Episode 1 - The Secret Structure

Shakespeare’s Sonnets were first published in the year 1609.  It’s not entirely clear, but there’s reason to believe that the publication was not authorized by the author.  In 1609, Shakespeare was the most famous playwright in London.  Seemingly, if the Bard had wanted to say something, he had the platform to do so.  However, history records no such event.  We do know for a fact that Shakespeare was writing sonnets in the 1590’s, a decade earlier.  Unfortunately, we don’t know if they were the same sonnets we read today.  Beyond that, we have very little to work with.

Fast forward four hundred years…The Sonnets is still one of the most enduring collections of poetry ever written.  As literature comes and goes, The Sonnets survive the test of time.  It’s safe to surmise that over one billion English speakers have read at least one of his poems.  Furthermore, it’s reasonable to guess that Shakespeare’s Sonnets will still be read, likely in a modernized form, for another thousand years or more.  Children growing up on Mars will read The Sonnets.  Students living on the moons of Uranus, most of which are actually named after Shakespearean characters, will study sonnets in school.  These people may live their entire lives without experiencing a summer’s day, but they will know, “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”

Academically, The Sonnets is one of the most studied works of all time.  Scholars, university professors, and grad students have devoted millions of hours to this one work.  It’s been dissected in so many ways that there’s basically an unlimited amount of resources available.  The books and websites about just The Sonnets alone might as well add up to infinity because one person could never read all the books and visit all the websites.  It would seem to any onlooker that we’ve figured out just about everything there is to know about these 154 poems, and that they have no new secrets to tell us.  We seemingly know all there is to know, and the rest has been lost to history.

However, what if I told you that this was incorrect?  As in 100% dead wrong.  What if I told you that within the 154 sonnets, Shakespeare embedded a Structure that completely changes the way we can read it?  Lastly, what if I told you that this revolutionary new way of reading them makes everything ever written about The Sonnets obsolete?  Those books and websites aren’t useless, but starting today they’re now all outdated.

(cue music)

Hello Shakespeareans and welcome to The Shakespeare Sonnets Podcast.  As you may have deduced from the intro, this podcast may be a little different from what you were expecting.  In this series, I will not be coalescing the infinite amount of material on The Sonnets into an audio medium.  No, that’s not my purpose.  Instead, I’m going to re-invent the way we understand these poems by revealing the Secret Structure hidden in Shakespeare’s Sonnets.

If you know what a sonnet is and how it works, the Secret Structure itself is actually quite simple and can be explained in under two minutes.  There are 154 sonnets.  14 x 11 is 154.  That’s eleven sections of fourteen sonnets.  Shakespeare arranged his sonnets into groups of fourteen.  These fourteen sonnets function like a sonnet themselves.  So, for example, Section 1 is Sonnets 1-14.  Sonnets 1-4 are the first quatrain.  5-8 are quatrain two.  Sonnets 9-12 are the third quatrain, and Sonnets 13 and 14 form a couplet.  Then Sonnet 15 starts the pattern all over again.  Adding more on top of that, these eleven Sections are grouped into five Acts.  Sections 1-3 form Act 1 and Acts 2-5 are all two sections each.

I know I just threw a bunch of numbers at you, but that’s it.  That’s the structure.  Eleven Sections of fourteen and each individual sonnet functions as a line within a larger sonnet.  Beyond that, these 11 sections are grouped into five acts.  Clearly, this isn’t that complicated, but at the same time, yes it is.  Words like quatrain, couplet, section, act, and even sonnet may be a little foreign to you.  Or at least they are in the context I’m using them.  

Furthermore, a parade of numbers can be hard to decipher and I’m fully aware that a famous sonnet hasn’t been written in over one hundred years.  The nuances of the sonnet format are only taught in schools, and that may have been a while back for most listeners.  It’s fair to say that the intricacies of the sonnet are not part of public consciousness.  Over the years, the most common feedback I’ve gotten for this idea is: “Reagan, you sound like you know what you’re talking about, but I’m confused.”  So, yes, I’m fully aware that it’s my responsibility to make this all accessible to the average listener.  

Having said that, yes, I will use literary terminology, lots of numbers, and most of my ideas will extend from the sonnet format.  I don’t know how to explain this idea without it.  However, that’s merely the foundation.  The Secret Structure is not just numbers and patterns.  Using very plain speech, let me give you a brief runthrough of the story that this reveals.

The Sonnets is a five act play with three characters.  There’s the narrator, the poems themselves, and the structure.  The poems are personified as a beautiful Young Man, and the structure is personified as the Dark Lady.  

Act 1 is a three part story with a clear, easy to follow narrative.  In Section 1, the poet wants his poems to find a structure because he believes unstructured poetry isn’t that good.  He believes that structure is the key to birthing more poems.  In Section 2, the poet realizes that structure isn’t enough.  So, he endeavors to write the poetry himself.  Unfortunately, he falls so in love with his words that ends up having a mental breakdown.  In Section 3, the relationship between the poet and his poetry is strained.  At the end, we find out why.  It turns out the poems love the sonnet format more than they love the sonnet writer.  For the poet though, this isn’t a problem because the poet and his words are one.  So, the format loves them both equally.

The second Act is two juxtaposed ideas.  In Section 4, Shakespeare abandons the structure because he feels like it’s impeding his writing ability.  He has things he wants to say, and not using the format is the best way for him to express himself.  In Section 5, he flips sides and decides that he is a slave to the structure.  He makes it very clear that he can’t write without it.  This is the story’s rising action.

Next, Acts 3 and 4 are a collection of very personal moments.  However, Act 3 and Act 4 are completely different.  Act 3 is a series of events that could happen to anyone.  Here are three examples:

-You’re the only thing that makes me happy

-I have writer’s block

-You inspire me

Simply put, these are timeless themes that can be found in both Ancient Greece and modern pop music.

Act 4, on the contrary, is also a collection of personal details.  This time however, the moments are clearly specific to only Shakespeare.  He laments being a public figure and he tells us that it took him three years to write the work.  Sonnet 107 potentially describes Shakespeare’s emotions after his gay lover was released from jail following the death of Queen Elizabeth.  In Section 9, the back half of Act 4, the references get so obscure that it’s impossible to know what the narrator is actually talking about.  I believe this ambiguity was by design.  It’s The Bard’s way of telling us that we’ll never know the man who was behind the curtain.

Act 5 transitions away from talking about his poems and instead focuses on the structure.  Yes, again, the Dark Lady is the structure.  The primary focus in Section 10 is trying to wrestle with both ownership and meaning.  Who owns The Sonnets: the sonneteer or the sonnet format?  The second major theme is what does this all mean?  However, beyond that, a big idea is introduced, and that’s that Shakespeare always intended for the Structure to be a hard to find secret.  So, for example, when Shakespeare says, “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun,” he’s actually telling us, “the Structure is nothing like transparency.”

In Section 11, the Narrator gets very angry at the Structure, but mainly because it’s not perfect.  He thinks his execution of his idea has 1000 flaws.  So, he decides to keep this story a secret because it will detract from the overall work.  If readers only look for the Structure, they will overlook the poems themselves.  The final two poems, Sonnets 153 and 154 are a prophecy of what will happen when this secret is eventually discovered.  And uh spoiler warning: Shakespeare tells his readers that he doesn’t really care.

So, this is the purpose of my podcast: to show you this story.  All the numbers and terminology might be a little confusing, but the reason is: all of my ideas extend forth from the sonnet format.  There’s no wishcasting here.  I’m trying to be as scientific as I can without getting in my own way.  If you don’t believe me, you can stop the episode right now and go test this for yourself. 

Are you still there?  Okay, good because the reality is that the smartest literary minds of the last four centuries have all missed both the structure and the story it was used to create.  And I’m not just talking about distinguished scholars at prestigious universities.  What about the poets too?  Metered poetry, written in rhymed verse, may not be popular to write in our contemporary times now, but it was the highest form of literature for hundreds of years after Shakespeare’s death.  How did all the great poets of the 1700’s and 1800’s not see this?

The answer is: We don’t know, but they weren’t alone.  To loosely paraphrase one of the Dark Lady sonnets, “A billion pairs of eyes have been blind.”  Therefore, that’s the purpose of this podcast, to show you what has never been seen before.  My goal is for your appreciation and understanding of Shakespeare to grow substantially.  Every single sonnet in the sequence has a purpose, and I will show you how each one fits in the puzzle.

Obviously though, I imagine you might be incredibly skeptical.  14 x 11 does equal 154, but what if that’s just random?  Plus, I’m just one guy.  The story I just told you sounds good, but, but what if I made most of it up?  The entire literary establishment can’t have missed all of this, right?  In this view, I’m just a crazy man spouting nonsense.  I must be wrong, right?

Well, no.  I’m not.  Let’s start by looking at four pieces of evidence that no one can dispute.  Please bear with me.  I’m about to throw some more numbers at you again, but I’m also about to prove the validity of my theory.  These four things cannot be disregarded as random chance.  First, the Dark Lady section, as historically arranged by scholars, is 28 sonnets long.  2 x 14 equals 28.  The Dark Lady Section is the final two sections of the work.  These 28 sonnets form Sections 10 and 11.

Next, the last two poems of the sequence, 153 and 154, are a perfect sectional couplet.  I mentioned them a minute ago.  Sonnets 153 and 154 are very different from all the other sonnets, but the important point is that the two of them work together as a single idea.  As in, they are the final couplet for both Section 11 and the entire work as a whole.

Third, sonnets, as you know, are traditionally 14 lines long.  There are two deviations from this in the work, and this is my next point.  Sonnets 99 and 126 are 15 and 12 lines long respectively.  The numbers 99 and 126 may not stand out numerically in your mind, but if you do the math, you’ll realize that Sonnet 99 is the first sonnet of Section 8 and 126 is the last Sonnet in Section 9.  Therefore, these two unicorn sonnets perfectly bookend Act 4.  I’ll let you decide if that's chance.

Last are Sonnets 40-42.  These are the so-called Betrayer Sonnets.  In them, the Young Man whom Shakespeare loves decides to have an affair with Shakespeare's mistress.  This really upsets the Narrator and leads to a strange resolution.  The point to make here though is that the mistress enters and exits the sequence in these poems.  Technically, she’s only in Sonnets 41 and 42, though the conflict is introduced in Sonnet 40.  Scholars have long theorized that this mistress is the same woman who’s in the Dark Lady Sonnets.  I believe she is too, but not in the same way.  If the Mistress is the Structure, this is a love triangle between poet, poetry, and format.  

If you do the math in your head, you know that 3 x 14 is 42.  This means that the Betrayer Sonnets perfectly line up as the surprise ending of Section 3.  Sonnet 40 introduces the problem, and in Sonnets 41 and 42, Section 3’s couplet, the Bard gets really angry that he’s been squeezed out and says his piece.  Then, in Sonnet 43, the very next poem, this plotline disappears, and the narrative goes in a new direction.  Moreover, the first 42 sonnets, regardless of how you’re interpreting them, have a narrative story that’s easy to follow.  This is why it is Act 1.  Starting in Act 2, the narrative becomes less about story and more about ideas.

So, there are four things that cannot be disputed.  They directly create transitions between four of the five Acts, plus the very end.  Maybe it’s a coincidence?  Or maybe it isn’t.  I think you know where I stand.  In this podcast, I’m going to show you that the Structure is the key to understanding the story.  Arrangement matters, and readers need to know where they are in order to decipher the code.

Now, I want to be clear, and I think I need to make this disclaimer: there are no wrong ways to read The Sonnets.  Most people just read a few in high school as one-off love poems and that’s enough for them.  Others read it as a literal real life narrative of three real people.  I’m not here to belittle that or any other interpretation.  No, not in the least.  You do you, and, if I’m being honest, it’s clear that Shakespeare intended for some readers to enjoy his poetry in this way.  In other words, read The Sonnets however you choose.  However, my goal is to show you something that no one has seen before.  If you like Shakespeare, my hope is that you’ll enjoy my podcast.

Having said all that, I’d like to now zoom out.  This is the first episode.  I’d like to lay out my plan for this podcast and give you some sort of prospective table of contents.  My intention is to create three types of episodes.  The first type will be short form episodes similar to this one.  I will focus on one topic and try to make an entertaining 15-30 minute episode.  The second type of episode will be long form deep dives.  I have twelve of these planned, one for each of the eleven sections and one overview of the entire work.  The overview is Episode 3.  So you can listen to that right now.  In these episodes, I’ll go sonnet-to-sonnet through a section and explain everything that’s there.  I’ll show you a new way to read The Sonnets.  Lastly, I will probably host some interviews.  My hope is that this podcast garners enough credibility that some of the prestigious people in the industry will come onto this show to offer their perspectives.

Finally, I’m sure some of you are wondering, “who am I and where did the idea come from?”  The origin story of how this idea birthed itself into my mind will be a future subject for a later stand alone episode.  That’s a long enough story that it’s a topic for another day.  As for me professionally, obviously I have an English degree.  Currently, I’m a high school literature professor at a prestigious private school.  I realize that’s not too distinguished compared to tenured professors at tier one universities, but I do like my job as it allows me to teach Shakespeare as much as I want.

As to the Secret Structure, I first discovered it as a third year university student way back in 2005.  For 15 years, I struggled with what to do with this idea and how to present it.  

Two years ago, I decided that the podcast medium was probably the best fit.  Since then, I’ve written about 450 pages of annotated notes and standalone scripts.  In other words, I’ve done my homework and made a bunch of discoveries along the way.  

My point in telling you all of this is that I’m so happy to get to produce this podcast.

The Secret Structure has been a burden on me for almost half my life.  If I didn’t believe in it, I’ve had countless opportunities to discard it.  However, the idea has always stuck around and the responsibility of sharing it has persisted.  So yes, I’m overjoyed to have access to a medium that makes it easy for me to reach listeners.

And, so here we are.  This episode is just a general introduction.  The second episode is called: “What is a sonnet?”  This is a refresher on what a sonnet is and how it works, but I will also cover important vocabulary and methodology that I believe will make this all easier for you.  Then, in the third episode, I will have the first deep dive.  It’s an extended overview of all eleven sections.  Earlier in this episode, I gave you a taste of what to look forward to.  In Episode 3, all will be revealed.  Listening to it will also guide you in your own reading.

Next, the website is sonnetspodcast.com and my email is sonnetspodcast@gmail.com.  Additionally, the website has transcripts of all episodes.  I know that many listeners are also avid readers.  So, if you prefer a hard copy, you can find it at sonnetspodcast.com.

Okay, that’s it for this introductory episode.  If you're still skeptical, I hope you’ll stick around through at least Episode 3.  See you next time!