The main way that those two Shakespearean sonnets differ is in their treatment of the written about woman. Both sonnets are explanations of love by the speaker. That's how they are similar. The main overall message is one of love.
The difference is in how the speaker talks about the object of his love. In Sonnet 18, the speaker initially tries to compare his lover to a summer's day. He then quickly decides that is lame, because his lover is way more amazing than summer and summer days in a bunch of ways. Basically, Sonnet 18 is incredibly complimenting toward the woman.
Sonnet 130 is not at all complimenting to the woman. The speaker goes on for 12 lines about how ugly she is.
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
He talks about how her voice is awful to listen to and how her breath stinks crazy bad too. The only reason it is a love poem at all is because of the final couplet.
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.
The final lines basically say that none of the previous stuff matters. He still loves her deeply. In other words, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
In summary, Sonnet 18 basically says "I love you because you are awesome." Sonnet 130 basically says, "I love you even though you aren't awesome."
No comments:
Post a Comment