CRITICAL APPRECIATION OF SHAKESPEARE’S SONNET NO.

130 (Note)

Sonnet 130 (My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun), written by William
Shakespeare, is a beautiful poem that captures the realistic beauty of a woman whom
Shakespeare refers to as his “mistress”. The sonnet is remarkably modern in outlook
with some Donne-like views and both in its content and stylistic appeal , it
appears to be an anti-Petrarchan one, deviating from the conventional Elizabethan
love-poems.
The refreshing frankness of attitude and tone arrests the reader’s attention
right from the opening line and continues to work even after the last line is read
with a random eagerness. The sonnet is actually a satire on the unreal comparisons
in which the contemporary poets used to indulge while writing about the beauty of
their mistresses. All kinds of artificial comparisons were made to eulogize and
glorify a woman in those days. Many of those comparisons figure in this sonnet, but
here the poet speaks in a negative vein pointing out that these comparisons are not
valid in the case of his beloved. Thus the poem is a satirical rejection of the
false comparisons which were current in the poetry of the Elizabethan times.
Shakespeare here adopts a more realistic approach while describing his beloved, but
at the same time he affirms that she is a rare woman.
The sonnet compares the speaker’s beloved to a number of other bright and
beautiful objects of nature, but what we can see is that no comparison is in her
favour. The sonnet begins with the sentence, “My mistresses’ eyes are nothing like
the sun”, setting the readers up for a cruel and unflattering description of the
beloved. According to the poet, his mistress’ eyes do not have the bright
glittering effect of the sun. Her lips are not certainly as red as coral is.
Comparing the skin or the breasts of the heroine with snow was very common in the
Elizabethan sonnets. But here the poet admits that the breasts of his beloved have
a “dun” or brown complexion, rather than being completely snow-white. The next
feature of beauty is hair. The poets of English literature have always heaped
lavish praise on golden hair of their heroines. But here Shakespeare, like a clear-
eyed man, observes that his mistress’ hair is black and looks like tough threads
twisted together, and is not velvety and smoothly wavy in the conventional manner.
In the second quatrain, Shakespeare says that he has seen “damasked” roses
having a mingled red and white colour, but he finds no such rosy glow in his
mistress’ cheeks; and the breath that “reeks” from his mistress is less delightful
than perfume. In the third quatrain, he admits that though he loves to listen to
his mistress’ voice, he knows it very well that “music hath a far more pleasing
sound”. Then he confesses that though he has never seen a goddess, his mistress –
unlike goddesses--walks on the ground. In the couplet, however, he swears by heaven
that he considers his mistress to be as rarely precious and essential in his life
as any other beloved-heroines who used to be claimed excessively and absurdly
excellent of all kinds by the other conventional lover-sonneteers.
This poem is essentially about a real woman, or all women, largely in response
to the language that was used to describe women. The series of negations applied to
the description of the mistress’ physical beauty amply implies that genuine passion
does not depend on sensuous promptings of items like dazzling eyes, coral-red lips,
snowy body, rosy cheeks, musical voice, golden hair and so on. Shakespeare’s
mistress is lacking in these requirements; and yet in Shakespeare’s eyes, his
mistress is an exceptionally beautiful woman. Now, it is possible that Shakespeare
means literally what he has said in this sonnet; but it is also possible that
Shakespeare may be ridiculing his mistress after she had been proved unfaithful to
him. Thus this sonnet may contain genuine praise by Shakespeare of his mistress in
the days when she was really in love with him; or it may be a satire on that woman
when she had been proved disloyal to him by transferring her affections from him to
his friend, the Earl of Southampton. Apart from Shakespeare’s intention, of which
we cannot be sure, this sonnet is undoubtedly most personal and its subjectivity
enhances its lyrical character.