By 1592, aged 28, Shakespeare was in London and already established as both an actor and a dramatist.

There is little evidence for Shakespeare's London career. Between 1592 and 1594, when the theatres
were frequently closed because of the plague, he wrote his earliest poems Venus and Adonis His first
plays have been dated to 1590 or even earlier, when he may have been a member of the Queen's Men.
Shakespeare was probably a founder member of the Lord Chamberlain's Men, an acting company.

Shakespeare wrote the majority of the 37 plays which are now accepted as his, as well as collaborating
on several more, between 1594 and 1613. As an actor, he was associated with the parts of kings and old
men. His roles may have included the Ghost in Hamlet and old Adam in As You Like It.

Shakespeare is named in the 1599 lease for the Globe, the new playhouse built by the Lord
Chamberlain's Men from the dismantled timbers of the Theatre. Many of Shakespeare's greatest plays
were written for this open-air playhouse.
SONNET 18 PARAPHRASE

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Shall I compare you to a summer's day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate: You are more lovely and more constant:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, Rough winds shake the beloved buds of May

And summer's lease hath all too short a date: And summer is far too short:

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, At times the sun is too hot,

And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; Or often goes behind the clouds;

And every fair from fair sometime declines, And everything beautiful sometime will lose its beauty,

By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm'd; By misfortune or by nature's planned out course.

But thy eternal summer shall not fade But your youth shall not fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st; Nor will you lose the beauty that you possess;

Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, Nor will death claim you for his own,

When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st; Because in my eternal verse you will live forever.

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long as there are people on this earth,

So long lives this and this gives life to thee. So long will this poem live on, making you immortal.

Sonnet 18 is the best known and most well-loved of all 154 sonnets. It is also one of the most
straightforward in language and intent. The stability of love and its power to immortalize the subject of
the poet's verse is the theme.

The poet starts the praise of his dear friend without ostentation, but he slowly builds the image of his
friend into that of a perfect being. His friend is first compared to summer, but, at the start of the third
quatrain (9), he is summer, and thus, he has metamorphosed into the standard by which true beauty
can and should be judged. The poet's only answer to such profound joy and beauty is to ensure that his
friend be forever in human memory, saved from the oblivion that accompanies death. He achieves this
through his verse, believing that, as history writes itself, his friend will become one with time. The final
couplet reaffirms the poet's hope that as long as there is breath in mankind, his poetry too will live on,
and ensure the immortality of his muse.
 SONNET 116 PARAPHRASE

Let me not to the marriage of true minds Let me not declare any reasons why two

Admit impediments. Love is not love True-minded people should not be married. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds, Which changes when it finds a change in circumstances,

Or bends with the remover to remove: Or bends from its firm stand even when a lover is unfaithful:

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark Oh no! it is a lighthouse

That looks on tempests and is never shaken; That sees storms but it never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark, Love is the guiding north star to every lost ship,

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken. Whose value cannot be calculated, although its
altitude can be measured.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Love is not at the mercy of Time, though
physical beauty

Within his bending sickle's compass come: Comes within the compass of his sickle.

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, Love does not alter with hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom. But, rather, it endures until the last day of life.

If this be error and upon me proved, If I am proved wrong about these thoughts on love

I never writ, nor no man ever loved. Then I recant all that I have written, and no man has
ever [truly] loved.

Sonnet 116 is about love in its most ideal form. The poet praises the glories of lovers who have come to
each other freely, and enter into a relationship based on trust and understanding. The first four lines reveal
the poet's pleasure in love that is constant and strong, and will not "alter when it alteration finds." The
following lines proclaim that true love is indeed an "ever-fix'd mark" which will survive any crisis. In lines 7-8,
the poet claims that we may be able to measure love to some degree, but this does not mean we fully
understand it. Love's actual worth cannot be known it remains a mystery. The remaining lines reaffirm the
perfect nature of love that is unshakeable throughout time and remains so "ev'n to the edge of doom", or
death.

In the final couplet, the poet declares that, if he is mistaken about the constant, unmovable nature of
perfect love, then he must take back all his writings on love, truth, and faith. Moreover, he adds that, if he
has in fact judged love inappropriately, no man has ever really loved, in the ideal sense that the poet
professes.