SONNET 116

SONNET 116

1. Structure

   • Pattern: Shakespearean sonnets are characterised by 14 lines, divided into 3 quatrains and 1 couplet. In the first three quatrains, the poet establishes a theme or problem and then resolves it in the couplet.
   • Rhythm: This piece, along with many others, follows the scheme of abab, cdcd, efef, gg and includes 10 syllables per line, phrased in accordance with iambic pentameter.
   • Outline: A sonnet is a poesy with fourteen lines that uses any of several formal rhyme schemes and typically has ten syllables in each line. Although William Shakespeare was not the first to write a sonnet, his creations of 154 such works have an aura of mystique surrounding them.
   • Shakespearean sonnets are distinguished from Petrarchan sonnets on the basis of their structure, that is, the way the 14 lines of the piece are grouped. The Petrarchan sonnet divides its lines between an octave (eight lines) and a sestet (six lines).

2. Themes

   • Shakespearean sonnets often explore themes of love, lust, beauty, change, ageing and many more. This sonnet, in particular, descriptive of love and affection, present between two souls. It is the ideal glorification of a perfect and enduring love.

3. Division & Interpretation

   • Quatrain One: The speaker declares in the first quatrain that love—"the union of true minds"—is flawless and unchanging; it does not "admit impediments," and it does not alter when the loved one changes.
   • Quatrain Two: the speaker tells what love is through a metaphor: a guiding star to lost ships (“wand’ring barks”) that is not susceptible to storms (it “looks on tempests and is never shaken”).
   • Quatrain Three: In the third quatrain, the speaker again describes what love is not: it is not vunerable to time. Though beauty fades in time as rosy lips and cheeks come within “his bending sickle’s compass,” love does not change with hours and weeks: instead, it “bears it out ev’n to the edge of doom.”
   • Couplet: In the couplet, the speaker attests to his certainty that love is as he says: if his statements can be proved to be error, he declares, he must never have written a word, and no man can ever have been in love.

4. References

   • Ever-fixed mark: signifies permanence and stability. A sea mark, a prominent navigational feature, a beacon, for guidance of shipping. In the days before lighthouses, mariners used well known and prominent features on the land as a guide to fix their position at sea.
   • wandering bark: ship or boat that is wandering and possibly lost. It can identify its position by reference to the Pole star.
   • Tempests: because of their height, the sea-marks would appear to be looking down on the world below, and almost riding above the tempests. Because of their solidity storms had no effect on them.
   • His references are a nod to the up and coming English Navy that were beginning to garner strength and flourish during the 17th century under the British Crown.