Shakespeare and His All Natural Love by Raquel Wood
             Shakespeare's ability to convey love, whether thwarted or fulfilled, is unparalleled in that he could do it in the form of a tragedy, comedy, or sonnet. He uses nature to convey this love in many cases. From Romeo and Juliet he writes, "But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun." From Sonnet 49 he likens the subject's eyes to the sun, "And scarcely greet me with that sun, thine eye." In The Rape of Lucrece he writes, "Her azure veins, her alabaster skin Her coral lips, her snow-white dimpled chin." And in The Taming of the Shrew, Act 1, Scene 1, "Tranio, I saw her coral lips to move And with her breath she did perfume the air." However, he departs from the traditional use of nature in describing a woman's desirability and, in doing so, creates an interesting twist on the common sonnet theme. Shakespeare, in Sonnet 130, parodies the classic Petrarchan sonnet in likening the woman's features to nature, but does so in su!
             ch a way that makes the poem and his love more honest, and, consequently, more charming. He does this through form and imagery.
             In utilizing the form of the sonnet to parody the classic Petrarchan sonnet and its theme, Shakespeare actually makes more of the love poem. His sonnet follows all the rules of the typical sonnet; the rhyme scheme is abab cdcd efef gg and this naturally divides the poem into three distinct quatrains, followed by a closing couplet. His lines also follow the standard form, containing 10 syllables each, with the exception of line 13, which contains 11 syllables. This exception is particularly meaningful, however, because at this line Shakespeare makes his concluding point. This adherence, as far as form goes, adds strength to his parody because it augments the difference in his imagery. If he had made more changes to the form, it would have diminished the whole tone of his adulation...