England In the Sky

I’ve been reading Shakespeare’s plays in chronological order (at least as close to that as can be determined). I’ve done it before, but it was years ago, 15 years or something. I highly recommend it, if you feel so inclined. I have not been writing about it, because I’ve been trying to relax more and not everything I read/see has to be written about (although I want to, and already I’m defying myself – look at me, here I am writing about it). Anyway, I’ve been reading the plays in the mornings, and it’s been so much fun. So I suppose it is no surprise that on Thursday, walking back to my car after spending the afternoon at the beach, I glanced up at the sky and saw England hovering there. Sad to say, Ireland is not represented in the sky. And, as my friend Jackie observed, “It appears that the North Sea is on fire.”

I had just finished Richard II that morning, where, of course, one of the most famous speeches is by poor John of Gaunt, in Act 2 scene 1:

This royal throne of kings, this scepter’d isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise,
This fortress built by Nature for herself
Against infection and the hand of war,
This happy breed of men, this little world,
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall,
Or as a moat defensive to a house,
Against the envy of less happier lands,
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England,
This nurse, this teeming womb of royal kings,
Fear’d by their breed and famous by their birth,
Renowned for their deeds as far from home,
For Christian service and true chivalry,
As is the sepulchre in stubborn Jewry,
Of the world’s ransom, blessed Mary’s Son,
This land of such dear souls, this dear dear land,
Dear for her reputation through the world,
Is now leased out, I die pronouncing it,
Like to a tenement or pelting farm:
England, bound in with the triumphant sea
Whose rocky shore beats back the envious siege
Of watery Neptune, is now bound in with shame,
With inky blots and rotten parchment bonds:
That England, that was wont to conquer others,
Hath made a shameful conquest of itself.

So naturally, after reading that ode to England, I would look up and see that “precious stone set in the silver sea” up there in the sky. It makes perfect sense.