shakespeare essay about love

Idealistic Love in “Sonnet 116” by William Shakespeare Essay

One of the reasons why Shakespeare’s poetry is being commonly referred to as such that represents a particularly high literary value, is that the overwhelming majority of his poetic pieces contains a number of in-depth insights into what accounts for the essence of different emotional states that people experience throughout their lives. The validity of this suggestion can be well illustrated, in regards to the Sonnet 116 , in which the poet exposes readers to his highly idealistic view on the significance of love.

After all, there can be only a few doubts that, along with being aesthetically refined, this poem appears thoroughly consistent with what happened to be people’s unconscious anxieties, in respect to the notion in question. This, of course, contributes to the mentioned sonnet rather substantially, in the sense of making it discursively plausible. Let us explore the legitimacy of this statement at length.

Probably the first thing that comes in sight of just about anyone who read Sonnet 116 , is that Shakespeare tends to objectify love, as something upon which the flow of time and what happened to be the affiliated circumstances have no effect, whatsoever:

Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds (2-3).

Despite the sheer simplicity of this suggestion, it is indeed utterly powerful, because it correlates well with people’s deep-seated desire to think in absolutes – especially when dealing with the emotionally charged notions, such as love. There is even more to it – the quoted suggestion appears rhetorically sound. That is, the very manner in which is being structured, presupposes that it would be rather impossible for readers to disagree with the suggestion’s predicate. This, of course, points out to the fact that Shakespeare was not only aware of what the rhetorical device of ‘appeal to ethos’ is, but also that he knew perfectly well how it could be used in the work of poetry.

Partially, this explains Shakespeare’s intention not to be questioning the beneficence of the love-relationship between two individuals – especially if they happened to be psychologically compatible:

Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments (1-2).

Apparently, the poet knew perfectly well that love should be appreciated for what it is, with no considerations given to the fact that it seldom proves long-lasting.

The reading of Sonnet 116 also leaves only a few doubts that, although rather intuitively, Shakespeare was knowledgeable of the ways, in which one’s psyche actually operates – something that can be proven, in regards to the lines:

O no! it (love) is an ever-fixed mark That looks on tempests and is never shaken (5-6).

The rationale behind this suggestion is quite apparent – the quoted lines imply that Shakespeare understood the importance of the deployment of highly metaphorical language, within the context of how one goes about encouraging readers to adopt his point of view on the actual significance of a particular abstract category (in this case, love). After having been exposed to the above-quoted metaphorical account of love, readers will indeed be much more likely to agree with the poet that the notion in question implies ‘indestructibleness’. The reason for this is that it is namely one’s ‘visualized’ images of abstract ideas, which his or her memory preserves the best.

What it more – this suggestion was meant to capitalize on what happened to the socially suppressed sexual anxieties in readers – hence, the clearly defined phallic undertones of the images it strives to invoke. Apparently, Shakespeare never doubted the assumption that the notion of love can be best discussed in relation to what causes men and women to enter into the sexual relationship with each other – for him, this was something self-evident.

What gives Shakespeare an additional credit, in this respect, is that in Sonnet 116 , he succeeded in combining the formally incompatible ‘materialist’ and ‘metaphysical’ outlooks on love. This simply could not be otherwise, due to the sheer ease, with which the poet moves from reflecting upon the physiological aspects of love, to referring to the latter in terms of a ‘thing in itself’:

It (love) is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken (7-8).

Quite obviously, these lines imply is that it is specifically the measure of love’s intensity, which positively relates to what can be deemed as the indications of its high worth. After all, the concerned lines do emphasize that true love is necessarily a ‘noble’ (high) one, regardless of whether it proves long-term productive or not. In other words, love is something that exists independently of people, while constituting nothing short of the universe’s actual fabric.

As they live their lives, people in fact climb the ‘ladder of love’, with only few of them having what it takes to be able to climb higher than the rest. Simultaneously, the quoted lines can be discussed as such that provide us with a better understanding of what caused the sheer popularity of Sonnet 116 – the fact that in it, Shakespeare proved himself as a ‘master of pathos’. Since it is in people’s very nature to be attracted to the ‘dramatic’ emanations of the surrounding reality, poetry-lovers are naturally inclined to favor specifically the emotionally charged works of poetry.

As we continue to read the sonnet, it becomes quite apparent that the last thing Shakespeare intended to do, while writing it, is to create the impression that his admiration of the notion of love came because of the poet’s cognitive abilities having been ‘love-impaired’. As he noted:

Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle’s compass come (9-10).

Being thoroughly rational, this statement appears to serve the purpose of convincing readers that Shakespeare’s outlook on love is thoroughly conscious. The reason for this is that the above-quoted suggestion implies the poet’s awareness of the actual effects of time on one’s physical appearance. However, it does not seem to undermine the integrity of his idealized stance on love – hence, adding even further to the extent of the mentioned suggestion’s plausibility.

This, of course, can mean only one thing – along with having possessed poetic talent for exploiting people’s endowment with the senses of ethos and pathos, Shakespeare has also been capable of adopting a proper discursive approach, when it comes to appealing to one’s sense of logos. Therefore, Sonnet 116 is not solely a ‘hymn to love’ – it is also a ‘hymn to rationality’.

At the sonnet’s end, Shakespeare comes up with the particularly powerful statement:

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved (11-14).

At first, this statement establishes the predicate that ‘love alters not’ and then, it presents readers with the choice of whether to agree with the author, in regards to the subject matter in question, or to renounce the validity of his love-related emotional experiences – something that would prove being easier said than done. Thus, the earlier quoted lines represent the classical example of ‘rhetorical contradiction’. It is understood, of course, this this credits Shakespeare rather substantially, as a poet – it is not only that Sonnet 116 is aesthetically pleasing, but it is also rhetorically thorough, in the full sense of this word.

This particular quality of the concerned sonnet explains why, despite consisting of only fourteen lines, it is utterly informative. The legitimacy of this suggestion can be illustrated, with respect to the fact that, in the aftermath of having read this Shakespeare’s masterpiece, people will learn the following: love is internal, love is one’s greatest spiritual endeavor, love guides individuals through their lives, time has no effect on the intensity of love.

I believe that the deployed line or argumentation, in defense of the suggestion that the popularity of Sonnet 116 has been objectively predetermined, is fully consistent with the paper’s initial thesis. Apparently, there is nothing accidental about the fact that Shakespeare is being commonly referred as a poetic genius – as Sonnet 116 indicates, he was capable of both: ensuring the emotional appeal of his poetic works and convincing readers that the ideas, contained in them, are logically sound. Therefore, it will be fully appropriate to conclude this paper by reinstating once again that Sonnet 116 is indeed exceptional. The fact that it happened to be inspiring and wise at the same time, leaves only a few doubts, in this respect.

Works Cited

Shakespeare, William 1609, Sonnet 116 . Web.

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Shakespearean Love Concepts in 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'

The Bard holds that lust, power, and fertility trump romantic love

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• Ph.D., English Language and Literature, Northern Illinois University
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"A Midsummer Night’s Dream," written in 1600, has been called one of William Shakespeare’s greatest love plays. It has been interpreted as a romantic story in which love ultimately conquers all odds, but it's actually about the importance of power, sex, and fertility, not love. Shakespeare’s concepts of love are represented by the powerless young lovers, the meddling fairies and their magical love, and forced love as opposed to chosen love.

These points undermine the argument that this play is a typical love story and fortify the case that Shakespeare intended to demonstrate the powers that triumph over love.

Power vs. Love

The first concept presented of love is its powerlessness, represented by the “true” lovers. Lysander and Hermia are the only characters in the play who are really in love. Yet their love is forbidden, by Hermia’s father and Duke Theseus. Hermia’s father Egeus speaks of Lysander’s love as witchcraft, saying of Lysander, “this man hath bewitched the bosom of my child” and “with feigning voice verses of feigning love ... stol’n the impression of her fantasy.” These lines maintain that true love is an illusion, a false ideal.

Egeus goes on to say that Hermia belongs to him, proclaiming, “she is mine, and all my right of her / I do estate unto Demetrius.” These lines demonstrate the lack of power that Hermia and Lysander’s love holds in the presence of familial law. Furthermore, Demetrius tells Lysander to “yield / Thy crazéd title to my certain right,” which means that a father must give his daughter only to the worthiest suitor, regardless of love.

Finally, Hermia and Lysander’s eventual wedlock is due to two things: fairy intervention and noble decree. The fairies enchant Demetrius to fall in love with Helena , freeing Theseus to allow Hermia and Lysander’s union. With his words, “Egeus, I will overbear your will, / For in the temple, by and by, with us / These couples shall eternally be knit,” the duke is proving that it is not love that is responsible for joining two people, but the will of those in power. Even for true lovers, it isn't love that conquers, but power in the form of royal decree.

Weakness of Love

The second idea, the weakness of love, comes in the form of fairy magic. The four young lovers and an imbecilic actor are entangled in a love game, puppet-mastered by Oberon and Puck. The fairies’ meddling causes both Lysander and Demetrius, who were fighting over Hermia, to fall for Helena. Lysander’s confusion leads him to believe he hates Hermia; he asks her, “Why seek’st thou me? Could not this make thee know / the hate I bear thee made me leave thee so?” That his love is so easily extinguished and turned to hatred shows that even a true lover’s fire can be put out by the feeblest wind.

Furthermore, Titania, the powerful fairy goddess, is bewitched into falling in love with Bottom, who has been given a donkey’s head by mischievous Puck . When Titania exclaims “What visions have I seen! / Methought I was enamored of an ass,” we are meant to see that love will cloud our judgment and make even the normally level-headed person do foolish things. Ultimately, Shakespeare makes the point that love cannot be trusted to withstand any length of time and that lovers are made into fools.

Finally, Shakespeare provides two examples of choosing powerful unions over amorous ones. First, there is the tale of Theseus and Hippolyta . Theseus says to Hippolyta, “I wooed thee with my sword / And won thy love doing thee injuries.” Thus, the first relationship that we see is the result of Theseus claiming Hippolyta after defeating her in battle. Rather than courting and loving her, Theseus conquered and enslaved her. He creates the union for solidarity and strength between the two kingdoms.

Next is the example of Oberon and Titania , whose separation from each other results in the world becoming barren. Titania exclaims, “The spring, the summer / The childing autumn, angry winter, change / Their wonted liveries, and the mazéd world / By their increase, now knows not which is which.” These lines make it clear that these two must be joined in consideration not of love but of the fertility and health of the world.

The subplots in "A Midsummer Night’s Dream" demonstrate Shakespeare’s dissatisfaction with the idea of love as a supreme power and his belief that power and fertility are the prime factors in deciding a union. The images of greenery and nature throughout the story, as when Puck speaks of Titania and Oberon meeting neither “in grove or green, / By fountain clear, or spangled starlight sheen” further suggest the importance that Shakespeare places on fertility. Also, the fairy presence within Athens at the end of the play, as sung by Oberon, suggests that lust is the enduring power and without it, love cannot last: “Now, until the break of day / Through this house each fairy stray / To the best bride-bed will we / Which by us shall blessed be.”

Ultimately, Shakespeare’s "A Midsummer Night’s Dream" suggests that believing only in love, creating bonds based on a fleeting notion rather than on lasting principles such as fertility (offspring) and power (security), is to be “enamored of an ass.”

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20 shakespeare quotes about love.

The word “love” appears 2,146 times in Shakespeare’s collected works (including a handful of “loves” and “loved”). Add to that 59 instances of “ be loved” and 133 uses of “lov ing ” and you’ve got yourself a “whole lotta love.” So, what does Shakespeare have to say about the subject? Here are 20 quotations from the Bard about love.

⇒ Related: Read, search, and download all of Shakespeare’s plays and poems for free with The Folger Shakespeare.

“What is Love?”

What does Shakespeare have to say about love? Let’s start with the basics.

“Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O no! it is an ever-fixed mark That looks on tempests and is never shaken.”

– Sonnet 116

In an interview on  Shakespeare Unlimited ,  Folger Director Emerita Gail Kern Paster noted that Sonnet 116 is a frequent choice for wedding toasts. Barbara Mowat and Paul Werstine, editors of The Folger Shakespeare, wrote of this famous sonnet, “The poet here meditates on what he sees as the truest and strongest kind of love, that between minds. He defines such a union as unalterable and eternal.”

“A lover’s eyes will gaze an eagle blind. A lover’s ear will hear the lowest sound, When the suspicious head of theft is stopped. Love’s feeling is more soft and sensible Than are the tender horns of cockled snails. . . . And when love speaks, the voice of all the gods Make heaven drowsy with the harmony.”

– Love’s Labor’s Lost , Act 4, scene 3, lines 328 – 339

In  Love’s Labor’s Lost, the King of Navarre and his three friends vow to spend three years cloistered from the world, studying, fasting, and seeing no women. But as soon as they’ve signed the contract, the Princess of France and her three pals show up to meet with the King. Of course, everyone immediately falls in love and the four men have to figure out how to extricate themselves from their solemn oaths. In Act 4, scene 3, Berowne, the wittiest of the four fellows, argues that love, not rigorous study, will make them better men. In fact, Berowne says, love is like a superpower that “gives to every power a double power.” The full speech is a beautiful testament to the gifts of love.

“Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind, And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.”

– A Midsummer Night’s Dream , Act 1, scene 1, lines 240 – 241

In Shakespeare’s time, Cupid was often depicted wearing a blindfold. In the Trevelyon Miscellany, a 1608 manuscript collection of patterns, notes, quotations, rhymes, and more from the Folger’s collection, compiler Thomas Trevelyon notes:

Venus the lady of love inflameth the heart. . . then Cupid her son shooteth his dart, and being blind, some times striketh with his arrow of love, and some time with his arrow of hatred, but at all times so shooteth that his arrows tend to love, in the beginning, though afterwards discords arise betwixt lovers.

Romeo, perhaps Shakespeare’s most famous lover, also describes Love this way: “Alas that love, whose view is muffled still, / Should without eyes see pathways to his will” ( Romeo and Juliet,  1.1).

“Love comforteth like sunshine after rain.”

– Venus and Adonis , line 799

“There’s beggary in the love that can be reckoned.”

– Antony and Cleopatra ,  Act 1, scene 1, line 16

Cleopatra tells Antony she’ll “set a bourn”—a boundary or limit—”how far to be beloved.” Antony tells her, “Then must thou needs find out new heaven, new Earth.” This is a fun activity to do with your partner: ask them to describe the physical extent of their love for you, then build a fence there together.

“What is love? ‘Tis not hereafter: Present mirth hath present laughter.”

– Twelfth Night , Act 2, scene 3, line 48

Seize the day! Love, Feste’s song suggests, is best enjoyed in the present: “What’s to come is still unsure. / in delay there lies no plenty, / Then come kiss me, sweet and twenty. / Youth’s a stuff will not endure.” (Playwright Noël Coward borrowed the phrase “present laughter” for the title of his play about an actor who has just turned 40). The idea is echoed in a song from the penultimate scene of As You Like It,  in which the characters sing, “And therefore take the present time. . . / For love is crownéd with the prime” (5.3).

“Letters Full of Love”

So you’re in love: what kind of things are you supposed to say? Here are a few romantic quotations from Shakespeare to make your lover’s heart go pitter-patter.

“I do love nothing in the world so well as you—is not that strange?”

– Much Ado About Nothing , Act 4, scene 1, line 281

Benedick and Beatrice, everybody’s favorite Shakespearean couple, provide us with a few of the most romantic lines in Shakespeare. See also: “I love you with so much of my heart that none is left to protest” (4.1.300), and “I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, and be buried in thy eyes” (5.2.101).

“My bounty is as boundless as the sea, My love as deep. The more I give to thee, The more I have, for both are infinite.”

– Romeo and Juliet , Act 2, scene 2, lines 140 – 142

“Thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings That then I scorn to change my state with kings.”

– Sonnet 29

“I kiss thee with a most constant heart.”

– Henry IV, Part 2 , Act 2, scene 4, line 274

“A heaven on earth I have won by wooing thee.”

– All’s Well That Ends Well ,  Act 4, scene 2, line 78

“When you do dance, I wish you A wave o’ th’ sea, that you might ever do Nothing but that. . . “

– The Winter’s Tale , Act 4, scene 4, line 166 – 168

“So are you to my thoughts as food to life, Or as sweet-seasoned showers are to the ground.”

– Sonnet 75

This sonnet isn’t quite so rapturous as its opening lines sound. We need food to live, but sometimes we eat too much. Things that grow in the earth need water, but too much rain will cause a flood. In Sonnet 75, the speaker finds that sometimes his passion can become unpleasantly overwhelming.

⇒ Related: the Reduced Shakespeare Company’s Austin Tichenor reflects on Shakespeare’s complicated and equivocal expressions of love.

“I would not wish any companion in the world but you.”

– The Tempest , Act 3, scene 1, lines 65 – 66

“Thee will I love, and with thee lead my life.”

– The Comedy of Errors ,  Act 3, scene 2, line 72

⇒ Related: Download illustrated Shakespearean valentines that you can send to your friends, family, and significant others.

“Love is a Devil”

Anyone who has experienced “the pangs of despised love” ( Hamlet,  3.1) knows that love doesn’t always end well. Shakespeare also wrote a lot about the challenges of being in love.

“The course of true love never did run smooth.”

– A Midsummer Night’s Dream ,  Act 1, scene 1, line 136

This line from Lysander might as well be  Midsummer’s  thesis statement; its central couples spend the whole play breaking up, making up, and, in Titania’s case, cuddling up with enchanted donkey-man Bottom.

“If music be the food of love, play on. Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, The appetite may sicken and so die.”

– Twelfth Night , Act 1, scene 1, line 1 – 3

Twelfth Night’s  opening line is one of Shakespeare’s most famous. But Duke Orsino goes on to say how miserable being in love makes him feel. “If music be the food of love,” he says, keep playing and fill me up so that I don’t feel this way any more!

“Love is a smoke rais’d with the fume of sighs; Being purg’d, a fire sparkling in a lover’s eyes; Being vex’d, a sea nourish’d with lovers’ tears: What is it else? a madness most discreet, A choking gall and a preserving sweet.”

– Romeo and Juliet , Act 1, scene 1, lines 197 – 201

“If thou rememb’rest not the slightest folly That ever love did make thee run into, Thou has not loved.”

– As You Like It , Act 2, scene 3, lines 33 – 35

As You Like It has a lot to say about what it’s like to be in love. In Act 3, Rosalind tells Orlando that a true lover has “a lean cheek. . . a blue eye and sunken. . .  an unquestionable spirit. . . a beard neglected.” If you’re really in love, Rosalind says, “your hose should be ungartered, your bonnet unbanded, your sleeve unbuttoned, your shoe untied, and everything about you demonstrating a careless desolation” (3.2). But how do lovers keep from tripping over their shoelaces?

In Act 2, scene 1 of Hamlet , when Ophelia is telling her father Polonius about Hamlet’s recent behavior, her description sounds a lot like Rosalind’s description of a lover:

Lord Hamlet, with his doublet all unbraced, No hat upon his head, his stockings fouled, Ungartered, and down-gyvèd to his ankle, Pale as his shirt, his knees knocking each other, And with a look so piteous in purport As if he had been loosèd out of hell To speak of horrors—he comes before me.

It’s not surprising that Polonius immediately guesses that Hamlet is in “ the very ecstasy of love.”

“When you depart from me, sorrow abides and happiness takes his leave.”

– Much Ado About Nothing , Act 1, scene 1, lines 99 – 100

What’s your favorite quotation about love from Shakespeare’s works?

Ben Lauer is the Folger's Social Media and Communications Manager. He is the web producer of the Folger's Shakespeare Unlimited podcast, and hosts the Folger's Shakespeare Lightning Round series on Instagram. — View all posts by Ben Lauer

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It isn’t the most obvious choice, but the ending couplet of Sonnet 109 resonated with me and reminded me of my wife: “For nothing this wide universe I call, / Save though, my rose; in it thou art my all.”

David Santangelo — February 4, 2022

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Shakespeare on Love and Lust

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• Language: English
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Home — Essay Samples — Literature — William Shakespeare — Shakespeare’s Love In Sonnet 18

Shakespeare’s Love in Sonnet 18

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Published: Oct 2, 2020

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