Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 18” and “Sonnet 130” are love poems written using metaphors that rely on sensory imagery to get the point across. Although metaphoric love poems were popular during the time of Shakespeare, they had also become a sort of cliché. The use of the metaphoric language in the two sonnets seem to be a form of parody. Shakespeare describes the beauty of his lovers by associating it to the beauty of nature using exaggerated and ironic metaphoric comparisons. We can see this focus by analyzing “Sonnet 18” and “Sonnet 130”.
In “Sonnet 18”, Shakespeare uses metaphoric language to describe and further eternalize his lover’s beauty. Shakespeare starts the poem off by questioning if he should compare his beloved to a summer day. He then proceeds to states that his beloved beauty is far more superior than that of summer. Summer is fated to end: “Rough winds do shake …show more content…
The metaphors in “Sonnet 18” are used to spotlight on the lover’s beauty by making it superior than nature’s. Meanwhile, the imageries in “Sonnet 130” are used to belittle the woman’s beauty by saying it is inferior to that of nature. “Sonnet 18” seems to lean more on the importance of physical beauty while “Sonnet 130” is about the inner beauty of his lover. The lover in “Sonnet 18” is seen as being more than a mere human: “Nor shall Death brag thou wander 'st in his shade, / When in eternal lines to time thou grow 'st;” (11-12). Death cannot take the lover away because he has been immortalized. Meaning the speaker loves him because his beauty is eternal and far greater than that of summer’s. Meanwhile “Sonnet 130” claims the mistress as being nothing like a goddess and simply an average human being: “I grant I never saw a goddess go; / My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:” (11-12). Even though he does not find her physically attractive he still declares his love for her at the end of the
In “Sonnet 18”, Shakespeare uses metaphoric language to describe and further eternalize his lover’s beauty. Shakespeare starts the poem off by questioning if he should compare his beloved to a summer day. He then proceeds to states that his beloved beauty is far more superior than that of summer. Summer is fated to end: “Rough winds do shake …show more content…
The metaphors in “Sonnet 18” are used to spotlight on the lover’s beauty by making it superior than nature’s. Meanwhile, the imageries in “Sonnet 130” are used to belittle the woman’s beauty by saying it is inferior to that of nature. “Sonnet 18” seems to lean more on the importance of physical beauty while “Sonnet 130” is about the inner beauty of his lover. The lover in “Sonnet 18” is seen as being more than a mere human: “Nor shall Death brag thou wander 'st in his shade, / When in eternal lines to time thou grow 'st;” (11-12). Death cannot take the lover away because he has been immortalized. Meaning the speaker loves him because his beauty is eternal and far greater than that of summer’s. Meanwhile “Sonnet 130” claims the mistress as being nothing like a goddess and simply an average human being: “I grant I never saw a goddess go; / My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:” (11-12). Even though he does not find her physically attractive he still declares his love for her at the end of the