he tells lesser poets to look at Stella and then begin to
write (l. 14). Like the typical poet-lover, Astrophil pro-
tests that his beloved is the fairest and most inspiring
beloved of all. But on the other hand, Astrophil does
not exactly say that admiring Stella will make his lis-
tener into a better poet. Instead, he says that if such a
poet want to “nurse” his “name... at fullest breasts of
Fame,” he should fi x his gaze on Stella (ll. 12–13).
Stella is a means to fame, not necessarily to good
poetry. This reference resonates with the imagery of
Parnassus and Petrarch (the Italian poet whose style
and imagery heavily infl uenced 16th-century lyric
poetry). But at the same time, it reveals that Astrophil
has been playing a game in seeming to oppose insin-
cere imitation against sincere inspiration: instead, he
opposes poor poetry that deserves its oblivion to better
poetry that earns fame by taking Stella as its object.
See also ASTROPHIL AND STELLA (OVERVIEW); SIDNEY, SIR
PHILIP; SONNET.
FURTHER READING
Coldiron, A. E. B. “Sidney, Watson, and the ‘Wrong Ways’
to Renaissance Lyric Poetics.” In Renaissance Papers,
edited by Trevor Howard-Hill and Philip Rollinson, 49–
- Columbia, S.C.: Camden House Press, 1997.
Joel B. Davis
Astrophil and Stella: Sonnet 16 (“In nature apt
to like when I did see”) SIR PHILIP SIDNEY (ca.
1582) Sonnet 16 is unusual in that, rather than
maintaining a pose of sincerity that is subtly under-
mined by the terms in which he expresses it, Astrophil
here narrates his conversion from being one who
merely believes he loves into a true lover. It follows the
ITALIAN (PETRARCHAN) SONNET form in that its fi rst two
QUATRAINs constitute a coherent OCTAVE, rhymed
abbaabba. The turn, where Astrophil tells us of truly
falling in love, occurs at line 9, so that the last part of
the SONNET may be taken as a coherent SESTET, rhyming
cdcdee. Sonnet 16 also marks a shift in the SONNET
SEQUENCE itself. Though there is some variance in their
themes, the fi rst 15 sonnets emphasize the difference
between Astrophil’s claim to sincerity and his criticism
of other, more imitative poets. Sonnet 16, in contrast,
begins Astrophil’s long account of his own follies.
The fi rst quatrain is an APOSTROPHE to love in which
Astrophil expresses the shallowness of his initial infat-
uations in unfl attering terms that evoke a cool and ava-
ricious assessment. Before he saw Stella, he compared
“beauties”—a word that primarily denotes beautiful
women but also suggests different kinds of beauty
itself—to the measurement of the purity of gold. Thus,
the beauties he has seen “were of manie Carrets fi ne” (l.
2): relatively refi ned and pure gold. These beauties
convinced Astrophil that he was “full” of love (ll. 3–4).
The second quatrain continues the apostrophe,
explaining that Astrophil did not feel in himself the
“fl ames” of love that others claimed to feel, and that he
denigrated these others’ expressions as a “whine” over
a mere “pinne’s hurt” (ll. 6–7). In line 8 he says he
based his judgment on his own as-yet shallow experi-
ence of love.
In the third quatrain, Astrophil ceases his address to
Love and speaks about love instead, characterizing his
dalliance as playing “with this young Lyon” (l. 9). In this
image, he alludes to a fable in which a shepherd brings
home a lion cub, thinking to make it a pet. When the
lion matures, it destroys the shepherd’s fl ocks, an action
that is subsequently compared to the devastation of Troy
wrought by Paris’s love for Helen. Thus, Astrophil hints
at the destructive power that he himself will fi nd in love.
He questions whether his eyes were “curst or blest” (l.
10) when they fi rst beheld Stella, which caused him to
fall in love truly; in this, he exploits the fascination with
paradox that characterizes 16th-century love poetry,
and particularly Petrarchan love poetry. Astrophil com-
pares himself to a schoolboy in the end of the quatrain,
claiming that, having seen Stella, he “speld” (which
means both learned and written out—like this very
poem, in fact) a “new lesson” (l. 12).
The COUPLET extends the metaphor of Astrophil-as-
schoolboy, as he explains to us that he has “learn’d
Love right” now that he has seen Stella (l. 13). Astro-
phil’s conclusion invokes much darker imagery and
implies that he has fallen from a state of innocence. He
asserts that one who has learned of love by an experi-
ence like his own is like one who “by being poisond
doth poison know” (l. 14). Poison is used as a meta-
phor for corruption and sin, an image derived from the
story of Adam and Eve, with Astrophil’s knowledge of42 ASTROPHIL AND STELLA: SONNET 16