Play Sonnet 60
Like as the waves make towards 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 crown’d,
Crooked 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.
Analysis
Sonnet 60 is an exploration of mortality, with strong metaphors for and personifications of Time, and a belief in the immortality of words.
Shakespeare compares the movement of time to the waves moving toward the pebbled shore, each moment striving to move forward. Everything that has been born, though it existed in the world before birth, crawls into maturity, where it faces cruel obstacles to its glory. Time is both a giver of gifts and a destroyer, piercing the beauty of youth, aging it. It devours the beauty in nature; nothing escapes it. But Shakespeare knows the power of words, that his verses will last into the future, continuing to praise the young man’’s worth despite mortality.
Will’s Wordplay
The imagery of “minutes hastening to their end” calls to mind the disappearance and dissipation of each wave as it beats on the shore. The sea as such is not an obvious simile of human life, as it continues almost forever, whereas our life so patently has an ending. But the individual waves mimic the disappearance of the minutes. The sonnet seems to be placed deliberately at this point, as number 60, to coincide with the 60 minutes of the hour.
“crawl” is both as a baby and suggestive of slowness. Youth seems to last forever until it is gone. And again, the slow crawl in advanced age.
An eclipse was considered to be a dangerous event. Reversals of fortune could be attributed to their influence. “Eclipses” here has a general meaning of blight, ill fortune, or setbacks
Prospect Park Dog Run, Brooklyn
This location features the dog-friendliest spot in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park!
The Dog Beach
“There aren’t many places in the ol’ Big Apple where dogs can frolic and play in the water and catch a Frisbee on the beach. Except Prospect Park, where that’s exactly the case. Just off the Long Meadow Beach at the Pools, dogs can run off-leash and catch a cool down during the hottest summer days. And trekking there from Manhattan is a worthy day trip – there’s more to do at Prospect Park than just throw ball. The huge amount of space welcomes picnics and games, and there are 585 acres of woodlands, waterways and trails to explore with your pup, family and friends.” [1]
References
ACTOR – Christopher McFarland
Christopher’s recent Shakespeare credits include Roderigo in Othello at the Pittsburgh Public Theater, Touchstone in As You Like It at the Guthrie, Enobarbus in Antony and Cleopatra at Opera House Arts, Iago in Othello at Allentown Shakespeare, Hubert in King John for the New York Shakespeare Exchange, and coming up next, Pisanio in Cymbeline at the Yale Repertory Theatre. He also spent six seasons as a resident company member at the Arizona Shakespeare Festival, where, amongst other roles, he gave his Hamlet. Non-Shakespearean work includes Lennie in Of Mice and Men with the Acting Company, Captain Iditarod in Spacebar at The Wild Project, Tommy in Pride in the Falls of Autrey Mill at the Signature Theatre, Rubini in Golden Age at Philadelphia Theatre Company and the Kennedy Center, and Il Capitano Nariz de Foyar in Even Maybe Tammy at the Flea. He hails from San Francisco, CA, and received his MFA from the Yale School of Drama.
DIRECTOR – Mike Fitzgerald
Mike Fitzgerald is a filmmaker and TV editor who is thinking pretty seriously about getting a dog. His most recent short film “In Prague” was screened at the San Francisco Independent Film Festival and the Big Apple Film Festival. His educational-comedy web series “Learnin’ with Vermin” aims to explain basic concepts about elections using the chalkboard of farce. He has directed numerous other short films and music videos. As an editor for TV, he has cut content for networks including IFC, A&E, MTV, Lifetime and more. He currently edits the true-crime series “On the Case with Paula Zahn” for Investigation Discovery. Mike has cut dozens of pitch reels for TV networks, including the pitch that spawned Jersey Shore (sorry). He spent two years as a development producer for factual TV, wherein he contributed to the genesis of various shows, including “3 Days to Open” with Bobby Flay. He co-directed a production of “Pains of Youth” at the Access Theater in New York, appeared in “Julius Caesar” at the Theater for the New City, and played Jesus in a farce about – well, sort of about Jesus. Before all that he worked nights shifts as an assistant editor, sweated and froze as a production assistant (and drove Tony Danza around for two days), taught sailing and swimming at a summer camp, and earned his bachelor’s degree in film production from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. He lives in Astoria with his beautiful wife, and spends his free time writing screenplays.
His other work is on his website at mikefitzgeraldfilm.com