Taylor Svete

Mrs. Smith/ AP British Literature

Part 3: Question 9

10/8/09

Satirizing Idealized Views of Love

The mistress in William Shakespeare’s Sonnet 130, is far from the ideals of a woman of

his time. “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” (line 1) and “Coral is far more red than her

lips red” (2) Shakespeare claims, and although he knows “That music hath a far more pleasing

sound” he loves to hear her speak. Her breasts are dun compared to snow, and “If hair be wires,

black wires grow on her head” (4), yet Shakespear thinks his love to be “as rare/ As any she

belied with false compare” (13-14) Any other writer would express his love for his mistress by

comparing her beauty to nature, not contrasting it. Shakespeare is different from other writers

though, he realizes that his mistress is not perfect but he loves her all the same, and he mocks the

other writers for thinking that their love is so perfect, when really, no woman is as perfect as

nature like men idealize love to be.