Sonnet 18 “Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?” focuses on the beauty of the poet’s beloved and how her beauty never fades because it will be remembered by those who read the poem; suggesting that the poem immortalizes her. He creates this main theme with poetic features such as, tone, imagery, symbolism, alliteration, assonance, metaphoric comparisons and with the style of syntax. These particular features are used to support this main idea and lead the reader to a realization of this conclusion. The poet uses several themes that contribute to the main point of the poem. He uses the season of summer and he compares and contrasts his love for his beloved to a beautiful summer’s day as well as a bad summer’s day. He asks, “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”Thou art more lovely and more temperate.”Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May”, “And summer’s lease had all too short a date” (Shakespeare).
Each of these points lead to his questioning whether he should compare her to summer because it is imperfect but she is an object of perfection. This contributes to the main idea of the poem by showing the reader that although summer is beautiful it does eventually end but his beloved’s beauty is eternal. Another theme that the poet uses is death. He states that his beloved cannot even be touched by death, the beauty of the summer season may die or diminish with the changing of nature but his beloved’s beauty will remain and live on because it is too strong to die. Climatic conditions are also a huge element in the poem, he uses words such as “rough winds”, “shake”, and the “hotness” and “dimness” of the sun, and untrimmed-implying the nakedness of the trees. These conditions are used to describe summer in contrast to his beloved’s beauty once again amplifying the exact opposite of her beauty.
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Sometimes by using such harsh words in contrast gives the readers vivid ideas as to how serious the poet really is about who and what he is writing; Thus causing the readers to remember and reminisce the poem. His tone in the poem seems to be on a serious note. He seems to feel an obligation to express his love for his beloved and he goes to the great lengths of comparing and contrasting her to even the extreme conditions of summer. Summer depicts warmth, freshness, life- the exact opposite of death. Plants blossom in summer and animals give birth. Summer signifies life and energy.
His intent is to use summer as a comparison because it is known to be the loveliest season of all seasons. It is the closest season that best compares to his beloved. In line nine, the poet seems to change his tone to that of a passionate one. In lines ten and eleven he states how his beloved’s summer / beauty will never fade, “But thy eternal summer shall never fade” (Shakespeare) and places it in comparison to lines six and seven, that summer does in fact loose it’s beauty but the beauty of his beloved remains.
It is not just the external beauty he is speaking of but the internal beauty of his beloved as well, the inner beauty that she possesses. His seriousness and passion gives readers insight to evoke such emotion that will be embedded into their very memories and souls forever, thus immortalizing her. His use of imagery is embedding. He portrays a vivid picture of the climatic conditions of summer.
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The beauty of the sun along with the tenderness and fragileness of the budding flowers contributes to the beauty of summer. Beauty is so wonderful it is sometimes hard to imagine that it can fade so he uses the harsh words to describe the conditions of summer like “rough winds”, “hotness”, “dimness” and “untrimmed” to depict and remind readers that beauty is a lovely and wonderful thing but the outward beauty over time fades but not the beauty of his beloved. When readers encounter any of the poem’s images in their everyday lives they will think back to the poem and remember Shakespeare’s beloved’s beauty. This again leads to her immortal ization. The poet utilizes much symbolism as figurative devices in the poem. Lease symbolizes time in line four: “And summer’s lease had all too short a date” (Shakespeare), implying that summer time is much too short a season.
Fair symbolizes beauty: “Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow ” st” (Shakespeare), his beloved’s beauty will not be lost. Shade symbolizes death: “Nor shall death brag thou wand ” rest in his shade” (Shakespeare), implying that death will be conquered. Shade is dark and obliterated just like what is understood to be death. Once readers read the poem, and anytime the readers encounter either one of these symbols it can possibly trigger their memories of the poem and the beloved, thus immortalizing her. The metaphoric comparisons in the poem are splendid. He uses “The eye of heaven” to describe the sun.
Line’s five and six: “Sometimes too hot the eye of heaven shines, and often in his gold complexion dimmed” (Shakespeare) describes the sun again meaning that sometimes the sun is too hot and sometimes not hot enough. “Gold complexion” compares to the golden sun. Line three: “Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May” (Shakespeare), rough winds symbolize damage. Line nine: “Thy eternal summer shall not fade” (Shakespeare), summer symbolizes the beauty of his beloved that will never fade. Line twelve: “When in eternal lines to time thou grow ” st” (Shakespeare) refers to lines of poetry as well as lines of shape, the shape of her beauty that will flourish and the lines of poetry that will live on. The poetic features such as alliteration and assonance are utilized as well.
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... 8211; Shakespeare's Sonnet 18 and Keats' Grecian Urn Shakespeare's sonnet 18 ("Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?' ... this poetry is his friend's beauty, it will immortalize his beloved friend's beauty. The poet can make ... mind; to immortalize the subjects of their poems by writing them down in verses for ... thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate… (lines 1-2) ' Though ...
Line seven: “And every fair from fair sometimes declines.” (Shakespeare).
This is an example of alliteration. Line fourteen: “So long lives this and this gives life to thee” (Shakespeare) is an example of assonance. Alliteration and assonance illustrates a smooth, even flow of words thus giving a more pleasant read for the reader which can evoke happiness. When people are happy they tend to remember more easily. This suggests that by evoking such pleasant feelings, the reader will most likely remember the poem; this will cause his beloved’s beauty and memory to be eternal.
His sentence structure is very subtle; he writes in short sentences broken by commas and a few periods. This can be compared to the shortness of the season of summer, which he makes apparent at the beginning of the poem. In reading the poem it is evident that Shakespeare’s purpose is to immortalize his beloved. With the use of the poetic features he gives clear, concise illustrations on supporting this purpose. The splendor of the entire poem is the last two lines that best illustrates it: “So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this and this gives life to thee” (Shakespeare).
Works Cited Shakespeare, William.
Sonnet 18. Course Syllabus. Rita Bode, 2003.
