Coy Mistress

Coy Mistress

To His Coy Mistress is a poem by Andrew Marvells that focuses on the lustful desires of a man who is trying to seduce a female virgin into sexual intimacy. Also known as a seduction poem, it is full of allusion, metaphor, and a dramatic monologue as the speaker progresses logically through stages of persuasion to win the heart of the virgin mistress.

Andrew Marvell deploys several strategies of seduction combined with a figurative use of language to give the poem a high aesthetic value. In his first stanza, Marvell begins by an appeal to Coy that they could spend their days in leisure if time and space were limitless. “Had we but world enough, and time…We would sit down and think which way….To walk and pass our long love’s day” (1-4). The two would sit by the side of the exotic Ganges River and gain the fascination of its ebb and flow. In this stanza, Marvell is bringing in vivid description as a seductive strategy employed by the man. In the first stanza, the speaker is using logos to appeal to the woman that they are not going to live forever, hence this is the right time, and they should become an item. Another seductive strategy that the speaker has used is flattery and trust. “While the youthful hue/ Sits on thy skin like morning dew” (33-34) where the seducer shows the mistress that they should have sex, especially at this time when they are young. However, the violent and macabre depiction of sex scares away the mistress who is not willing to lose her virginity.

The speaker uses a stretched metaphor to display his wit and intelligence to win sex from a virgin woman. In the phrase “and pass our long love’s day” (line 4), the speaker uses this metaphor to compare his life with that of his mistress coy. He has used allusion when he describes the Ganges River that flows through India to explain the attractiveness that their love will portray. In the second stanza, the speaker uses the metonym of chariot to describe time growth of their love. The speaker is using morning dew as a synecdoche to signify the tranquility of their passion. Lastly, the speaker says, “like am’ rous birds of prey” (Stanza 3, line 6). This smile builds the theme of sex and desire. Marvell has thus used couplets of figurative language to describe the passion of a male speaker for a sexual liaison.