The Sonnets (eBook)

The Sonnets by William Shakespeare is the title of a collection of 154 sonnets by William Shakespeare, which covers themes such as the passage of time, love, beauty, and mortality. The first 126 sonnets are addressed to a young man; the last 28 to a woman. The quarto ends with “A Lover's Complaint”, a narrative poem of 47 seven-line stanzas written in rhyme royal—though some scholars have argued convincingly against Shakespeare’s authorship of the poem. The sonnets to the young man express overwhelming, obsessional love. The main issue of debate has always been whether it remained platonic or became physical. The first 17 poems, traditionally called the procreation sonnets, are addressed to the young man urging him to marry and have children to immortalize his beauty by passing it to the next generation. Other sonnets express the speaker's love for the young man; brood upon loneliness, death, and the transience of life; seem to criticize the young man for preferring a rival poet; express ambiguous feelings for the speaker's mistress; and a pun on the poet's name. The final two sonnets are allegorical treatments of Greek epigrams referring to the “little love god” Cupid.

• Classics