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Shakespeare
Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day
The explication of Shakespeare's sonnet, "Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day" has been done ad nauseum. A quick web search will pull up a million websites dedicated to Shakespearean sonnets, and each of these domains will have its own, slightly different interpretation and analysis of the oft-cited and much praised Sonnet 18. But the reality is the poem says what it says and while some will debate the finer points of the poem (the language, the historical relevance, the imagery, the themes, the dangling modifiers, etc.), the overall meaning is straightforward and easy to apprehend, especially when compared to some of the more unintelligible Shakespearean sonnets (number 108 comes to mind). So, what is the overall meaning of the poem? Allow me to answer that question by doing another, painstakingly banal, explication of "Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day.
The first line of the sonnet is a question to both the reader and the muse of the poem. One can suggest that there's a seductive quality to it as it offers intrigue and suspense about the prospect of an exciting metaphorical compliment. "Shall I compare thee to a Summer's day?" Shall I compare you (the subject...
"Rough winds do shake the darling buds," meaning winds have a ravaging effect on the beautiful flowers of late spring/early summer. Line four - "And summer's lease hath too short a date" - points out that summer is too short. Line five -- "Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines" -- summer is too hot under the rays of the sun. Line six -- "And often in his gold complexion dimm'd" -- summer's gold complexion, again referring to the sun, is dimmed by clouds (presumably). So, in summation, summer is too rough on flowers, too short, too hot, and often marred by clouds. Summer is not without its faults, it's not perfect.
Line Seven kind of recapitulates this idea, that summer has its faults, that it is fallible. But speaking more generally -"And every fair…
Works Cited
Mabillard, Amanda. An Analysis of Shakespeare's Sonnet 18. Shakespeare Online. 2000.
(11/11/2011) < http://www.shakespeare-online.com/sonnets/18detail.html >.
Bloom, Harold. Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human. NY: Riverhead Books, 1998.
Shakespeare Journal 9/14 Sonnets (1. I usually have to force myself to read poetry, especially sonnets about romance that seem contrived or sentimentalized. Also, I am not very good at understanding and explaining the various metaphors, hidden meanings and so on. Sonnet 18 is so famous that it has long since turned into a cliche ("Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?") and would simply not go over very well is
Shakespeare's Sonnets 18, 73, 97 Poets have often looked to nature for inspiration and as a vehicle for self-expression. Throughout his lifetime, William Shakespeare is known to have written 154 sonnets, which cover various topics such as love, mortality, and the passage of time. Of these sonnets, sonnet numbers 18, 73, and 97 incorporate seasonal symbols that allow Shakespeare to express his love, the passage of time and its effect on
" Again, the poet employs repetition (of the word "fair") to emphasize his point. Moreover, "chance" and "changing" provide some alliteration, which is otherwise rare in this particular Shakespeare sonnet. Line nine begins with the word "But," to herald a shift in tone: the speaker went from listing summer's deficiencies to pointing out the particular qualities of his lover that make her superior. The speaker focuses almost exclusively on her "eternal
The ironic twist is the play of what is to be expected to be said and what is actually said (or, going back to the argument, what is expected from love and what actually occurs): It begins: "My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; / Coral is far more red than her lips' red" From here the sonnet continues with a much less pleasing list of the qualities about
Shakespeare and Romantic Love Clearly one of the most influential writers in the English language that has survived and prospered in contemporary times is William Shakespeare. Despite some of the controversy of whether he actual wrote what is attributed to him, or the other theories of the origination of his writing, no one can deny that he holds a place in literature that few, if any, have attained. The classic stories
SHAKESPEARE'S PLAYS William Shakespeare and his plays are the main topic of discussion in this paper. William Shakespeare is one of the greatest names whose literary contributions and writings are considered as assets for the literary world. Shakespeare's plays and writings are of considerable importance for the readers all around the world because his writings and power of expression are unmatchable. William Shakespeare and his plays have in fact formed