Sonnets: The Power of Love Essay

Shakespeare examines love in two different ways in Sonnets 116 and 130. In the first, love is treated in its most ideal form as an uncompromising force (indeed, as the greatest force in the universe); in the latter sonnet, Shakespeare treats love from a more practical aspect: it is viewed simply and realistically without ornament. Yet both sonnets are justifiable in and of themselves, for neither misrepresents love or speaks of it slightingly. Indeed, Shakespeare illustrates two qualities of love in the two sonnets: its potential and its objectivity. This paper will compare and contrast the two sonnets by Shakespeare and show how they represent two different attitudes to love.

William Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 116” and Edna St. Vincent Millay’s “Love Is Not All” both attempt to define love, by telling what love is and what it is not. Shakespeare’s sonnet praises love and speaks of love in its most ideal form, while Millay’s poem begins by giving the impression that the speaker feels that love is not all, but during the unfolding of the poem we find the ironic truth that love is all. Shakespeare, on the other hand, depicts love as perfect and necessary from the beginning to the end of his poem. Although these two authors have taken two completely different approaches, both have worked to show the importance of love and to define it. However, Shakespeare is most confident of his definition of love, while Millay seems

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.

In modern times, youth and beauty is an image seen everywhere. For example, a Versace billboard, magazine ad, TV commercial, all of which displays images of beautiful people. But what happens when this beauty fades? Shakespeare in his 12th sonnet talks about his experience and fading beauty. The purpose of this poem is to encourage a young man to not lose his beauty to the ravages of time. In order to do this, one must reproduce so beauty will live.

However, others believe that one’s life is already mapped out for them and that there is no stopping the path in life that God has planned of them. One of the most common forms of conveying love, sonnets, regularly affect how one sees the world. In the play Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, Shakespeare’s utilization of sonnets impacts upon the reader a feeling of destiny and fate for the love story of Romeo

In Sonnet 20, Shakespeare feels highly of himself so much that he believes he can basically admit to everyone that he has intentions for a men which is the Prince, the Prince doesn't have any intentions for William but he is so kind, flirty, and so smooth that Shakespeare begins to think they have a thing. Shakespeare feelings about the Prince are very prominent and deep in this sonnet that to me, he seems obsessed with something that is a fairy tale in his head. Shakespeare was married with kids but travels for his plays to make money so he rarely ever sees them but Shakespeare has a mistress that is also being shared between the Prince which is supposedly his true love but William feels betrayed by the Prince and his mistress and his attitude towards both of them changes very severely in sonnet 144.

To be or not to be! Shakespeare, whoever he or she was, wrote a variety of texts, one of which was a collection of sonnets: Sonnets of Shakespeare. This collection of sonnets, based mostly on the subject of love, are eloquent, but often unclear. The ways in which they can be interpreted are infinite. Each person has lived a different life, has a unique story, and therefore draws his or her own message from the words. What I believe these sonnets share may not be relatable to everyone else; we are all different. Of all these sonnets, I received the most message from sonnets 38, 129, and 58, each different yet important.

Many people are compelled to believe love is the answer to everything in life, but in order for a person to live it is necessary to abandon it. Some people believe love will save them when they need to be saved the most but it will not. That is just a false idea that has been placed in their mind because they hear all of these great stories of love and romance. People seem to forget that they cannot live off of simply love because it will not provide life’s basic needs. The theme of the sonnet “Love is Not All” is that no matter how important some people think love is it will not keep you alive.

Sonnet XX, stands out to being a pivotal moment in Shakespeare’s sonnet writing, his first play was starting to take off, and with that so was his carrier. Though the sonnet touches on many things from his love of another man, to what love was to him and how it was all controlled by nature. He did this through diction, imagery, and symbolisms. His Tone and Mood, changing through the sonnet makes, the poetry flow like his emotions seems to do, when talking about the rival poet, who he seems to love.

In the hands of a master such as Shakespeare, the conventions of the sonnet form are manipulated and transformed into something unique and originally emphasized. Both sonnets in one way or another subvert the conventions of the base Petrarchan sonnet; though they are about love, the traditional topic of sonnets, whilst in Sonnet 20 the object of desire is unattainable and there is no evidence of the level of affection being requited, the target is male, and the target of the poet's affections in Sonnet 130 is the poetic voice's current mistress. It also seems important to note that love in neither of these cases is of the generic youthful female Aryan stereotype, and

Francesco Petrarch, Sir Thomas Wyatt and Henry Howard, the Earl of Surrey were three of the greatest poets in history. They were truly visionaries in their work and with their origination of the sonnet, they crafted poems of love in all its incredible forms. With these poets, we are able to see how the sonnet evolved into the form popularized by Shakespeare and even how it still influences the modern poetry of today. Petrarch, known as the "Father of Humanism," first wrote the Italian sonnet during the 14th century. Wyatt and Surrey, who lived and were close friends during the tumultuous reign of Henry VIII in England, composed respective translations of some of Petrarch 's

When the plague had occurred, which made it difficult for him to host plays; he started to write poems called sonnets. A sonnet is a fourteen lined poem with one theme. Shakespeare’s sonnets were fourteen lines, and followed a rhyme consisting of a pattern such as “abab cdcd efef gg.” His sonnets were about a young man, a dark woman, and the speaker himself. Shakespeare has a total of 154 sonnets (Wiggins). Some of the many common themes about love in Shakespearean sonnets consist of jealousy, grief and greed.

Similar to people in each period, literature is defined by its era. Likewise, critical literary periods influence motifs such as love and therefore are expressed differently over centuries. Within literature, love is expressed differently in the sixteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This is evident in“Since brass, nor stone, nor boundless sea” by William Shakespeare,John Fletcher's,“Take oh ,take those lips away' written in the Renaissance of the Elizabethan period,“Life in A Love” by Robert Browning, Thomas Hardy's “Broken Appointment” from the Romantic period and“To My Valentine” by Ogden Nash and Langston Hughes' “Love Again Blues” written in the Modern period . Each poem of different periods succumb to exterior influences in society and therefore projects love in distinct ways. The

In Shakespeare’s sonnets, the idea of time and time passing, often shows the reader his feelings about life and love. The speaker (Shakespeare) tells stories trying to describe his love for a young man and a dark lady. He fears that beauty diminishes after old age and wears on the body; however, true love and emotional connections will never abandon him. As time passes, everything physical becomes worse to the speaker, which seems to be why he makes such points of emotions, love and poetry being timeless.

The beginning of the 1500’s became an important time for the sonnet and early modern literature. Thomas Wyatt and Henry Howard were the first to introduce the form to England by translating the sonnets of the overtly influential Italian poet Petrarch, giving a firm foundation for many others including that of William Shakespeare to expand and contrast. Consisting of fourteen lines, the sonnet follows a specific rhyme scheme and rhythm. Although seemingly compact, the sonnet is used by many to express both the thought and emotion of the poet, from this it is evident that although superficially short in structure, the poet is still able to elaborate to an extent that touches the reader making it sincere to the reader at first, however as we