Comparative Poetic Analysis of William Shakespeare's Sonnet no. 18 with Sonnet no. 130

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Content

•Shakespeare’s Biography

• The Sonnet

• Paraphrase

•Theme

• Differences

William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

An english poet, dramatist, actorHe wrote about 37 plays,154 sonnets as well as a variety of poemsThe most quoted writer in the literature and history of the english speaking worldConsidered to be England’s national poet and is sometimes referred to as the ‘’Bard of Avon’’ or the ‘’Swan of Avon’’Shakespeare wrote all of his great work in about 2-25 years span and died relatively young at 52

The Sonnet

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Sonnet 130

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun,

ParaphraseSonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer's

day?

Shall I compare you to a summer's day?

Thou art more lovely and more

temperate:

You are more beautiful and gentle:

Rough winds do shake the darling

buds of May,

Stormy winds will shake the May flowers,

And summer's lease hath all too short

a date;

and summer lasts for too short of a time;

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven

shines,

Sometimes the sun is too hot,

And often is his gold complexion

dimmed,

and many times it is overcast,

By chance or nature's changing

course untrimmed:

either by some unforseen circumstance,

or nature's course:

But thy eternal summer shall not

fade,

But your beauty will never fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair

thou ow’st,

or lose its inherent loveliness,

Nor shall Death brag thou

wand’rest in his shade,

even Death will not be able to claim you,

When in eternal lines to time

thou grow’st.

when in my eternal poetry you will grow.

So long as men can breathe or

eyes can see,

As long as there are people who see and

breathe,

So long lives this, and this gives

life to thee.

So long will this poem live on, making you

immortal.

Sonnet 130

My mistress' eyes are nothing

like the sun;

My love's eyes are nothing like the sun,

Coral is far more red, than her

lips’ red;

coral is far redder than her lips;

If snow be white, why then her

breasts are dun;

if snow is white, her breasts are

brownish gray;

If hairs be wires, black wires

grow on her head;

if hairs are wires, than she has black

wires growing from her head;

I have seen roses damask’d,

red and white,

I have seen roses mingled with red and

white,

But no such roses see I in her

cheeks;

but I don’t see such colors on her

cheeks;

And in some perfumes is there

more delight

there are perfumes that smell better

Than in the breath that from

my mistress reeks;

than my love’s horrid breath ;

I love to hear her speak, yet

well I know

I love to listen to her talk, though I know

That music hath a far more

pleasing sound;

music is much more pleasing to listen

to;

I grant I never saw a goddess

go -

I 've never seen a goddess walk;

My mistress, when she walks,

treads on the ground.

But I know that my mistress walks only

on the ground.

And yet, by heaven, I think

my love as rare

And yet I think my love is as rare

As any she belied with false

compare.

as any woman praised and

misrepresented by false comparisons.

Theme

Sonnet 18

Appearances

Ars Longa, Vita Breve

(Arts is lone, life is short)

Sonnet 130

Appearances

Unconditional Love

Comparison between sonnet 18 & 130

SONNET 18 SONNET 130

Seriousness &

romance of courtly love

sonnet

Parody of

conventional flowery love

sonnet

Clichéd beauty

(of an idealized and

perfect being )

Real beauty

(of an ordinary being )

Message discovered

almost at the end (the woman

in the poem can do no wrong in

the eyes of her lover)

Message discovered almost

at the end

(explanation of the woman’s

flaws )

Shakespeare worships

her as something more than a

human (he will immortalize her

through the sonnet)

The woman is obviously

very human. (“My mistress, when

she walks, treads on the

ground.”)