Shakespeares Definition of Love in Sonnet Number 116 and 130

Shakespeares Definition of Love in Sonnet Number 116 and 130 Sonnet number one hundred sixteen and number one hundred thirty provide a good look at what Shakespeare himself defines as love. The former describes the ever-enduring nature of true love, while the latter gives an example of this ideal love through the description of a woman who many call the â€Å"Dark Lady†. Through the combination of these two sonnets Shakespeare provides a consistent picture of what love should be like in order to â€Å"bear it out even to the edge of doom†(116, Ln: 12). To me the tern â€Å"maker† used by Sir Philip Sidney to describe the poets first and foremost duty would refer to the creation process, which produces the end text. The discourse of the poet is to†¦show more content†¦Love is something that does not change when it finds and alteration in the object of its affection. Love merely adapts or does not notice these alterations at all. The second quatrain compares loves stability to a star fixed in the sky, â€Å"t he star to every wandering bark, / Who’s worth’s unknown, although his height be taken† (Ln: 7-8). The third quatrain again shows the consistency of love through imagery concerning the passage of time. With the lines: â€Å"Love is not time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks/ Within his bending sickles compass come† Shakespeare comments on the blindness of this ideal love (Ln: 9-10). Time, although it may be able to fade someone’s physical appearance, cannot touch love. Love is immortal and unchanging regardless of any effect time would have on ones physical appearance. The couplet changes in tone from the rest of the sonnet. In contrast to the descriptive images used to catalogue the virtues of love, the couplet is a stern straightforward set of words. Sonnet one hundred thirty describes a woman that Shakespeare loves. His descriptions of both this woman, and what he loves about her comply with the standards he has set forth in sonne t one hundred sixteen. It seems as though Shakespeare is almost playing it safe by loving this woman. The cheeks and lips, which are portrayed in the previous sonnet as something, which will fade with time, are not at all the basis ofShow MoreRelatedStudy Guide Literary Terms7657 Words   |  31 Pagesas charity, greed, or envy. Thus an allegory is a story with two meanings, a literal meaning and a symbolic meaning 4. allusion- A reference in one literary work to a character or theme found in another literary work. T. S. Eliot, in The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock alludes (refers) to the biblical figure John the Baptist in the line Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter, . . . In the New Testament, John the Baptists head was presented to King Herod