The Red and the Black: Manuscript Annotations on Sandys' A Paraphrase upon the Song of Solomon.
Upon review of this piece of literature, one can notice right away it is dedicated to the Queens Majesty. The queen at the time was Queen Harietta Maria, a very religious monarch figure. George Sandys was a son of the archbishop of the Church of England. His works were of a religious nature. From what one can see from this book’s analytics that the highlighted parts are almost romantic in nature. The Song of Solomon speaks of wisdom as a beautiful woman and gives wisdom gender pronouns such as She and Her. In this romanticism, George Sandys could possibly be using this excerpt as book of poetry. Some of the most inclusive ways could be to paraphrase eloquent, poetic gestures that are written in the bible as a means to court a marital partner.
George Sandys was a writer, poet, traveler, and colonist. The son of an archbishop, Edwin Sandys, George grew up very religious and attended the most prestigious religious schools. He went to school in Oxford. George was known to be observant and inquisitive. This gives us good explanation for the paraphrase of biblical text. He included anti-Calvinist commentaries in his Paraphrase upon the Psalms" (1636). Both in Psalms and The Songs of Solomon are written arts works and tribute to God through poetry and lyricism. It is possible that Sandys was creating his own personal devotionals and later decided to publish them. According to the Oxford dictionary, Sandys was not a rich man near the end of his life and could have published the paraphrases to make a living.
Another theory about the paraphrases is that Sandys could have published these for new lyrical content for music. Just as the previous accounts in the Paraphrase upon the Psalms of David, Sandys highlights very poetic passages that could almost be translated and transposed into songs. These words could be written romantically as well. Most of the parts that are not highlighted or underlined give direct reference to the scriptures written by Solomon and King David. It is also unclear of what translation of the bible Sandys paraphrased from.
In a much deeper analysis of the actual piece, one can notice right away that highlights are in different colors. These are annotations made by and unknown reader. Some are in red, these could indicate a more poetic, endearing passage. While the black highlights are followed with a changing of one word written in the margins. There is an annotation written sideways in the margins as well. This could indicate that the annotator was writing in shorthand. Analysis of the shorthand script reads “At the Bill out…” The rest becomes difficult to read and is inconclusive. What is written in the margin is most interesting because further research could possibly decode the handwritten script. Those that are not written in the margins, really have a light, gentle underlining of script. These unmarked passages give us no significant content but are clues into what Sandys is really trying to make certain references of.
Annotations are made in two different colors could give indication that they were done at different times or they have different subjects to be noted.
There are also several unknowns in this piece of English literature. One instance could be the printing pattern around the titled. As one could do intense research to find significant meaning regarding its symbolism, one may find more questions than answers. Was this just a popular pattern written to be decorative to the eye? Do the symbols represent any monarchy or group of religious sects?
