🌹 Stanza 64 - Literary Analysis

Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis

📖 Original Stanza

‘For shame,’ he cries, ‘let go, and let me go;
My day’s delight is past, my horse is gone,
And ‘tis your fault I am bereft him so:
I pray you hence, and leave me here alone:
For all my mind, my thought, my busy care,
Is how to get my palfrey from the mare.’

🔍 Line-by-Line Analysis

Line 1: 'For shame,' he cries, ‘let go, and let me go;

"For shame,": An exclamation expressing strong disapproval, embarrassment, or moral indignation. Adonis is deeply uncomfortable and mortified by Venus's actions, indicating his youthful innocence and strict sense of propriety. Shakespeare uses this to immediately highlight Adonis's internal distress and his moral opposition to Venus's forwardness.
"let go, and let me go": A desperate and urgent plea for both physical release from Venus's embrace and permission to depart. The repetition of "go" emphasizes his desire for freedom and highlights the physical restraint he feels, reinforcing his lack of consent.
Meaning: Adonis exclaims, "How shameful!" and frantically tells Venus to release her hold on him and allow him to leave immediately.

Line 2: My day’s delight is past, my horse is gone,

"My day’s delight is past": Refers to his primary source of joy and activity for the day, which is hunting. His pleasure has been entirely interrupted and spoiled by Venus's relentless pursuit, indicating his singular focus on the chase and his disinterest in anything else.
"my horse is gone": His horse, essential for hunting, has evidently run off, likely spooked or neglected during Venus's embrace. This underscores Adonis's practical, material concerns and his devotion to his sport over any romantic entanglement. Shakespeare uses this practical loss to ground Adonis's rejection in tangible reality.
Meaning: My enjoyment of the day's hunting is over, and my horse has disappeared.

Line 3: And ‘tis your fault I am bereft him so:

"And ‘tis your fault": A direct and emphatic accusation of blame towards Venus. This shows Adonis's frustration and his clear assignment of responsibility for his predicament.
"I am bereft him so": "Bereft" means deprived of or lacking something valuable. "Him" refers to his horse. "So" emphasizes the complete nature of his loss. Adonis blames Venus for the disruption of his day and the loss of his horse, indicating his youthful inability to see beyond immediate consequences and his lack of empathy for Venus's emotions.
Meaning: And it is entirely your fault that I have been deprived of my horse in this manner.

Line 4: I pray you hence, and leave me here alone:

"I pray you hence": "Pray you" is an archaic polite plea, meaning "I beg you" or "please." "Hence" means away from this place. It's a polite but firm command for Venus to depart.
"and leave me here alone": A direct and unequivocal request for solitude, a stark contrast to Venus's desire for intimacy. This highlights Adonis's preference for isolation and his rejection of companionship, especially of a romantic nature.
Meaning: I beg you, please go away from here, and leave me by myself.

Line 5: For all my mind, my thought, my busy care,

"For all my mind, my thought, my busy care": This tripartite list emphasizes the complete preoccupation of Adonis's mental faculties. "Busy care" implies anxious concern or diligent thought. He is not thinking of Venus or love, but solely of his lost horse. This phrase underscores his practical, non-romantic nature.
Meaning: Because all my attention, my reflections, and my anxious concerns...

Line 6: Is how to get my palfrey from the mare.’

"Is how to get my palfrey from the mare": "Palfrey" is a riding horse, typically a smaller, gentler one. "Mare" is a female horse. This line functions as a direct, literal concern (his male horse potentially coupling with a female horse) but also as a powerful and ironic metaphor for his own situation. The "palfrey" represents Adonis himself, and the "mare" symbolizes Venus, who is relentlessly pursuing him. Shakespeare uses this analogy to highlight Adonis's innocence and his tendency to frame his human emotional struggles in simple, animalistic terms. It also ironically undercuts Venus's sophisticated passion by reducing it to a common animal urge.
Meaning: ...are focused on figuring out how to retrieve my male riding horse from the female horse he has strayed with.

🎭 Literary Devices

Device	Example	Effect
Direct Address	"For shame,' he cries, 'let go, and let me go;"	Adonis directly confronts Venus, asserting his agency and clearly communicating his discomfort and desire to escape, shifting the dynamic from passive recipient to active rejecter.
Repetition	"let go, and let me go"	Emphasizes Adonis's urgent and desperate plea for physical release and freedom, highlighting his distress and the perceived entrapment.
Blame/Accusation	"And ‘tis your fault I am bereft him so:"	Clearly establishes Adonis's frustration and assigns direct responsibility to Venus for his predicament, portraying him as a put-upon victim of her advances.
Metaphor/Symbolism	"Is how to get my palfrey from the mare."	The "palfrey" (Adonis) and "mare" (Venus) serve as a thinly veiled metaphor for Adonis's own unwanted pursuit by Venus. It reveals Adonis's youthful innocence, his literal-mindedness, and his inability to grasp human passion, reducing his complex situation to a simple animalistic problem.
Irony	"Is how to get my palfrey from the mare."	Adonis uses an analogy of horses to describe his predicament, ironically simplifying his complex human emotional situation. This highlights his naivete regarding love and desire, as he is more concerned with animal husbandry than a goddess's affections.
Contrast	Adonis's "day's delight" (hunting) vs. Venus's desire for love; Adonis's desire for solitude vs. Venus's desire for intimacy.	Highlights the fundamental incompatibility between Adonis's youthful, nature-oriented priorities and Venus's mature, amorous pursuits, driving the central conflict of the poem.

🎯 Overall Meaning & Significance in the Context of the Poem

Stanza 64 marks a crucial turning point in Venus and Adonis, as Adonis explicitly and forcefully rejects Venus's advances. This stanza serves as a clear articulation of his lack of interest in her passionate overtures, showcasing his youthful innocence and his singular devotion to hunting and the natural world. His repeated pleas to be released and his direct accusation of blame ("'tis your fault") underscore his profound discomfort and frustration with Venus's aggressive pursuit.

The stanza's ultimate significance lies in its final line: "Is how to get my palfrey from the mare." This seemingly simple statement encapsulates Adonis's character and the core themes of the poem. It reveals his literal-mindedness and his inability to comprehend or reciprocate Venus's complex, mature love. By reducing his own predicament to an analogy of horses, Adonis demonstrates his naive view of desire and his preference for the order of nature over the chaos of human passion. This line subtly mocks Venus's attempts at seduction by equating them with basic animal instinct, while simultaneously highlighting Adonis's emotional immaturity.

In the broader context of the poem, this stanza solidifies the theme of unrequited love, with Adonis's unequivocal rejection serving as a stark contrast to Venus's overflowing passion. It reinforces the conflict between youthful innocence and passionate experience, showing Adonis's attachment to chastity and the hunt versus Venus's embodiment of fertility and desire. Furthermore, it subtly critiques Venus's aggressive methods, suggesting that her forcefulness only pushes Adonis further away, making him perceive her as an obstacle to his true "delight" (hunting) rather than a source of pleasure. The stanza therefore deepens the tragic irony of Venus's pursuit, as her immense power and desire are rendered impotent by Adonis's resolute purity and indifference.