A Complete Astrophil

And so, nearly a year late, the recordings of all the sonnets and songs from Astrophil and Stella by Sir Philip Sidney are now online.  It's been a difficult process recording them - some are very good, some are so so, and many are very similar to the one before or after it.
It is a complete story, the love of a man for a lady, one which is doomed, and his roller coaster emotions.  It has a truth to it, in that it is clearly true to the authors feelings.  That isn't to say the text isn't problematic.  Stella is revered, says little and is there to be won.  The authors jealousy is corrosive and unpleasant.  It is the product of a masculine culture, his idea of love being positively adolescent.
Problematic as it is, and surprising to me because I chose these poems almost at random, I can see a performance piece for it.  With a paired down selection of the material and a small team I could create a really dark, anguished and critical piece of theatre about this mindset.
Whether I will, time will tell.
In the meantime, here is the complete sequence for you to judge for yourself.