Subjects:
contrary, the speaker is losing his sanity as time progresses. In the past, perhaps, the
speaker's rational thought processes allowed him to cope with failed romances. However,
in the presence of this love for his dark mistress, all his logical mental abilities are
overpowered. His rational mind, which he depends on for truth and sanity, has left him in
the face of love. The torment of love has made it impossible for the speaker to make
truthful, objective observations about his world ("Companion to" 43). In this poem,
Shakespeare claims that it is love, not reason, that shapes one's perception of the world,
for one's mind, the ideal and rational judgment-maker, is subject to and overwhelmed by
the whims of emotion ("Companion to" 44). At the beginning of Sonnet 147, the spe
. . .
contrast to poem 147, Sonnet 130 describes the experiences of a man's struggle against
external, social factors, such as his culture's romantic ideal for one's beloved. Finally, Shakespeare portrays love on an
even larger scale, where Love is an external power that, independent of any individual,
struggles against and then defeats Time, another external entity (Booth 14). Sonnet 147 deals with
love as an internal agony where there is no mention of outside forces at play.
Love, then, is, for Shakespeare, a force that operates within several different
contexts. Clearly, if
love is an overwhelming, forceful entity that defeats time, death, social pressures, and
reason, then love is no longer simply an internalized emotion; it is also an externalized
power which can exist independent of human beings (Booth 22). " He continues, "My thoughts and my discourse as mad
men's are, /At random from the truth vainly expressed (Lines 10 and 11). As such, love has a multi-faceted definition, which yields to a multi-faceted
identity. In
Sonnet 116, Shakespeare goes one step further, and depicts two external forces, Love and
. This is a
personal poem where Shakespeare uses the metaphor of disease and illness to represent
the obsessive love which has taken over his speaker's senses ("The Works" 119) .
Towards the end of the poem, love has completely overwhelmed his mind, inducing him to
become "frantic-mad (Line 10). Second, Shakespeare epics love as an internal force which
battles external forces, such as social pressures. " The speaker's
logical mind knows that his woman is evil, yet his love for her blinds him and he sees her
as beautiful. " The language
Shakespeare chooses further emphasizes the crazed effect love has had on the speaker's
mind (Rowse, A Biography 72). " The use of this word creates a clear image of a mad man running
wild and uncontrolled. aker's
love is described as a fever, but as the sonnet continues, the effects of love intensify.
Essay's Topics
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