Extra Credit: Analysis of Shakespeare Sonnet 18

William Shakespeare is the most famous English playwright and poet in Britain during the European Renaissance periods. Sonnet 18, often alternately titled Shall i compare thee to a summer’s day, is one of the best-known of 154 sonnets of his work.

SONNET 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? 

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer's lease hath all too short a date: 

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; 

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade

Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;

Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou growest: 

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

Just like what I said in the last blog, it is really difficult for a me to comprehend the main idea of Shakespeare’s work. However, in this poem, according to my understanding and the researches on the internet, I think Shakespeare wants to show the humanism thought, beauty and love.

In the first sentence of the poem, he indicates that poem happens in a summer. As we know, the summer in Britain is not as hot as in Rabun Gap. The summer in Britain is more likely to be a late spring here which is the time that everything is active and vital. This part suggests that the “thee” is in the best time of his life.

In the first six sentences, Shakespeare compared “thee” with “darling buds of May”, “ Summer”, and the “Eye of heaven shines”. In his view, “summer”, “bud” and “sun” are “too hot” or “too short”. Thus, he argues that “thee”, his beloved, is more attractive than anything else and certainly he thinks his beloved is better.

In ninth and tenth sentence, Shakespeare also says that “thee” “sometimes declines from fair and the changing of nature”. However, in his opinion, “thee”, his beloved, will not “fade in the eternal summer”, even the “Death” could not claim “thee” for his own. Therefore, his beloved will live on forever through the words of poem, and we could consider this poem as a glorify to the beauty.

This poem praises the love as well. In the poem, he says “Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade” . In my opinion it is more than the beauty, it is a power that is able to conquer anything. That is the love form the human heart. As long as human exist, the love will never disappear.

Additionally, hough the resource on the internet, most scholars now agree that the original subject of the poem, the beloved to whom the poet is writing, is a male, though the poem is commonly used to describe a woman.

Reference:

"Analysis of Shakespeare's Sonnet 18 - Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day." Shakespeare Online. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Mar. 2011. <http://www.shakespeare-online.com/sonnets/18detail.html>.

"Sonnet 18 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia." Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Mar. 2011. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonnet_18>.