SOURCE: “Sexual Puns in Astrophel and Stella,” in Essays in Criticism, Vol. XXIV, No. 4, October 1974, pp. 341–355.

In the following essay, Sinfield asserts that viewing Astrophel as the elegant but naïve courtier is misleading, since sexual double entendres are an important feature of Sidney's verbal skill.

How far are Astrophil's feelings for Stella in Sidney's sequence sexual? The non-specialist reader at least tends to be blinded by the radiance of the prevalent image of Sidney as an urbane and elegant courtier throwing off Petrarchan conceits, and is unprepared to perceive much sexual passion in Astrophil. Perhaps we have not entirely recovered from romantic attitudes like the Reverend Alexander Grosart's in his edition of the Complete Poems (3 vols., 1877). Grosart insisted that the sonnets are not in their proper order, observing ‘It is of the last importance to remember this; for upon the dates of these Sonnets and Poems is...