Subjects:
Shakespeare wrote that are addressed to a young man of great beauty and promise.
In this group of sonnets, the speaker urges the young man to marry and perpetuate
his virtues through children, and warns him about the destructive power of time,
age, and moral weakness. Sonnet 18 focuses on the beauty of the young man, and
how beauty fades, but his beauty will not because it will be remembered by
Shakespeare starts the poem with a metaphoric question in line one asking if
he should compare the man to a summer’s day. This asks if he should compare the
beauty of a summer’s day to the beauty of the young man about whom
Shakespeare is writing. Line two of this poem states “Thou art more lovely and
more temperate.” Temperate is used as a
. . .
This poem that Shakespeare wrote, in the octave, describes how all beauty
fades except for the man about whom Shakespeare is writing. Lines thirteen and fourteen say that as long as this poem is read, the man’s
beauty will never go away, because every time someone reads the poem they will
be reminded of his beauty.
Shakespeare uses “the eye of heaven” as a metaphor in this line to describe the
sun. Line three, “Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,” tells
why the man’s beauty is greater than that of a summer’s day. Shakespeare makes
use of much symbolism and many other figurative devices in this poem that
contribute and emphasize to the overall theme of the poem.
In the sestet, the poem tells about how the man’s beauty stays alive and out lives
all other beauty. Line five states another imperfection of the summer. In lines seven and eight the
speaker ends the complication by describing how nature is never perfect.
“Eternal summer” in line nine is referring back to the man’s eternal beauty, using
summer to symbolize beauty, and saying that the man’s beauty will never fail like
the summer’s beauty. This emphasizes the man’s beauty and how the man is viewed by
the speaker.
Line nine starts the resolution of the poem by using the conjunction “but”. The octave also
tells of how great the man’s beauty is compared to everything else that is beautiful. In
line two the speaker is describing the man as more lovely and more moderate than
a summer’s day.
Essay's Topics
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