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Byron Twain
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Jeanne Dininni
Shilpa KarhikShakespeare Poetry
April 18th 2006 04:52
Shakespeare needs no introduction, but I'll give a little background information on his sonnets. There were 154 of them and all except Sonnet 126 are twelve lines long, followed by a final couplet which adds a twist or gives clarification to the preceding lines. They were often written to one of three people, who are referred to nowadays as the Fair Lord, the Rival Poet, and the Dark Lady. There is some conjecture as to their real identities, or if they were even real people. It also isn't known whether or not the sonnets are autobiographical.
Some of the sonnets aren't written to or about a specific person, but are ruminations on love, time and mortality, such as the following, Shakespeare's 116th sonnet. A few hints on possibly unfamiliar expressions in this poem: the "ever-fixed mark" is a beacon, such as a tower or rock, to help lost ships (every wand'ring bark) to navigate stormy seas. Since it is referred to in this poem as "the star", it is probably a reference to the Pole star, which in the Northern hemisphere never appears to move and is useful for navigation. The "edge of doom" is the Day of Judgement or the day of a person's death.
SONNET CXVI
by William Shakespeare
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand'ring bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me prov'd,
I never writ, nor no man ever lov'd.
Some of the sonnets aren't written to or about a specific person, but are ruminations on love, time and mortality, such as the following, Shakespeare's 116th sonnet. A few hints on possibly unfamiliar expressions in this poem: the "ever-fixed mark" is a beacon, such as a tower or rock, to help lost ships (every wand'ring bark) to navigate stormy seas. Since it is referred to in this poem as "the star", it is probably a reference to the Pole star, which in the Northern hemisphere never appears to move and is useful for navigation. The "edge of doom" is the Day of Judgement or the day of a person's death.
SONNET CXVI
by William Shakespeare
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand'ring bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me prov'd,
I never writ, nor no man ever lov'd.
Shakespeare 1564 - 1616
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