poetry essay on sonnet 18

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Sonnet 18 Summary & Analysis by William Shakespeare

• Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis
• Poetic Devices
• Vocabulary & References
• Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme
• Line-by-Line Explanations

"Sonnet 18" is a sonnet written by English poet and playwright William Shakespeare. The poem was likely written in the 1590s, though it was not published until 1609. Like many of Shakespeare's sonnets, the poem wrestles with the nature of beauty and with the capacity of poetry to represent that beauty. Praising an anonymous person (usually believed to be a young man), the poem tries out a number of clichéd metaphors and similes , and finds each of them wanting. It then develops a highly original and unusual simile: the young man's beauty can be best expressed by comparing him to the poem itself.

• Read the full text of “Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”

The Full Text of “Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”

1 Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

2 Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

3 Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

4 And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

5 Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

6 And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;

7 And every fair from fair sometime declines,

8 By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd;

9 But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

10 Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;

11 Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,

12 When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:

13    So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

14    So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

“Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” Summary

“sonnet 18: shall i compare thee to a summer’s day” themes.

Art and Immortality

• See where this theme is active in the poem.

Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”

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 hath all too short a date;

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;

And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st; Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:

Lines 13-14

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,    So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

“Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” Symbols

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“Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

Alliteration.

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End-Stopped Line

Personification, juxtaposition, “sonnet 18: shall i compare thee to a summer’s day” vocabulary.

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

• See where this vocabulary word appears in the poem.

Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”

Rhyme scheme, “sonnet 18: shall i compare thee to a summer’s day” speaker, “sonnet 18: shall i compare thee to a summer’s day” setting, literary and historical context of “sonnet 18: shall i compare thee to a summer’s day”, more “sonnet 18: shall i compare thee to a summer’s day” resources, external resources.

"Sonnet 18" Read Aloud — Listen to actor David Tenant read "Sonnet 18" aloud.

Image of "Sonnet 18" in its 1609 Printing — An image of Shakespeare's "Sonnet 18" as it appeared in its first printing.

Close Reading of "Sonnet 18" — Richard Price close reads "Sonnet 18" for the British Library.

David Gilmour Sings "Sonnet 18" — David Gilmour from Pink Floyd performs a musical interpretation of the poem.

"Sonnet 18" Meter — Test your understanding of Shakespeare's meter with this interactive tool from the University of Virginia.

LitCharts on Other Poems by William Shakespeare

Sonnet 116: Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Sonnet 129: Th' expense of spirit in a waste of shame

Sonnet 12: When I do count the clock that tells the time

Sonnet 130: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun

Sonnet 138: When my love swears that she is made of truth

Sonnet 141: In faith, I do not love thee with mine eyes

Sonnet 147: My love is as a fever, longing still

Sonnet 19: Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws

Sonnet 20: A woman’s face with nature’s own hand painted

Sonnet 27: "Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed"

Sonnet 29: When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes

Sonnet 30: When to the sessions of sweet silent thought

Sonnet 33: Full many a glorious morning have I seen

Sonnet 45: The other two, slight air and purging fire

Sonnet 55: Not marble nor the gilded monuments

Sonnet 60: Like as the waves make towards the pebbl'd shore

Sonnet 65 ("Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea")

Sonnet 71: No longer mourn for me when I am dead

Sonnet 73: That time of year thou mayst in me behold

Sonnet 94: "They that have power to hurt"

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By William Shakespeare

Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnet 18’ praises timeless beauty, rooted in virtues that endure beyond the fleeting beauty of the youth.

William Shakespeare

Nationality: English

His plays and poems are read all over the world.  

Key Poem Information

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Central Message: True beauty endures beyond physical appearance.

Themes: Aging , Beauty , Desire , Love

Speaker: William Shakespeare

Emotions Evoked: Compassion , Joyfulness , Love for Him

Poetic Form: Shakespearean Sonnet

Time Period: 16th Century

This poem is a masterful ode to the power of love and art to transcend the limitations of time and mortality.

Poem Analyzed by Elise Dalli

B.A. Honors Degree in English and Communications

Although William Shakespeare is best known as a playwright , he is also the poet behind 154 sonnets , which were collected for the first time in a collection in 1609. Based on the Petrarchan (or Italian) sonnet , Shakespeare’s sonnets differ from the norm by addressing not only a young woman – which was the norm in Italy – but also a young man, known throughout as the Fair Youth. 

A total of 126 of the 154 sonnets are largely taken to be addressed to the Fair Youth, which some scholars have also taken as proof of William Shakespeare’s homosexuality.

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Explore Sonnet 18

• 2 Detailed Analysis
• 3 Historical Background
• 5 Similar Poetry

Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day ? attempts to justify the speaker ’s beloved’s beauty by comparing it to a summer’s day and comes to the conclusion that his beloved is better after listing some of the summer’s negative qualities.

While summer is short and occasionally too hot, his beloved has an everlasting beauty, and that will never be uncomfortable to gaze upon. This also riffs – as Sonnet 130 does – on the romantic poetry of the age, the attempt to compare a beloved to something greater than them. Although in Sonnet 130 , Shakespeare is mocking the over-flowery language, in Sonnet 18, Shakespeare’s simplicity of imagery shows that that is not the case. The beloved’s beauty can coexist with summer and indeed be more pleasant, but it is not a replacement for it.

The Poem Analysis Take

Expert Insights by Elise Dalli

One element of ' Sonnet 18' that's sometimes overlooked in traditional interpretations is Shakespeare's interest in sharing the power of the written word. The world is constantly changing, and he chooses to immortalize his beloved's beauty in the poem. By doing so, he's making a statement about the impact of poetry. The written word is permanent in a way that life and beauty are not.

Detailed Analysis

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 hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimmed, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature’s changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st, Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st,    So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,    So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

The poem opens with the speaker putting forward a simple question: can he compare his lover to a summer’s day? Historically, the theme of summertime has always been used to evoke a certain amount of beauty, particularly in poetry. Summer has always been seen as the respite from the long, bitter winter, a growing period where the earth flourishes itself with flowers and with animals once more. Thus, to compare his lover to a summer’s day, the speaker considers their beloved to be tantamount to a rebirth and even better than summer itself.

As summer is occasionally short, too hot, and rough, summer is, in fact, not the height of beauty for this particular speaker. Instead, he attributes that quality to his beloved, whose beauty will never fade, even when ‘ death brag thou waander’stin his shade ‘, as he will immortalize his lover’s beauty in his verse .

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, / So long lives this, and this gives life to thee .

The immortality of love and beauty through poetry provides the speaker with his beloved’s eternal summer. Though they might die and be lost to time, the poem will survive, will be spoken of, and will live on when they do not. Thus, through the words, his beloved’s beauty will also live on.

In terms of imagery, there is not much that one can say about it. William Shakespeare’s sonnets thrive on simplicity of imagery, the polar opposite of his plays, whose imagery can sometimes be packed with meaning. Here, in this particular sonnet, the feeling of summer is evoked through references to the ‘darling buds’ of May and through the description of the sun as golden-complexioned.

It is almost ironic that we are not given a description of the lover in particular. In fact, scholars have argued that, as a love poem, the vagueness of the beloved’s description leads them to believe that it is not a love poem written to a person but a love poem about itself, a love poem about love poetry, which shall live on with the excuse of being a love poem.

The final two lines seem to corroborate this view as they move away from the description of the lover to point out the longevity of his own poem. As long as men can read and breathe, his poem shall live on, and his lover, too, will live on because he is the subject of this poem.

However, opinions are divided on this topic.

Shakespeare’s sonnets are all written in iambic pentameter – an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable, with five of these in each line – with a rhyming couplet at the end.

Historical Background

William Shakespeare was born in 1564 in Stratford-Upon-Avon to an alderman and glover. He is widely regarded as the greatest English writer of all time and wrote 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems , and 38 plays, though recently, another play has been found and attributed to William Shakespeare. Although much is known about his life, scholars are still uncertain as to whether or not Shakespeare actually authored his works, and convincing arguments exist on both sides.

He died on his 52nd birthday after signing a will that declared that he was in ‘perfect health.’ Theories about his death include that he drank too much at a meeting with Ben Jonson, and Drayton, contemporaries of his, contracted a fever and died.

His work remains a lasting source of wonder to many filmmakers, writers, and scholars and has been recreated in other media – most noticeably Baz Luhrmann’ 2004  Romeo + Juliet.  William Shakespeare’s work also has worldwide appeal and has been recreated for Japanese audiences in films such as  Throne of Blood , which is based on  Macbeth , though  Throne of Blood eschews all the poetry and focuses simply on the story.

The main theme of this poem is the power of beauty to overcome normal comparisons. Shakespeare explores the idea that while natural beauty, like that of a summer’s day, is fleeting, the beauty captured in his poem will endure forever.

‘Sonnet 18’ is believed to be addressed to a young man, often called the “Fair Youth.” The identity of this young man remains a subject of speculation and debate among scholars.

The concluding couplet in ‘ Sonnet 18’ offers a twist to the preceding lines. It serves as a declaration that the beauty of the beloved will live on in the poem itself, granting it eternal life as long as the poem is read.

Its universal themes, elegant language, and memorable opening line (“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”) have contributed to its enduring popularity and recognition as one of the most iconic works in English literature.

Similar Poetry

Readers who enjoyed  ‘Sonnet 18’  should also consider reading some other  William Shakespeare poems . For example: 

• ‘ Sonnet 27 ’ –   dwells on exhaustion and hope and how both are associated with a young man.
• ‘ Sonnet 38 ’ – focuses on the importance of the speaker’s  muse , the Fair Youth, and how integral the young man is to the poet’s writing. 
• ‘ Sonnet 1 ‘ – this poem appeals to the Fair Youth to procreate and preserve his beauty.

Poetry + Review Corner

16th century, love for him, inner beauty, valentine's day, shakespearean sonnet.

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Home » William Shakespeare » Sonnet 18: Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day?

About Elise Dalli

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Great I learned a lot more about him than I knew before

THat’s awesome!

Explain each and every line of the poem.Only the last two lines of the poem is explained.This thing i don’t like rest is superb.Good job sir

Thank you for your feedback. In some poems, we do break down each line individually. In this particular case our writer didn’t feel that it was needed and instead discussed the poem as a whole. We appreciate your feedback though. If there’s a specific line you need explaining please do get back to us.

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Dalli, Elise. "Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare". Poem Analysis , https://poemanalysis.com/william-shakespeare/shall-i-compare-thee-to-a-summers-day/ . Accessed 31 August 2024.

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“Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare: Analysis

“Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare, since its publication in 1609, has become a textbook poetic piece on account of its theme and subject matter.

• 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 hath all too short a date;
• Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
• And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
• And every fair from fair sometime declines,
• By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
• But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
• Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
• Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
• When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
• So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
• So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Introduction: “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

Table of Contents

“Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare, since its publication in 1609, has become a textbook poetic piece on account of its theme and subject matter. The sonnet is also part of a collection of 154 sonnets published by Thomas Thorpe under the title, Shake-Speares Sonnets , in a quarto edition. While the exact circumstances of the publication are unknown, it is believed that the sonnets were written over a period of several years and circulated among Shakespeare’s close friends and associates. “Sonnet 18” has become particularly famous for its opening lines “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”

Annotations of “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

Literary Devices in “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

Sound and Poetic Devices in Sonnet 18″ by William Shakespeare

Functions of Literary Devices in “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

• Metaphor: The first line of the sonnet (Verse 1) introduces a metaphor in which the speaker questions whether he should compare his beloved to a summer’s day. This metaphor serves to illustrate the beauty and perfection of the beloved in comparison to the transient and changeable nature of a season.
• Hyperbole: The second line of the sonnet (Verse 2) employs hyperbole to exaggerate the beauty of the beloved by suggesting that they are even lovelier and more temperate than a perfect summer’s day.
• Personification: In line 3 (Verse 3), the speaker personifies “rough winds,” describing them as shaking the “darling buds of May.” This literary device serves to create a vivid image of the natural world and the potential threats to beauty.
• Imagery: Shakespeare employs vivid imagery to convey the beauty of the beloved, the changing seasons, and the passage of time. For example, he uses the image of the “eye of heaven” and the “gold complexion” to describe the sun (Verse 5 and 6), and the image of a lease to describe the brevity of summer (Verse 4). These images serve to create a powerful and lasting impression of the beloved and the natural world.

Themes in “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

• The Power of Poetry and Art to Preserve Beauty: Throughout the sonnet, the speaker suggests that his beloved’s beauty is so great that it can never truly fade, even with the passage of time. He claims that through his poetry, he can capture the essence of the beloved’s beauty and preserve it forever: “Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, / When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st” (Lines 11-12).
• The Transience of Beauty: While the speaker praises the beauty of his beloved, he also acknowledges the transient nature of beauty in general. He notes that even a perfect summer day is subject to change and decay: “And summer’s lease hath all too short a date” (Line 4). This theme serves to underscore the preciousness and fleetingness of life.
• Love and Devotion: The sonnet is a love poem, and throughout it, the speaker expresses his devotion and admiration for his beloved. He uses hyperbole to emphasize the beloved’s beauty, claiming that they are even more lovely than a perfect summer day: “Thou art more lovely and more temperate” (Line 2).
• The Power of Immortality: The sonnet suggests that the beloved’s beauty is so great that it can achieve a kind of immortality through the power of art and poetry. The final lines of the poem suggest that as long as people continue to read and appreciate the speaker’s poetry, the beloved’s beauty will continue to live on: “So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, / So long lives this, and this gives life to thee” (Lines 13-14).

Literary Theories and “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

• New Criticism : New Criticism is a literary theory that emphasizes close reading of a text to understand its form, structure, and language. This approach could be used to analyze “Sonnet 18” by examining the sonnet’s traditional structure and language choices, such as the use of iambic pentameter and metaphors comparing the beloved to a summer’s day.
• Reader-Response Criticism : Reader-Response Criticism is a literary theory that emphasizes the role of the reader in interpreting a text. This approach could be used to explore how different readers might interpret the sonnet’s themes of love and beauty, and how their own experiences and perspectives might shape their understanding of the poem.
• Feminist Criticism : Feminist Criticism is a literary theory that focuses on the representation of gender and power in literature. This approach could be used to analyze the sonnet’s depiction of the beloved and the speaker’s relationship to them. Some feminist readings of the sonnet might critique the speaker’s objectification of the beloved or explore the ways in which the poem reflects the patriarchal society in which it was written.
• Historical Criticism: Historical Criticism is a literary theory that examines a text in its historical context. This approach could be used to analyze “Sonnet 18” by considering the political, social, and cultural factors that influenced Shakespeare’s writing. For example, a historical reading might explore how the sonnet reflects Renaissance ideas about love and beauty, or how it speaks to the concerns of Shakespeare’s contemporary audience.

Essays Questions Thesis Statements about “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

• Topic: The Theme of Immortality in “Sonnet 18”

Question: How does Shakespeare use poetic devices such as metaphors and imagery to convey the theme of eternal love and immortality in the sonnet?

Thesis Statement: Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 18” explores the theme of immortality through the use of metaphors, imagery, and other poetic devices, ultimately arguing that true love can transcend even death.

• Topic: The Power of Poetry in “Sonnet 18”

Question: How does the sonnet itself serve as a testament to the power of poetry to capture and preserve beauty, even in the face of mortality?

Thesis Statement: Through the use of poetic devices such as metaphor, imagery, and personification, Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 18” highlights the power of poetry to transcend time and preserve the memory of beauty.

• Topic: The Nature of Beauty in “Sonnet 18”

Question: How does Shakespeare’s sonnet explore the nature of beauty and its fleeting nature, using the metaphor of a summer’s day to evoke the transience of youth and vitality?

Thesis Statement: “Sonnet 18” uses vivid imagery and figurative language to explore the fleeting nature of beauty, arguing that true beauty lies in the memory of the beloved.

• Topic: The Role of Gender in “Sonnet 18”

Question: How are gender and power dynamics reflected in the sonnet, with a particular focus on the female subject and her agency?

Thesis Statement: Through the portrayal of the female subject in “Sonnet 18,” Shakespeare reveals the gendered power dynamics of his time, ultimately questioning societal norms and elevating the status of the beloved.

Short Questions-Answers about “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

• What is the overall theme of “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare?

The overall theme of “Sonnet 18” is the power of poetry to preserve beauty and transcend time. The speaker uses vivid imagery and metaphors to describe the beauty of his beloved, ultimately arguing that the sonnet itself will ensure that she remains immortalized. The poem opens with a comparison between the beloved and a “summer’s day,” which highlights the fleeting nature of beauty and the inevitability of aging and death. However, the speaker argues that through the power of poetry, his beloved will live on forever. The sonnet is itself an act of preservation, as it immortalizes the beloved’s beauty in words that will be read and appreciated long after the speaker and his beloved are gone.

• What is the significance of the metaphor of the “summer’s day” in “Sonnet 18”?

The metaphor of the “summer’s day” in “Sonnet 18” serves to highlight the fleeting nature of youth and vitality. By comparing the beloved to a summer’s day, the speaker emphasizes the transience of beauty and the inevitability of aging and death. The metaphor also suggests that the beloved’s beauty is not just temporary, but also fragile and vulnerable to the forces of time and nature. By the end of the sonnet, however, the speaker argues that the beauty of his beloved will live on through the power of poetry, transcending even the forces of nature.

• How does Shakespeare use personification in “Sonnet 18” to convey the theme of immortality?

Shakespeare uses personification to convey the theme of immortality in “Sonnet 18” by anthropomorphizing the elements of nature. By describing how “rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,” the speaker emphasizes the power of nature to destroy beauty, but also suggests that the sonnet itself can preserve it. The personification of the winds and the buds of May creates a vivid image of the destructive power of nature, but also suggests that the beloved’s beauty can be protected through the power of poetry. The personification also serves to make the poem more memorable and engaging for the reader, as it creates a sense of drama and motion in the natural world.

• What is the significance of the final couplet in “Sonnet 18”?

The final couplet in “Sonnet 18” serves as a triumphant conclusion to the poem’s argument that the beloved’s beauty will be immortalized through the sonnet. By declaring that “So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, / So long lives this, and this gives life to thee,” the speaker asserts that the power of poetry can transcend even death. The final couplet is also significant in that it is the first time the beloved’s name is mentioned in the poem, making it clear that the poem is intended as a tribute to her beauty. The couplet also serves to tie together the themes of the sonnet, as it affirms the power of poetry to preserve beauty and transcend time, while also affirming the importance of human connection and memory.

Literary Works Similar to “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

• **Sonnet 116: ** Celebrates true love as an enduring, unchanging force.
• Sonnet 73: Explores the idea of love persisting even in the face of aging and decay.
• Sonnet 130: Subverts traditional beauty tropes, praising a beloved’s realistic qualities
• “Amoretti” by Edmund Spenser: A sequence of love sonnets dedicated to his wife, with similar themes of immortalizing love.
• “Astrophel and Stella” by Sir Philip Sidney: Explores complex, unrequited love and praises the beloved’s beauty with elaborate imagery.
• “She Walks in Beauty” by Lord Byron: Admires a woman’s inner and outer beauty using vivid natural comparisons.
• “Ozymandias” by Percy Bysshe Shelley: The transient nature of power and beauty contrasts with the enduring nature of art and words.
• “Having a Coke With You” by Frank O’Hara: Finds beauty and significance in everyday shared moments.
• “[love is more thicker than forget]” by e.e. cummings: Unconventional structure and wordplay convey the timelessness and power of love.

These works share a focus on:

• The power of poetry to immortalize: The poets strive to capture and preserve the beauty of their beloved or a specific emotion.
• Love and beauty: Often focus on physical or inner beauty, sometimes in idealized forms.
• Time and its relentless passage: The poets contrast the brevity of life with the potential for love and art to exist beyond it.

Suggested Readings: “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare

• Bloom, Harold. Shakespeare’s Sonnets . Chelsea House, 2009.
• Kerrigan, John. The Sonnets and a Lover’s Complaint . Penguin Books, 1995.
• Vendler, Helen. The Art of Shakespeare’s Sonnets . Harvard University Press, 1999.
• Ferry, Anne. “The ‘Inward’ Language: Sonnets of Wyatt, Sidney, Shakespeare, Donne.” Sidney Journal , vol. 11, no. 1/2, 1993, pp. 71-94. JSTOR , www.jstor.org/stable/41206003.
• Schoenfeldt, Michael. “‘The Expense of Spirit’: Love and Sexuality in Shakespeare’s Sonnets.” Representations , vol. 86, no. 1, 2004, pp. 1-22. JSTOR , www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/rep.2004.86.1.1.
• Wilson, Douglas B. “Shakespeare’s Sonnets and the 1590s.” A Companion to Shakespeare’s Sonnets , edited by Michael Schoenfeldt, Blackwell, 2002, pp. 14-31.
• Folger Shakespeare Library. “Shakespeare’s Sonnets.” Folger Shakespeare Library , www.folger.edu/shakespeares-sonnets.
• Poetry Foundation. “Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare.” Poetry Foundation , www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45099/sonnet-73-that-time-of-year-thou-mayst-in-me-behold.
• British Library. “Discovering Literature: Shakespeare’s Sonnets.” British Library , www.bl.uk/shakespeare/articles/shakespeares-sonnets.

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Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18 Analysis (Detailed and Illustrated)

Ever wondered what Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18 really means and how it is organized? In this article,

• You’ll see how Sonnet 18 is structured – in fascinating detail
• You’ll discover what Shakespeare really means
• You’ll get plenty of ideas for writing about Sonnet 18

Now, let’s dive into a detailed analysis of the sonnet.

Part 1 – Main Structure

Sonnet 18 by william shakespeare.

• 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 hath all too short a date;
• Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
• And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
• And every fair from fair sometime declines,
• By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
• But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
• Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
• Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
• When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
• So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
• So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

(source: The Poetry Foundation )

Let’s Do the Big Picture Analysis

An analysis is really identifying the parts of something and the relationship between the parts. And that’s how you comprehend a piece of writing, such as a poem. 

First, I want to show you how comprehension really works. In other words, how do you really read a sonnet, a poem, or any piece of writing, so that you would actually understand its meaning?

To make this really simple and easy, I came up with the idea of the Comprehension Pyramid. Here’s what it looks like:

It’s very simple. The better you understand the structure, the easier it will be to understand the meaning of any piece of writing. 

So, in the diagram above, as you climb the pyramid along the left ridge (structure), the meaning climbs with you on the right. And then you meet at the top, and you exclaim, “I got it!”

All you really need to do to understand something is to identify its parts and the relationship among them.

To analyze Sonnet 18, you need to ask yourself these two questions repeatedly:

• What are the parts?
• What is the relationship between the parts?

You can learn this process in this video:

How Is Sonnet 18 Structured?

First, let’s get some vocabulary out of the way.

In line 1, the word “ thee ” simply means “ you .” 

In line 2, the word “ thou ” also simply means “ you .” 

And in Line 9, ” thy ” means “ your ” or “ yours .”

Let’s take a look at lines 1 and 2

1. “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

2. Thou art more lovely and more temperate:”

In Line 1, Shakespeare tells you exactly what he intends to accomplish in this sonnet. He wants to compare “thee,” meaning “ you ,” to a summer’s day (or to the summer ). 

This already gives you a hint that there could be two parts to this sonnet. 

In line 2, he states the contrast: “You are more lovely and more temperate” than the summer.

As a result, lines 1 and 2 contain the argument , much like an argumentative essay.

In fact, this sonnet works like a perfect college-level essay. You state the thesis in the first paragraph and then support it in the body of the essay. This is exactly what Shakespeare does in this sonnet. 

Shakespeare is about to compare “you” to the summer, and that’s perfectly clear right from the beginning.

Now, since Shakespeare just told us that he wants to do a comparison, we can start looking for the main structure.

In other words, we should look for what parts of the sonnet Shakespeare devotes to “ you ” and what parts to “ the summer. ”

Hint: Look for Key Power Words

To identify the main parts of the sonnet, we should look for some of the key words.

These are words like “ and ” or “ but ” and their variations, such as “ also ” and “ however .”

And we find our main key word “ But ” in line 9.

The word “ But ” separates the two main sections of this sonnet. The first one is about “you,” and the other one is about “the summer.”

Shakespeare Structures this Sonnet Perfectly

Lines 3 to 8 are about the “ summer .” And lines 9 to 14 are about ” you .”

Note that this structure is in perfect accordance with line 1 which essentially states: “I’m comparing you to the summer.”

When I teach essay writing, this is how I teach my students to write. State your argument upfront in the beginning, and then structure the body of the essay accordingly.

Good job, Shakespeare!

Part 2 – How Does Shakespeare Accomplish the Comparison?

We know that Shakespeare is about to compare you to the summer . But do we have even more information in the first two lines?

Yes, we do. In line 2, Shakespeare gives us two criteria on which he wants to compare you with the summer . 

 And what are the criteria? In line 2, he says “You are more lovely and you are more temperate .”

And “temperate” just means “mild,” or “not extreme.” 

And so the criteria are loveliness and mildness .

Now we need to read the rest of the sonnet to see if Shakespeare really uses these two criteria to do the comparison. Here’s a video where I do this line by line:

If we go through the entire sonnet, we’ll see that only lines 3, 5, and 6 are about loveliness and mildness . The rest of the lines are about something else. 

Let’s take a look

3. Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,   

This line is about mildness. How do we know that?

We know that because the winds are “rough,” and “rough” is the opposite of “mild.” In other words, compared to you , May is rough. And you, therefore, are milder. 

And May, of course, represents the summer. 

See how this works?

4. And summer’s lease hath all too short a date; (we’ll come back to this line…)

5. Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,  

This line is also about mildness. How do we know that? 

We know that because the sun (the eye of heaven) is “too hot.” In other words, it’s extreme, it is not mild. And in comparison, you are milder. 

So, we’ve got two lines devoted to mildness so far. 

6. And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;    

This line is about loveliness. How do we know that?

We know that because the face of the sun becomes dim . And dim is low brightness, low energy. In other words, it is not lovely enough. 

And in comparison, you are more lovely, just like Shakespeare stated in his argument in line 2 (see diagram below).

Thus far, we have identified in which lines Shakespeare actually supports his argument the way he stated it in the first two lines. 

But What About the Rest of the Sonnet?

Great question. If Shakespeare is not talking about loveliness or mildness in the rest of the lines of the sonnet, then what IS he talking about?

Let’s take a look. 

We know what’s happening in lines 1-2, 3, and 5-6. 

1. Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?  (Argument)

2. Thou art more lovely and more temperate:  (Two criteria) 

3. Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,   (The summer is rough, unlike you)

4. And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

5. Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,   (The summer is too hot, unlike you)

6. And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;   (The summer is less lovely than you)

Now, what is going on in line 4?

This line has something to do with Time. Do you see that it has nothing to do with beauty or mildness? Nothing whatsoever.

Shakespeare’s complaint against the summer in line 4 is that it is too short. In other words, it lacks longevity . 

And when we read the rest of the sonnet (lines 7-14), we realize that those lines are devoted to time. More precisely, they are about longevity .

7. And every fair from fair sometime declines,  (Any beauty must fade away at some point)

8. By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d; (Because that’s how nature is) 

9. But thy eternal summer shall not fade, (But your youth will NOT fade)

10. Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st; (It will not lose its beauty)

11. Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,  (And Death will not take you)

12. When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:  (When time tries to claim you)

13. So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,  (Because you shall forever)

14. So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.  (Stay alive in this poem)

As it turns out, back in line 4 Shakespeare introduced a new criterion on which to compare you with the summer . And it is not loveliness or mildness. It has nothing to do with these concepts.

The third criterion is about Time. It is longevity . 

Your Takeaways So Far

• Shakespeare initially gives us two criteria on which to compare you with the summer in line 2. 
• The criteria are Loveliness and Mildness. You are more lovely and more mild than the summer.
• However, in line 4, Shakespeare introduces a third criterion – Longevity. You are also more long-lasting, more durable than the summer.
• And the poet devotes lines 4 and 7-14 to supporting this point.
• As a result, you can say that the sonnet is mostly about Longevity because Shakespeare spends most of the time talking about it. 
• We can summarize Shakespeare’s entire argument this way: You are more lovely, more mild, and more long-lasting than the summer. 

How interesting is it that Shakespeare actually uses three criteria, not two! Very interesting.

And if we go back to our Comprehension Pyramid, as we were getting more clarity on the structure, we were also getting more clarity on the meaning.

We have reached the top, and now we can proudly say that we truly understand the meaning of this sonnet. 

Part 3 – How Shakespeare Uses Words to Draw a Contrast

Shakespeare is not only a master of argumentation and rhetoric. As a poet, he is also a master of using words with impact. 

He knows that once he put forth his argument, he has to support it. And in this sonnet, he must continually present a contrast.

This is the contrast between You and the Summer . How does Shakespeare use words to make a sharp and clear contrast?

Let’s take a look. (You may watch the video below for a video lesson)

In line 3, Shakespeare uses the word “rough” to describe the winds of May. And we immediately know that if the summer is “rough,” then You, in contrast, are mild.

Again, we’ll come back to line 4. (Poor line 4 🙂 )

In line 5, the sun is “too hot.” You see, if something is “too” something, that means it’s an excess. Too much of anything is bad. Shakespeare knows this and uses the word to bring the sun down, in implied comparison with you . 

In line 6, the sun is “dimmed.” It’s dull, not beautiful. Compared to it, you are not dim or dull at all. That’s the implication. 

In other words, Shakespeare doesn’t even have to mention You to make a point about You . All he has to do is criticize the summer. And it becomes clear that You are simply better (more beautiful and mild). 

How Shakespeare Uses Juxtaposition  

Let’s look at some of the pairs of opposites Shakespeare uses so masterfully. 

He juxtaposes lines 7-8 with line 9. In lines 7-8, he uses the words “declines” and “changing.” They refer to the summer. 

Decline and change are opposites of longevity and constancy. These words imply death. 

In contrast, in line 9, Shakespeare uses the words “eternal” and “not change.” These refer to You . Do you see how cleverly the poet presents a contrast?

Eternal means forever. Not to change also means to last forever. Shakespeare endows You with longevity, durability, immortality (see diagram below).

Now, it’s time to come back to line 4, where the poet uses the word “lease.” What is a lease? It is a rental contract. You pay to use something, and then you have to give it back. 

Contrast this with “ow’st” which means “own” in line 10. What does it mean to own something? Do you have to give it back? No! It’s yours forever.

See how clever that is?

The Punchline

Lines 13 and 14 (the couplet) are the punchline of the sonnet. Please note that section two (lines 9-14) is entirely devoted to the third criterion (Longevity). 

In the last two lines of the sonnet, Shakespeare explains why You are more long-lasting than the Summer . 

It’s for a very simple reason. Because for as long as men can breathe, for as long as people can come to this poem and read it, you are alive in it. 

Essentially, this poem makes you eternal. It makes you immortal.

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Shakespeare's Sonnets - Sonnet 18

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In a radical departure from the previous sonnets, the young man’s beauty, here more perfect even than a day in summer, is not threatened by Time or Death, since he will live in perfection forever in the poet’s verses.

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Introduction

William Shakespeare was one of the most prominent playwrights and poets of the sixteenth century. He wrote many famous plays and sonnets. “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” is one of his most beautiful pieces of poetry. This sonnet is also referred to as “Sonnet 18.” It was written in the 1590s and was published in his collection of sonnets in 1609. In this collection, there are a total of 154 sonnets. These themes of these sonnets are usually love, beauty, time, and jealousy to mortality and infidelity.

Literary Context

Thomas Wyatt was the first English poet to introduce it to the English audience. Many other poets like Sidney and Henry Howard followed the same pattern and anglicized it by introducing quatrains in it. This sonnet confirms this tradition of the English sonnet form. It is written in the form of quatrains and is composed of fourteen lines. The first thirteen lines are divided into three quatrains, and the last two lines make a couplet. 

Sonnet 18 Summary

First quatrain, second quatrain, third quatrain.

The first line of the third quatrain directly addresses the beloved and tells him that his beauty is eternal. It will never fade. The speaker tells him that you should not be afraid of losing the charm that you have now. Time will never be able to take it from you. Similarly, death will also fail in dispossessing him of his beauty. The shadows of death will never be able to take him under their control. The speaker says that you will keep on growing in the eternal lines he is saying. These lines do not come under the influence of time and will be able to remain in world till the end of time.

Themes in Sonnet 18

Cruelty of nature, inevitability of death, poetry as a source of immortality, sonnet 18 literary analysis.

The poem starts with a rhetorical question that emphasizes the worth of the beloved’s beauty. This question plays the role of informing the reader about the ensuing comparison in the rest of the poem. The speaker talks to his beloved as if his beloved is standing in front of him. This conversational style makes the message of the poem easy to grasp. It also makes it very attractive for the readers.

The next quatrain brings a few more flaws in the summer season. The speaker is weary of the two extremes of sunshine during the summer season. He uses the metaphor “the eye of heaven” to describe the sun. This use of metaphor is intended to further elevate the status of the speaker’s beloved by showing that he is even better than heavenly entities. The speaker says that the sun shines too brightly at times during the summer season.  It makes the pleasant weather a bit too hot to bear.

 In the third quatrain, the speaker tells his beloved that he should not be afraid of these things. He uses the phrase “thy eternal summer” to refer to his beloved’s beauty. This metaphor serves the purpose of maintaining the image of the comparison of the summer season and the speaker’s beloved, which started in the first line. The second line continues the same thought, and the speaker tells his beloved that he should not be afraid of losing his charm. His charm will stay eternally. 

The last two lines of the sonnet make a couplet where the speaker talks of his arsenal in his fight against mortality and death. He says that as long as human life exists on this earth, his lines will be read. He uses the phrase “men can breathe, or eyes can see” to refer to human life on earth. Such an elaborated reference emphasizes that even when a single aspect of human life is here on earth, the speaker’s words will live. He furthers his claim by saying that the immortality of his poetry will give immortality to his beloved.

Rhyme Scheme

Literary devices, rhetorical question, personification, more from william shakespeare.

Poems & Poets

Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

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 hath all too short a date; Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd; But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st; Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:    So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,    So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

• Annotated Full Text
• Literary Period: Renaissance
• Publication Date: 1609
• Flesch-Kincaid Level: 22
• Approx. Reading Time: 0 minutes

This sonnet marks a turn in the sonnet sequence in which Shakespeare transitions from the procreation sonnets to sonnets that claim his verse can create immortality. The speaker of Sonnet 18 begins by questioning whether or not he should follow the Petrarchan trope of comparing the beloved to a summer’s day. He decides that his beloved is much more lovely and temperate than a summer’s day, which has violent winds and a too hot sun. The speaker returns to the idea that summer and youth are ephemeral. However, unlike the procreation sonnets, in which he claims that the youth can avoid death by procreating, this sonnet begins a new argument. In the final lines of this poem, the speaker claims that his words will preserve the youth in eternity; the poem itself will protect the youth from time and aging.

Table of Contents

• Historical Context
• Literary Devices
• Personification
• Quote Analysis

Study Guide

• William Shakespeare Biography

Shakespeare's Sonnets

By william shakespeare, shakespeare's sonnets summary and analysis of sonnet 18 - "shall i compare thee to a summer's day".

What's he saying?

"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? / Thou art more lovely and more temperate:"

What if I were to compare you to a summer day? You are lovelier and more temperate (the perfect temperature):

"Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May / And summer's lease hath all too short a date:"

Summer's beauty is fragile and can be shaken, and summertime fades away all too quickly:

"Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines / And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;"

Sometimes the sun is far too hot, and often it is too cool, dimmed by clouds and shade;

"And every fair from fair sometime declines / By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;"

And everything that is beautiful eventually loses its beauty, whether by chance or by the uncontrollable course of nature;

"But thy eternal summer shall not fade / Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;"

But your eternal beauty (or youth) will not fade, nor will your beauty by lost;

"Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade / When in eternal lines to time thou growest:"

Nor will Death boast that you wander in his shadow, since you shall grow with time through these sonnets:

"So long as men can breathe or eyes can see / So long lives this and this gives life to thee."

For as long as people can breathe and see, this sonnet will live on, and you (and your beauty) with it.

Why is he saying it?

Sonnet 18 is arguably the most famous of the sonnets, its opening line competitive with "Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?" in the long list of Shakespeare's quotable quotations. The gender of the addressee is not explicit, but this is the first sonnet after the so-called "procreation sonnets" (sonnets 1-17), i.e., it apparently marks the place where the poet has abandoned his earlier push to persuade the fair lord to have a child. The first two quatrains focus on the fair lord's beauty: the poet attempts to compare it to a summer's day, but shows that there can be no such comparison, since the fair lord's timeless beauty far surpasses that of the fleeting, inconstant season.

Here the theme of the ravages of time again predominates; we see it especially in line 7, where the poet speaks of the inevitable mortality of beauty: "And every fair from fair sometime declines." But the fair lord's is of another sort, for it "shall not fade" - the poet is eternalizing the fair lord's beauty in his verse, in these "eternal lines." Note the financial imagery ("summer's lease") and the use of anaphora (the repetition of opening words) in lines 6-7, 10-11, and 13-14. Also note that May (line 3) was an early summer month in Shakespeare's time, because England did not adopt the Gregorian calendar until 1752.

The poet describes summer as a season of extremes and disappointments. He begins in lines 3-4, where "rough winds" are an unwelcome extreme and the shortness of summer is its disappointment. He continues in lines 5-6, where he lingers on the imperfections of the summer sun. Here again we find an extreme and a disappointment: the sun is sometimes far too hot, while at other times its "gold complexion" is dimmed by passing clouds. These imperfections contrast sharply with the poet's description of the fair lord, who is "more temperate" (not extreme) and whose "eternal summer shall not fade" (i.e., will not become a disappointment) thanks to what the poet proposes in line 12.

In line 12 we find the poet's solution - how he intends to eternalize the fair lord's beauty despite his refusal to have a child. The poet plans to capture the fair lord's beauty in his verse ("eternal lines"), which he believes will withstand the ravages of time. Thereby the fair lord's "eternal summer shall not fade," and the poet will have gotten his wish. Here we see the poet's use of "summer" as a metaphor for youth, or perhaps beauty, or perhaps the beauty of youth.

But has the poet really abandoned the idea of encouraging the fair lord to have a child? Some scholars suggest that the "eternal lines" in line 12 have a double meaning: the fair lord's beauty can live on not only in the written lines of the poet's verse but also in the family lines of the fair lord's progeny. Such an interpretation would echo the sentiment of the preceding sonnet's closing couplet: "But were some child of yours alive that time / You should live twice; in it and in my rhyme." The use of "growest" also implies an increasing or changing: we can envision the fair lord's family lines growing over time, yet this image is not as readily applicable to the lines of the poet's verse - unless it refers only to his intention to continue writing about the fair lord's beauty, his verse thereby "growing." On the other hand, line 14 seems to counter this interpretation, the singular "this" (as opposed to "these") having as its most likely antecedent the poet's verse, and nothing more.

Shakespeare’s Sonnets Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for Shakespeare’s Sonnets is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

Summary of sonnet 18

Here the theme of the ravages of time again predominates; we see it especially in line 7, where the poet speaks of the inevitable mortality of beauty: "And every fair from fair sometime declines." But the fair lord's is of another sort, for it...

Part A In Sonnet 12 (“When I do count the clock that tells the time”), what do the images of passing time make the speaker wonder about the person he addresses? a. Will that person’s beauty fade? b. Will that person’s fame endure? c. d. Will that person a

a. Will that person’s beauty fade?

What is the message of Sonnet 18?

Shakespeare's main message is that which will fade in life (beauty) can be immortalized in verse.... his poetry will live forever.

Study Guide for Shakespeare’s Sonnets

Shakespeare's Sonnets study guide contains a biography of William Shakespeare, literature essays, a complete e-text, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About Shakespeare's Sonnets
• Shakespeare's Sonnets Summary
• Character List

Essays for Shakespeare’s Sonnets

Shakespeare's Sonnets essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of various sonnets by William Shakespeare.

• Colonial Beauty in Sidney's "Astrophil and Stella" and Shaksespeare's Sonnets
• Beauty, As Expressed By Shakespeare's Sonnet 18
• From Autumn to Ash: Shakespeare's Sonnet 73
• Dark Beauties in Shakespeare's Sonnets and Sidney's "Astrophil and Stella"
• Human Discrepancy: Mortality and Money in Sonnet 146

Lesson Plan for Shakespeare’s Sonnets

• About the Author
• Study Objectives
• Common Core Standards
• Introduction to Shakespeare's Sonnets
• Relationship to Other Books
• Bringing in Technology
• Notes to the Teacher
• Related Links
• Shakespeare's Sonnets Bibliography

E-Text of Shakespeare’s Sonnets

Shakespeare's Sonnets e-text contains the full text of Shakespeare's Sonnets.

Wikipedia Entries for Shakespeare’s Sonnets

• Introduction

Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare Essay

• To find inspiration for your paper and overcome writer’s block
• As a source of information (ensure proper referencing)
• As a template for you assignment

William Shakespeare, the well-known English poet and playwright is famous for his various sonnets, short poems filled with expressive emotions and deep feelings. Overall, Shakespeare has written 154 sonnets which are thought to be created in the period between 1592 and 1598 (Introduction to Shakespeare’s Sonnets par. 2).This paper is focused on one of the most known sonnets of Shakespeare, the sonnet number 18 which is also known as “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?”

The main theme reflected in the sonnet number 18 is love. The author expresses his affection to a person he does not name, yet it is suspected that the mysterious object of the poet’s admiration who is mentioned in most of the other sonnets is a young man named William Herbert, the Earl of Pembroke (Introduction to Shakespeare’s Sonnets par. 4). The very first line of the sonnet is a question, the speaker wonders if he could compare his beloved person to a summer day. Generally, this seems to be an appropriate comparison since summer is known to be a beautiful and pleasant time of a year, enjoyed by everyone. Yet, the author has a different opinion, his view of a summer day is unusual. He mentions number of negative qualities a summer day has.

First of all, the speaker states that the summer weather can be quite unpleasant when “Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May” (3). Secondly, the author notes that summer is rather brief and short-lasting. Thirdly, the poet adds that “Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines” (5) meaning that the heat of summer can be simply unbearable and merciless which is definitely a negative characteristic. Finally, the author underlines the imperfection of summer remarking that it is not always bright, and from time to time summer days are cloudy with their “gold complexion dimmed” (6). The speaker lists all of these negative features of summer in order to answer his initial question and confirm his primary statement where he admits that the object of his romantic interest is “more lovely and more temperate” (2) than a summer day.

In the next several lines of the sonnet, the poet reminds the reader that nothing is eternal, and “every fair from fair sometime declines” (7) meaning that even the most exceptional beauty tends to go away after a certain amount of time since this is how our world is – every object and being here goes through stages of birth, blossom, decline and eventual death, obeying the cyclic nature of life.

Yet, having stated that everything sooner or later loses its beauty, the poet emphasizes that his beloved is an exception, because their “eternal summer shall not fade” (9). The poet believes that the person he admires in this sonnet is never going to lose their fair beauty or even be taken away by death. This statement seems rather bold, because it looks like the poet is convinced that the object of his love is going to live forever, which is impossible. The confusion is solved in the end of the poem where the speaker explains his previous words about the eternal life of his beloved specifying that what is going to live forever is their beauty and the memory about this person as it is now imprinted in this sonnet. The poet says: “So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,/ So long lives this, and this gives life to thee” (13-14) meaning that the poem he dedicated to the object of his love will serve as an eternal source of life for them, preserving their beauty and fairness, and passing the memory about them through generations of people.

The last lines of the sonnet can be rather overwhelming for the contemporary reader who is encountering the poem more than 400 years after it was first published. The words of the author who created the poem specifically to preserve the memory about his beloved person turned out to be a prophesy – the sonnet still lives today, and it is still very famous and is read and discussed by thousands of people who pass the memory of the person depicted in this poem through generations.

It seems that Shakespeare has found the formula of eternal life, he use his sonnets as the carriers of messages, feelings, emotions and thoughts that practically served as bottled messages able to travel through an ocean of time and still be able to deliver their contents. The only difference is that those who throw their bottled messages into the sea can only hope that their letters will be found by someone one day, but Shakespeare seems to be very confident about the long lives of his sonnets.

In conclusion, the 18 th sonnet by William Shakespeare is the author’s monologue where he admires his beloved person and states that even a summer day cannot be a fair comparison for them due to their beauty that, unlike a summer day, will live forever carried by the poem as long as the humanity can read it.

Works Cited

Introduction to Shakespeare’s Sonnets . Shakespeare-online . 2014. Web.

Shakespeare, William. Sonnet XVIII . 2014. Web.

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Sonnet 18 Lyrics

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This is probably the most famous of Shakespeare’s sonnets and possibly the most famous poem in the English language. The argument is simple; the poet compares the Fair Youth to summer, arguing that he is even more beautiful than the most beautiful season.

The sonnet is interesting in that it is the first in the sequence in which the speaker doesn’t urge the young man to have his own children. The language is simple and the imagery accessible, without much of the complex wordplay or poetic devices which Shakespeare often deploys so cleverly.

Scholars speculate that the sonnet was written to a young man, part of the Fair Youth sequence of Shakespeare’s sonnets–numbers 1–126–which, along with the rest of his sonnets, was dedicated to a “Mr. W.H.” Popular candidates for the identity of W.H. include Henry Wriothesley, 3rd Earl of Southampton, and William Herbert, 3rd Earl of Pembroke, both of whom were patrons of Shakespeare.

Note that in the third quatrain, starting with “But thy eternal…”, the tone of the poem changes – from the weaknesses of summer to the greatness of the subject of the poem. This is a “ volta ”.

About Sonnets A sonnet is a poem which expresses a thought or idea and develops it, often cleverly and wittily.

The sonnet genre is often, although not always, about ideals or hypothetical situations. It reaches back to the Medieval Romances, where a woman is loved and idealised by a worshipping admirer. For example, Sir Philip Sydney in the Astrophil and Stella sonnet sequence wrote in this mode. Poems were circulated within groups of educated intellectuals and they did not necessarily reflect the poet’s true emotions, but were a form of intellectual showing-off. This may not have been true of all; it is a matter of academic debate today. It is generally believed, however, that Shakespeare’s sonnets were autobiographical, although some dispute this. BBC Podcast, Melvyn Bragg, “In Our Time” Shakespeare’s Sonnets

Sonnets are made up of fourteen lines, each being ten syllables long. Its rhymes are arranged according to one of the following schemes:

• Italian, where eight lines consisting of two quatrains make up the first section of the sonnet, called an octave. This section will explore a problem or an idea. It is followed by the next section of six lines called a sestet, that forms the ‘answer’ or a counter-view. This style of sonnet is also sometimes called a Petrarchan sonnet.

• English, which comprises three quatrains, making twelve lines in total, followed by a rhyming couplet. They too explore an idea. The ‘answer’ or resolution comes in the final couplet. Shakespeare’s sonnets follow this pattern. Edmund Spenser’s sonnets are a variant.

At the break in the sonnet — in Italian after the first eight lines, in English after twelve lines — there is a ‘turn’ or volta , after which there will be a change or new perspective on the preceding idea.

Language The metre is iambic pentameter , that is five pairs of stressed and unstressed syllables to the line. The effect is elegant and rhythmic, and conveys an impression of dignity and seriousness. Shakespeare’s sonnets follow this pattern.

Rhyme Scheme The rhyming pattern comprises three sets of four lines, forming quatrains , followed by a closed rhyming couplet .

In sonnet 18 it forms ABAB, CDCD, EFEF, GG. This is typical of Shakespeare’s compositions. For contemporary readers today not all the rhymes are perfect because of changed pronunciation, but in Shakespeare’s time they would probably have rhymed perfectly.

See Don Paterson – Reading Shakespeare’s Sonnets, Faber & Faber, 2012 Helen Vendler The Art of Shakespeare’s Sonnets Harvard University Press Shakespeare’s Sonnets with Three Hundred Years of Commentary, Associated University Press 2007 BBC Podcast, Melvyn Bragg, “In Our Time” Shakespeare’s Sonnets

Find answers to frequently asked questions about the song and explore its deeper meaning

• 1. Sonnet 1
• 2. Sonnet 2
• 3. Sonnet 3
• 4. Sonnet 4
• 5. Sonnet 5
• 6. Sonnet 6
• 7. Sonnet 7
• 8. Sonnet 8
• 9. Sonnet 9
• 10. Sonnet 10
• 11. Sonnet 11
• 12. Sonnet 12
• 13. Sonnet 13
• 14. Sonnet 14
• 15. Sonnet 15
• 16. Sonnet 16
• 17. Sonnet 17
• 18. Sonnet 18
• 19. Sonnet 19
• 20. Sonnet 20
• 21. Sonnet 21
• 22. Sonnet 22
• 23. Sonnet 23
• 24. Sonnet 24
• 25. Sonnet 25
• 26. Sonnet 26
• 27. Sonnet 27
• 28. Sonnet 28
• 29. Sonnet 29
• 30. Sonnet 30
• 31. Sonnet 31
• 32. Sonnet 32
• 33. Sonnet 33
• 34. Sonnet 34
• 35. Sonnet 35
• 36. Sonnet 36
• 37. Sonnet 37
• 38. Sonnet 38
• 39. Sonnet 39
• 40. Sonnet 40
• 41. Sonnet 41
• 42. Sonnet 42
• 43. Sonnet 43
• 44. Sonnet 44
• 45. Sonnet 45
• 46. Sonnet 46
• 47. Sonnet 47
• 48. Sonnet 48
• 49. Sonnet 49
• 50. Sonnet 50
• 51. Sonnet 51
• 52. Sonnet 52
• 53. Sonnet 53
• 54. Sonnet 54
• 55. Sonnet 55
• 56. Sonnet 56
• 57. Sonnet 57
• 58. Sonnet 58
• 59. Sonnet 59
• 60. Sonnet 60
• 61. Sonnet 61
• 62. Sonnet 62
• 63. Sonnet 63
• 64. Sonnet 64
• 65. Sonnet 65
• 66. Sonnet 66
• 67. Sonnet 67
• 68. Sonnet 68
• 69. Sonnet 69
• 70. Sonnet 70
• 71. Sonnet 71
• 72. Sonnet 72
• 73. Sonnet 73
• 74. Sonnet 74
• 75. Sonnet 75
• 76. Sonnet 76
• 77. Sonnet 77
• 78. Sonnet 78
• 79. Sonnet 79
• 80. Sonnet 80
• 81. Sonnet 81
• 82. Sonnet 82
• 83. Sonnet 83
• 84. Sonnet 84
• 85. Sonnet 85
• 86. Sonnet 86
• 87. Sonnet 87
• 88. Sonnet 88
• 89. Sonnet 89
• 90. Sonnet 90
• 91. Sonnet 91
• 92. Sonnet 92
• 93. Sonnet 93
• 94. Sonnet 94
• 95. Sonnet 95
• 96. Sonnet 96
• 97. Sonnet 97
• 98. Sonnet 98
• 99. Sonnet 99
• 100. Sonnet 100
• 101. Sonnet 101
• 102. Sonnet 102
• 103. Sonnet 103
• 104. Sonnet 104
• 105. Sonnet 105
• 106. Sonnet 106
• 107. Sonnet 107
• 108. Sonnet 108
• 109. Sonnet 109
• 110. Sonnet 110
• 111. Sonnet 111
• 112. Sonnet 112
• 113. Sonnet 113
• 114. Sonnet 114
• 115. Sonnet 115
• 116. Sonnet 116
• 117. Sonnet 117
• 118. Sonnet 118
• 119. Sonnet 119
• 120. Sonnet 120
• 121. Sonnet 121
• 122. Sonnet 122
• 123. Sonnet 123
• 124. Sonnet 124
• 125. Sonnet 125
• 126. Sonnet 126
• 127. Sonnet 127
• 128. Sonnet 128
• 129. Sonnet 129
• 130. Sonnet 130
• 131. Sonnet 131
• 132. Sonnet 132
• 133. Sonnet 133
• 134. Sonnet 134
• 135. Sonnet 135
• 136. Sonnet 136
• 137. Sonnet 137
• 138. Sonnet 138
• 139. Sonnet 139
• 140. Sonnet 140
• 141. Sonnet 141
• 142. Sonnet 142
• 143. Sonnet 143
• 144. Sonnet 144
• 145. Sonnet 145
• 146. Sonnet 146
• 147. Sonnet 147
• 148. Sonnet 148
• 149. Sonnet 149
• 150. Sonnet 150
• 151. Sonnet 151
• 152. Sonnet 152
• 153. Sonnet 153
• 154. Sonnet 154
• Sonnets: Dedication

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Sonnet 18: Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day

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 hath all too short a date. Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd; But thy eternal summer shall not fade Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st; Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st: So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Superb couplet, absolutely superb. This poem is divine and oh so romantic.

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Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

By William Shakespeare

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 hath all too short a date; Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm’d; And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d; But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st; Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:    So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,    So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

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The Themes of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18, beginning ‘Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?’ is one of the best-known and most widely studied poems in all of Renaissance literature. The poem is often viewed as a love lyric, but can alternatively be interpreted as a poem about the power of poetry to immortalise the human subject of the poem. But in fact, the poem takes in a variety of themes which deserve the critic’s and student’s close attention.

Let’s take a closer look at some of the most prominent themes of the ‘summer’s day’ sonnet, Sonnet 18 .

Although it’s often viewed as a love poem, Sonnet 18 is more than a traditional romantic poem. Shakespeare praises the Fair Youth’s beauty as ‘more lovely’ than the beauty of a summer’s day, before going on to list all the ways in which the young man’s beauty outdoes the vagaries of summer weather (not to mention the fact that summer is over all too soon).

The word ‘fair’ is used several times in the poem. Although the ‘Fair’ in ‘Fair Youth’ – the appellation often given to the addressee of Sonnet 18 – principally refers to his blond hair and pale skin, ‘fair’ also denotes beauty, and it carries this meaning in this sonnet.

So when Shakespeare writes that ‘every fair from fair sometime declines’, he means that, in summer, every beautiful thing falls short of its true beauty from time to time. The first ‘fair’ (in ‘every fair’) is a noun, where ‘fair’ means ‘fair thing’ or ‘beautiful thing’. The second ‘fair’ is an adjective, so the line could be paraphrased as, ‘Every beautiful thing occasionally falls short of being beautiful’ or ‘Every fair thing occasionally falls short of being fair’.

By extension, every beautiful person has ‘off days’ when they do not look their best. Not so the Fair Youth, who always looks ‘fair’.

The precise addressee of the majority of the Sonnets, including Sonnet 18, is unknown, although there are several leading candidates . All of them are young men, and youth versus ageing is an important theme addressed in this sonnet. When Shakespeare turns back to considering the Fair Youth’s beauty, having discussed the flaws that might attend a typical summer’s day, he tells the young man: ‘But thine eternal summer shall not fade’.

In other words, the Fair Youth is currently in his ‘summer’: that is, his prime . He has matured into early adulthood and is not in the first full flush of his maturity. But whereas other people are destined to grow older and lose their looks, the young man, Shakespeare asserts, will not suffer this fate. He will remain forever young and beautiful.

How? Well, we’ll come to that in due course …

As well as touching briefly upon ageing and the decline of one’s looks, Sonnet 18 also addresses the topic of death. The image of someone walking in the ‘shade’ or shadow of Death – suggesting someone in old age nearing their end – is a powerful one, but Shakespeare is confident that this fate will not befall the Fair Youth. (Stephen Booth, in his Shakespeare’s Sonnets , makes a good case for ‘shade’ here referring to a place, such as the underworld: indeed, Hades, the underworld in classical mythology, was often referred to as ‘the shades’.)

And this is all because, for Shakespeare, the young man will be immortal . How?

Immortality.

Immortality is a key theme in Sonnet 18, but it’s worth putting this into context. By ‘immortality’ we don’t mean that Shakespeare believes the Fair Youth will literally mean a young man forever, like some sort of Dorian Gray figure. He will be immortalised some other way.

Short of finding a way to become Dorian Gray, there are two ways in which people can become ‘immortal’ in the extended sense of the word. The first is by having children and continuing their line. They will then ‘live on’ through their children, and their children’s children, and so on. This is relevant here, because it’s the subject of the first seventeen Sonnets as they were printed in 1609.

But then, in Sonnet 18, Shakespeare drops this argument. Rather than becoming immortal through siring an heir, the Fair Youth can be immortalised in another way. And Shakespeare is the one to take care of that, through … his writing.

There’s a common trope in Elizabethan sonnet-writing: the poet will make his beloved immortal by writing about them . By writing about the Fair Youth’s beauty, Shakespeare will preserve that beauty forever, in the form of a poem. Much the same could be said about a portraitist or miniaturist painting a portrait of someone, so that their youthful beauty would be captured on the canvas forever.

This is an act of colossal arrogance, of course: the poet is swaggeringly boasting that his words will live on forever. But here we are, more than four centuries after Shakespeare wrote those words, and we’re still reading and discussing them, so perhaps he was right.

There appears to be a clever bit of wordplay on ‘lines’ in the phrase ‘eternal lines’ (‘When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st’). Booth points out that the image conveys the idea of cords or ropes, by which someone might be bound: so the Fair Youth would be bound, or tied, to time – that is, under time’s control. There’s also the idea of ‘lines of life’: the threads spun by the Fates in classical mythology.

But when we get to the poem’s concluding couplet, we can retrospectively realise that ‘lines’ here also refers to lines of verse : that is, the poem we’re reading, Sonnet 18. In other words, ‘Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade, / When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st’ means ‘nor will death be able to brag he has you in his abode – no, not when you continue to “grow” and live in these eternal lines of poetry I’ve written for you’.

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