Exploring the Theme of Love in Sonnets 57 and 58

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Shakespeare’s sonnets are numbered in a sequential order and adjacent sonnets often have similar content. Throughout Shakespeare’s sonnets, he covers many subjects, such as interest in the life of a young man, his love for a young man, and his love for a dark haired woman. In sonnets 57 and 58, Shakespeare discusses how love is like slavery in its different manifestations. The object of the narrator’s love has a dominating power over the narrator, which controls him and guides his actions. Shakespeare shows in sonnets 57 and 58 that love can be displayed by using many different routes such as viewing love as a controlling force, exploring the theme of time and waiting in regards to love, and the question of the physical state of being of love.

Throughout both sonnets there is a sense that the narrator has resigned himself to the slavery of love. In sonnet 57, the narrator asserts in the first two lines that all he (we will assume the narrator is a "he") can do is wait until the lover needs something. This blind devotion to the lover seems to come without any reservations on behalf of the narrator and seems to be a natural inclination to give of one’s self whole-heartedly and unconditionally ("unconditional love"). In sonnet 58, line 13, "though waiting so be hell" shows the pain that the narrator is going through while he is waiting on the lover. In sonnet 58, line five, "let me suffer, being at your beck" again constitutes this devotion of the narrator to the recipient of the love without any reservations. The narrator is willingly accepting suffering, hell, and sadness, as seen in the phrase "sad slave" (sonnet 57, line 11), in order to be a slave to love. This devotion to loving servitude is admirable and the bond formed...

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... that love thinks no ill.

Shakespeare uses many different methods of discourse to examine this theme of love. In both sonnets the lover is exerting his control over the narrator, but the narrator does not really mind being controlled in either sonnet. Both sonnets include many elements and references to time and waiting and all of these references relate to love by showing love’s long lifespan and varying strengths over time. The only major difference between the two sonnets lies in their addressing love. Sonnet 57 talks directly to it in a personifying manner, whereas sonnet 58 merely refers to it through other means. Through this variety of explorations of the theme of love, Shakespeare shows that love has many faces and ways of expressing itself.

Works Cited

McCurry, Justin. Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder: Shakespeare’s Sonnets 57 and 58.

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