Analysis of Sonnet 18 by Shakespeare

Analysis of Sonnet 18 by Shakespeare

Introduction

William Shakespeare was one of the most acknowledged English poets. He wrote over 150 poems, but his sonnet 18 took the world away. The sonnet 18 is considered to be the most beautiful of all sonnets as it depicts romance, yet written in simplicity. Shakespeare deployed literacy devices to make the sonnet a lyric and interesting poem.

Analysis of the poem

The poem depicts the theme of romance. Shakespear targeted his friend or a lover for that matter. The opening line is a reflection of the uncertainty of the speaker, as he tries to compare his friend or lover to a day of summer. The line is more of a teaser.  “Shall I compare thee to a summer day?”He continues to praise the lover by stating that she is lovely and temperate, “thou art more lovely and more temperate.” Here, he describes the day a perfect summer day, which is usually lovely with the perfect temperature. He compares the lover with a perfect summer day. In the English language, lovely could mean that attractive or beautiful, which gives the reader of the poem, the idea that Shakespeare dedicated the poem to a woman. Temperate could mean gentle-natured, suggesting that Shakespeare loves her for her beauty and composure. To him, the lover is perfect.

As the poem proceeds, the speaker describes the changes in the weather. The weather is not predictable; it could be sunny today, then the wind blows, clouds gather and rain pours, and within no time, summer has come and passed. Shakespeare deploys a steady iambic rhythm to express the weather changes and to show that summer will come and go, and people will grow old and as it is within nature. As they age, so will their beauty fade, as the beauty of summer fades due to weather change. However, Shakespeare states that his lover will not fade, where he states that “thy eternal summer shall not fade.” This can be interpreted that the lover will always be beautiful to the speaker even if they age, her beauty will remain. The lover can be able to cheat time and death.

Literary terms and theoretical perspectives in Sonnet 18

The speaker employs repetition, assonance, and rhyme to create interest and musical rhythm in the poem. Assonance and repetition are depicted in the poem, and this increases the texture and soundscape of the poem, For instance, inline seven, which states, “And every fair from fair sometime declines.” In this line, there is a repetition of the word fair, which adds to the sound pattern of the poem. In the last line, assonance is depicted, where the speaker says, “so long lives this, and this gives life to thee.” The word’s lives and life, have a resemblance to the sound, which creates a musical rhythm for the reader as he reads the poem.

The speaker uses metaphors to convey his message. He compares his lover to a summer day. He states that the lover is lovelier and more temperate, just like the summer day.  He continues to state that thy eternal summer will never fade. Here, he represents his lover’s beauty with the eternal summer. The eternal summer will never lose its fair. By this, he means that his lover will never lose her beauty and will continue to be young. The speaker also uses vagaries of the words summer weather over and over again as he tries to put the entire context into perspective.

The rhyme scheme in Sonnet 18

Shakespeare uses a regular rhyme scheme in this sonnet. The 13^th and 14^th lines end with see and thee, creating a regular rhyming. Also, the first and third lines are rhyming. The first line ends with a day while the third ends with May. The fifth line ends with shines, and the seventh line ends with declines. This combination of words ends with the same sound, creating a regular pattern throughout the poem. The poem depicts a traditional iambic pentameter, an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable. On the first line. “shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? The stress is put on the summer’s day even if the statement is a question. The speaker wants to capture the attention of the reader by bringing all the attention to the summer’s day.

Conclusion

ThroughThroughout the poem, Shakespeare does not use any preposition to refer to the one he dedicates the poem to. By doing this, he gives the reader the chance to decide if the poem was written for a friend, lover, or family member.  He engages the reader all through the poem by using literacy devices and theoretical perspectives. Through the use of literary terms, he is able to capture the audience’s attention by keeping the poem interesting.