![]() These final lines of the sonnet, the concluding couplet, holds the speaker’s main point and the poem’s essence. Lines 13–14Īnd yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare She doesn’t fly or do anything superfluous of that sort. He is being frank here to admit that his mistress walks on the ground just like a normal human being, and not like a goddess, an angel or a fairy. And so, he won’t compare his beloved’s moves to that of a goddess as done by most lovers and especially poets in their poems. The speaker now admits that he has never seen how a goddess moves. My mistress when she walks treads on the ground. Though her voice sounds nice to him, it is not as good as music the way most lovers claim their beloved’s voice to be. He admits that music can be ‘far more pleasing’ than her voice. But the ‘yet’ in the middle takes us back to the same negative comparison again. The speaker seems to be getting a bit nicer to say that he loves to hear her speak. That music hath a far more pleasing sound Advertisements I love to hear her speak, yet well I know But now it has come down to her breath, how it smells. Till line 6, it was all about the lady’s look – her eyes, lips, breasts, hairs and cheeks. He acknowledges that some perfumes are certainly far more pleasing than her breath which instead of a sweet smell gives out a foul odour. It rather produces a strong and offensive smell (reeks). It doesn’t give out any delightful fragrance. But our speaker is honest while describing her lady’s breath. Poets praise the sweet breath of their mistress as if it surpasses some sweet-smelling perfumes. Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. Lines 7–8Īnd in some perfumes is there more delight When the speaker goes to measure the beauty of his beloved in the standard sense, he seemingly finds her to be hopelessly deficient in it. But the lady in Shakespeare’s sonnet is not that beautiful in the stereotypical sense, as her skin is dark in complexion. ![]() The perfectly beautiful women possess a reddish rosy blush on their white cheeks. But he finds nothing like those roses in his mistress’ cheeks. The speaker has seen beautiful roses with red and white hues woven together (damasked). The next element of beauty the speaker talks about is his lady’s cheeks. I have seen roses damasked, red and white, So, the lady has frizzy black hair which is uncommon for English women. But here the speaker identifies his lady’s hairs with nothing but black wires. A man would generally compare his lover’s hair to something soft and smooth, shiny and silky, and it would ideally be golden in colour. The hair is the next element that comes to our speaker’s mind. But the breasts of the speaker’s mistress are ‘dun’ or dull grayish-brown in colour when compared to white snow. English women’s breasts are generally white in colour. A woman of ideal beauty is thought to have snow-white breasts. The lover continues similar comparisons making his lady look an ordinary human being. If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun Thus, what we see in Sonnet 130 is unique and in sharp contrast to what the Renaissance readers were accustomed to read in other poets’ verses. The speaker here attempts to show his beloved’s beauty in true and honest way as she actually looks, without resorting to artificial exaggeration. These beginning lines of the poem sets the tone of the entire poem. The speaker says that his beloved’s lips are not as red as the beautiful red corals formed under the sea. In the next line the comparison changes, but the motif is the same. But according to the lover here, the eyes of his mistress are so dull that they can hardly come near the sun in brightness. Generally, we consider that a woman of ideal beauty should have eyes that are as bright as the sun. Here, the lady’s eyes are not as bright as the sun. The speaker here negates the comparison between his mistress’ eyes and the brilliance of the sun. ![]() But it doesn’t seem to be a lover’s usual attempt to glorify in verse the beauty of the woman he loves. William Shakespeare’s sonnet 130 opens with the speaker talking about his mistress’ eyes. My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun Ĭoral is far more red than her lips’ red Sonnet 18 - Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day by William Shakespeare || Hamandista Academy Lines 1–2
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