Seminararbeit / Hausarbeit Analysis - William Shakespeare `Sonnet 138” 1.607 Wörter / ~8 Seiten Autor Gernot S. im Jul. 2014

Proseminar Paper

William Shakespeare “Sonnet 138”

Table of Contents

Introduction page 3

Lyric speech situation page 4

Theme page 4

General structure page 4

Metre and rhythm page 5

Rhymes and other sound patterns page 5

Rhetorical figures on the morphological and on the syntactic level page 6

Semantic structure page 7

Argumentative structure page 7

Conclusion page 8

Works cited page 8

Introduction

Up to the present day we are not sure if the poet, playwright and actor William Shakespeare really existed. Who was this mysterious person? What was his actual birth date and when did he die? We think that William Shakespeare was baptized in 1564 and died in 1616. But is it really possible for a person who had such a great influence on English literature, in fact the entire English language, to die? In any case Shakespeare’s works survived to this day.

Shakespeare’s sonnets were some of his most successful works. The first sonnets are addressed to a young man and some later sonnets are addressed to a mysterious “dark lady”.

In the following pages I will analyse and discuss Shakespeare’s sonnet 138 structured in 14 lines:

“Sonnet 138”

1. When my love swears that she is made of truth

2. I do believe her, though I know she lies,
3. That she might think me some untutor'd youth,
4. Unlearned in the world's false subtleties.
5. Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young,
6. Although she knows my days are past the best,
7. Simply I credit her false speaking tongue:
8. On both sides thus is simple truth suppress'd.
9. But wherefore says she not she is unjust?
10. And wherefore say not I that I am old?
11. O, love's best habit is in seeming trust,
12. And age in love loves not to have years told:

13. Therefore I lie with her and she with me,
14. And in our faults by lies we flatter'd be.

William Shakespeare

Lyric Speech Situation

The speaker of the poem, the ‘lyric I’, is the man of the relationship described in the poem. His lover is referred to as ‘she’. In other words there is an explicit ‘lyric I’ and an implicit ‘lyric thou’. The explicit ‘lyric I’ can be identified by different signal words and phrases as well as the implicit ‘lyric thou’. Phrases like ‘When my love swears…’, ‘Simply I credit…’ or ‘… thinks me young‘ are definite evidences for the explicit ‘lyric I’. Phrases like ‘…she is made of truth’, ‘That she might think…’ or ‘… her false speaking tongue’ underline the fact that there is no one who is addressed in the poem. The person who speaks reflects about the relationship which is obviously a love relationship. He analyses and points out his point of view. But there are also questions in the sonnet like in line 9 ‘But wherefore says she not she is unjust?’, which remain unanswered. The speaker asks this questions himself and has no specific addressee. Furthermore there aren’t any decisive signal words or phrases which suggest a specific time or a specific place.

Theme

The main theme of the sonnet is love. The relationship between a man and a woman is presented to the reader as based on lies but also love. The author knows that his lover is lying to him, but he chooses to pretend, to himself and to her, that he believes her in order to preserve their love.

Main Structure of the poem

This sonnet is a classic ‘English- Sonnet’ also known as a ‘Shakespearean- Sonnet’. A so called ‘Shakespearean - Sonnet’ consists of fourteen lines, characterised by four lines stanzas, called ‘quatrains’, which consist of three line iambic pentameter, followed by a final heroic couplet.

Metre and Rhythm

As mentioned previously, a ‘Shakespearean- Sonnet’ is marked by iambic pentameters and consists of fourteen lines. These fourteen lines consist of ten syllables. A stressed syllable followed by an unstressed final syllable. But in this poem there are some exhibitions, or deviations from the general syllable structure. For instance in the first two lines there is always one word, mostly in the middle of the sentence, which points out of the lines. Words like ‘swears’ or ‘love’ have a special meaning for the poem. That’s the reason why they are stressed, in that case double stressed. In other lines the poet highlights words like ‘me’ or ‘she’ to point out that there is a relationship between the ‘lyric I’ and the ‘lyric thou’. What’s very interesting is that in some cases there are no deviations. The last two lines are perfect lines. It is a conclusion and a obviously intentional coordination of stressed and unstressed syllables, in other words: regular patterns. That means that this is the final statement, a final message for the speaker himself. It is his final conclusion. He isn’t angry or sad about his situation. He doesn’t want to change a thing. He just accepts the conditions of the relationship. He just ‘lies’ with her and she ‘lies’ with him.

Rhymes and other sound patterns

Another art of writing sonnets and poems is creating a special sound, creating rhymes. It depends on the message and the meaning of the poem what kind of rhyme the author uses. In this sonnet he only uses end rhymes, in which the rhyme is between stressed final vowels in lines of verse, and perfect rhymes. Perfect rhymes are rhymes with exact consonance of phonemes in the rhyming syllables. The general rhyme scheme of sonnet 138 is ‘ABAB CDCD EFEF GG’- three line iambic pentameter, followed by a final heroic couplet. Another great idea of this sonnet is the selection of the rhyming words. Some rhymes like ‘Truth’ – ‘Youth’ or ‘past the best’ – ‘truth suppress’d’ have a special meaning. Her youth is the only real truth beside his age in the sonnet. And because of his age he has to suppress the truth of being old, because his passed days were his best. They never come back.

Rhetorical figures on the morphological and on the syntactic level

The main function of syntactic figures is to establish relations of correspondence and opposition. Rhetorical figures on the syntactic level are hard to find in this sonnet. One syntactic figure is ‘Parallelism’. Parallelism is defined as succession of clauses or sentences of the same structure. An example for this syntactic figure can be found in line nine and ten. In both lines there is a repetition of some words and there is the same word structure. Furthermore the ends of both sentences end with a question mark. The person asks this question himself. He doesn’t ask anybody or a specific person.

Rhetorical figures on the morphological level can be classified in two groups: On the one hand exact word repetitions and on the other hand repetition involving variation of repeated elements. Exact word repetitions such as ‘Anaphora’ can be found again in line nine and ten. Anaphora is a repetition of a word or group of words at the beginning of successive clauses or lines of verse. It is the word ‘wherefore’ that repeats in both sentences. An example for repetition involving variation of repeated elements is ‘Polyptoton’. Polyptoton is a repetition of a word in different inflected forms. Line five, ‘Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young’ gives a clear example for this kind of morphological figure.

Semantic Structure

Similes, metaphors, metonymies and many more. These figures of similarity and figures of contiguity are figures of the semantic structure of a poem. This is the imagery, the beating heart of poetry. It vitalises the poem and animates us to imagine and to dream.

Line one, ‘When my love swears that she is made of truth’ is a classic example for a metaphor. Her love is made of truth. It is impossible that a person is made of a meaning. The author means that this person tries to make the speaker believe that she doesn’t lie. But he knows that she lies. He knows that she is young and attractive. He knows that she associates with other men, he knows that her beauty is seen by other men too. An example for personification can be found in line seven. ‘Simply I credit her false speaking tongue’. The tongue is presented as if it was alive, as if the tongue was able to speak false. One of the most expressive examples is in line thirteen: ‘Therefore I lie with her and she with me’. The word lie has two different meanings but fits perfectly in both versions into the sentence. This is called ‘Pun’ or ‘Paronomasia’. It is a play on words using two identical or similar sounding words with different or perhaps contradictory meanings. The last line expresses that all the lies and faults are not as important as their actual love relationship. In the world they create everyone is perfect, unique and everything is correct. He ignores her faults he only sees what he wants to see to keep this relationship alive. It kind of seems like that in the end they start believing all these lies, maybe they think that they don’t live in a lie.

Argumentative Structure

From line one to line seven the speaker describes the situation, the relationship. Line eight turns the poem into another direction for the first time. The speaker starts to ask himself different questions about the relationship. Finally in lines 13 and 14 he gives a final conclusive statement about what he really thinks about the relationship. It is a perfect ending for this poem. Conclusive and expressive.

Conclusion

As a conclusion, this poem is a poem about love and devotion in a doomed relationship. The speaker, the lyric I, is perfectly aware of the flaws in his relationship to the impicit lyric thou. Yet, he identifies the vital component in the agreement: They do not talk about the unfaithfulness of the lady, and they do not mention his age. Thus, their relationship can continue.

Works cited

Nünning, Vera und Ansgar (2009). An Introduction to the Study of English and American Literature. Stuttgart: Klett Lerntraining GmbH.