William Shakespeare - Sonnets
SONNET 116
1 Let me not to the marriage of true minds
2 Admit impediments. Love is not love
3 Which alters when it alteration finds,
4 Or bends with the remover to remove:
5 O no; it is an ever-fixed mark,
6 That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;
7 It is the star to every wandering bark,
8 Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
9 Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
10 Within his bending sickle's compass come;
11 Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
12 But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
13 If this be error and upon me proved,
14 I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
2 Admit impediments. Love is not love
3 Which alters when it alteration finds,
4 Or bends with the remover to remove:
5 O no; it is an ever-fixed mark,
6 That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;
7 It is the star to every wandering bark,
8 Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
9 Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
10 Within his bending sickle's compass come;
11 Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
12 But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
13 If this be error and upon me proved,
14 I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
Sonnet 116 was published in 1609 and is written in typical Shakepearean Sonnet form in Iambic Pentameter with three quatrains with the rhyme scheme a-b-a-b and a rhyming couplet to end.
Typical of sonents are the 14 line verse, the volta and the couplet at the end and this sonnet is no different. Although it could be disputed Sonnet 116 shows no definitive volta which in typical Petracharcan sonnets is shown by a word or phrase that marks a shift in the argument, in sonnet 116, Shakespeare goes from using imagery of love being definitive, unmoving concept where the tubulance of life is concerned "it is an ever-fixed mark" "never shaken", after the volta "Love's not time's fool", continued is the symbol of love as an unmoving concept but this time it is described as not being affected by time "love alters not with his brief hours and weeks".
The couplet at the end of a sonnet is said to be a line that comes to some conclusion about the argument or problem that has been discussed throughout. Here, Shakespeare plays somewhat with the traditional Petrarchan form. His final couplet seems to, in some ways, discount his entire argument yet it also cements it indefinitely "If this be error and upon me proved,// I never writ, nor no man ever loved".
The use of negatives in the poem is perhaps reflective of the very nature of love as something that is difficult to define - it is easier to say what it is not "Love is not love// Which alters when it alteration finds..." "Love's not time's fool" than it is to say what it is. The use of mirroring language too "remover to remove" "alters when alteration finds" "love is not love" represents the couple - the two people love exists between.
Heightened imagery is something common of sonneteers who wished to lay flattery on their subject or patron, Shakespeare is not writing to a lover, but about love which again makes his sonnet different to the traditional. Here Shakespeare compares love to a star "who's worth's unknown" which could be seen as hyperbolic but the star also represents something that is present and can be seen anywhere on earth. They are unmoving and unchangeable which is also a metaphor for the nature of love Shakespeare is trying to present.
SONNET 18
1 Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?2 Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
3 Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
4 And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
5 Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
6 And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
7 And every fair from fair sometime declines,
8 By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm'd;
9 But thy eternal summer shall not fade
10 Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
11 Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
12 When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st;
13 So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
14 So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
This sonnet it perhaps more true to original petrachan form: an argument is clearly put across in the first line "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" and the volta is clearly marked by the conjunction "but" in line 9 and the couplet in lines 13 and 14 come to a conclusion about the argument completed throughout the poem.
In the poem Shakespeare begins by asking whether he should compare "thee", his lover, to a sumemr's day. He then uses reasons why actual summer isn't great "winds to shake the darling bds of may", "summer's lease hath all to short a date" "sometime too hot". Yet when the volta comes at like 9, he concludes that his own lover does not have any of the negativity of the season - "shall not fade" like an "eternal summer". He even goes on to say how death will not bring "shade" and darkness upon his muse. And time itself cannot effect the "eternal lines" which could represent the wrinkles of age or the physical lines of the poem that eternalise his lover's beauty and love as long as people read it "as long as men can breathe or eyes can see,// So long lives this, and this gives life to thee".
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