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Sonnet 130 Symbolism, Imagery, Allegory

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Sonnet 130 Summary & Analysis by William Shakespeare

• Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis
• Poetic Devices
• Vocabulary & References
• Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme
• Line-by-Line Explanations

"Sonnet 130" was written by the English poet and playwright William Shakespeare. Though most likely written in the 1590s, the poem wasn't published until 1609. Like many other sonnets from the same period, Shakespeare's poem wrestles with beauty, love, and desire. He tries to find a more authentic, realistic way to talk about these things in the sonnet, and gleefully dismisses the highly artificial poems of praise his peers were writing. Shakespeare's poem also departs from his contemporaries in terms of formal structure — it is a new kind of sonnet—the "Shakespearean" sonnet.

• Read the full text of “Sonnet 130: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun”

The Full Text of “Sonnet 130: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun”

1 My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; 

2 Coral is far more red than her lips' red; 

3 If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; 

4 If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. 

5 I have seen roses damasked, red and white, 

6 But no such roses see I in her cheeks; 

7 And in some perfumes is there more delight 

8 Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. 

9 I love to hear her speak, yet well I know 

10 That music hath a far more pleasing sound; 

11 I grant I never saw a goddess go; 

12 My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground. 

13    And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare 

14    As any she belied with false compare.

“Sonnet 130: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun” Summary

“sonnet 130: my mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun” themes.

Beauty and Love

• See where this theme is active in the poem.

Love, Personality, and the Superficial

Line-by-line explanation & analysis of “sonnet 130: my mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun”.

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; 

Coral is far more red than her lips' red;  If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;  If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. 

I have seen roses damasked, red and white,  But no such roses see I in her cheeks;  And in some perfumes is there more delight  Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. 

I love to hear her speak, yet well I know  That music hath a far more pleasing sound;  I grant I never saw a goddess go;  My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground. 

Lines 13-14

   And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare     As any she belied with false compare.

“Sonnet 130: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun” Symbols

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“Sonnet 130: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

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Parallelism

End-stopped line, “sonnet 130: my mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun” vocabulary.

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Sonnet 130: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun”

Rhyme scheme, “sonnet 130: my mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun” speaker, “sonnet 130: my mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun” setting, literary and historical context of “sonnet 130: my mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun”, more “sonnet 130: my mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun” resources, external resources.

Harryette Mullen's "Dim Lady" — Read the full text of Harryette Mullen's "Dim Lady," a rewriting of Shakespeare's Sonnet 130.

"Sonnet 130" Glossary — A glossary and commentary on Sonnet 130 from Buckingham University.

1609 Quarto Printing of Shakespeare's Sonnet 130 — An image of Shakespeare's Sonnet 130 as it appeared in its first printing, in 1609.

Reading of "Sonnet 130" — Ian Midlane reads "Sonnet 130" for the BBC, introduced by some smooth jazz.

Blazon Lady — See an image of Charles Berger's blazon lady and read Thomas Campion's contemporaneous blazon. 

Sidney's Astrophil and Stella #9 — Read the full text of Sidney's earlier blazon, Astrophil and Stella #9.  

LitCharts on Other Poems by William Shakespeare

Sonnet 116: Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Sonnet 129: Th' expense of spirit in a waste of shame

Sonnet 12: When I do count the clock that tells the time

Sonnet 138: When my love swears that she is made of truth

Sonnet 141: In faith, I do not love thee with mine eyes

Sonnet 147: My love is as a fever, longing still

Sonnet 18: Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Sonnet 19: Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws

Sonnet 20: A woman’s face with nature’s own hand painted

Sonnet 27: "Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed"

Sonnet 29: When, in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes

Sonnet 30: When to the sessions of sweet silent thought

Sonnet 33: Full many a glorious morning have I seen

Sonnet 45: The other two, slight air and purging fire

Sonnet 55: Not marble nor the gilded monuments

Sonnet 60: Like as the waves make towards the pebbl'd shore

Sonnet 65 ("Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea")

Sonnet 71: No longer mourn for me when I am dead

Sonnet 73: That time of year thou mayst in me behold

Sonnet 94: "They that have power to hurt"

Ask LitCharts AI: The answer to your questions

By William Shakespeare

Sonnet 130, ‘My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun,’ satirizes and subverts traditional love poetry, presenting a new perspective.

William Shakespeare

Nationality: English

His plays and poems are read all over the world.  

Key Poem Information

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Central Message: Genuine love transcends superficial, exaggerated expressions and cherishes authentic beauty and uniqueness

Themes: Beauty , Celebration , Love

Speaker: Unknown, likely a male

Emotions Evoked: Compassion , Empathy , Love for Her , Passion , Satisfaction

Poetic Form: Shakespearean Sonnet

Time Period: 16th Century

'Sonnet 130' remarkably departs from the cliched concept of the ideal woman in love poetry, offering a refreshingly modern perspective on love in a meticulously crafted sonnet.

Poem Analyzed by Elise Dalli

B.A. Honors Degree in English and Communications

In ‘ Sonnet 130,’ Shakespeare satirizes the tradition – stemming from Greek and Roman literature – of praising the beauty of one’s affection by comparing it to beautiful things, typically in a hyperbolic manner. For example, it was not uncommon to read love poems that compared a woman to a river or the sun. Therefore, the imagery used throughout the poem would have been recognizable to contemporary readers of the sonnet because it was playing with an established tradition that contemporary poets would have made use of quite frequently, so far as to lead it to become cliché .

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Explore Sonnet 130: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun

• 3 Structure and Form
• 4 Literary Devices
• 6 Analysis, Line-by-Line
• 7 Tone and Mood
• 8 Historical Context
• 9 About William Shakespeare
• 11 Similar Poems

In ‘Sonnet 130,’ William Shakespeare ( Bio | Poems ) contrasts the Dark Lady’s looks with the conventional hyperboles used in contemporary sonnets .

The poetic speaker spends an inordinate amount of time describing his mistress down to the bare bones. The lines he spends on her description could very well symbolize his true adoration for the mistress and her looks. For example, her eyes are nothing like the sun, and her lips are not rosy. Besides, her skin is dun, and her hairs are like wires. By contrast , poets who compare their lovers to nature are not really describing them as they are, but idealizing them – and therefore, the poet seems to hint they cannot love their beloved as much as he loves his mistress.

The meaning of this poem is interesting to understand. Though Shakespeare presents the main idea in the couplet , each section reveals the qualities of a lady the speaker loves. According to the poetic persona , his beloved is unlike the beautiful things of nature. She is as she is, not a lady with heavenly attributes. The speaker loves a lady with whom he can share his heart. There is no need to have a goddess if one has a partner who understands the minute emotional impulses. That’s why the speaker proclaims his love is rare, as he does not flatter her with false epithets .

Structure and Form

Usually, most Elizabethan love poetry was written in the tradition of the Petrarchan sonnet . Contemporary poets, such as Philip Sidney and Watson, would use the Petrarchan sonnet for its poetic form , whereas in ‘Sonnet 130,’ Shakespeare mocks all the conventions of it. This sonnet consists of three quatrains , followed by a rhyming couplet . The rhyme scheme of this piece is ABAB CDCD EFEF GG. Shakespeare composed the poem in iambic pentameter with a few variations. It means the meter is based on five beats or iambs per line.

Literary Devices

Shakespeare uses the following literary devices in his ‘Sonnet 130’ .

• Simile : It occurs in the first two lines: “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;/ Coral is far redder than her lips’ red”.
• Metaphor : Readers can find an implicit comparison between music and human voice in this line: “That music hath a far more pleasing sound”.
• Hyperbole : It occurs in the following lines: “If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head” and “Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks”.
• Irony : Readers can find the use of irony in the final couplet. Here, Shakespeare ironically comments on the epithets used by contemporary poets.
• Allusion : According to scholars, this sonnet alludes to the convention of glorifying a lady’s beauty in contemporary as well as earlier sonnets.
• Alliteration : It occurs in “Co r al is fa r redder than he r lips’ r ed,” “hear her speak,” etc.

The main theme of this piece deals with the conventional way of glorifying a speaker’s beloved and how Shakespeare looks at her lady love. It is a matter of seeing a human by her worth in one’s life. Using far-fetched comparisons to elevate a lady actually elongates the distance between two souls. Shakespeare says they are at a similar level. Their love exists on this plane. He loves the lady as she already is. She does not have anything sparkling or glorious in her looks, yet the speaker treats his relationship as rare. This sonnet also taps into the themes of love and perception vs reality.

Analysis, Line-by-Line

Lines 1–4.

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips’ red; If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

The poetic persona opens ‘Sonnet 130’ with a scathing remark about his beloved’s eyes. They are “nothing like the sun”. As per Elizabethan tradition, such a comparison would have been almost expected. However, the poetic speaker continues to deride his beloved’s appearance by slashing any attempt to match her to things found in nature. If snow is white, her skin is not. Her breasts are rather “dun”, which is another word for grey-brown. Her hair is described as black wires.

Lines 5–8

I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks; And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.

The speaker’s beloved does not have a pleasant flush to her cheeks. He goes so far as to condemn the smell of her and the sound of her voice. The idea behind the Elizabethan tradition of love poetry was to elevate one’s love to a near unachievable plane, to make a mortal woman read in such a manner that she became elevated to near goddess status. The poetic speaker, rather than elevating her, brings her further down to earth.

Lines 9–12

I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound; I grant I never saw a goddess go; My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground.

As he continues to write, he admits that he loves to listen to her voice when she speaks. Yet he knows that the sound of music is more soothing than her voice. Still, he adores her voice as it is. He has never seen a goddess go, but his mistress walks on the ground. That line, in particular, seems almost openly satirizing the tradition itself, as it is well known that many Elizabethan poets would compare their lovers to things that mortals could not achieve, leaving the realm of humans to enter the pantheon of the gods.

Lines 13–14

And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare.

Despite her shortcomings, the poet insists that he loves her, not because she is a goddess, not because she is an unattainable beauty, but because she is his and because she is real. He loves her for what the reality is and not because he can compare her to beautiful things.

Scholars have attempted to push forward the idea that ‘Sonnet 130’ is ultimately a romantic one in nature. They point out that Elizabethan love poetry tended to emphasize and praise people for qualities that they could not, or would not, have possibly been able to possess, whereas this, through mentioning all the mistress’ qualities, is actually complimenting her. It is quite a stretch to reach this conclusion, and it is not the popular interpretation of ‘Sonnet 130’ .

Tone and Mood

The difference between the Fair Youth and the Dark Lady sonnets is not merely in address but also in tone and mood : while the Fair Youth sequence uses mostly romantic and tender words, the Dark Lady sonnets are characterized by their overt references to sex and bawdiness. Scholars have attempted to illustrate the difference in tone and mood between them by stating that the Fair Youth sequence refers to spiritual love, while the Dark Lady sequence refers to sexual passion. There have been a number of attempts to identify the Dark Lady; however, none have come to fruition.

Historical Context

Of the 154 sonnets that Shakespeare wrote throughout his lifetime, 126 were written to a figure known as the Fair Youth. The remaining 28 poems were written to the Dark Lady, an unknown figure in Shakespeare’s life who was only characterized throughout ‘Sonnet 130’ by her dark skin and hair. The Dark Lady was called so for having those characteristics as described in this sonnet. As with the Fair Youth, scholars identify her with a real historical individual, Lucy Negro.

Explore how to understand Shakespeare’s sonnets .

About William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare ( Bio | Poems ) was born in 1564 in Stratford-Upon-Avon to an alderman and a glover. He is widely regarded as the greatest English writer of all time and wrote 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems , and 38 plays, though recently, another play has been found and attributed to Shakespeare.

So little record of his private life exists that most of what people know about Shakespeare stems from scholarly discussion and speculation rather than actual records or facts. It is still unknown who many of the figures in his sonnets are or whether or not Shakespeare authored his own works or merely signed his name on completed plays, and convincing arguments exist on both sides.

He began a successful career in London as part of the King’s Men, working as a writer, actor, and part-owner. He produced most of his work in a 23-year period. Many of his plays were actually published throughout his lifetime; however, it was only in 1693 that a collection of all his works was published – posthumously. This was known as the First Folio, and it contained all of Shakespeare’s plays, with a preface by Ben Jonson ( Bio | Poems ) , who described Shakespeare as “ not of an age, but for all time “.

William Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnet 130’ is about the realistic portrayal of his mistress that is in contrast with the convention of the courtly sonnets .

All the 154 sonnets of Shakespeare were first published in 1609.

In this sonnet , Shakespeare parodies the convention of contemporary sonnets and satirizes the attempt to glorify one’s beloved to an unrealistic height.

Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnet 130’ is a love poem. In this piece, Shakespeare talks about how the Dark Lady is unlike any other lady as described in conventional sonnets and how his love for the lady is rare.

In this sonnet , the mistress’ description is unusual in respect to the convention of flowery, courtly sonnets . Her eyes are unlike the sun, and she does not have red lips. Besides, her skin is dun, and her hairs are like black wires. According to Shakespeare, her mistress reeks, and she has a dull voice . When she walks, her footfall makes sounds.

Similar Poems

Readers who have enjoyed ‘Sonnet 130’ can consider reading the following Shakespearean sonnets from the Dark Lady sequence. You can also read more William Shakespeare poems .

• ‘Sonnet 127: In the old age black was not counted fair’ – This Shakespearean sonnet explores changing opinions on beauty and the use of makeup in contemporary times.
• ‘Sonnet 132: Thine eyes I love, and they, as pitying me’ – The sonnet describes the impact the Dark Lady’s eyes have on the speaker.
• ‘Sonnet 137: Thou blind fool, Love, what dost thou to mine eyes’ – This piece is about the speaker’s love for the Dark Lady. It condemns love for misleading the speaker about her.
• ‘Sonnet 145: Those lips that Love’s own hand did make’ – This sonnet details a woman’s changing regard for the speaker.

You can also read about the best of Shakespeare’s love sonnets and the greatest Shakespearean sonnets .

Poetry + Review Corner

16th century, celebration, love for her, satisfaction, beautiful women, individuality, inner beauty, shakespearean sonnet.

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About Elise Dalli

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This is my favourite Shakespeare sonnet, as, to me, it is a love poem to someone real; not imagined or set on a pedestal…If I were to have been presented with this sonnet by a lover, I would have been very pleased!

I agree that when a poet addresses a specific person rather than a nebulous ideal it elevates the intimacy of the poem.

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Dalli, Elise. "Sonnet 130 by William Shakespeare". Poem Analysis , https://poemanalysis.com/william-shakespeare/sonnet-130/ . Accessed 16 July 2024.

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Sonnet 130 (My mistress’ eyes) Summary & Analysis

Sonnet 130: my mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun – explanation.

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;

William Shakespeare’s sonnet 130 opens with the speaker talking about his mistress’ eyes. But it doesn’t seem to be a lover’s usual attempt to glorify in verse the beauty of the woman he loves. Rather we see the exact opposite. The speaker here negates the comparison between his mistress’ eyes and the brilliance of the sun. Here, the lady’s eyes are not as bright as the sun.

Generally, we consider that a woman of ideal beauty should have eyes that are as bright as the sun. But according to the lover here, the eyes of his mistress are so dull that they can hardly come near the sun in brightness.

In the next line the comparison changes, but the motif is the same. Now it is about her lips. The speaker says that his beloved’s lips are not as red as the beautiful red corals formed under the sea.

These beginning lines of the poem sets the tone of the entire poem. The speaker here attempts to show his beloved’s beauty in true and honest way as she actually looks, without resorting to artificial exaggeration. Thus, what we see in Sonnet 130 is unique and in sharp contrast to what the Renaissance readers were accustomed to read in other poets’ verses.

If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

The hair is the next element that comes to our speaker’s mind. A man would generally compare his lover’s hair to something soft and smooth, shiny and silky, and it would ideally be golden in colour. But here the speaker identifies his lady’s hairs with nothing but black wires. So, the lady has frizzy black hair which is uncommon for English women.

I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks;

The next element of beauty the speaker talks about is his lady’s cheeks. The speaker has seen beautiful roses with red and white hues woven together (damasked). But he finds nothing like those roses in his mistress’ cheeks.

And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.

Poets praise the sweet breath of their mistress as if it surpasses some sweet-smelling perfumes. But our speaker is honest while describing her lady’s breath. It doesn’t give out any delightful fragrance. It rather produces a strong and offensive smell (reeks). He acknowledges that some perfumes are certainly far more pleasing than her breath which instead of a sweet smell gives out a foul odour.

I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound;

Lines 11–12

I grant I never saw a goddess go; My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.

The speaker now admits that he has never seen how a goddess moves. And so, he won’t compare his beloved’s moves to that of a goddess as done by most lovers and especially poets in their poems. He is being frank here to admit that his mistress walks on the ground just like a normal human being, and not like a goddess, an angel or a fairy. She doesn’t fly or do anything superfluous of that sort.

Lines 13–14

And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare.

These final lines of the sonnet, the concluding couplet, holds the speaker’s main point and the poem’s essence. He swears (by heaven) that with all the ordinary features of his mistress, he still finds his beloved (my love) to be as lovely (rare) as any other woman (any she) who are misrepresented (belied) by inflated comparisons (false compare).

Unlike other poets he doesn’t need fanciful exaggerated comparisons. He still finds his lady beautiful and loves her with all her flaws. Great! isn’t it?

Sonnet 130: My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun – Into Details

Publication, background/context.

Though most early editors and critics took the sonnet at its face value and observed it to be simply a demeaning of the lady, currently it is seen as exactly opposite. The sonnet is now believed to be a compliment for the lady in an honest way and a satire on poetic conventions in which poets tend to make false comparisons with their mistress’ beauty.

Sonnet 130 does not have a specific setting as such. Shakespeare’s sonnets were mostly written in the 1590s and came out in the beginning of the 17th century. This sonnet questions the poetic traditions and feminine ideals of the 15 th and 16 th century English society. It also reflects the language used at that time and represents the standard of female beauty in the then society.

Shakespeare did not give titles to his sonnets and so they are referred by numbers. This sonnet comes at 130 th position in his collection. In most cases the first line of the sonnet is used as a title in many anthologies.

Here the first line “ My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun ” serves a very good title. It is apt in the sense that it sets the tone of the entire sonnet right at the start. From the title alone, we can guess that the speaker is going to comment negatively on his mistress’ beauty and it is most probably in a satirical note.

Form and Language

The poem “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” is a sonnet. A sonnet is a 14-lines poem usually written in iambic pentameter. Most of the Elizabethan love poetry was written in the traditional Petrarchan form in which a sonnet was divided into two parts – an octave and a sestet.

But Shakespeare broke this convention. He invented a new structure. Now this is called Shakespearean sonnet. The Shakespearean sonnet consists of three quatrains and a couplet.

Meter and Rhyme

Like all other Shakespearean sonnets, Sonnet 130 consists of three quatrains and a couplet with the rhyme scheme being ABAB CDCD EFEF GG. The first twelve lines rhyme in alternating pairs developing the main idea of the poem. The rhyming couplet sums it up well.

The meter used here is iambic pentameter. This is almost a norm for sonnets though. An iambic meter is a disyllabic meter where a stressed syllable comes after an unstressed one. Pentameter means five feet in a line. There are a few exceptions in the poem’s meter. For example, the first foot of the second line is a trochee.

Sonnet 130: My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun – Themes

Beauty and love.

William Shakespeare in his Sonnet 130 redefines the idea of beauty and love and how they are related. His contemporary poets used to present their beloveds as perfectly beautiful and that was why they were so much in love with those ladies.

But Shakespeare shatters that stereotype here. The poet-lover states in the concluding couplet of the sonnet that he finds his mistress similarly rare as any other woman and loves her even knowing that she is deficient in terms of beauty in society’s defined terms. A person’s inner beauty and real appearance matters more than the inflated image of beauty by false comparisons or artificial make-up.

Real vs Superficial

Sonnet 130: my mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun – symbols.

In line 3, the speaker states that his mistress’ breasts are deplorably ‘dun’ in appearance when compared to the white colour of snow. White generally symbolizes purity and innocence. So, what does the lady’s less white skin indicate? Maybe she is not so pure.

Moreover, in the Renaissance period, whiteness of skin was a standard for perfect feminine beauty. The lovers and the poets all liked to describe their beloved’s complexion as snow-white. By stating that his mistress’ breasts are rather grayish-brown, the poet here goes against the convention. Thus, whiteness here symbolizes the conventions and the stereotypes.

Sonnet 130: My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun – Literary Devices

End-stopped line.

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips’ red; If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;

I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound; And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare.

If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare

But no such roses s ee I in her ch ee ks; I love to h ea r her sp ea k, ye t well I know

Co r al is fa r mo r e r ed than he r lips’ r ed; (‘r’ sound)

Alliteration

Alliteration is a sub-category of consonance. It is the repetition of consonant sounds in the beginning (or, stressed syllables) of nearby words.

I g rant I never saw a g oddess g o; (‘g’ sound)

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;

If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

But no such roses see I in her cheeks;

In the above line, the speaker compares the reddish hue on women’s cheeks to that of roses in an indirect way here to say that he cannot find roses on his beloved’s cheeks.

… why then her breasts are dun; … black wires grow on her head I have seen roses damasked, red and white,

Again, olfactory imagery (sense of smell) is used in lines 7 and 8 –

I grant I never saw a goddess go; My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground.

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• Annotated Full Text
• Literary Period: Renaissance
• Publication Date: 1609
• Flesch-Kincaid Level: 10
• Approx. Reading Time: 0 minutes

Sonnet 130 takes place near the beginning of the series of “dark lady” sonnets. After 126 sonnets, the speaker shifts his affections and attentions from the fair youth to a new object of desire, an unnamed woman often termed the “dark lady.” The speaker has a vastly different relationship with the dark lady than he does with the fair youth. The pure, platonic, unrequited love at the heart of the first set of sonnets is replaced with an earthly, physical relationship with the dark lady. In Sonnet 129, sex enters the equation for the first time in the sonnets, bringing up feelings of shame for the speaker. In Sonnet 130, the speaker arrives at a grounded, playful treatment of the dark lady. He takes the tradition of the blazon—the love poem in which the poet lists the best characteristics of the beloved—and turns the form on its head. Rather than hold the lady on an idealized pedestal, the speaker brings her down to earth. He takes account of her numerous imperfections, from her reeking breath to her gray complexion. Yet the imperfections add up to a beguiling, admiring portrait of his lover. In a sense, the poem is about the flawed nature of love poetry, with its idealization of women.

Table of Contents

• Character Analysis
• Historical Context
• Literary Devices

Study Guide

• William Shakespeare Biography

Background of the Poem

Historical context.

 Shakespeare’s sonnet collection is usually divided into two parts. This division is made on the basis of the different people these sonnets address. The first part consists of 126 sonnets. These sonnets are addressed to a young guy. The speaker in these sonnets tells him about the mortality of life and the ways he can escape its clutches. These sonnets also stress the role of poetry in immortalizing its subjects. The second part consists of the remaining twenty-eight sonnets. The sonnets of this part are addressed to a female. This character is usually called “dark lady.” The speaker seems to have a troublesome relationship with her and speaks to her in a manner that is not typical of lovers. Sonnet 130 falls in this portion of the sonnet collection and is, therefore, considered to address this lady.  

Literary Context

Sonnet 130 summary (my mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun), first quatrain.

The speaker opens the poem with the description of his mistress. He says that his mistress’s eyes are in no way comparable to the sun. He says that the sun is far more bright and beautiful than the ordinary eyes of his mistress. He goes on to describe another aspect of his mistress’s beauty by comparing her lips and cheeks to corals. However, this comparison does not go in his beloved’s favor as well. He says that the redness of corals is far more than the redness of his mistress’s cheeks and lips.

Second Quatrain

Third quatrain.

Furthermore, the speaker mocks the comparison of beloveds to goddesses. He says that he has never seen a goddess in his life. Therefore, he has no knowledge of how the goddesses walk. However, he says that he is sure about one thing. He knows that his mistress walks on earth. Therefore, he knows that his mistress cannot be compared to a goddess.  

Themes in Sonnet 130

Escape from idealism, sonnet 130 analysis.

In the third quatrain, the speaker continues the same pattern of satire and mocks further traditional analogies. He says that he can neither claim that his mistress’s voice is more delightful nor can he say that she walks like goddesses. In the last line of this quatrain, the speaker employs exaggerated alliteration to express his annoyance with these absurd notions.

Rhyme Scheme

The rhyme scheme of this sonnet is traditional ababcdcdefefgg. The first twelve lines make three quatrains with an alternate sound pattern, and the last two lines make a rhyming couplet.

Literary Devices in Sonnet 130

Alliteration.

In the fourth line, the speaker compares his beloved’s hair to wires. In this line, there are two alliterative sound patterns. The first pattern is made by the words “be” and “black,” while the  second is made by the words “hair,” “her,” and “head.” This type of repetitive sounds at the start of the words exhibits the disagreement of the speaker with this type of comparison.

Here the /g/ sound is repeated three times in the line. Through this device, the speaker conveys his annoyance with the comparison of humans and gods.

In the poem, the speaker compares his mistress’s eyes to the sun in the first line.

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Sonnet 130 Analysis

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Published: Mar 13, 2024

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Sonnet 130: My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun

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While William Shakespeare’s reputation is based primarily on his plays, he became famous first as a poet. With the partial exception of the Sonnets (1609), quarried since the early 19th century for autobiographical secrets allegedly encoded in them, the nondramatic writings have traditionally been pushed...

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Many of my classmates believe that Shakespeare was saying that, although this girl is ugly, he still loves her. While others claim that he was not making any statements about her looks, but instead being realistic. It is my view that he was making a point of claiming that his girlfriend was a regular person and not a mythological goddess. Most people have heard on television or in movies , some guy tell his girlfriend that she has eyes as deep as the ocean or lips as soft as velvet.

So it seams obvious that to them perfume smelled better that any part of a person. He then says that music sounds better than her voice. This was probably true as well, unless she was an opera singer whos every word sounded like an aria. Some people will claim that he likened her breasts to excrement (dun). I think that he was making an analogy. He was saying that her skin is closer to the color brown than to white. I think that Shakespeare was making a contention against the style of poetry of the time which was of the romantic movement , particular to the Elizabethan era.

This sonnet and most of his other sonnets seem to be of the realist movement, which leans toward stating things as they are and not as they appear to be. In conclusion, I dont see any evidence that he was saying that she was ugly. I see that he was making a literary stand against what was popular at the time (and what is still popular in our culture). It is a fallacy of reason to state that since an author says that something is not true, that the opposite must be true. It think that he was making point to keep his view of this girl in perspective.

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