The Phoenix and the Turtle
The Phoenix and the Turtle (also spelled The Phœnix and the Turtle) is an allegorical poem by William Shakespeare, first published in 1601 as a supplement to a longer work, Love's Martyr, by Robert Chester. The poem, which has been called "the first great published metaphysical poem",[1] has many conflicting interpretations.[2] The title "The Phoenix and the Turtle" is a conventional label. As published, the poem was untitled. The title names two birds: the mythological phoenix and the turtle dove.
The poem describes a funeral arranged for the deceased Phoenix and Turtledove, to which some birds are invited, but others excluded. The Phoenix and Turtledove are emblems of perfection and of devoted love, respectively. The traditional attribute of the Phoenix is that when it dies, it returns to life, rising from the ashes of its prior incarnation; the Turtledove, by contrast, is mortal. The poem states that the love of the birds created a perfect unity which transcended all logic and material fact. It concludes with a prayer for the dead lovers.
Publication
The Phoenix and the Turtle was first published in 1601, as part of a collection of poems by different authors, including John Marston, George Chapman, and Ben Jonson, which was appended as a supplement to Love's Martyr, a long poem by Robert Chester printed by Richard Field for the London bookseller Edward Blount. The unused sheets of the first quarto were subsequently acquired by another publisher, Matthew Lownes, and reissued in 1611 under a different title, The Annuals of Great Britain. The poem did not appear in print again until 1640, when it was included in John Benson's collected edition of Shakespeare's poems, Poems Written by Wil. Shake-speare, Gent.[3]
Context
The title page of the original edition of Chester's Love's Martyr explains its content:
Love's Martyr: or Rosalins Complaint. Allegorically shadowing the truth of Loue, in the constant Fate of the Phoenix and Turtle. A Poeme enterlaced with much varietie and raritie; now first translated out of the venerable Italian Torquato Caeliano, by Robert Chester. With the true legend of famous King Arthur the last of the nine Worthies, being the first Essay of a new Brytish Poet: collected out of diuerse Authenticall Records. To these are added some new compositions of seuerall moderne Writers whose names are subscribed to their seuerall workes, vpon the first subiect viz. the Phoenix and Turtle.
Chester prefaced his poem with a short dedication addressed to the Phoenix and Turtledove. The Phoenix is envisaged as female and the dove as male:
- Phoenix of beautie, beauteous, Bird of any
- To thee I do entitle all my labour,
- More precious in mine eye by far then many
- That feedst all earthly sences with thy savour:
- Accept my home-writ praises of thy love,
- And kind acceptance of thy Turtle-dove
Chester's main poem is a long allegory in which the relationship between the birds is explored, and its symbolism articulated. It incorporates the story of King Arthur, and a history of ancient Britain, emphasising Welsh etymologies for British towns. It culminates with the joint immolation of the Phoenix and Turtledove, giving birth to a new and more beautiful bird from the ashes. It also includes several allegorical love poems within it, supposed to have been written by the Turtledove to the Phoenix.
It is followed by a brief collection of "Diverse Poeticall Essaies" by the "best and chiefest of our moderne writers, with their names sub-scribed to their particular workes". These include, in addition to Shakespeare,
Interpretations
The Phoenix and the Turtle is interpreted as an allegory of an ideal marriage. In addition the poem can be seen as an elucidation of the relationship between truth and beauty, or of fulfilled love, in the context of
The concept of a symbolic perfect love between two very different beings, one immortal and one mortal, may be associated with the Christian doctrine of the
Several attempts have been made to link the lovers of the poem to historical individuals, though others have argued that the poem should not be interpreted with "appliqué literalism", in the words of James P. Bednarz.[6] Exponents of the New Criticism such as I. A. Richards and William Empson emphasised the unresolvable nature of the text's ambiguities.[6] Helen Hackett argues that the poem "incites deciphering, but at the same time firmly rebuffs it."[7] Some of the more prominent attempted decodings of the allegory with reference to real individuals are listed below:
John and Ursula Salusbury
Because Chester dedicated the main poem to the Welsh statesman
Queen Elizabeth
Katherine Duncan-Jones and Henry Woudhuysen adopt a variation of the view that the poem refers to Salusbury and the queen, arguing that the "session" mentioned in the poem is the 1601 parliament, in which Elizabeth made a famous speech about the symbolic relationship between herself and her people, sometimes referred to as her Farewell Speech.[11] They draw on the earlier work of Marie Axton, who argued that Elizabeth herself is both birds, in her monarchical and human aspects, but that the human aspect (the Turtle) also includes the body of the people as a whole. Duncan-Jones and Woudhuysen suggest that Salusbury represents the people.
Some scholars interpret the child of the phoenix as a reference to Elizabeth's heir,
The theory that both Chester's and Shakespeare's poems were intended to refer to the relationship between Elizabeth and
Catholic martyrs
Another interpretation, first proffered in the 1930s by Clara Longworth in the novel My Shakespeare, Rise! is that the poem is a cryptic
Proponents of the Catholic interpretation have suggested various identities for the poem's birds, but the interpretation that has the most traction is that the phoenix commemorates
Clara Longworth first suggested that
References
- ^ James P. Bednarz in Cheney, Patrick Gerard The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare's Poetry, Cambridge University Press, 2007, p117
- ^ Oxford Anthology of Literature of Renaissance England, J. Holander, F. Kermode (eds), OUP, 1973, p. 424.
- ^ Shakespeare, William (1960). Prince, F. T. (ed.). The Poems. London: Methuen. pp. xxiii–xxiv.
- ^ Zezmer, D.M., Guide to Shakespeare, 1976, New York, p. 88
- .
- ^ a b c d James P. Bednarz, Shakespeare and the Truth of Love: The Mystery of 'The Phoenix and Turtle', Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.
- ^ a b Helen Hackett, Shakespeare and Elizabeth: The Meeting of Two Myths, Princeton University Press, 2009, p. 136.
- ^ Poems by Sir John Salusbury and Robert Chester by Carleton Brown.
- ^ a b c John Klause, "The Phoenix and the Turtle in its Time", in Gwynne Blakemore Evans (ed), In the Company of Shakespeare: Essays on English Renaissance Literature, Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press, 2002, pp. 206–227.
- ^ William Empson, Essays on Shakespeare, Cambridge University Press, 1986, p. 20.
- ^ Duncan-Jones and Woudhuyson, Shakespeare's Poems, Arden Shakespeare, Cengage Learning EMEA, 2007, p.421ff.
- doi:10.1086/389840.
- ^ John Finnis and Patrick Martin, "Another turn for the Turtle", The Times Literary Supplement, 18 April 2003
- ^ James P. Bednarz, p. 72.
- ^ a b Longworth, Clara, My Shakespeare, Rise!, London: 1935.
- ^ David Beauregard, pp. 141–144.
- ^ See the discussion in Shakespeare's Poems in Arden Shakespeare Series, 93–94.
- ^ a b Martin Dodwell, Anne Line: Shakespeare's Tragic Muse (Brighton: The Book Guild, 2013).
- ^ Christine J. Kelly, "Anne Line [St Anne Line] (d. 1601)”, ODNB, online edition, January 2009, http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/69035, accessed 3 November 2013.
- ^ Times Literary Supplement, 18 April 2003, pp. 12–14.
- ^ Asquith, Clare, Shakespeare Newsletter, 50, 2001.
Bibliography
- Gillham, Christiane (1992). "'Single Nature's Double Name': Some Comments on The Phoenix and Turtle". Connotations. 2 (2): 126–136.
- Gillham, Christiane (1993–1994). "Single Natures–Double Name: A Reply to Peter Milward and James H. Sims". Connotations. 3 (2): 123–128.
- Kerrigan, John (2013a). "Reading 'The Phoenix and Turtle'". In Post, Jonathan (ed.). Oxford Handbook of Shakespeare's Poetry. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 540–559. ISBN 978-0198778011.
- Kerrigan, John (2013b). "Shakespeare, Elegy and Epitaph: 1557–1640". In Post, Jonathan (ed.). Oxford Handbook of Shakespeare's Poetry. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 225–244. ISBN 978-0198778011.
- Milward, Peter (1993–1994). "'Double Nature's Single Name': A Response to Christiane Gillham". Connotations. 3 (1): 60–63.
- ISBN 978-1903436868.
- Sims, James H. (1993–1994). "Shakespeare's 'The Phoenix and the Turtle': A Reconsideration of 'Single Natures Double Name'". Connotations. 3 (1): 64–71.
- Straumann, Heinrich (1977). "'The phoenix and the turtle' in its dramatic context". English Studies. 58 (6): 494–500. .
External links
- Facsimile of the first quarto of Love's martyr (1601) (Folger Shakespeare Library)
- Edition of Love's Martyr by A. B. Grosart (1878) (Internet Archive)
- The Phoenix and the Turtle at Project Gutenberg
- The Phoenix and the Turtle at Wikibooks
- Public domain recording of The Phoenix and the Turtle (Internet Archive)
- The Phoenix and the Turtle public domain audiobook at LibriVox
- Partial bibliography for Clifford Stetner, Shakespeare's "Shrieking Harbinger": Seasonal Pattern, Genre, and the Shapes of Time in the "First Folio" and "The Phoenix and the Turtle" (Ph.D. dissertation, City University of New York, 2008).