My Mistress Eyes Are Nothing Like The Sun Tone

Shakespeare’s sonnet 130, “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” and Pablo Neruda’s “My ugly love” are popularly known to describe beauty in a way hardly anyone would write: through the truth. It’s a common fact that modern lovers and poets speak or write of their beloved with what they and the audience would like to hear, with kind and breathtaking words and verses. Yet, Shakespeare and Neruda, honest men as they both were, chose to write about what love truly is, it matters most what’s on the inside rather than the outside. The theme of true beauty and love are found through Shakespeare and Neruda’s uses of imagery, structure, and tone.

In “Sonnet 130: My Mistress’ Eyes are Nothing like the Sun,” William Shakespeare uses the literary devices of scent and audible imagery, simile, metaphor, and alliteration to show that a person should be loved for what kind of person they are at heart, not for their appearance. To start, the text states, “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” (I.i). This line uses a simile to compare his mistress’ eyes to the radiant, beautiful sun. The eyes of his mistress are not beautiful like the sun. This connects to the theme of the poem by explaining that his mistress does not meet society's beauty standards.

A sonnet is a poem of fourteen lines that rhyme in a particular pattern. William Shakespeare’s sonnets were the only non-dramatic poetry that he wrote. Shakespeare used sonnets within some of his plays, but his sonnets are best known as a series of one hundred and fifty-four poems. The series of one hundred and fifty-four poems tell a story about a young aristocrat and a mysterious mistress. Many people have analyzed and contemplated about the significance of these “lovers”. After analysis of the content of both the “young man” sonnets and the “dark lady sonnets”, it is clear that the poet, Shakespeare, has a great love for the young man and only lusts after his mistress.

Although Shakespeare appears to be conforming, he still elevates his work above the exhausted conventions of other Elizabethan sonneteers. Instead of objectifying his lover through trite comparisons, he declares that she is too beautiful and pleasant to be compared even to a day of the most enjoyable season of the year. While most consider the realm of nature to be eternal and that of humans to be transitory, Shakespeare accentuates the death of a season and imbues his sweetheart with everlasting life. He ingeniously inverts the scheme of things in order to grant his love perpetual existence through his poetry.

“Sonnet 130”. This poem first starts off with a man or possibly a woman, talking about their mistress in a negative way. Starting off with saying “My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun” (Shakespeare 1.) This man or woman than starts talking more about how his mistress’s lips,

In “My Mistress’ Eyes Are Nothing Like The Sun,” poet William Shakespeare describes his love for a woman that throughout the poem he states is nothing special to most but special to him. Shakespeare uses imagery, similes, metaphors, alliteration, and irony to show the reader all love poems do not have to be the same but still profess the love one has for another.

Poets and authors alike evoke emotion and pictures from one single word. The imagery and thoughts put into the readers’ heads by these different writers are the base of one’s creativity and imagination while reading the author’s work of art. William Shakespeare is one of the most well-known poets of all time that is able to elicit these emotions from the reader to allow the reader to fully understand what Shakespeare is trying to accomplish with his poems. Shakespeare keeps his audience entertained with a whopping 154 sonnets, each having a different meaning and imagery associated with it. Sonnet 18, “[Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day]”, and Sonnet 55, “[Not Marble, nor the Gilded Monuments]”, are both one of Shakespeare’s most famous works. Shakespeare uses these sonnets to explore the powerful relationship between humanity, art, and time.

In William Shakespeare’s poem “Sonnet 130,” he describes his lover in a non-idealistic way by describing her features which are the complete opposite of a typical lady in a Petrarchan sonnet. A sonnet is a 14 line poem with 10 syllable lines and a rhyming scheme that uses iambic pentameter. Petrarchan sonnets idolize women by creating a dream lady, thus resulting in unrealistic features. The typical Petrarchan lady has blonde hair, a high forehead, pale skin, and a long neck, and the physical traits are seen as a reflection of inner beauty. Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 130” uses figurative language and a creative structure to mock the Petrarchan ideal by portraying true love for what’s in the inside instead of lust or infatuation.

The speaker uses vulgar words. Therefore, his readers can easily imagine how natural and unrefined she is. In line 1 he states, “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun”(1). The speaker begins to describe the woman in a heinous way. Calling a woman “ my mistress” shows that she is a strong, powerful woman therefore he is giving her high credibility. In contrast, he describes her “eyes are nothing like the sun” this statement shows that her eyes are dull and not bright. When speaking of a person with dull eyes it is associated with an individual without passion and a slow thinker. The speaker continues to speak of her in an insulting

William Shakespeare conveys the speaker's negative feelings toward his mistress through this anti-love poem by using comparisons. The first example of these comparisons is seen in the opening sentence of the poem through the simile within “My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun.” This simile sets the tone of mockery seen throughout the passage. Shakespeare also uses sensual descriptions to describe the unsightly way the speaker views his mistress. This can be seen as the speaker describes his mistress as having pale lips, dingy colored flesh, wiry hair, pale cheeks, rotten breath, and an off-putting voice.

"Sonnet 130" compares William Shakespeare’s mistress to typical, natural beauty; each time drawing attention to his mistress’ obvious imperfections. He addresses her as if she cannot compare to the ideal appearances women are expected to look like in that of the natural world. The comparisons Shakespeare addresses highlight aspects of nature, such as snow (3)or coral (2) yet; each comparison proves to be unflatteringly about his mistress. However, in the final rhyming couplet, Shakespeare claims his love for his mistress by professing; that even though his mistresses has a great deal of flaws, he accepts them and loves her as much as any man could love a woman.

The title of the poem “My mistress eyes are nothing like the sun” suggests that the speaker is not in love with his ‘mistress’. However, this is not the case. Shakespeare uses figurative language by using criticizing hyperboles to mock the traditional love sonnet. Thus, showing not only that the ideal woman is not always a ‘goddess’, but mocking the way others write about love. Shakespeare proves that love can be written about and accomplished without the artificial and exuberant. The speaker’s tone is ironic, sarcastic, and comical turning the traditional conceit around using satire. The traditional iambic pentameter rhyming scheme of the sonnet makes the diction fall into place as relaxed, truthful, and with elegance in the easy flowing verse. In turn, making this sonnet one of parody and real love.

To give imagery details of the women being described, one poet uses nature to compare his mistress, while the other plainly describes her stage presence and appearance. They are both detailed visual sonnets. Both poets see beauty in these women, and describe them in a unique and detailed way. Throughout Shakespeare’s sonnet he uses nature and to say his mistress is not as beautiful as. One imagery Shakespeare uses in the beginning of the sonnet, stating “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips’ red” (Shakespeare). Furthermore, the imagery he uses makes us visualize how the woman may have looked. He gave us an idea; we can see how dull she looks. Imagine her pale skin, brittle hair, and pinkish colored lips. I imagine her breath reeking of cigarettes, seeing that he states that he has smelled perfumes smelling better than her. Shakespeare has different views of beauty upon his mistress’ looks. His mistress is

William Shakespeare is recognized for being one of greatest poets of all time. His works are still popular to this day. Many of his works included extended metaphors and similes with rhetorical language and were rooted in the nature of love. Two of his poems that are rather alike, but also very contrastive are “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” and “My mistresses’ eyes are nothing like the sun.” They both contain a core theme of love or anti-love in some aspects. While these two poems are built around the same type of subject, their interpretations come across in separate ways. In contrast to Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 18” which is a serious love poem that contains imagery and metaphors, Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 130” is more negative and humorous but contains imagery and similes.

“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” (Line 1). “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” (Line 1). These are both two of the famous lines from William Shakespeare’s sonnet 18 and 130. William Shakespeare was an intelligent English playwright, poet, and dramatist during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. He is known as one of the greatest playwrights of all time. Sonnet 18 and 130 are two of Shakespeare’s most famous poems. Sonnet 18 is a love poem about how he compares the woman’s love to a summer’s day. Sonnet 130 has a different approach. It is still a comparison, but it seems to be a more spiteful one. These sonnets are both share similar subjects, imagery, theme, and rhyme scheme; however they are more so different in forms and purpose.