Task 2 When in Disgrace With Fortune and Mens Eyes is about Shakespeares love for a woman.

The subject matter of this poem is a woman whom Shakespeare is in love with. The main message in this poem is that true love is able to free a person from his sorrow(s).

The first two quatrains of this poem conjure melancholic feelings and some pity for the poet, who curses his fate for not having the skills, good looks or friends that other men had. However, the mood changes into a hopeful one from the third quatrain onwards, as the poet thinks of his true love, and decides that the riches his love brings is far greater than that of a king.

This poem is a typical English sonnet, and has all the features of it. Shakespeare uses Old English, and there are some words that suggest this (bootless, haply, thy, thee). He also uses words like bootless and disgrace in the first two quatrains to help the reader understand his sorrowful and wretched state.

A simile found is Like to the lark at break of day arising (l.11). Shakespeare compares himself to a bird rising at sunrise, which shows that he feels spirited and full of hope for his life when thinking of his love.

Two examples of personification are And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries (l.3) and From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate (l.12). The first example gives heaven a human trait of being deaf, thus proving that his cries to heaven are useless as heaven will not listen to him. The second example personifies earth, and is related to the previous line, Like to

the lark at break of day arising (l.12). To show that the bird arising signifies hope for Shakespeare, he compares the birds ascent into the sky with the dull and boring earth where it came from.

The use of alliteration can be located in Like to the lark at break of day arising and From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate (l.11-12). In line 11, the consonant sound of l is repeated. The sound of l feels, to some extent, light. This, along with the alliteration of s and h in line 12, creates a soft and gentle feel which describes the grace and awesomeness of the lark arising at daybreak.