Wings of a dove/angel idea - Shakespeare

Subject: RE: Wings of a dove/angel idea - Shakespeare
From: leeneia
Date: 27 May 16 - 04:24 PM

Thanks for the idea and the beautiful sonnet, Helen. I agree that they share of the idea of somehow becoming disembodied and travelling far to a loved one.

Subject: RE: Wings of a dove/angel idea - Shakespeare
From: Helen
Date: 27 May 16 - 03:29 PM

Lighter, who knows what Shakespeare could have written with the "benefit" or maybe "hindrance" of modern technology? He might have been too distracted by blogs, twitter, facebook, etc to bother sitting around writing plays and sonnets. An ill wind, indeed! LOL

Yes, you are right, Stim. I made a comment about Psalm 55 in the following thread:

What the heck is this word (Beautiful Light o'er

but it was just a comment about the verse about the wings of an angel, and that was not the main discussion in the thread.

When I heard Paul Kelly's version of Shakespeare's sonnet 44 the similarity struck me of the idea of wishing you could have wings, or wishing that you could fly like thought to the one you love.

Apart from that, I think Paul Kelly's versions of the Sonnets are worth a listen.

Helen

Subject: RE: Wings of a dove/angel idea - Shakespeare
From: Stim
Date: 27 May 16 - 01:23 PM

I tend to think that idea is more connected to Psalm 55:

My heart is in anguish within me;
the terrors of death have fallen on me.
Fear and trembling have beset me;
horror has overwhelmed me.
I said, "Oh, that I had the wings of a dove!
I would fly away and be at rest.
I would flee far away
and stay in the desert;
I would hurry to my place of shelter,
far from the tempest and storm."

Subject: RE: Wings of a dove/angel idea - Shakespeare
From: Lighter
Date: 27 May 16 - 11:01 AM

With telephones and Skype, there'd have been no sonnet.

It's an ill wind, etc.

Subject: RE: Wings of a dove/angel idea - Shakespeare
From: Helen
Date: 26 May 16 - 06:42 PM

Some more sonnets performed by Paul Kelly

Paul Kelly - Sonnet 18

The animated video is worth watching too.

Paul Kelly - Sonnet 73

Paul Kelly - Sonnet 138

And synchronicity at it's best:

Paul Kelly, Rufus Wainwright and William Shakespeare, together at last Read mor

Helen

Subject: Wings of a dove/angel idea - Shakespeare
From: Helen
Date: 25 May 16 - 04:28 PM

Hi all,

Last night I saw on Oz TV a performance by a singer-songwriter called Paul Kelly. He has worked with heaps of Oz performers and is a local legend here.

His latest CD based on some of Shakespeare's sonnets for which has written new music.

While listening to Sonnets 44 and 45 I realised that the idea in Sonnet 44 is very similar to the idea expressed in many folk songs, for example, one verse of the traditional Oz song, Botany Bay :

Oh had I the wings of a turtle dove
I'd soar on my pinions so high
Slap bang to the arms of my Polly love
And in her sweet presence I'd die

Shakespeare's Sonnet 44 is:

If the dull substance of my flesh were thought,
Injurious distance should not stop my way;
For then despite of space I would be brought,
From limits far remote, where thou dost stay.
No matter then although my foot did stand
Upon the farthest earth removed from thee;
For nimble thought can jump both sea and land
As soon as think the place where he would be.
But ah! thought kills me that I am not thought,
To leap large lengths of miles when thou art gone,
But that, so much of earth and water wrought,
I must attend time's leisure with my moan,
    Receiving nought by elements so slow
    But heavy tears, badges of either's woe.


Isn't that beautiful?

Oh, if only they had telephones and Skype in those days!

Helen