Towards the end of Shakespeares sonnets, his preoccupation seems to be less with the fair, young blonde and is steered in another direction, towards that of a more mysterious dark lady. Where sonnets in the fair youth section seem to be more straightforward, focussing on beauty and its preservation against time. The dark lady section however is far more thoughtful and takes a totally different angle on love, in some poems dubbing it a maddening disease.
In Sonnet 130, Shakespeare, instead of exaggerating his beloveds physical features by comparing them to the sun, coral, snow, roses, perfumes, goddesses, declares that he can proclaim his love for her despite the fact that she is not a model of beauty with inhumanly perfect features.
In the first quatrain, instead of exaggerating the beauty of his ladys eyes by claiming that they outshine the sun, this down-to-earth speaker asserts that those eyes are nothing like the sun. He fails to describe the eyes at all, but as he continues through other body parts, he becomes more expressive.
Her lips are not as red as coral, though they are red, just not as red as coral. Her breasts are not as white as snow; they are actually a dun shade of brown, as all humans beings are various shades of brown. And her hair instead of silky strands look more like black wires sticking out of her head. It must be noted here that Shakespeare's reference to hair as 'wires' confuses modern readers because we assume it to mean our current definition of wire, i.e., a thread of metal, which is hardly a fitting word in the context of the poem. However, the in Old English Dictionary, wire would refer to the finely-spun gold threads woven into fancy hair nets. Many poets of the time used this term as a benchmark of beauty.
In the second quatrain, the speaker lets us know that he has experience the beauty of a variegated rose, but he does not see those roses on the cheeks of his beloved. And he admits that some perfumes are actually more pleasing to his nose than the breath that exhales from her.
Again, it must be noted here, that in the Old English Dictionary, the word reek has changed somewhat from Shakespeares time. It meant exhale or exudes in the 16th and 17th century, but now it more commonly associated with a stench or an awful smelly odor.
In the third quatrain, the speaker does something that has been conspicuously lacking in the first and second - he says something positive. (I love to hear her speak . . .) So far the beloved by comparison to the sun, coral, snow, roses, and perfume has come up lacking, or so it seemed. All of these natural phenomena seemed to outshine her, but now he has said something positive about her and it happens to be her voice that he loves.
However, he does admit that even though he loves her voice, he knows it is not as pleasing as music. And although he has never seen a goddess walk, he knows that his beloved just treads on the ground. But, as far as the speaker knows, maybe a goddess would just tread on the ground.
In the couplet, the speaker swears that he loves his mistress just as much as those poets who exaggerate their beloveds features. He loves her simply because she is rare, or a unique individual.
If he claimed her eyes were like the sun, one who looked would see that they are not, and her reality would belie, that is, make false, that comparison. The speaker wishes to proclaim his love but in truthful, human terms; he no doubt believes that that is also rare. Perhaps the message of this poem is that no matter the superficial nature on the outside of a person, it will not in the end affect how much one can love someone.
Sonnet 130 is clearly a parody of the conventional love sonnet, popular around the time of Shakespeare, one that would shower praise upon a lover and compare them to supernatural forces such as the sun. In Sonnet 130, there is no use of grandiose metaphor or allusion; he does not compare his love to Venus etc. The ordinary beauty and humanity of his lover are important to Shakespeare in this sonnet, and he deliberately uses typical love poetry metaphors against themselves. In other Shakespeare poems, most famously in Sonnet 18, the features of the poet's lover are better even than a summers day. In Sonnet 130, the references to such objects of perfection are indeed present, but they are there to illustrate that his lover is not as beautiful -- a total rejection of his other sonnets content.
However, Shakespeare ends the sonnet by proclaiming his love for his mistress despite her lack of adornment, so he does finally embrace the fundamental theme in nearly all sonnets: total and consuming love.
This theme is continued in sonnet 127 which is the first of the dark lady sonnets. Sonnet 127, which begins the sequence dealing with the poets relationship to his mistress, the Dark Lady, defends the poets unfashionable taste in brunettes. In Elizabethan days, so the poet tells us, black was not considered beautiful: In the old age black was not counted fair, / Or, if it were, it bore not beautys name. However, what is considered beautiful, at least to the poet, has changed; now is black beautys successive heir. This change in what is considered beautiful is the poets main concern here in Sonnet 127 and in succeeding sonnets.
What most upsets the poet is not that one definition of beauty supersedes another but that women use cosmetics to enhance their natural appearance. This unnatural practice creates artificiality, Fairing the foul with arts false borrowed face. Even worse, cosmetics devalue the ideal of what beauty is, for they allow women to change their appearances on a whim according to what is currently deemed beautiful. Constancy in what is beautiful is sacrificed again for superficial notions of how a woman should look: Sweet beauty hath no name, no holy bower, / But is profaned, if not lives in disgrace.
In conclusion Shakespeare idolises lovers in such a way in that he can see a womans inner worth and does not enjoy the way that women change their appearance with the use of cosmetics and suchlike. Mercurial looks do not interest Shakespeare at this time in his life it seems, he can still find the real beauty in a woman as he says in the last couplet of sonnet 130: And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare / As any she belied with false compare.
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