Research Paper on:
Shakespeare/Sonnet 18

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
and the immorality of the poets verse. The beginning of the poem is devoted to comparing the beauty of the youth that the poet is addressing to a perfect summer  day. However, the point to the poem is not the beauty of youth, per se, but rather that Shakespeare offers a form of immorality. Specifically, the point is that while  summer will eventually be over, the beauty of the youth will live on because Shakespeare has immortalized the youths beauty in his verse. Shakespeare begins this sonnet by asking:  "Shall I compare thee to a summers day?" He then devotes the majority of the sonnet to answering this question. His first observation is that the beauty of the youth  is both "more lovely" and "more temperate" than a summers day (line 2). High winds often accompany spring flowers, and summers "lease," i.e. the time that it can stay,  is actually quite short (lines 3-4). The student researching this topic will note that this sonnet is relatively unadorned. There is little in the way of assonance or alliteration.  Likewise, its metaphors are simple, substantiating the extended metaphor, which compares the youths beauty to a summers day, as noted by the simple beginning. However, to say that one is  "temperate" is not exactly a great complement. Therefore, Shakespeare adds to this in the next line stating that "rough" winds can shake the "darling buds of May" (line 2). This  line also brings to mind the image of winds shaking tree limbs heavy with spring blossoms, which is a strikingly lovely image. The next lines read: "Sometimes too hot  the eye of heaven shines / And often is his gold complexion dimmed" (lines 5-6). The "eye of heaven" is, of course, a metaphor for the sun. Frequently, the summer