Reviewed by Luis Estable
Shakespair: Sonnet Replies to the 154 Sonnets of William Shakespeare
by Martin Bidney
CreateSpace
Oct 2015, 336 pages, ISBN-13: 978-1517697945
Shakespair: Sonnet Replies to the 154 Sonnets of William Shakespeare by Martin Bidney is a good attempt to give a reply to each of the 154 sonnets that form Shakespeare’s book. The Sonnets have been quite popular for several centuries now and have given rise to countless interpretations from Shakespeare being bisexual, homosexual, slave to love to the author being Queen Elizabeth to Edward De Vere. There is a library of interpretations and commentaries on the sonnets. The imagination has not failed when it comes to think, talk, or write about the sonnets, making an industry out of them in the number of books written about them and sold. All kinds of ideas have developed from the reading of the sonnets. Just when the critics think that there is nothing new that could possibly be said about the sonnets a book appears to take them by surprise. The sonnets of Shakespeare, much like the Bible, keeps on giving. Year after year for some time now a good number of books about the sonnets from all kinds of angles: love, historical, sexual, political… appear in the market.
Martin Bidney is quite creative in his Replies to Shakespeare’s sonnets. He gives Replies in a very innovative and surprising way to the issues of the Lovely Youth, the Rival Poet, and the Dark Lady as the woman has come to be known by critics and readers of the sonnets. The language that Martin Bidney uses for his Replies to the sonnets is not always easy to follow, but it is one that has merit as sonnet-writing with an interesting poetic diction. Martin Bigney is an excellent sonnet writer and that his book has value as literature and one that could give pleasure to any reader if he or she is willing to do the work of reading the lines of the sonnets both by Shakespeare and by Bidney with attention and with dedication for the book cannot be rushed. It calls for careful reading to get the most out of poems such as the sonnets 1, 3, 8, 20, 29, 35, 40, 49, 55, 71, 73, 76, 86, 107,119, 121, 127, 129, 130, 143 from Shakespeare and some from Martin Bigney himself with their interesting Replies. Of course, to choose any list from Shakespeare’s sonnets is a big challenge. One always feels one is leaving some out.
One can say without fears of being wrong or accused of hyperbole that Shakespeare’s sonnets are one of the most read and written about work of literature in any language, and a book that can be placed alongside the Bible, or the work of Homer, Dante, and Cervantes for the amount of speculations, points of views, creative thinking derived from their three persons: The Youth, The Rival Poet, and The Dark lady. These characters have given rise to the most noble and craziest ideas ever conceived about a literary work in any language. There are no shortages of surprises when one reads what has been said of the sonnets through the centuries. Commentaries that are humorous, very serious, sexual, philosophical, and hyperbolic. If reading means reading the best that has ever been written, then the sonnets of Shakespeare and this book are a must in any library of those who love literature even if they are not fan of poetry and even to those who are not lover of the art of sonnet writing. One may not come to enjoy all the poems in Martin Bigney’s Replies, but the experience of going through Shakespeare’s sonnets will be a memorable one. I recommend this book to all who speak English or form part of the English-speaking world. It is time well-spent.
About the reviewer: Luis A. Estable has been a poet for more than twenty years. He writes sonnets, songs, haikus, children’s verses, limericks, and free style poems where he pays attention to diction, mixing wisdom and delight, the goal of poetic composition. To him, poetry represents the most beautiful and compact expression known to man, and he believes there is a clear distinction between prose and poetry, and that the aim of the poet is not to confuse or mix the two. He is also of the belief that criticism is part of the writing life and forms part of literature. His advice to young and want-to-be poets is to accept it as an essential part and learn from it. He lives in Spokane, WA, likes reading, listening to music, going for long walks, and of course writing poetry. His book Religious,Ten songs and Thirty Sonnets is available wherever good books are sold.