Sonnet 1,

In this sonnet, Shakespeare has used natural imagery, example, “That thereby beauty’s rose might never die”, this shows that Shakespeare is talking about the person (either man or woman) who can never die. In his sonnet, his rhyming pattern goes in a ‘ABAB’ method.

Sonnet 2,

In this sonnet, the phrase ‘Where all the treasure of thy lusty days’, might be telling us that the treasure is the person who Shakespeare is talking about and ‘lusty days’ might mean they are sleeping everyday.

Sonnet 3,

In sonnet 3, Shakespeare now talks about an old woman who could possibly be his mum. The phrase ‘Look in thy glass and tell the face thou viewest’ tells me that the woman is looking at people through a glass, so that would mean that she has a glass eye and is looking at their faces as it also says ‘and tell the face thou viewest’.

Sonnet 18,

In sonnet 18, Shakespeare uses natural imagery to present love by talking about weather, for example, ‘darling buds of May’ ‘sweet birds sang’ and ‘twilight of such day’. These quotations suggest that he loves the person more than nature itself. Shakespeare also uses hyperbole in sonnet 18 by exaggerating the word ‘more’ to explain more about the summer’s day.

Sonnet 73,

In sonnet 73, Shakespeare mentions a series of weather which could be describing the special person he is talking about, example, ‘sunset fadeth in the west’, ‘black night doth’ and ‘glowing of such fire’. What these three sentences have in common is that they all mention something about the time of day.

Sonnet summaries,

by Nemare Taylor-Duffus