Poetry Notes - Mrs-claassen.co.za

SONNET 104
By William Shakespeare
POEM: EXPLANATION:
To me, fair friend, you never can be old, The poet is writing a tribute to his friend. Fair = good / fine. Age is NOT a
good thing, so the poet is saying, don’t worry, I’ll never think of you as old.
For as you were when first your eye I eyed, To me you’re just the same as when I first met you. Shakespeare uses the
phrase “eye I eyed”. He uses this play on words to say ‘when I first saw
you’. The phrase creates rhythm.
Such seems your beauty still. Three winters As you were, so you remain.
cold
Have from the forests shook three summers’
pride,
Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn
turned
He uses a metaphor of the seasons to indicate the passing of time. When
the season changes from summer to winter, the leaves, fruit, flowers, etc
(i.e. the pride of summer) fall from the trees. So he’s saying that three years
have passed (summer to winter x 3).
He continues the metaphor by saying that three springs (beauteous =
beautiful, bountiful) have turned to autumn when all the leaves turn yellow
(spring to autumn x 3).
In process of the seasons have I seen, The metaphor continues. In spring, all the plants smell gorgeous. However,
Three April perfumes in three hot Junes as summer reaches its height, the heat becomes too much and flowers
burned
begin to wilt (spring to summer x 3).
Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are All this passing of time (i.e. three years) has occurred since he first met his
green.
friend. Shakespeare uses the words “fresh” and “green” to continue on the
whole nature metaphor. Green = new. The memory of his friend looking all
sparkly and wonderful is still fresh / green / new in his mind.
Ah yet doth beauty, like a dial hand, Now Shakespeare gets down to reality. He admits that time changes a
Steal from his figure, and no pace perceived, person (“steals from his figure”). He compares the aging process to the
hands of a clock (“dial hand”). You don’t really notice it move but yet it does
(“no pace perceived”).
So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth In the same way, Shakespeare’s friend is also aging (“your sweet hue …
stand,
hath motion”). However, Shakespeare chooses not to see this (“methinks
Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceived. still doth stand” / “my eye may be deceived”).
For fear of which, hear this, thou age unbred; And now comes the ‘punchline’ of the poem. Shakespeare speaks to the
“age unbred”, in other words, the generations of people who haven’t yet
been born.
Ere you were born was beauty’s summer He says: sorry for you! The ultimate in beauty (“beauty’s summer”) – i.e. his
dead.
friend – has already lived and died before you were ever born.