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Theme Of Love In William Shakespeare's Sonnet XVIII

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The mark of a successful writer is their ability to convey not only a message, but an emotion simply by describing something with vivid and thoughtfully provoking language. William Shakespeare brilliantly encapsulates this in his ,”Sonnet XVIII” a poem of love and the feeling it exhumes. His stylistic elements such as attention to detail, imagery , metaphors, and diction that all help to convey his overarching message on the eternity of love. To begin with, Shakespeare shows an immense amount of detail to really show how much this love truly means to him. In the very first sentence he says, “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” to compare his lover to the warmth and brightness that he/she gives to him. He shows the happiness that love can bring to people through this line. …show more content…

The way he uses the diction is to describe his lover and emotions that they give off. For example, he says that they are like “heaven” to paint a picture of their beauty that is unrivaled from earth to heaven itself(5). The use of heaven helps in the description mostly because it is said that religious entities such angels and even Jesus are unmatched in beauty and in their looks. In addition, he says that they have a “gold” complexion which helps paints a picture of their beautiful glowing and shining appearance that is similar to the glistening and gleaming effects of something golden(6). The use of a word such as “death” may seem rather cacophonous but for the context in which is said it is positive to show that even through death they will still have one another beside them tying back to the religious themes of heaven(11). The presentation of death in a way that is positive opposed to being negative is masterful in its delivery. As a result, he is able to represent the endless feeling of love as something that carries through both life and

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