 130 (‘My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun’). Sonnet 12 uses a variety of ways to show the passing of time; the group were asked to explore this idea in their own writing, using specific metaphors from the natural or urban landscape. Looking at Sonnet 130 and the way it describes the mistress against convention and resisting hyperbole, it becomes clear that some of the physical descriptions are downright odd. The group were asked to write a description of someone using this sort of opposition, exploring unconventional points of comparison between their subject and the material world.

Ella Kent