Discussion Topic
The addressee and audience of Shakespeare's Sonnet 18
Summary:
Shakespeare's Sonnet 18 is addressed to a young man, often referred to as the Fair Youth. The audience is both the young man himself and the broader readership, as the poem aims to immortalize the youth's beauty through its verses.
Who is the audience in Shakespeare's Sonnet 18?
The audience in Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 18” is assumed to be the same audience as all of Shakespeare’s first 126 sonnets—a “fair youth,” a mysterious character who is beloved by the speaker.
The speaker’s word choice from the very opening lines suggest that this sonnet is directed at the fair youth. Consider how the sonnet opens with the speaker asking “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” The word “thee” here suggests that the intended audience is the person that the speaker thinks is beautiful and fair. In the following line, “Thou art more lovely and more temperate,” the fact that the poem is directed at the speaker’s lover is confirmed by the word “Thou" and the description of the person as extremely lovely. There has been debate about whether this sonnet was directed at a man or a woman, but what is clear from the...
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language is that it is directed at one person.
It is also interesting to note that in the end the speaker veers from discussing the lover’s beauty directly and reflects a bit on the power of poetry. Consider the meaning of the line “So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.” Here, “this” refers to the sonnet itself. The speaker is saying that as long as this poem exists, the lover’s beauty will be preserved. This prompts the reader to reflect on the enduring power of poetry and suggests that the poem is also intended for readers and lovers of poetry.
Who is the addressee in Shakespeare's Sonnet 18?
Much critical analysis has been done with the whole sonnet sequence, and while there are no definitive answers, an interesting theory is that he is writing what we know as the first 75+ sonnets in praise of a young man, perhaps someone who had commissioned him to write the sonnets in praise of him. If this is true, then sonnet 18 is a flattering poem about the young man, but is ultimately a poem in praise of the poet's talents. While the young man's "eternal summer shall not fade," it is because the poet's words will live on for future generations to read in this poem.
Specifically whom is not clear. The convention at the time was for a poet to write a sequence of sonnets to a beloved; for many poets the person of their affections was known, but not so in Shakespeare's case:
It is thus ironic that the object of Shakespeare’s own sequence should be unknown. The poems themselves range over many topics, including the beauty and desirability of marriage for a young man, a love triangle, a “dark lady,” and several philosophical and moral problems.
Whomever he is addresssing, what is clear is that he's imparting a bit of elder advice to a younger person - while young, in the time of beauty, procreate, your descendants being what transcend death and make you immortal.