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Essay: Shall I Compare Thee by William Shakespeare

Shall I Compare Thee

-          William Shakespeare



Introduction to the Poet:

William Shakespeare was the greatest English Poet and dramatist the world has ever known. He was a prolific writer during the Elizabethan and Jacobean ages of British theatre. He wrote thirty-eight plays, two narrative poems, one hundred and Fifty-Four sonnets, and a variety of other poems. William Shakespeare continues to be one of the most important literary figures of the English language.

Introduction to Shakespearean Sonnet:

            The themes of Shakespeare’s sonnets cover the passage of time, love, beauty, and mortality. Shakespeare’s sonnets are classified as Fairyouth, dark lady, and Greek. Shakespeare uses many nature-oriented metaphors in his sonnets. The Shakespearean sonnets are made of three quatrains (four-line stanzas) and one couplet (a two-line stanza). Traditionally, Shakespearean sonnets are in iambic pentameter.

            Sonnet No: 18 “Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day” is one of the most loved sonnets that celebrates love and the timelessness of poetry.

Comparison: Summer’s Day Vs The Beloved:

The sonnet begins with a rhetorical question:

“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”

            William Shakespeare states that his beloved is more lovely and more temperate. He talks about the negative aspects of the summer season. Rough winds destroy the new buds of May (early summer) and “summer’s lease” is destined to end.

Nature of summer and beauty:

                                                “Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines”

            Shakespeare personifies and calls the Sun as “Eye of heaven.” The sun has a golden complexion but this beauty and attractiveness declines as time passes. But the nature and beauty of his beloved shall not fade away. His beloved’s nature, beauty cannot be taken away by death or time

 Conclusion:

“ So long lives this, and this gives life to thee”

            Shakespeare states that his beloved’s “eternal summer” shall not fade away as it is embodied in the sonnet. By employing Personification, Metaphor, Alliteration and Biblical reference, Shakespeare glorifies his beloved’s beauty and ascertains it shall last forever through the “eternal lines”

 

 

 

 

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