In “Sonnet 127”, Shakespeare begins to ease the reader into these new philosophical and practical conceptualizations and meanings of beauty and love. Black is the new beauty, he contends, “the successive heir” (l. 2) to the type of beauty glorified by Spenser and the other Italian and English poets who perfected the sonnet form. This sonnet is more general than the subject that Shakespeare will tackle with his meaning of “Sonnet 130,” in which he will speak of his love directly and in which he will paradoxically enumerate all of her unappealing, unattractive personality traits and physical attributes. In “Sonnet 127,” however, Shakespeare is in a more pensive mood. In this sonnet, Shakespeare reflects upon the established social definitions of beauty.

In Sonnet 127 by William Shakespeare, the speaker  muses briefly but vehemently about cosmetic modifications to natural features, a practice which he detests, calling it “a bastard shame” (l. 3). Regardless of a woman’s physical attractiveness, Shakespeare contends that the use of make-up constitutes an act of insincerity and disingenuousness, as the made-up face is a “false borrow’d face” (l. 5) that is “profaned” and “disgraced” (l. 7). Even for the woman who is “not born fair” (l. 10), making oneself up is an act of “Slandering creation with a false esteem” (l. 12). With this determinedly assertive statement, in this sonnet by William Shakespeare seems to suggest that beauty can be found in every person, though that beauty may not always be physical. Any attempts to change one’s features are useless distortions that not only betray creation, but also the self. Above all, Shakespeare seems to call for absolute authenticity, which is alluded to in this sonnet as the ultimate standard of beauty.

 “Sonnet 130” is a fascinating and humorously compelling treatment of a specific woman, the Dark Lady, who is Shakespeare’s mistress. In “Sonnet 130” Shakespeare establishes the beauty of his love by declaring what the Dark Lady is not. The laundry list of negative qualities is an effective means of engaging the reader, who wonders how the poet can love a woman about whom he evidently finds so little to admire and attract him. This sonnet totally defies a reader of sonnets’ expectations about what the form and its subject are. After reading Petrarch’s fawning “Laura” sonnets or Spenser’s endlessly admiring compositions about his fair, golden-haired muse, reading Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 130” is remarkable and refreshing for its comedic approach to the subject and its not-so-subtle poking fun at the other sonnet writers. Because it is so unexpected and so distinct from the other traditional sonnets and the treatment of their subjects, “Sonnet 130” gains its authority and power to exert influence over the reader to change his or her own notions of beauty and, perhaps more importantly, of love.

In “Sonnet 130” Shakespeare declares with incredible candor how his love does not possess any of the qualities that are traditionally considered characteristic of beauty. The construction of the poem and the inclusion of specific aspects of physical attributes almost seems to be a direct response to Spenser’s “Fair is my love, when her fair golden hairs.” The eyes of Shakespeare’s Dark Lady are not shining “like the sun” (l. 1), and her breasts, while dun, do not evoke the kind of rich imagery that so moved Spenser. The Dark Lady’s hair does not call up images of a bright angelic halo or golden light; instead, the Dark Lady’s hair is “black wires” (l. 4). Unlike Spenser’s beauty, Shakespeare’s love does not have rosy cheeks that mirror the beauty of “roses damask’d, red and white” (l. 5). Shakespeare goes still further, addressing a characteristic as intimate and personal as his love’s breath, which “reeks” (l. 8) and is nothing like perfumes, which hold far “more delight” for the poet’s senses (l. 7). Finally, the poet contests the idea that the feminine muse glides through life and the poet’s life; his beauty “treads on the ground” (l. 12); she is fully earth-bound, not a heavenly creature descended directly from God for the poet’s enjoyment.

The end of “Sonnet 130” lacks resolution, in a sense. While the poet unequivocally declares his love for this strange beauty, and has defined and defended her beauty as equally valid as the notions of traditional beauty, Shakespeare has not really said what makes his love so strong and so “rare” (l. 13). Hubler, however, says that this lack of information does not really matter with respect to coming to a valid interpretation of the poem (39). He contends that Shakespeare demonstrates “his awareness of a discrepancy between the ideal and the fact [and] the fact did not seem to matter” (Hubler 39). Hubler continues, observing that Shakespeare was “[a]ware of the ideal, [but] declares himself in favor of alloyed reality. He does not say that he loves [the Dark Lady] in spite of her faults; he loves her faults and all” (Hubler 40). In a sense, then, it is not important why Shakespeare loves the Dark Lady, but rather that he loves her at all and that he is willing to defend her and her strange beauty amongst what Marcus calls the “hordes of golden-tressed women” (13) so boldly in this series of sonnets. As Hubler concludes, love is never anchored anywhere other than the earth. In “Sonnet 130”, Shakespeare keeps himself and the reader firmly attached to solid ground, where a realistic assessment of ourselves and one another is possible. This, then, is the point of the “Dark Lady” sonnet cycle: to present desire, beauty, and love as they are, not as we wish them to be, and to thereby prevent unnecessary conflicts within ourselves about those subjects which persistently occupy human attentions and emotions (Armstrong 135).

Considered alongside the entire impressive corpus of Shakespeare’s poetic and dramatic writings, these two sonnets are representative of Shakespeare’s philosophy of love. Although, as Hubler points out, Romeo and Juliet suggests that “love is worthy dying for” (41), the love between the two star-crossed youths is “not idealized to the point of irrelevance to actual life” (41), and it never “den[ies] the body” (Hubler 41). This observation is also true of Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 127” and “Sonnet 130”. In fact, the earthliness– indeed, the flawed humanity– of Shakespeare’s cast of characters, whether in his plays or in these poems, assures the reader that love is achievable. Shakespeare cautions the reader, however, against the acceptance of a false brand of love. Instead, he urges the reader to understand and accept that true love is not always, or ever, as beautiful as Spenser, Petrarch, and other poets might convince the reader to believe.

“Sonnet 127” and “Sonnet 130” were radical because they broke from poetic conventions. In doing so, Shakespeare made a case for a new and more inclusive kind of beauty. Although the contemporary reader engages with these poems almost five hundred years after they were written, the themes remain relevant. This is especially true in our beauty-obsessed culture, which in many ways has not advanced significantly in expanding notions of what it means to be beautiful. These sonnets, then, serve as a reminder that beauty comes in all kinds of physical forms, but the beholder must be willing, like Shakespeare, to challenge and redefine conventional beauty.

Other essays and articles in the Literature Archives related to this topic include : Poetry Comparison of Dover Beach (Arnold) and Sonnet 29 (Shakespeare)


Works Cited

Armstrong, Philip. Shakespeare in Psychoanalysis. New York: Routledge, 2001.

Hubler, Edward. The Sense of Shakespeare’s Sonnets. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UniversityPress, 1952.

Marcus, Leah S. Unediting the Renaissance: Shakespeare, Marlowe, Milton. New York: Routledge, 1996.

Shakespeare, William. “Sonnet 127.” Retrieved March 21, 2007 fromhttp://www.shakespeare-online.com/sonnets/127.html

Shakespeare, William. “Sonnet 130.” Retrieved March 21, 2007 fromhttp://www.shakespeare-online.com/sonnets/130.html

Spenser, Edmund. “Fair is my love, when her fair golden hairs.” Retrieved on March 21, 2007 fromhttp://www.sonnets.org/spenser.htm#001

Vickers, Brian. William Shakespeare: The Critical Heritage, Vol. 6. London: Routledge, 1974.