Compare A & S To Sonnet 130

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 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.

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.

“Sonnet 116” written by William Shakespeare is focusing on the strength and true power of love. Love is a feeling that sustainable to alterations, that take place at certain points in life, and love is even stronger than a breakup because separation cannot eliminate feelings. The writer makes use of metaphors expressing love as a feeling of mind not just heart as young readers may see it. To Shakespeare love is an immortal felling that is similar to a mark on a person’s life.

     During the Renaissance, it was common for poets to employ Petrarchan conceit to praise their lovers. Applying this type of metaphor, an author makes elaborate comparisons of his beloved to one or more very dissimilar things. Such hyperbole was often used to idolize a mistress while lamenting her cruelty. Shakespeare, in Sonnet 18, conforms somewhat to this custom of love poetry, but later breaks out of the mold entirely, writing his clearly anti-Petrarchan work, Sonnet 130.

Power influences the dynamics of a relationship because it shows who the dominant partner is and how they interact with each other. The poem, “Sonnet 130,” by William Shakespeare is about the speaker comparing his lover to a variety of other natural beauties while never in his lover’s favor. The author uses these humorous comparisons to describes the person he loves. The next poem, “My Papa’s Waltz,” by Theodore Roethke is about the father’s love for the speaker and the speaker’s fear of this powerful event. Therefore, Shakespeare and Roethke uses diction to convey the complexities of power and their effect on the dynamics of a relationship.

William Shakespeare, an English playwright and poet, is perhaps the most famous writer in the English language. One of his poems, Sonnet 130, is a parody of typical Petrarchan love poetry in which Petrarch often wrote about an idealized woman he loved and worshipped. In Shakespeare’s sonnet, he makes fun of the idea that a woman can be so perfect and so amazing by describing his mistress as a completely average person. This makes the Petrarchan love poems seem silly and false because, as Shakespeare seems to suggest, no one is that perfect and amazing, including Shakespeare’s “mistress”. The last lines of the poem make clear that Shakespeare did not approve of these high, unreasonable standards of the time. Shakespeare’s Sonnet 130 begins with Shakespeare intentionally comparing his mistress to the unreasonable, exaggerated

The Astrophil and Stella sonnets 1 and 15 contemplate the author’s awareness as he tries to find inspiration to write. By exploring their own inspirations, in Shakespeare’s Sonnets 116 and 130, and “The Indifferent” mock the Petrarchan sonnet, whose theme of comparing women to things that are generally accepted as beautiful was used in many works of the English Renaissance, including: Amoretti sonnet 64, “The Sun Rising,” “Song,” “To His Coy Mistress,” and “Upon Julia’s Clothes.” In another venture of exploration into the author’s inspirations, Volpone was created as a comedy which parodies classical masque plays, such as Doctor Faustus, by characterizing the legacy hunters as birds of

‘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.

Once upon a time there was an English writer from the 1600s who wrote a collection of 154 poems called Shakespeare’s Sonnets. The poems reflect on love, time, beauty, and death. Throughout the sonnets, many different types of love can be deciphered. The Various ways to love can be seen in William Shakespeare’s poems, as proven by lust in “Sonnet 129,” the love of appearances in “Sonnet 130,” true love in “Sonnet 116,” and the elements of nature in contrast to love in “Sonnet 18,” proving that there can be many different aspects of love and how it is perceived.

The renaissance was an explosion of culture that forced Europe out of the dark ages. One of the popular new types of literature was the sonnet: a fouteen line poem with a specific rhyme scheme written to earn a woman’s love. In sonnet 1 by Edmund Spenser, sonnet 31 by Philip Sidney, and sonnet 130 and 29 by William Shakespeare, the authors focus on romanticizing love in order to emphasize the importance of developing a relationship with a lady and earning her love. This is accomplished through the use of personification, similes, and allusions.

Society’s standards and requirements in order for one to be considered beautiful, William Shakespeare's persona in sonnet 130 “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” states though his mistress (lover) is average compared to the society’s taste, she’s still consider special. Throughout the poem, Shakespeare utilizes conceit, imagery, and diction to describe his mistress’ beauty allowing one to visualize her. “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” is written in an iambic pentameter divided into three quatrains and a couplet. However, in lines 2, 3, 4, 5, and 7 have slight variations depending on what parts of the mistress Shakespeare is comparing her to. On the surface, one may think the poem is about pointing the mistress’ flaws and beauty and accepting it. With further analyzation, one starts realizing that Shakespeare is mocking and making a parody of traditional love poems. Traditional love poems mainly exaggerate (ideal fantasy) how beautiful their partner (mainly a woman) by comparing them to goddess or nature. With the author use of alliteration, assonance, conceit, and diction, one can sense Shakespeare’s tone as well as opinion about traditional love.

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.