Drayton Sonnet No.6

A little bit of poetry analysis from this terms poetry journal

How many paltry, foolish, painted things, 

That now is coaches trouble every street, 

Shall be forgotten, whom no Poet sings, 

Ere they be well wrapt in their winding-sheet. 

Where I to thee eternity shall give, 

When nothing else remaineth of these days, 

And Queens hereafter shall be glad to live 

Upon the alms of thy superfluous praise. 

Virgins and matrons, reading these my rhymes, 

Shall be so much delighted with thy story 

That they shall grieve they liv'd not in these times, 

To have seen thee, their sex's only glory. 

So shalt thou fly above the vulgar throng, 

Still to survive in my immortal song.

Predating young Williams’s work, I would have to call this an English sonnet. The ABAB rhyme, three quatrains, the turn and a couplet leave me with no other choice. This sonnet caught my eye with the contempt or disdain Mr Drayton shows for all other women when compared to his heart’s desire. From the collection of sonnets that make up Idea, published in 1619, this sonnet is one of 73 proclaiming the glories of Anne Goodeere, whom Drayton was said to be in love with (Jokinen, 2007).

The ‘paltry, foolish and painted things,’ troubling ‘every street’, seem to be utterly unworthy of his, or anyone’s contemplation. He states as much in the second half of the first quatrain, they will be dead and gone with none to remember them. This language marks all other women as very poor things indeed. In this first quatrain he is also setting up the rest of the sonnet; the ‘whom not poet sings,’ line is in direct contrast to what he is offering below.

The next quatrain sees him let his ego off the leash, claiming that even queens will be glad to live on the leftovers from his praise. The idea of achieving immortality through words is presented more clearly in these lines; only hinted at in the first quatrain. This immortality is a gift able to be bestowed by the author, the words surviving long after what ‘remaineth of these days’. Drayton is gifting Anne with ‘eternity’.

The last of the quatrains bring both their glories together; his writing and her splendour. Written at about the same time, it is not too far leap to the sentiment of Shakespeare’s St Crispin’s day speech in Henry V. where those not able to be at the battle or, in this case, witness the beauty shall ‘hold their manhoods cheap’ or ‘grieve they have not lived in these times’. Again, Drayton is returning to the idea of immortality achieved through words. This time he is suggesting that not only will they be wishing for but a fraction of the praise outlaid in these sonnets, they will also regret that they were not around to witness the beauty here described, the turn crowning her the female ‘sex’s only glory’.

The couplet contains a promise, that through his words, she will forever be above all others, or the ‘vulgar throng’ in Drayton’s words. The promise of immortality also returns, this time directly attributing this ability to his ‘immortal words’.

I am left in no small amount of awe at the level of devotion Michael Drayton displays in this work. This particular sonnet I found quite amusing, though all of the sonnets combined are an epic work of flattery. Mr Keating spoke of poetry being used to 'woo women', this takes it to a whole other level.

http://www.luminarium.org/renlit/draybio.htm