SOURCE: Cousins, A. D. “Venus and Adonis.” In Shakespeare's Sonnets and Narrative Poems, pp. 12-47. New York: Longman, 2000.

In the following essay, Cousins examines the complexities of the characterization of Venus and Adonis.

(i) the Minor Epic. Lodge's Scillaes Metamorphosis

Venus and Adonis was the first of Shakespeare's poems to be published. It was registered at Stationers' Hall on 18 April 1593 and may have been begun in the summer of the previous year.¹ For much of the time, approximately between that summer and May 1594, the London theatres were closed because of the plague.² His career as a playwright interrupted, Shakespeare took the opportunity to present himself publicly as someone who could write not only plays.³ He dedicated his poem to Henry Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, who was then nineteen years old, prominent at court and a sought-after patron.⁴ As has often been pointed out, the wording of the dedication...