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 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 to make clear declaration of his religious faith. 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.
Other works done by Sandys include several books, he is best known for his travel writings. Relation of Journey, (1615) and Metamorphoses (1632). Another notable book, A Paraphrase upon the Divine Poems. (1638). In the early modern period, biblical texts were extremely popular.
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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. Annotations made in two different colors could give indication that they were done at different times or they have different subjects to be noted.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. Black annotations are also bracketed and could be part of a collective meaning. Those that are not written in the margins, really have a light, gentle underlining of script.
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 Bull at Dartford…” The rest becomes difficult to read and is inconclusive. It could possibly say “Broken armory, broken arms…” But when researching that near Dartford, nothing was found. What is written in the margin is most interesting because further research could possibly decode the handwritten script. These unmarked passages give us no significant content but are clues into what the annotator is really trying to make certain references of. One can speculate that this sidenote was one of significance to only the annotator and no one else. Its refence to a Dartford inn creates a new set of questions, why did the annotator write this? For what purpose? Was this information meant to be passed on? And as one can hypothesize over these question, some answer may come as great challenge to one with a curious mind.
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? After careful review, these patterns were also inconclusive and could not determine their origin. Printing such as this could have been common in the printing press and used to emphasize the title and author’s name. Books and annotations like this could help give us the periphery of what was spoken at the time. It also gives implications to what was popular, what was relevant, what was purposeful, along with how they spoke and in what context. Discovery of such finding deserves a much closer look, not just for historians, but for everyone.
