Shakespeare Sonnet 130 Tone

Current stereotypes and of Shakespeare’s time are similar in manifold ways. These stereotypes thrust upon girls at such a young age can cause them to compare themselves to one another. One might want the other’s nose, while one might want to be shorter like the other. When I was younger, I just wanted to be thinner. To look like those girls on the magazine covers I what I desired, which is an unattainable goal in my everyday life. Just like how these girls, and even myself, compare themselves to each other, Shakespeare compares his lover to the ideal woman of his own time. Stating another way that his lover varies from the ideals of the time, Shakespeare compares her hair to those of others lovers when he states the following: “If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.” In the public today, women want long, silky hair. Over the years, it seems that society believes that blonde hair is more attractive, and women with blonde hair have bounteous amounts of fun and act more impromptu. I, on the other hand, have shorter, dark brunette hair, but this does not mean I cannot have fun or be just as attractive as a “bombshell blonde.”

In life people sometimes face different tribulations that bring them down such as being judged for their physical appearance or even the way they are. Writers in literature who are known to write about romantic things sometimes use this as a way to create things to write about. In sonnet 130, Shakespeare helps us understand that even though his wife has different flaws he still loves her for who she is as a person. Shakespeare uses a critical and judgmental tone to show that even though he compares his mistress to all of these things he still loves her even though her physical appearance isn’t the best.

In the first quatrain of “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun…”, the speaker is already showing that this is not an ordinary love poem. He says, “my mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” (line 1). This metaphor depicts that the woman does not have bright eyes. Most poets would use a cliché to describe a woman’s eyes as bright or like sapphires, but the speaker is saying there is nothing special about her eyes. Next, the speaker describes the woman’s lips. The color coral is slightly orange, but he believes coral is more red than her lips. Also, most poets would describe their subjects to have bright, shiny red lips (2). In these two lines, the speaker compares his mistress to things found in nature, and many people associate beauty with nature. However, that is not the case with this poem. He describes her as the complete opposite. In line 3, the woman’s skin is described as gray which makes it seem like her skin is dull. In Shakespeare's time, pale skin was more desirable, and since she does not have a pale complexion, it would make her less attractive. The speaker then compares her hair to wire in this line: “If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head” (4). A beautiful woman is usually described as having silky locks. That is the opposite in this poem. This comparison depicts the woman to have hair that lacks

The theme for honour and fidelity apply for both men and women in Shakespeare’s play ‘much ado about nothing’. Honour and fidelity is represented very differently for men and women as it would have been for the people in Elizabethan times. In this first section of the essay, I will be exploring double standards and Shakespeare’s awareness of the double standards between sexes and his feminist approach, the differences of honour and fidelity for men and women and upper class and lower class comparisons.

Not just does this represent the inferiority of women to men, it likewise expresses that ladies are seen as a commodity to be given, transported and purchased. Moreover, it highlights the characterisation of Desdemona and how submissive she is. This accentuates that Shakespeare was a man who saw ladies simply the same as a man. His emphasis on gender equality permits viewers to get a look at how ladies are dealt within society and how men ought to treat ladies. He underscores that gender equality should be valued in society.

A woman, in Shakespearean England, was made to be a trophy for men to win. Just as they are in his plays, Romeo and Juliet and Taming of the Shrew, both Juliet and Katharina go through changes in their attitudes that are for the better or worse. Shakespeare takes these characters and shows the audience what happens to women who don’t meet the standards of society. Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway, who was pregnant at the time, to make sure that she would not be shunned. Hathaway was born to be married off to a man, so she would have been society’s ideal woman. Therefore, based on Romeo and Juliet and Taming of the Shrew, Shakespeare’s ideal woman would meet society’s expectations.

In Shakespeare’s Sonnet 29 “When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes,” the speaker explores emotions expressed by the people around him, focusing on the contrasting feelings of envy, and love. Despite the intense jealousy and yearning for another man’s riches, the speaker awakens himself to his own figurative riches as the sonnet reaches its volta. Love, he realizes, is worth much more than what another man possesses. However, love itself may be the speaker’s fatal flaw, as the speaker seems to be mourning the loss of his love at the beginning of the sonnet. Within the sonnet, love is depicted as powerful enough to break and rebuild a man. The speaker’s love may not be present, which is the cause of his disgrace, but the memory of her love is enough to lift his spirits.

One of William Shakespeare's tools from his choices of words was figurative diction since most words used to describe the narrator’s mistress were based in comparing her to other objects. For example, the poem starts with the narrator using the words “eyes”, “like”, “nothing”, and “sun”. The narrator introduces an example of a simile from the figurative choice of words since the word “like” is been used to compare her to something else. In this case he's comparing the sun’s brightness to the dull light of his mistress's eyes and the eyes are important because they are the door to the soul. Then in line 2 from Sonnet 130, the narrator says that the color of the coral outcast more “her lip’s red”. This is an example of a metaphor since the narrator

“I came hither to tell you; and circumstances shortened, for she has been too long a talking of, the lady is disloyal” (p. 32). Being chaste back in early days was extremely honorable. Now a day’s a good majority of people is losing their pureness in such a youthful age. The ideas of being chaste and honorable for a woman from Shakespeare’s time is different yet similar from today time due to several reasons.

In Shakespeare’s time women were meant to be submissive and considered less equal to their male counterparts - their possessions (this would not go down well today with the women I know). Women in his plays were not displayed as the usual over perfected, only quality being their looks and incapable without a man stereotype, they were real interpretations of women capabilities. They had

The first quatrain of Shakespeare “Sonnet 130” reinforces his idea of real “beauty”. The images of an imperfect body and exceptional hair gives the sonnet a contradictory tone. If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun (line, 3). Shakespeare reveals the imperfection of women through this line. For men breasts characterizes

In Shakespeare’s time, the role of women were if they were property to their husbands. They were only to be at their house doing everything a wife should do, like clean, cook, any duties that had to be done, they were usually married early 20’s. They were to do whatever to please their husbands, which was mostly in sexual ways. In twelfth night, Orsino says “For women are as roses, whose fair flow’r, being once displayed, doth fall that very hour.” (page 41) With this quote, it was saying that women were just seen for their beauty at a young age, but once aging, they would lose it all. Viola states “Alas, our frailty is the cause, not we, for such as we are made of, such we be.” (page 30) Which was explaining how the women are emotionally and

In both tales, each woman is judged based on her attractiveness, they are both surrendered to the unfair and superficial beauty standards of the age Chaucer lived in. The women are negatively portrayed based on the attributes they display. The old woman is ugly and poor and therefore is seen as a woman unfit to be a wife. The reaction of the knight when he finds out that he

In Shakespeare’s time, men had particular views on women and Shakespeare shows these views through

“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” (Line 1). “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” (Line 1). These are both two of the famous lines from William Shakespeare’s sonnet 18 and 130. William Shakespeare was an intelligent English playwright, poet, and dramatist during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. He is known as one of the greatest playwrights of all time. Sonnet 18 and 130 are two of Shakespeare’s most famous poems. Sonnet 18 is a love poem about how he compares the woman’s love to a summer’s day. Sonnet 130 has a different approach. It is still a comparison, but it seems to be a more spiteful one. These sonnets are both share similar subjects, imagery, theme, and rhyme scheme; however they are more so different in forms and purpose.