The Interpretation Of Love In Shakespeare's Sonnet 138 By William Shakespeare

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

The ideas of love being expressed in Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing and Sonnet 130 are genuinely contrasting. In Much Ado About Nothing, one of the many focal points are Beatrice and Benedick’s foolish relationship, also the most captivating, whereas in Sonnet 130, Shakespeare is talking about the misrepresentation of the “Dark Lady”, who he refers to as his mistress. Regardless of a person’s flaws disfigurements, the stress they cause, and the bickering that occurs, love can withstand time, and under the circumstances love doesn’t change for anyone, that it does not substitute itself when it finds differences in the loved one.

Sonnets 127-154 are addressed to the “dark lady” (hereafter the mistress). Shakespeare’s relations to his mistress vacillate; sometimes sanguine, tender, teasing, or bitterly anger; yet it is a simpler relation than that

What is love? Is it an object? Is it a feeling? Is it even attainable? Love is everything, it is an object, it is an emotion, and it cannot be bought, stolen, given. Love can only be found. Love is discovered in the most unthinkable places during the most unimaginable times. It can never be predicted who you fall in love with or when you do but all you do know is that you are in love and you would give anything for that person, and for your love to always stay resilient through all other obstacles and distractions. In Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Montague’s and Capulet’s are know and expected to hate each other until the miracle of love presented its self. Romeo is a Montague and Juliet is a Capulet. They both fell in love when

The speaker alternates between professing great love and professing great worry as he speculates about the young man’s misbehavior and the dark lady’s multiple sexual partners. As the young man and the dark lady begin an affair, the speaker imagines himself caught in a love triangle, mourning the loss of his friendship with the man and love with the woman, and he laments having fallen in love with the woman in the first place. In Sonnet 137, the speaker personifies love, calls him a simpleton, and criticizes him for removing his powers of perception. It was love that caused the speaker to make mistakes and poor judgments. Elsewhere the speaker calls love a disease as a way of demonstrating the physical pain of emotional wounds.

This sonnet serves to invoke a strong sense of realism in love, arguing that as strong an intensity of emotion as may be held, may be held, without the need for delusions of grandeur, taking the view that trying to reconcile two essentially different and diverse things as equal is to do true justice to neither. The beloved in this case thus represents more the need for a character developed to challenge stereotype than an actual real-life woman,

Each poem reflects the emotions that Shakespeare experiences with the duality of his love. Although each of these poems only show one half of this duality, "Sonnet 144" expresses both while giving a further basis for the understanding of "Sonnet 116" and "Sonnet 147." "Sonnet 144" opens with the line "Two loves I have of comfort and despair," (1). When used as a foundation, this opening line reveals that the reader can expect one of the two sonnets to deal with the comfort of love while the other deals with the despair of love. Shakespeare goes on to say, "The better angel is a man right fair, / The worser spirit a woman, colored ill." (144.3-4) which shows that he considers his young friend to be the comfort aspect of love and his dark woman to be the despair aspect of love. Shakespeare goes on to say that the dark woman tempted his young friend from his side. This shows that an affair has occurred between the young man and the dark woman. Taking this poem as a basis, the reader can better understand how "Sonnet 116" deals with the comfort of love and how "Sonnet 147" deals with the despair of love.

‘Sonnet 116’ by William Shakespeare and ‘What Lips My Lips Have Kissed, And Where, And Why” by Edna St. Vincent Millay are both sonnets that discuss companionship and a glimpse of each poet’s experiences. In ‘Sonnet 116’, Shakespeare illustrates how capability is weakened by its metaphysical stereotype and ideals such as, love, while on the contrary, in ‘What Lips My Lips Have Kissed, And Where, And Why” Millay feeds on the chaos between the ideal of love and its harsh reality, heartbreak. Both poets seem to be love struck but there is a significant difference in the two. I will compare and contrast ‘Sonnet 116’ by William Shakespeare and ‘What Lips My Lips Have Kissed, And Where, And Why” by Edna St. Vincent Millay. I will also inquire and analyze why this particular form of poetry established different effects.

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.

Truth and honesty are key elements to a good, healthy relationship. However, in Shakespeare's Sonnet 138, the key to a healthy relationship between the speaker and the Dark Lady is keeping up the lies they have constructed for one another. Through wordplay Shakespeare creates different levels of meaning, in doing this, he shows the nature of truth and flattery in relationships.

“Sonnet 130” written by William Shakespeare, is one of his most well known poems and can be analyzed and broken apart in great depth. The poem is written in fourteen lines which makes it a sonnet. Like all of Shakespeare’s sonnets the meter is iambic pentameter. The rhyme scheme for “Sonnet 130” is ABAB CDCD EFEF GG. An overlaying theme for “Sonnet 130” is, “True love is based on how beautiful you find someone on the inside.” Shakespeare proves to have a great view on true love in this sonnet. He cares more about what’s on the inside rather than what’s on the outside. “Sonnet 130’s” theme can be proven by Shakespeare's use of poetic and literary devices, the tone and mood of the sonnet, and the motif of true love.

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.

In Shakespeare’s Sonnets, the pain experienced emotionally and physically contributes to the realistic nature of his words. Specifically addressing the Dark Lady, the speaker expresses a more mature love unlike the relationship between him and the young man. Readers are warned about the dangers of lust in the love triangle, but the speaker is content with the Dark Lady’s affairs rather than the young man’s. In Sonnet 138, the speaker says, “On both sides thus is simple truth suppressed/But wherefore say not I that I am old?/Oh love’s best habit is in seeming trust” (8-10). In their relationship, love is therefore a mutual understanding of deception. The Dark Lady ignores that he is old and considers him to be young and the speaker ignores that she is cheating on him by not bringing up her faithfulness. What ties these two characters together is

Shakespeare, who wrote the sonnets in 1609, expresses his own feelings through his greatest work of literature. The theme of love in the poems reflect thoughts from the Renaissance period. Love is one of many components of Shakespeare’s life shown in the sonnets. Love can be defined in many ways other than a strong affection for a lover. In Shakespeare’s sonnets, the concept of love can be seen through many uncommon means such as the love of life before death in “Sonnet 73,” love in marriage in “Sonnet 116,” love through sexual desire in “Sonnet 129,” and love through nature in “Sonnet 130,” proving that love can be expressed through many different feelings and emotions.