Understanding Shakespeare: The Sonnets by Robert A. Albano - HTML preview

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CHAPTER 3

SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS ON THE DARK LADY

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN

THE SONNETS ON THE DARK LADY AND THE SONNETS ON THE YOUNG MAN

In "Sonnet 127" Shakespeare shifts topics. He moves away from the Young Man as the subject of his poems and to the Dark Lady. Although the change in subject may seem abrupt to the reader, at least four characteristics unite the two parts of the sequence.

(1) In terms of theme, both the Young Man sonnets and the Dark Lady sonnets break away from the conventions or standards of typical sonnet cycles. We can call this, then, the theme on sonnet conventions. The Young Man sonnets break two conventions: (a) the speaker adores a male instead of a female, and (b) a male is an object of great or surpassing beauty. The Dark Lady sonnets also break two conventions: (a) the lady is dark, not fair (meaning she does not have light skin and blond hair); and (b) the lady is promiscuous or sexual, rather than virtuous.