Polyptotonic Will: or Will in over-plus…

Polyptoton is a figure in rhetoric, belonging to those that are puns. It takes a word and echoes it with another word derived from the same root….

Paranomosia repeats a word similar in sound to one already used;

Antanaclasis repeats a word while shifting from one meaning to another.

Syllepsis is an ambiguity, it uses a word which has two different meanings.

Asteismus is useful in dialogue, when a word is returned by the answerer with an unlooked for second meaning. so it’s excused from being listed. Doh!

there are some 64 uses of the word will in the Sonnets. Most are the future tense and show intent. But even these uses can be punny…I will be true… and …So will i pray that thou mayst have thy Will… in sonnets 123 and 143 respectively.

Obviously the traditional Will sonnets, ie those accepted by the orthodox, sigh, as massive puns on Shakespeare’s own name are sonnets 135 and 136, with 12 reps in the first and 6 in the second.

The Conspiracy theories inhabit the sonnets implicitly. It is after all the closest thing we have of Will. So let’s say it was that other guy that was actually Will’s Muse, Maecenas and Mentor. Now unless he too was a Will, why would he pun on this word so much?

But what to think of sonnets 88? …and i by this will be a gainer too… that for thy right, myself will bear all wrong…

and 89?…i will comment upon that offence…and i straight will halt…knowing thy will, i will acquaintance strangle…

or …whilst i like a willing patient I will drink…. in sonnet 111?

or sonnet 80? …on your broad main doth wilfully appear…

…steady on Will.
But there’s more…

there are also his …willingly willing wills… besides his being …self-willed… and …wilfull… he flaunts his …wilfulness… and is even … wilful-slow. This guy is so punny!

You might suppose …ills… would even count as well.

Hell, well as well if you slur it a bit…

I’ll… will be next on the list.

or how about…

“how far a modern quill doth come too short’

modern hWill…get it?

‘He thinks no ill’ is another hidden Will. Try saying it slowly and the phonetics will bring in the extra ‘w’.