Sonnet 116 Group
Question:
yayuda0011
Student
Community / Jr. College
Please explain "Let Me Not to the Marriage of True Minds" (or Sonnet 116) by Shakespeare.
Answers:
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pohnpei397 Teacher
Community / Jr. CollegeeNotes Editor
Posted by pohnpei397 on Friday November 6, 2009 at 7:06 PMThis question was asked a couple days ago. Please follow the link to see what I and a colleague said...
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lit24 Teacher
DoctorateeNotes Editor
Posted by lit24 on Friday November 6, 2009 at 8:42 PMShakepare's Sonnet No. 116, "Let Me not to the Marriage of True Minds" is a fervent expression of the theme of constancy in love. Love which is the "marriage" or sacred union between two minds is "true" only when it is constant.
He defines true love both negatively and positively. True love will not change when any type of change occurs in the life of the lovers or when the lovers are separated - "removed."
It is, Shakespeare asserts, "an ever-fixed mark" that can weather any storm. It is the fixed star by which sailors steer their wandering ships. Even though the lovers grow old and their youthful beauty fades with the passage of time their love for one another will remain constant and firm till death separates the true and constant lovers.
Shakespeare swears that all what he has said in the quatorzain is true and that if he is proved wrong then neither has any person truly been in love nor has he ever written. However paradoxically, since the poem has been written it means that all what Shakespeare has written about true love is indeed true.
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