My Mistress Eyes Are Nothing Like The Sun Essay

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.

Shakespeare's My Mistress' Eyes Are Nothing Like the Sun Many authors compose sonnets about women whom they loved. Most of these authors embellish their women's physical characteristics by comparing them to natural wonders that we, as humans, find beautiful. Shakespeare's "My Mistress' Eyes Are Nothing Like the Sun" contradicts this idea, by stating that his mistress lacks most of the qualities other men wrongly praise their women for possessing. Shakespeare presents to one that true love recognizes imperfections and feels devotion regardless of flaws, while satirically expressing his personal thoughts on Petrarchan sonnets.

Unlike Sonnet 18, Shakespeare utterly abandons the poetic convention of Petrarchan conceit in Sonnet 130. In this poem, Shakespeare denies his mistress all of the praises Renaissance poets customarily attributed to their lovers. The first quatrain is filled exclusively with the Shakespeare's seeming insults of his mistress. While Sir Thomas Wyatt authors a poem entitled "Avising the Bright Beams of These Fair Eyes," in the first line of Sonnet 130, Shakespeare affirms that his "mistress's eyes are nothing like the sun." John Wootton, in a poem published in England's Helicon, boasts that his love has "lips like scarlet of the finest dye," but in Sonnet 130 , Shakespeare is sure that his beloved's lips are not nearly quite as red as coral (11; 2). Michael Drayton, in his poem, To His Coy Love, begs his lover, "Show me no more those snowy

In conclusion, Shakespeare shows us that love has two faces. One face shows us that love can be beautiful and can bring happiness, the other shows a darker and more painful side where love can be heartbreaking and mournful.

By doing so, Shakespeare further implies that it is not the physical perfections, or having a voice as lovely as music that make up love, but rather personality and more skin-deep qualities that make up true love. The utilization of excellent diction, and the use of paradox and allegory techniques throughout conveys to the reader the admirable tone the speaker seems to have for his love, and the realistic point Shakespeare tries to prove in that love is not just simply looks, but character and quality of a person that form a truer and deeper bond.

“My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;/Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;” (1-2) When one reads those lines in Shakespeare’s “My Mistress’ Eyes Are Nothing Like the Sun”, to a normal eye it may seem as if Shakespeare is attacking his mistress with harmful words for no reason in disgust. But in contrast, if one looks closer throughout the poem, one begins to find abnormalities in its text, to some individuals it would simply state it as just gibberish. As it turns out, Shakespeare was only poking fun at how others would never would have a relationship as pure as his; any other individual would paint their mistress out to be a beyond what she actually is. That gibberish is just one of the literary techniques that authors put in place

“The course of true love never did run smooth,” comments Lysander of love’s complications in an exchange with Hermia (Shakespeare I.i.136). Although the play A Midsummer Night’s Dream certainly deals with the difficulty of romance, it is not considered a true love story like Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare, as he unfolds the story, intentionally distances the audience from the emotions of the characters so he can caricature the anguish and burdens endured by the lovers. Through his masterful use of figurative language, Shakespeare examines the theme of the capricious and irrational nature of love.

He idolizes her as if she were the Virgin Mary: "her figure defined by the half- opened door . . . The light from the lamp opposite our door caught the white curve of her neck, lit up her hair that rested there, and falling, lit up the hand upon the railing." Yet even this image is sensual with the halo of light accentuating "the white curve of her neck." The language makes obvious that his attraction is physical rather than spiritual: "Her dress swung as she moved her body and the soft rope of her hair tossed from side to side." His desire for her is strong and undeniable: "her name was like a summons to all my foolish blood"; "my body was like a harp and her words and ges­tures were like fingers running upon the wires." But in order to justify his love, to make it socially acceptable, he deludes himself into thinking that his love is pure. He is being hypocritical, although at this point he does not know it.

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.

Poetry in Elizabethan time was based on courtly love conventions which included conceits and complements. Themes such as the unattainability of the lady, sleeplessness, constancy in love, cruelty of the beloved, renunciation of love, fine passion of the lover versus icy emotions of the beloved, praise of the beloved’s beauty and eternalizing her as being subject of the poem; these all are

But line 1-8 as a whole is in contrast with line 9-14 where Shakespeare says he loves to hear her speak and that in fact he loves her and that even heaven recognises that. At the end, wee realise that the love you have for one person overcomes all of their imperfections.

“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.

He accepts her essentially, because of her mediocracy. At times, he is outraged by her additional lovers, but he still is wrapped around her finger. He blames himself for staying with her even though the relationship is toxic and copes with her infidelity. Shakespeare turns the traditional feeling of a love sonnet to that of hatred, resentment, and lust. It seems more in line with the reality and harshness of falling in love, as opposed to the traditional googly-eyed admiration of a lover. Since Shakespeare avoids this fictional theme, he gives readers a good reason to believe his Sonnets may actually be true.