Shakespeare Sonnet 68

‘Thus is his cheek the map of days outworn’

Aug 22, 2008

Sonnet 68 is a companion piece to sonnet 67, continuing the theme of authentic art vs. the artificial.

First Quatrain: “Thus is his cheek the map of days outworn”

The speaker begins sonnet 68, linking it to sonnet 67, with the conjunctive adverb “thus.” Because Nature will always be able to proffer true art through true artists, therefore “is his cheek the map of days outworn.” On the aging face of the true artist will “beauty” live and die, despite the phony upstarts who merely copycat and therefore denigrate art with their prettiness and shallowness.

The speaker is metaphorically using “face” to mean to face of art, not the face of the human artist. He is not concerned with human appearance here as he was in the “marriage sonnets”; he is concerned only with the genuine art of bona fide artists. Earlier art provided a “beauty” that “liv’d and died as flowers do now.” That was before “these bastard signs of fair were born” who now dare to copy past masters yet remain poetasters.

Second Quatrain: “Before the golden tresses of the dead”

The shallowness of copycat poetasters is an abomination just as are grave robbers who steal hair from the dead to fashion into wigs. The “second life” of that hair that well suited its original owner becomes an unnatural prop, not an outgrowth of beauty.

The speaker implies that such art is unnatural, unoriginal and therefore lacks the attributes of natural beauty and truth, which he much disdains as counterfeit. By comparing metaphorically such artists to grave robbers, he makes it known that he values the older works that have stood the test of time. Better such art remain sepulchered than brought out by shining hucksters whose bogusness denigrates the art.

Third Quatrain: “In him those holy antique hours are seen”

The speaker then turns to the valid artist whose “holy antique hours are seen.” That artist’s creations are genuine, “Without all ornament, itself and true, / Making no summer of another’s green, / Robbing no old to dress his beauty new.”

The legitimate artist does not rely on decorations; his metaphors and image are “true.” He does not reply on the work of others. He has no need to “rob” or copy from older artists to enhance his own work.

The Couplet: “And him as for a map doth Nature store”

It is the work of that indisputable artist that Nature stockpiles using his true creations as a “map” “[t]o show false Art what beauty was of yore.” No matter how much the contemporary poetasters “rob” from the artists of “yore,” only Nature will recognize the authentic, genuine, heart-felt works of the morally and spiritually inspired artist.

The copyright of the article Shakespeare Sonnet 68 in British Poetry is owned by Linda Sue Grimes. Permission to republish Shakespeare Sonnet 68 in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.