A MODERN TRANSLATION OF SONNET 18 INTO OLD ENGLISH.

A MODERN TRANSLATION OF SONNET 18 INTO OLD ENGLISH. Mary Jane sent me this translation of Shakespeare’s Sonnet into Old English (Anglo-Saxon), which she found on Facebook.

Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnet 18’ in Old English

Sceal ic þē gelīcian tō sumeres dæge?
Þū eart luflīcra ond staþolfæstra.
Rūge windas sceacað þrīmilces dȳrlinge blōstman
Ond sumeres lǣn hæfð eall tō lȳtelne termen.
Hwīlum heofones eage tō hāte scīnð,
Ond oft his gylden hīw is dimmod;
Ond ælc þāra fægernese hwīlum unwlitegað,
Of belimpe oþþe gesceaftes wendendum pæðe ne geglenged;
Ac þīn ēce sumor ne sceall forweornian
Ne forleosan þā fægernese þe þū hæfð;
Ne Dēaþ hrēman ne þorfte þæt þū wandrast in his sceadwe,
Þonne þū in ēce linan tō tīde grēwst
Swā lange swā man mæg orþian oþþe eagan magon sēon,
Swā lange swā þes lifaþ, ond þes þē līf giefþ.

Here for comparison is the text of Sonnet 18 from the Poetry Foundation site:

Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
By William Shakespeare

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.