Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 18” is simply a statement of praise about the beauty of the beloved girl; summer tends to unpleasant extremes of windiness and heat but the beloved woman is more lovely and temperate. Shakespeare deliberately chose nature to compare with love because nature is a lovely creation by God. Shakespeare uses a wide range of literary devices, such as personification, metaphysical conceits, anaphora, tone, imagery, and has recurring themes as well as motifs, to illustrate his darling’s comparison to a summer’s day. Some literary devices used are personification, metaphors, and similes. To begin with, Shakespeare sets up a contrast between the beloved and a summer’s day. He argues that his cherished, contrasting nature, will be saved by the force and stability of his poetry. For instance he personifies nature by saying “Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May” (3) meaning that if winds are able to "shake" things, buds could be described as "darling," these are both words more often pragmatic to human actions. In addition, “And summer’s lease hath all too short a date” in line 4 personifies summer because it can’t literally take out a lease on anything. Also the buds are a metaphor of the beginning of a new life. This shows how tranquil is the girl in comparison to the “rough winds” (3) of the summer. Moreover, the sun is described through the metaphor “the eye of heaven” (5), showing that even something as powerful as the sun will shadow the earth unlike his lover’s beauty. This shadow which he calls a “complexion” shows that when the sun fades over the buds, they won’t flourish, for plants need sunshine. However, in line 9, the personification is inverted; instead of relating nature in human terms, Shakespeare ... ... middle of paper ... ...compares her with images of summer to show their differences and resemblances such as “Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May” (3). Those repetitive images portray summer. He talks about “rose buds of May”, the summer’s “gold complexion”, and Death’s “shade”. Summer days are short, seasons end, and people decease. Despite all the sweet talk, he realizes that if nothing is done, her “eternal summer” would indeed end. These lead on to themes of this poem. The imagery used leads us to its central theme and motifs. The main theme of this poem is impermanence. Works Cited www.sparknotes.com/shakespeare/shakesonnets/section2.rhtml www.shmoop.com/sonnet-18/personified-nature-symbol.html www.writework.com/essay/metaphysical-comparison-between-sonnet-18-and-friends-depa http://media.wix.com/ugd/24e9ef_18dc18238332048913e7c379aee1b239.pdf?dn=explication+sonnet+18.pdf
William Penn, an English philosopher and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, once said that, “For death is no more than a turning of us over from time to eternity.” He is saying that death is not the end of our lives, but just another stage. In the poem “Holy Sonnet 10” by John Donne, the poet talks to death itself and gives his opinion on his view of death and others’ views: it is something that cannot control anything, can be replaced by others things, and is not the end of a person’s life. Through the use of his figurative language, Petrachan form, and tone and language, Mr. Donne expresses the message that death is not to be feared because one lives on in heaven.
“But the while I think on thee (dear friend) all losses are restored, and sorrows end” (lines 15-16). This is an excerpt from the master himself, William Shakespeare, in “Sonnet 30” also known as “When to the Sessions of Sweet Silent Thought”. As with all of his works, this sonnet requires a lot of interpretation due to the Old English to be able to understand anything in it. “Sonnet 30” is written in iambic pentameter with a rhyme scheme of “abab/cdcd/efef/gg”. The sonnet is a lyrical poem because it is uses first person, which signifies that there is a signal speaker. The meaning itself is simple; though after a good bit of decrypting; the speaker is looking back is recollecting all the things that have happened to him or her, but more specifically looks at things that weren’t good and remembers how things “piled” up more and more which brought great sorrow. However, in the last two lines of the verse, Shakespeare pulls out his classic trump car with a positive ending where the speaker describes how thinking of someone dear brings great joy over the sorrow they felt. Overall, the sonnet is gentle, passive, and even somber to an extent. A variety of poetic devices especially alliteration and metaphors are used to heavily convey a theme of love lost and found relying on a mood similar to that of the speaker, grieving in sorrowful recollection yet feeling joy for the future.
One of the poems that William Shakespeare wrote is called “That time of year thou mayst in me behold.” It is also known as William Shakespeare’s Sonnet 73. This Sonnet is viewed as being comprised of metaphors, which capture the struggle of life. Life in which there is an end to everything but beauty within it. The speaker within this poem is one that reflects on his life and how nature is closely connected with his journey. In order to understand the theme of the poem, the reader must first recognize and understand the three major metaphors within the poem.
Shakespeare’s themes are mostly conventional topics, such as love and beauty. Nevertheless, Shakespeare presents these themes in his own unique fashion, most notably by addressing the poems of beauty not to a fair maiden, but instead to a young man: ‘‘shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate” (book). Shakespeare points out that the youth’s beauty is more perfect then the beauty of a summer day. It is also “more temperate”, in other words more gentle, more restrained whereas the summer’s day might have violent excesses in store. At first glance of sonnet 18, it’s pretty much certain that one would think Shakespeare is referring to a woman, not a man. The idea of a man describing another man with such choice of words is always seen with a different eye. Several even stated that Shakespeare is homosexual. Whichever the case may be, Shakespeare painted beauty in the most original matter. He dared to do what everybody else didn’t, or maybe feared to, and accomplished his goal with flying colors. Besides, in his sonnets, Shakespeare states that the young man was made for a woman and urges the man to marry so he can pass on h...
The speaker uses metaphors to describe his mistress’ eyes to being like the sun; her lips being red as coral; cheeks like roses; breast white as snow; and her voices sounding like music. In the first few lines of the sonnet, the speaker view and tells of his mistress as being ugly, as if he was not attracted to her. He give...
In “Written at the close of Spring,” Smith’s second sonnet, she focuses on the wonderful ability nature has in rejuvenating itself each year. Smith personifies Spring in the way it “nurs’d in dew” its flowers as though it was nursing its own children (“Close of Spring” 2). While it creates life, Spring is not human, because it has this ability to come back after its season has passed. Human beings grow old and die; we lose our “fairy colours” through the abrasive nature of life (“Close of Spring” 12). Smith is mournful that humans cannot be like the flowers of Spring and regain the colors of our lives after each year.
A couplet is two lines of verse, usually in the same meter and joined by rhyme, that form a unit. In Shakespeare’s writing, the couplet can be found at the end of the poem. In Sonnet 18, the couplet expressed Shakespeare’s hope that through his writing, any living man will be able to understand how beautiful and amazing this person is that is described in his writing. This relates to the overall meaning because it describes how he plans to carry on the beauty that he fears will fade like summer. Shakespeare conveys a hopeful tone in this couplet because he knows that his writing is good enough to keep the beauty of this person alive for many years.
In Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18, also known as “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” represents and discusses the love and beauty of his beloved. Also, the speaker refers to his love more sweet, temperate, and fair than all the beauty that he can see in nature. He also speaks how the sun can be dim and that nature’s beauty is random: “And often is his gold complexion dimm’d / And every fair from fair sometimes declines” (6-7). At the end of the poem the speaker explains that they beauty of the person that is being mentioned is not so short because, his love with live as long as people are still reading this sonnet. The beauty of his beloved with last longer than nature, because although nature is beautiful flowers and other things still have to die: “So long as men can breathe or eyes can see / so long lives this and this gives life to thee” (13-14) Also, the speaker is comparing his love to a summer’s day, but does not really say anything specific or that the qualities given to his beloved are more superior to a summer’s day, which can allow the reader to understand that his beloved can stay young, beautiful, and never going to die.
In the second quatrain, the lover grants to Time its own will: "And do whate'er
Therefore, because William Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 18” and Edmund Spenser’s “Sonnet 75” share the idea that love is sincere and eternal, they can be looked upon as similar in theme. However, although similar in theme, Shakespeare’s intent is portraying the true everlasting beauty of his love, which is already achieved, whereas Spenser concentrates more on trying to entice his desired love, remaining optimistic throughout the entire poem.
In Sonnet 18, Shakespeare employs a Petrarchan conceit to immortalize his beloved. He initiates the extended metaphor in the first line of the sonnet by posing the rhetorical question, "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" The first two quatrains of the poem are composed of his criticism of summer. Compared to summer, his lover is "more lovely and more temperate" (2). He argues that the wind impairs the beauty of summer, and summer is too brief (3-4). The splendor of summer is affected by the intensity of the sunlight, and, as the seasons change, summer becomes less beautiful (5-8).
In William Shakespeare’s sonnet “shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” the audience is introduced to a poem in which he himself goes into depth about the person he is infatuated with. The author does not give any type of hints telling the audience who the poem is towards because it can be for both male and female. That’s the interesting part about William Shakespeare’s work which is to second hand guess yourself and thinking otherwise. Making you think and think rational when you read his work. The sonnet “Shall I compare thee to a summers day” is one of his most famous and published poem. Shakespeare’s tone of voice at the commence of the poem is somewhat relaxed and joyful because he is going on talking about the person he is intrigued by. Throughout the passage Metaphors, similes and imagery can all be found in the poem itself
Thou art more lovely and more temperate" (18.1-2). The first few lines of this sonnet place vivid images in the readers mind about a beautiful and sweet tempered person. Most readers believe this person to be a beautiful woman because of the preconceived notions about the dynamics of love.... ... middle of paper ...
In Shakespeare’s sonnet 130, the speaker ponders the beauty, or the lack thereof, of his lover. Throughout the sonnet, the speaker presents his lover as an unattractive mistress with displeasing features, but in fact, the speaker is ridiculing, through the use of vivid imagery, the conventions of love poems and the way woman are portrayed through the use of false comparisons. In the end, the speaker argues that his mistress may not be perfect, but in his eyes, her beauty is equal to any woman who is abundantly admired and put through the untrue comparison.