Shakespearean Sonnets

Q:What is unique about Shakespeare’s sonnets is “the variety, complexity and sensitivity found therein.” Analyse some of the sonnets you have read with reference to this comment.

The Shakespearean sonnet is unique when compared to traditional sonnets. Shakespeare dealt with different themes and subjects that were unconventional at the time. A sonnet is a love poem, usually written in praise of an idolized and unattainable woman. All 365 of Petrarch’s sonnets were written in praise of a single woman, Laura and were passionate lyrics that used hyperbolic images to praise her as a model of adoration and inspiration. Petrarch did not interact with Laura, but merely viewed her from afar; and therefore his love for her is what he imagines it to be; it is based on the ideal. While following the same tradition, Shakespeare introduced new aspects to the sonnet. His sonnets are unique because he introduced ‘variety, complexity, and sensitivity’ to them.  

When speaking of the variety in Shakespeare’s sonnets we have to bear in mind that sonnets spoke only of love and themes directly related to love; they focused on only one hub. Shakespeare, on the other hand, deals with a variety of themes, some of them having nothing to do with love. He explores sex, death, dying, the ravages of time, carnal lust, platonic love, immortality, religion and the soul and develops a number of other subjects such as blame, deceit, insomnia, loneliness, etc… To illustrate this point, let us take sonnet 129. Here, Shakespeare deals with the theme of lust, engaging in it explicitly and without reservations. This was highly unconventional for his time. He speaks of how the fulfillment of lust is desired, longed for and experienced with enjoyment – but then how it leads to immediate regret and shame. The poet warns against the dangers of indulging in lust yet says that although the world knows all this about lust already, they do not know how to ‘shun the heaven that leads men to this hell’. He seems to be speaking from experience, although he tries to hide this fact.

Another poem that is unique when compared to conventional sonnets is sonnet 130. Here we have a direct parody of a Petrarchan sonnet. He makes fun of the courtly tradition of praising a woman to the skies by comparing her to hyperbolic images. Shakespeare begins by the negative line, ‘My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun’ and follows it with comparison after comparison that only emphasizes the negative aspects of his mistress. However, in the volta (the terminating couplet), he states that his love is true and real despite the fact that his woman is not perfect.

Sonnets such as 18 and 55 praise the fair youth of Shakespeare’s sonnets and promise immortality through verse, while the very first sonnet laments the consequences that the passing of time will have on the youth’s beauty and perfection. This reversal of roles, that is, the male poet praising not a young woman but another man, is also unique. It has led to the speculation that Shakespeare was a homosexual but there is no valid proof to substantiate this.

Complexity was a feature of Shakespearean sonnets which contain the potentially troubling depiction of human love. The speaker of the sonnets has two loves. One is a man to whom sonnets 1 – 126 are dedicated and the other is the dark lady with ‘metaphorically’ dark morals to whom sonnets 127-154 are dedicated. His relationships with these two people are obscure and troubling. He calls the youth an angel and praises him as Petrarch does Laura. The woman conversely, is ‘coloured ill’, a bad angel and a temptress. She later lures the youth away from the poet thereby leaving him in fear of losing both his loves. Sonnet 144 deals particularly with this, and is the only sonnet that explicitly refers to both the lady and the lord.

Sonnet 94 is extremely complex in its description, and contains ambiguous metaphors and references, which make it difficult to interpret. The poet speaks of ‘cold, unmoving people’ and then jumps to a description of a ‘sweet summer flower’. He ends by saying that the flower, if it festers, will smell worse than a weed. The theme is ‘optima corrupta pessima’ – the best becomes the worst when corrupted. The entire poem is a complex riddle that has continued to cause debate.

In this way, Shakespeare portrays complex issues, often in complex, ambiguous ways. The relationships he describes are complicated, but this makes it realistic. Life is complex and intricate. It is hard to find clear – cut relationships and situations. The poet has understood this and is realistic in his portrayal.

Finally, when taking sensitivity into account, we see that Shakespeare’s sonnets are deeply emotional, poignant and reflective. They are so convincing that scholars believe they are autobiographical. He writes as though he has gone through each situation and perhaps he has.

Number 30 is a good example of such a sonnet. Here the poet speaks of his youth, his old friends, some of whom have died, lost loves and mistakes made. It is full of deep emotion. All three quatrains deal with the poet’s grief. The couplet focuses on the young man and the poet indicates how much he depends on him for his emotional and spiritual sustenance. The poem expresses the poet’s discontent in life.

In 130 he describes his mistress in realistic terms and proclaims that he loves her despite her inadequacies. This is a show of honest feelings and rings true to the reader. It shows the speaker as a sensitive person.

Sonnet 73 is another that deals with the poet’s feelings on the passing of time. It expresses the speaker’s anxieties over his advancing age and his concern that the same will happen to the youth. The poem contains complex, interchangeable metaphors, and is deeply poignant. The private sentiments expressed are like a window into the poet’s soul. Few poets are so outspoken regarding their innermost feelings, but it is this that partly constitutes the uniqueness in Shakespeare’s sonnets.

To sum up, Shakespeare’s sonnets can be viewed as the prototype of a new kind of ‘modern’ love poetry. This poetry was unique in term of themes, expression and development. He encompasses several distinct points of love, life, death and time. It is no wonder than that the Shakespearean sonnet remains the epitome of the sonnet form in the English language. 


Q: How effectively does Shakespeare portray the process of ageing in the sonnets that you have studied?

One of the main themes of the sonnets that is alluded to again and again is that of the ravages of time and the effects it has on age. The narrator of the sonnets is often obsessed with this theme and tries to find various solutions to this inevitable problem. Time is portrayed as an enemy – it makes men age, beauty fade and life to end.

Shakespeare opens the sequence of sonnets by pleading with the fair youth to beget children so that he may leave his beauty to posterity, in the very first sonnet. He wants to combat the inevitable by pushing the fair lord to sire a child and thereby bequeath his perfection to them. He is pre-occupied with the problem and in Sonnet 2, he says, “When forty winters shall besiege thy brows” and goes on to detail the detrimental ramifications of the passing of time. In these early poems, his focus is on the aging of the young man and the way to achieve immortality is by having children.

From sonnet 18 onwards, however, the poet suddenly changes his stance. He turns to another solution: that of achieving immortality through verse. For the first time in the sonnets, the speaker says that the young man will be eternized through the poet’s lines:

                     “So long as men can breath or eyes can see,

                     So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.”

The author is animated and hopeful. His poetry will keep the fair youth alive in verse. However, later on, the troubles of aging return to haunt the speaker. Sonnet 30 deals with his sorrow of his past, and lamentations of the foolish mistakes of his youth. He weeps the loss of friends to death. Sonnet 73 deals entirely with aging and fading life. It has been suggested that the lines “When yellow leaves, or more, or few do hang, Upon those boughs…” is a reference to the poet’s balding state. This interpretation fits well if we take this to be autobiographical, for we know the poet was indeed balding as he aged. In this sonnet, he tries to explain to the fair youth that time will do the same to him that it has done to the poet. These references suggest that the poet was somewhat older than the young man and in a position to illustrate to him the effects of time on age. The speaker is anxious about this. He brings about is argument wit a series of metaphors. This sonnet carries the story of how the speaker comes to grips with the real finality of his age and his impermanence in time. He pleads with the young man to love that which he must soon leave ‘ere long’. It is a reasonable request. It is also poignant and deep with emotion. Age comes slowly but realization comes suddenly.

In Sonnet 73, Shakespeare uses the seasons of the year and the time of day as metaphors for his age – winter, twilight and a dying fire. He speaks of his impending death which will happen ‘by and by’. Not only does Shakespeare convince the youth, but he also convinces the reader that life is impermanent and that we will all go through this situation that he is describing.

In Sonnet 146, Shakespeare speaks of outwitting Death. He paradoxically asserts

                   “So shalt thou feed on Death, that feeds on men

                    And Death, once dead, there’s no more dying then.”

Here the poet begins to look towards a way of ensuring the immortality of the soul as death is inevitable. The poet seems to have given up his previous views, and turns to a more spiritual outlook.  

Ultimately, Shakespeare understands that he cannot stop the inevitable process of aging, and although he looks to many ways of thwarting death he realizes that this cannot be done. He accepts that his verse may overcome the ravages of time. From our contemporary vantage point, we see that the speaker’s words are correct. His lines have lived long than ‘gilded monuments’ or ‘marble’ and he has achieved immortality. Shakespeare’s portrayal of the consequences of passing time and the striving towards immortality is poignant, sincere and emotional. He lays bare his soul on this theme that we can all relate to. His honesty makes the point forceful. Shakespeare has been very effective in his portrayal of the process of ageing.

Q: “The sonnet is a courtly form and is one of the most formalistic of all renaissance poetic forms. Shakespeare uses this very public form to express private sentiments that sound not only extremely personal but also non-courtly.” Do you agree? Discuss with reference to at least three of Shakespeare's sonnets.

The sonnet, which originated in Italy and came to English writers through the works of Dante and Petrarch, was a formal and courtly poetic form that was conventionally associated with love poetry. It had certain distinctive features and was usually about the poet’s feelings towards an idolized woman. The rhyme scheme was rigid and the metre was generally iambic pentameter. Shakespeare broke the conventions associated with sonnets so much so that his sonnets have sometimes been called parodies or pastiches of the traditional Petrarchan sonnet. With mastery skill, he uses the sonnet form to speak of sentiments that seem autobiographical in their convincing portrayal of emotions. While the exploration of love is central in courtly poetry, Shakespeare goes beyond that to explore all sorts of ‘love’, even those types that were generally taboo in poetry.

Shakespeare begins the sequence of sonnets with a violation of the rules. He speaks of love and idolization which is associated with courtly forms of poetry; however the subject is not a woman. Shakespeare plays defiantly with gender roles and chooses to praise a man. He praises the perfection of a certain fair lord and elevates him above the whole world, begging him to sire children so that he may preserve his beauty through them and thereby defy the ravages of time. The poet’s obsession with the young man has often led scholars to conclude that the he was homosexual and that the poet was writing autobiographically. Whether this love is platonic or not is not known.

Throughout the sequence the poet mentions two loves in his life. One is a man to whom sonnets 1 – 126 are dedicated and the other is the dark lady with ‘metaphorically’ dark morals to whom sonnets 127-154 are dedicated.  In Sonnet 144 the poet mentions both together for the first and only time. In this sonnet, the poet shows the tension between his two loves and the relationship that they have with each other. He uses a cynical and mocking tone but this is only to disguise the uncertainty and the jealousy that he feels. Unlike courtly poetry, Shakespeare writes of reciprocal love. His loves are not objects to be admired from afar, such as Petrarch’s Laura. We feel the poet’s despair, jealousy, hopelessness and uncertainty.

Another theme common in the Shakespearean sonnets is sex, lust and the effects of indulging in this. Sonnet 129 deals explicitly with this theme. The poet speaks of longing for the fulfillment of lust and then the regret as soon as the act is over. He bemoans the ramifications that yielding to lustful temptations brings with it. The speaker uses an impersonal tone to describe the various stages one goes through in lust. He seems to rue his own lustful urges and acts. The poet engages in the topic without reservation in a way that was not typical of his time. This is definitely non-courtly and an extremely private meditation. The poet convinces us as to the wisdom of his words. He certainly knows what he is talking about. Is this imagination or experience? Either way, the words ring true.

In Sonnet 130, the poet turns Petrachan tradition upside-down as he makes fun of courtly love by parodying it. While Petrarch compares his Laura to various object to heighten her perfection, Shakespeare on the contrary tell us what his mistress is ‘not’. Her eyes are not like the sun, her lips are not red as coral, her breasts are not white but dun and so on. This is a tongue-in-cheek sonnet that ends on a serious note: she may not be all that but still he loves her truly accepting her as she is. There is no formality in his tone, no false flattery but genuine love for his mistress. This is realistic love and poses the question of whether it is not better to speak plainly than flatter your lover with false words.

The poet also freely discusses his private feelings regarding old age, his past, his confusions, mistakes, regrets and so on. Sonnet 30 “When to the sessions of sweet, silent thought” laments his youthful mistakes and the time gone by, the loss of old friends to death and former loves that are now over. He then remembers his fair friend and his sorrows are lifted, showing a pathetic dependence upon him for the sustenance of his joy and vitality. This is an extremely personal poem and deals with aspects of life that anyone can relate to.

In the final analysis, Shakespeare used the formal sonnet to speak of intimate and private subjects, making his poetry a prototype of a new kind of ‘modern’ love poetry. Comparing his work to that of poets such as Pope, Dryden, Milton, Petrarch or Spenser we see why Shakespeare is considered a master of the depiction of human feelings. He speaks openly on topics that most other writers would avoid. He bends and breaks rules where he feels necessary, proving that he remains not a slave to form but a master in the portrayal of human nature and emotion.