See the Introduction to this presentation of early poems by Edward de Vere. Click here to go to the next poem or the previous poem in the series. All the poems, and a printable pdf version of the entire presentation, may also be accessed from the Introduction. See also Note on Sources, Titles, and Presentation of Parallels, Key to Abbreviations, and Bibliography of Works Cited.
Poem No. 19: “If Women Could Be Fair and Yet Not Fond”
(renumbered as “E.O. 20” in Professor Stritmatter’s published study)
1 If women could be fair and yet not fond,
2 Or that their love were firm, not fickle still,
3 I would not marvel that they make men bond
4 By service long to purchase their good will.
5 But when I see how frail those creatures are,
6 I muse that men forget themselves so far.
7 To mark the choice they make and how they change,
8 How oft from Phoebus they do flee to Pan;
9 Unsettled still, like haggards wild they range,
10 These gentle birds that fly from man to man.
11 Who would not scorn and shake them from the fist,
12 And let them fly, fair fools, which way they list?
13 Yet for disport we fawn and flatter both,
14 To pass the time when nothing else can please,
15 And train them to our lure with subtle oath,
16 Till weary of their wiles ourselves we ease.
17 And then we say when we their fancy try,
18 To play with fools, oh what a fool was I.
Textual sources: The poem dates no later than 1588, when it was first published in William Byrd’s collection, Psalms, Sonnets, and Songs. It may well have been written years earlier, since it also appears in Harleian MS 7392(2) (British Library) and Rawlinson MS 85 (Bodleian Library, Oxford University), which were transcribed starting in the mid-1580s. See Hannah (143-44); Grosart (420); Looney (1921, 37, Miller ed. 1975, 1: 595); May (PBO #3) (1980, 40-41, 81-82, 122-23; 1991, 284).
Structure: Three six-line stanzas of iambic pentameter rhyming ABABCC.
Looney’s title: “Woman’s Changeableness”
Past commentaries on parallels: Looney (1920, 139-40, 163-64); Ogburn (380-81, 518); Sobran (266-67); Brazil & Flues; May (2004, 223-24, 228); Goldstein (2016, 53-54); Whittemore (55-58).
Clarifications of the text:
(1) The word fond bears here the archaic meaning of “foolish” or “foolishly affectionate” (not the bland modern sense of merely “affectionate”); the archaic meaning of fond could also, more intensely, connote madness or imbecility (OED 6: 5-6).
(8) Phoebus (see also Nos. 14.31, 17.24, and 20.4) is an epithet for Apollo (see No. 3.6), Greco-Roman god of the sun. Pan, in Greek mythology, is the god of wild woodlands, fields, and shepherds, strongly associated with fertility and sexuality.
(9) A haggard (a term of art in falconry) refers to a wild adult hawk (typically female) caught for training (see also No. 9.14). It is thus mainly a noun in this context (not to be confused with the adjective indicating an exhausted appearance) (OED 6: 1013).
Strongest parallels to No. 19:
(7-8) To mark the choice they make and how they change, How oft from Phoebus they do flee to Pan
‘She must change for youth: when she is sated with his body, she will find the error of her choice. She must have change, she must’ (Oth., 1.3.355); ‘So excellent a king [Hamlet’s late father], that was to this Hyperion to a satyr [referring to his uncle, the new King Claudius, hastily married to his widowed mother] … Within a month … She married. O, most wicked speed, to post With such dexterity to incestuous sheets!’ (Ham., 1.2.139-40, 153, 156-57).
As noted above, Phoebus is an epithet for Apollo, while Pan is a god associated with fertility and sexuality. Apollo (or Phoebus) is often associated with the Greek sun god Helios, who in turn is the son of Hyperion (one of the Titans). Satyrs, in Greek mythology, are the priapic male companions of Dionysus (Bacchus to the Romans). Like Pan, with whom they have long been associated, satyrs are typically depicted with goatish hindquarters, prominent genitals, and insatiable sexual appetites.
Hamlet’s famous diatribe (“Hyperion to a satyr”) thus essentially accuses his mother (in only slightly different terms) of flee[ing] … from Phoebus … to Pan. Oxfordians have long noted that de Vere, at the impressionable age of 12, experienced the death of his father and, apparently within a year or so, his mother’s remarriage — perhaps unduly prompt or unseemly as it may have appeared to a grieving pubescent son (see, e.g., Anderson 16-18, 37).
See also the parallel to line 5.
(9) like haggards wild they range
‘I know her spirits are as coy and wild As haggards of the rock’ (Much, 3.1.35-36); ‘If I do prove her haggard, Though that her jesses were my dear heartstrings, I’d whistle her off and let her down the wind To prey at fortune’ (Oth., 3.3.260-63).
See also the parallels to line 15 (train them to our lure) and to No. 9.14 (The haggard hawk with toil is made full tame). Falconry was an aristocratic sport and status symbol during Shakespeare’s time. See the Introduction (Evaluating the Poetic Parallels) for more discussion. In early English falconry literature, hawk, haggard, and “falcon” usually refer to females (a male hawk is known to falconers as a “tiercel”).
The parallels to line 9 (which refers generically to women as wild haggards) are not quite as strong as those to No. 9.14, though line 9 and Much Ado About Nothing do present a triple word parallel (like/as wild haggards). Line 9 and Othello also present a specifically similar image of women ranging or roaming freely like wild birds. The notable passage in The Taming of the Shrew (“to man my haggard,” etc.) echoes line 9, as it does (even more strongly) No. 9.14. Since that passage also connects tellingly to line 15, the quotation is provided below.
Update: Though Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece do not appear to expressly mention “haggards,” it is noteworthy, as discussed by Whittemore (55-58), that both of those epic Shakespearean poems also deploy vivid falconry metaphors. ‘As falcons to the lure, away she flies’ (Venus, 1027); ‘[Tarquin] shakes aloft his Roman blade, Which, like a falcon tow’ring in the skies, Coucheth the fowl below with his wings’ shade, Whose crooked beak threats if he mount he dies’ (Lucrece, 505-08). See also No. 9.14.
(15) train them to our lure
The reference to a lure makes clear that de Vere in line 15 is continuing the falconry simile of line 9 (and No. 9.14). Line 15, like No. 9.14, thus parallels the same passage quoted there in The Taming of the Shrew — and, given the parallel between training and taming (as well as “manning”) the haggard (or shrewish woman), the very title of that play:
‘My falcon now is sharp and passing empty, And till she stoop she must not be full-gorged, For then she never looks upon her lure. Another way I have to man my haggard, To make her come and know her keeper’s call’ (Shrew, 4.1.177-81).
Line 15 also recalls the passages in Much Ado About Nothing and Othello quoted in connection with line 9 and No. 9.14. Again, see the additional discussion of the haggard hawk parallels in the Introduction (Evaluating the Poetic Parallels).
In a gender-flipping contrast (see also No. 9.14), Juliet imagines herself as a falconer luring Romeo:
‘[Juliet:] Hist! Romeo, hist! O for a falc’ner’s voice To lure this tassel-gentle back again!’ (R&J, 2.2.159-60).
Additional parallels to No. 19:
(4) By service long to purchase their good will
‘I entreat true peace of you, Which I will purchase with my duteous service’ (Rich. III, 2.1.63-64); cf. ‘purchase us a good opinion’ (Caes., 2.1.145).
(5) how frail those creatures are
‘frailty, thy name is woman’ (Ham., 1.2.146).
See also the parallels to lines 7-8 above.
(15) with subtle oath
Compare Sonnet 138:
When my love swears that she is made of truth,
I do believe her, though I know she lies,
That she might think me some untutored youth,
Unlearned in the world’s false subtleties.
(1-4)
Continue to Poem No. 20, return to Poem No. 18, or return to the Introduction.
[published June 22, 2018, updated 2021]
