Chris at Crooked Timber points out that it’s National Poetry day in the UK, and gives his favourite Shakespeare sonnet. I don’t have one favourite, because there are too many, though if I did have to pick one I decided it would be either 116 or 29. Either ‘Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediment’ or ‘When in disgrace with Fortune and men’s eyes.’ But there are several other top favourites, which I shared with the lucky readers of CT, so I’ll share them with our readers too.

Like as the waves make toward the pebbled shore

and

When I have seen by Time’s fell hand defaced

and

Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea

and

No longer mourn for me when I am dead

and

That time of year thou mayst in me behold

and

They that have power to hurt and will do none

and

Alas, ‘tis true, I have gone here and there

and

O for my sake do you with Fortune chide

and

Not marble nor the gilded monuments of princes

And if you like the Sonnets, and if you haven’t read Philip Sidney’s set, which preceded Shakespeare’s and influenced and inspired them, you oughta. Astrophil and Stella. Great stuff. Not the way the Sonnets are; on a different level; a different kind of level; but great stuff all the same.

Happy Poetry Day.