Shakeaspear's Sonnets Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Shakeaspear's Sonnets - Essay Example He says that when he thinks of the past, he remembers that he had sought many things then, and regrets that he had not been able to acquire any of those things by now. The use of words like ‘sigh’ and ‘lack’ accentuates his gloomy mood and unhappy thoughts. By saying ‘many a thing I sought,’ again the sense of unfullfilment and feeling of being in a deprived state are brought through to the reader. â€Å"And with old woes new wail my dear times’ waste†: Here he expresses that his thoughts about the old miseries, renews them afresh, and he â€Å"wails† his â€Å"dear times’ waste.† Once again the use of alliteration: starting the words ‘woes’, ‘wails’ and ‘waste’ with the same consonant ‘w’, emphasizes his expression of loss, and how it affected him to think that his precious time in the past had been wasted, as he lacked now many of those things that he had so ught then. The usage of ‘old’ and ‘new’ which are of opposite meaning, closely placed: ‘And with old woes new wail†¦Ã¢â‚¬â„¢ is an example of Shakespeare’s stylistic expression. The second quatrain of the sonnet expresses the poet’s grief at the loss of ‘precious friends’. who he says are hidden in ‘death’s dateless night’. Again, the use of alliteration, i.e. repetition of the starting consonant ‘d’ in two consecutive words, adds to the rhythm of the line. The word ‘dateless’ alludes to the timelessness of death, which is eternal. The use of another poetic device ‘assonance’ is used to enhance the rhythm: i.e. similar vowel sounds in accented syllables, as the short ‘e’ sound in the words ‘precious friends.’ This is also seen in the beginning of the sonnet: ‘When to the sessions’ and ‘remembrance’. Also, the first and last words of the poem: When and end also have assonance, and serve the function of unifying the entire poem. The same tone of sad loss is repeated when he talks of weeping again over old