Bardisms (19 page)

Some details:

The image of Richard’s heart beating in Lady Anne’s chest has Shakespeare all over it. This trope—call it cardiac swap—appears a few times in the plays and gets developed at length in a handful of the sonnets. What’s marvelous about it is that at the same time as being ravishingly romantic, it’s also quite grotesque. My heart is in your chest? Then what’s keeping me alive? And what’s happened to your heart? And how did this transplant happen? Did some Elizabethan Dr. Jarvik come along and hack you open while you weren’t looking? It must have been painful. It must have been bloody. Richard’s facility with bizarre and surprising images like this one is part of his charm, and is central to his audacity and inexhaustible self-confidence. Shakespeare’s facility with such images is what makes him so hair-raisingly brilliant and so thoroughly indelible.

SHAKESPEARE ON WEDDINGS

As the ox hath his bow, sir, the horse his curb, and the falcon her bells, so man hath his desires; and as pigeons bill, so wedlock would be nibbling.

—T
OUCHSTONE
,
As You Like It
, 3.3.66–68

If there’s one occasion for which Shakespeare is truly well suited, it’s a wedding. Nearly a third of his plays include one, or at least end with the coming together of a couple or two who will soon be headed for one. Here are three pieces of Shakespeare all eminently suitable for reading during the marriage ceremony, or for accompanying a raised glass at the reception, plus one excerpt to ensure the party is a properly raucous affair.
*

A WEDDING TOAST

The standard Bardism for a wedding is this well-known poem that confers a lush and romantic blessing on the couple exchanging vows by exalting their love as true, devoted, and everlasting.

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove:

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark 5

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark,

Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.

Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

Within his bending sickle’s compass come: 10

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

—S
ONNET
116

In other words:

I don’t want to consider even for a moment that anything whatsoever might somehow block the union of two true-minded people. Love isn’t really love if it changes when circumstances change, or if it yields to some attractive temptation. No way!

Love is a permanent beacon, a lighthouse erected forever, that withstands storms without suffering any damage. Love is the North Star that helps every lost little boat navigate its way. (We might be able to determine precisely where in the sky that star is located, but we can’t begin to measure its value or the full force of its astrological influence.)
*

Love’s not susceptible to time’s ravages, although Father Time can indeed undo a person’s youthful beauty. Love isn’t changed by such little things as hours and weeks; love endures until doomsday itself.

If I’m wrong about all this and you can prove it, then I’m no writer, and no person has ever truly been in love.

How to say it:

The presence of the word
marriage
in this sonnet’s first line is not the only reason it’s so frequently read at weddings. Another is its opening idea,
Let me not…admit impediments
. Many commentators note that this is a direct reference to the part of the marriage service when the officiant asks, in that line so familiar from a million movies, if anyone present knows any reason why this couple should not be joined in matrimony. The speaker of this sonnet answers by saying, “May I never even acknowledge the
possibility
that two such well-matched people might have some reason not to be married!” Keep that in mind when you speak this Bardism. Imagine that the minister or rabbi or justice of the peace has just this minute asked that familiar question. You know this couple well, and you think that the notion of an impediment to this marriage is simply outrageous. This couple’s minds are too true and their love is too deep to be affected by any obstacle. After all, you know something not only about these two people, but about love itself. You’re a writer—a poet, to be exact—and you’ve been around. You’ve traveled (specifically, by boat), you’ve lived a while, you’ve observed others in love, and you’ve loved, too. You therefore know that true love is constant. And you believe this so firmly that you’re willing to announce it to the entire world.

The verbs, as always, are crucial.
Let, admit, alters, finds, bends, remove, fixèd, looks, shaken, wand’ring, taken, come, alters, bears, proved, writ, loved
, and, of course, many occurrences of
is
. Try the sonnet one time through, concentrating in particular on the expressive power of these vivid words.

Next, take a look at the words that come at the end of each line. Read them aloud:
minds, love, finds, remove, mark, shaken, bark, taken, cheeks, come, weeks, doom, proved, loved
. Now read the sonnet again, emphasizing this list. You’ll find that the sense of the sonnet starts to emerge much more clearly, because, as a general rule, the energy of each line of Shakespearean verse drives toward the idea at its end.

What’s more, you’ll now hear very clearly that there’s a rhyme scheme in this sonnet. The first and third lines of each quatrain, or set of four lines, rhyme with each other, as do the second and fourth lines of each quatrain, and the sonnet ends with a rhyming couplet. (Each of Shakespeare’s sonnets follows this scheme.) Try to let your audience hear the rhymes, but don’t hit them so hard that the sense of the words disappears. (The sonnet has two almost-but-not-quite rhymes:
love
and
remove
, and
come
and
doom
. These are called
near rhymes
. Don’t worry about forcing them to rhyme perfectly; just say them as they naturally sound.)

Remember to stress the contrasting terms:
alters
versus
bends
;
finds
versus
remove
;
worth
versus
height
;
Love’s
versus
time’s
;
alters
versus
bears
;
I never writ
versus
no man ever loved
; and, in line 2, oddly enough,
Love
versus
love
!

Finally, really dig into some of the sounds of the words themselves:

• Impediments
  is, with its four consonant-filled syllables, a long and hefty word. Make each syllable count, letting the weight of the word help infuse it with a sense of irony: as forbidding and formidable as they may sound,
  im-ped-i-ments
  have no standing in the face of this glorious union of true minds.
  
• Let the rich and soothing
  -ar
  sounds in
  mark
  ,
  star
  , and
  bark
  be nice and luxurious, suggesting how reassuring and permanent love is, particularly in contrast with the skimpy and tumultuous sounds of
  tempests
  and
  worth’s unknown
  .
  
• Allow those
  s
  sounds in
  rosy lips
  ,
  cheeks
  ,
  sickle’s compass
  ,
  hours
  , and
  weeks
  , which so vividly describe the sharp swipe of time’s cutting scythe, to contrast as fully as possible with the long, melodic vowels of
  bears
  ,
  out
  ,
  doom
  , and of course,
  love
  .
  
• Finish strong by giving each word in line 14, most of which are monosyllables, as much weight as you can:
  I. Never. Writ. Nor. No. Man. Ever. Loved.
  

This sonnet works just fine spoken on its own. But if you want to give it a bit of context or make a few brief introductory remarks, here are some approaches:

• You might comment on how your friends are ideally matched, and in that sense are indeed a “marriage of true minds,” and on how you’re certain that theirs will be an everlasting love.
  
• You could talk about how every marriage is like an ocean voyage. There are thrills and also challenges, exciting times as well as routine ones, many ups and plenty of downs. But when true love is the star by which the ship navigates, then the challenges, doldrums, and difficulties are far less significant.
  
• You could present yourself as an expert on love who’s been asked to comment on today’s marriage, and you could joke that these are some of your jottings on the matter.