William Shakespeare is known for his deep, meaningful poems and strong comparisons of a woman’s beauty and ideals to the norm and views of his time. In “Sonnet 130”, the theme and overall message is no different as he challenges the idea of “false comparisons” between women, and unattainable thoughts of high quality and perfection. Throughout William Shakespeare’s Sonnet 130 he uses clever metaphors and choices of diction to, seemingly, harshly describe his mistress. He says that “[His] mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun,”(Shakespeare 1) implying her eyes must be dull and unextraordinary. However, Shakespeare does this in a very interesting way, as the “insults” seem to compliment the object being referred to as well. By saying ones eyes aren't as bright or vibrant as the sun, the …show more content…
Focusing strongly on outer beauty in the rest of the passage however, rather than inner beauty, Shakespeare paints a vivid mental image through his use of metaphor and imagery. This image, painted with his “compliments’ such as; having dull lips, or bad breath, compared to roses and perfumes (Shakespeare 2, 7-8), shows how people in Shakespeare’s time and people in our time perceive beauty. Glorifying a woman’s beauty is seen as a compliment, however it constructs a very high standard to live by. When women do not meet this standard their appeal diminishes along with their uniquenesses, as seen in with the mistress in Shakespeare’s sonnet. In the last two lines of Sonnet 130 he says “yet, [he thinks his love is] rare as any belied with false compare.”(Shakespeare 13-14) He conveys that anyone will seem unattractive, unkempt, and boring when glorified to something or, some being that is realistically impossible to reach or recreate. People of Shakespeare’s time however did not have that sort of outlook and