Sir Patrick Stewart Sparks Love Of Language With #ASonnetADay

#SirPatrickStewart might be best known for roles like Professor Charles Xavier in films like Logan and Days of Future Past, or to older generations as Captain Jean-Luc Picard from Star Trek: The Next Generation (and more recently, Picard), but for those of us following the talented thespian on social media, Stewart is the man behind #ASonnetADay.

Of course, with all of us currently practicing social or physical distancing and spending a good deal of time in our homes, many of us are spending more time than we might like on social media, and Stewart's decision to start #ASonnetADay is like a light in the middle of a dark tunnel. The 79-year-old, who resides in the United States, began the sonnet sensation on March 21, 2020.

Certainly, Shakespeare's sonnets are something with which Stewart is quite familiar. He was a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company for 16 years for 60 productions, so he has more than a passing familiarity with the Bard's works. While his motivations for beginning the daily sonnet posts are unknown, they have brought much-needed light into what has been fairly dark times recently.

I know as an English major, Stewart's daily posts have become something I look forward to on a daily basis. There's nothing political, there's nothing at all that would be inflammatory; it's just a man, sharing with the world his love of the English language, and it's hard not to be drawn into that.

What I've really enjoyed about the entire experience that has been #ASonnetADay so far is just the pure joy that Stewart seems to have with each word he shares with us. I know with the post for Sonnet 10, I actually laughed out loud with Stewart's insistence that no one could make him read Sonnet 9 out loud, because he found it offensive. The man had a twinkle in his eye and a broad smile on his face when he said it, so it was not hard to enjoy the genuine mirth on Stewart's face. For the record, Sonnet 9 is not so offensive, but I'll leave that for you to determine on your own.

It's not just English teachers embracing Stewart's posts, either. Each post has received anywhere from 73 thousand to 235 thousand views, so it's clear that everyone who's seen the posts is embracing the change to the unending news blasts we have been getting about COVID-19 and what we can continue to do to stop the spread of it.

There's also a significant difference between reading Shakespeare's sonnets for yourself and listening to it read by one well versed in Shakespeare's art - one who so clearly loves Shakespeare's art in the way Sir Patrick Stewart does. There is a warmth to Stewart's delivery, and while the iambic pentameter sonnets are written in are a reflection in many ways of the natural cadences with which people speak in general, there's just something that seems naturally right about Stewart's recitations. One could easily imagine the impassioned Shakespearean actor on stage instead of Stewart sitting on his couch with a much-loved book in his hands, smiling at the camera as he falls into the words he knows so well.

Sir Patrick Stewart's offerings of these sonnets are a welcome balm in times that seem so uncertain. They are an escape from the dark headlines that scream at us from websites and newspapers. Even if we do not necessarily embrace sonnets as a form of entertainment, we can surely recognize the beauty in each sonnet Stewart presents to us, and it is because of these slivers of beauty that Stewart is offering each day that we have one more thing that's positive and lovely to hold on to in times which might seem so very bleak.