Rodriguez Jewels Rodriguez 3 July 2012 Critical Analysis of Let me not the marriage of true minds

William Shakespeares Let me not the marriage of true minds is a sonnet about love and relationships angled towards the meaning of true love, specifically beyond the physical and platonic manner. Not only does Shakespeare relate this sonnet to love and relationship between adults, he also inadvertently relates his story to Cupid and Psyche the story of the heart and mindwhich explains the meaning of love. The Greek myth compliments Shakespeares comparison of love to Love by emphasizing that Loveindicated by capitalization as true loveis boundless and adaptive to changing circumstances as compared to the indicative lowercased love which is circumstantial. In the first quatrain, Shakespeare explores the qualities not associated with love. He provides a metaphorical allusion to explain the merits of love through the word marriage. The phrase marriage of the minds emphasizes a love that essentially describes the connection beyond a marriage of the bodya term used to describe a love created with a base of lust and physical connectionand a marriage of the heart a quintessentially emotion-based love that is not fully realized. The Love of the mind has grown to essentially connect the two lovers through body and spirit in a mature and eternal form. This relates to personal relationships by expressing that true love is everlasting. The enjambment following the first line symbolizes a connection that surpasses impediments. The third line follows this connection by stating that love is changed when a difficult situation arises. This statement is a perfect allegory to the Greek myth of Cupid and Psyche in that Psyche loved Cupid despite the fact she had never seen

Rodriguez him. This is also a reverse allusion to the myth because Psyches love was conditional under the pretense that Cupid was not a monster. In the next line, Shakespeare emphasizes that love can be removed when such alteration occurs. Alternatively, the second quatrain speaks about what true love is. When Shakespeare says, it is an ever-fixed mark through the metaphorical tempests he

suggest that love remains a fixed point and is never shaken. In other words, Love can be weathered down by time and difficult circumstances but still remains true. This is similar to the Greek myth of Cupid and Psyche in that their relationship was weathered in her attempt to take his life; however, since their love was true love, they reconciled. In line seven, Shakespeare allegorizes olden day nautical travels with love by saying that although it may be weathered, love stands as a star to every wandering bark. This references the fact that ship captains would follow the North Star to find their way back home because it was the only fixed point in the sky. He follows this by adding that the value of love is unknown but it can be measured by comparing love to a starthis was appropriate in his timeline because scientist in the Shakespearean Era did not know what stars consisted of; however, ship captains could easily fix their positions using star maps by identifying the relative height of the North Star. This relates to Psyche because even though she was asked to complete three impossible tasks to see Cupid, she stood through each one of them because she valued her love for Cupid. Even though Psyches love was unknown, it was clear that she would do anything to find her way back to Cupid. In the third quatrain, Shakespeare adds to the concept that love is fixed in time by saying that it does not entertain timelove does not behave as Times fool. Essentially, Shakespeare uses time to personify death in saying that love surpasses death

Rodriguez and goes beyond the bending [of] its sicklewhich symbolizes the scythe; the embodiment of deaths grip. Also, this line indicates that love is unbiased towards time and remains the same. This is elaborated upon by, the statement rosy lips and cheeks

which indicates a persons fading physical quality as time progresses. In the Greek myth, Cupid and Psyches love is proven to be true because it becomes everlastingthis is because at the end of the myth, Psyche becomes a goddess. Respectively, Shakespeare adds that love is inattentive toward time and in essence, it surpasses the edge of doom or end of timeallegorically, the Day of Judgment in keeping with the metaphor of death. Shakespeare ends this quatrain with a logical couplet to challenge the readers dispute of his ideals on the basis and composition of Love. He uses a redundancy statement to establish his ethos on the subject. Furthermore, Shakespeares description of true love circumvents the elements of Greek mythos pertaining to Cupid and Psyche by exploring the concept of love and its relation to time and its ability to remain pure and unshaken through difficult obstacles. He provides many metaphorical analogies to prove that there was a difference between love and Love. Love is never ending even through death Love still exists; however, love fades in time when the mind and body began to decay. Through difficult situations and failed expectations love is altered by the remover to remove and is ever shaken.

Rodriguez Works Cited Boeree, George. "Psyche and Eros." Psyche and Eros. N.p., 1999. Web. 03 July 2012. <http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/psyche.html>. Shakespeare, William. "Let Me Not to the Marriage of True Minds." Perrine's Literature: Structure, Sound, and Sense. 11th ed. Australia: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2012. Print.