does it work?" The second is, in the broadest sense, moral: "\44ratkind of a guv inhabits this poem? \{4rat is his notion of the goodlife or the good place? His notion of the trvil One? \\4rat does heconceal from the reader? \,\hat does he conceal even from him-self?" [so-st].Like any poet, Auden knor,l's that the second question cannot be re-sponded to correctly until the first has been ansu'ered. It is the rvorkingsof the verbal construct that give evidence of the moral stance of the poet.Auden here separates the technical from the moral, and perhaps believesthat the answer about the "verbal contraption" must be distinct from theanswer about personaliq,, ethics, and u,hat u'e s'ould nou, call "uncon-scious" and "deconstructive" moments in the poem. I believe that thedeepest insights into the moral u'orld of the poem, and into its construc-tive and deconstructive energies, come preciselv from understanding it asa contraption made of "words," by which I mean not onlv the semanticunits we call "words" but all the langpage games in u'hich u'ords can par-ticipate. Because many essays on the sonnets attempt moral and ethicaldiscussion without any close understanding of holv the poems are put to-gether, I have emphasized in this Commentan, the total "contraption-ness" of any given sonnet as the first necessary level of understanding. Ihope that my comments on the famous "moral" sonnets (such as 66,94,116, 129) will not disappoint readers u.ho are looking for Shakespeare's"notion of the good life . . . the Evil One" and so on. As to u'hat Shake-speare may conceal from the reader, or even from himself, such a su-premely conscious u,riter conceals, it seems to tlle, very little.
I wrote my blogs from last week partially on this topic. The message conveyed in this paragraph is trying to pick apart the art, the "words" of a particular piece from the artist. This is why I think that a "Shakespearean sonnet", whether ajar or concise as it relates to the stereotypical "iambic pentameter structure" is still a Shakespearean Sonnet all the same.
"It is the workings of the verbal construct that give evidence of the moral stance of the poet." This line reminds me most of our readings of Sonnet 130 in class. In order to not only read that sonnet properly (voice, pitch, rhythm, feet) , but to properly understand the context of that sonnet, one has to understand how Shakespeare uses words. His use of iambic pentameter isn't to the effect of a feeling or a sound, but a direct meaning. The syllables stressed in his stanzas are used to indicate emphasis on certain words, such as "Her" or "lips" or "my mistress" in conjunction. The stressing of these words often come out of sync.
The effect given off when he manipulates the stress of these words can create a trochee or even a spondee at times, which would mean that the line isn't in iambic pentameter; yet, the poem itself is in iambic pentameter, because, indicated in the reading, the "total contraptionness... of any given sonnet [is] the first necessary level of understanding."