Introduction: Sonnet 147 by W. Shakespeare is a poem that is often analyzed for its distinctive style, making it a popular choice for a sonnet 147 analysis essay. The poem follows a specific pattern of metrical structure and verse composition, using extended metaphors throughout. Background: The tone of the poem shifts from sadness and anguish to anger and annoyance, while the content remains consistent. Written in iambic pentameter, the predominant meter in this poem is ta-DUM ta-DUM ta-DUM ta-DUM ta-DUM, with an ABABCDCDEFEFGG rhyme scheme. Understanding these elements of the poem is essential to a thorough analysis of Sonnet 147. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Thesis Statement: In Shakespeare's Sonnet 147, the speaker addresses his beloved using a metaphor, stating that her love is like a disease. However, he desires what keeps him sick or in love. The fact that he compares his love to an illness suggests that he knows that his love is a bad idea, but is defenseless against the subject's love. The "disease" of love can also explain his anguished and crazy state of mind. In the first two quatrains reason and love are personified as two opposing forces, love in the form of illness and reason in the form of the speaker's doctor. However, while love is the negative force and reason is the positive force, the negative force of love seems to overwhelm the positive force of reason. At the end of the poem, the speaker is able to admit that the object of his affection is not good for him, although it is unclear whether or not this admission means he will leave her. Thematic Sentence: In the first quatrain, the speaker presents his love as an illness that feeds on his desires. The beloved is the one who nourishes him. Even still, love is consuming him, "...longing still / For what nourishes the disease longest" (1-2) Commentary: By using the metaphor of disease, the speaker shows that he knows that loving the listener is a bad thing, since diseases are harmful to the health of those who suffer from them. This also indicates that he suffers from the love he feels for his beloved, rather than enjoying it. However, instead of ending it, it feeds him, allowing him to completely take over his thoughts and actions. He seems to be in a cycle where he loves the listener, knows it's wrong, but can't separate himself from the relationship, nurturing it and making it stronger. The fact that Shakespeare uses “fever” in line 1 to describe illness is appropriate, as fever causes one to act madly, madly, and anguished. He expands the disease metaphor by stating that it "feeds" on what preserves his love, "The uncertain and sickly appetite to please." (4) This line breaks away from iambic pentameter, as the word "feed" is trochaic. This underlines the fact that love must be constantly nurtured. During illness, your appetite changes rapidly as you try to find something to satisfy you. The speaker, in this case, has found that his beloved satisfies his “stupid appetite,” no matter how “uncertain.” The phrase could also refer to lust and carnal desire. Theme Sentence: The speaker further expands the metaphor in the second quatrain by comparing his Reason to his doctor. Reason is the opposing force in the speaker. Just as love is shown in a negative light, Reason is the positive force. However, reason was given the impossible task of curing those who spoke of his love. Reason gives instructions to the speaker on how to overcome his love, but soon becomes "angry because his prescriptions are not observed" (6) and abandons the speaker to his miserable love. Comment: theThe speaker's judgmental and logical side cannot win against the passionate and romantic side, even if it is the positive force. The speaker goes on to say that "Desire is death, which the physicist was no exception to." (8) The speaker could mean a variety of things by this statement. The first is that desire as experienced will lead to death, while Reason would prevent it. This continues with the metaphor, as desire is a disease and doctors prescribe medicine to counteract it. Evidence and Citations: However, in the previous lines, the speaker says that "Angry that his prescriptions are not being followed, / [he] left me, and now in desperation I approve / I desire death, which the doctor took exception to" . (6-8) Whoever speaks now is desperate, without Reason. And in his desperation, he may demonstrate that he wants to die, but Reason, his doctor, will not allow it. Furthermore, if you look at it from a sexual point of view, you could argue that the speaker is talking about a venereal disease, since too much desire could lead to a potentially fatal disease without medication. In the third quatrain, the speaker is severely disturbed, even acknowledging that he is "beyond caring." (9) His thoughts and words are like those of a sick person with a fever, who has been declared incurable by the doctor. This line is also irregular as the first foot is trochaic. Comment: The speaker emphasizes the fact that there is no cure for this love. No medicine or person can change his fate. It's a terminal affliction. However, he goes on to say that he doesn't care that this love will be the end of him. Love has slowly eaten away at his sanity and driven out his reason, so not even his logical side can worry that this beloved will be the death of him. The next two lines are frenetic and feverish, in keeping with the theme of fever introduced at the beginning of the poem. “And gone mad with ever-increasing restlessness;/My thoughts and speeches are like those of a madman” (10-11) As in those sick with fever, the orator speaks and writes like a madman. None of his thoughts or words are coherent. He can't explain his infatuation with his beloved, he just knows it's wrong. The saying "We are all fools in love" is true. This sonnet proves that the saying is indeed true. His writing is deteriorating, from comparing his love to fever to completely succumbing to that fever. His passion is turning him into a raving madman, incapable of listening to reason. In the last line of the quatrain, the speaker admits that his words stray erratically and irrationally from the truth, as they are spoken by someone so blinded by love that he can no longer even see the truth. Therefore his words are "expressed in vain." They serve no purpose, as they are nothing more than extreme exaggerations, if not lies. The thoughts and words he has towards his beloved are really just things about the beloved he has objectified. The couplet gets to the heart of the matter, explaining how he strayed "at random from the truth expressed in vain." (12) Commentary: The speaker is able to admit that while he believed his beloved to be beautiful and bright, she is actually dark and evil. The most disturbing aspect of the couplet is that it is completely heartless and cold. Throughout the entire sonnet, the speaker has expressed how much he loves the listener, even though the beloved is clearly not good for him. However, in these lines, the speaker actually reveals why the beloved is harmful to him. While he believed the beloved was "light" and "bright", the beloved was actually "black" and "dark". This comparison could mean several things. On a superficial level, the speaker might mean that he thinks the beloved is beautiful, when in reality the beloved is unattractive. That would come,.