Sonnet 19 PDF

Preview

Summary

Sonnet 19 Ideen ...

Description

Sonnet 19: Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws By William Shakespeare 1609 Renaissance

Devouring Time, blunt thou the lion's paws, And make the earth devour her own sweet brood; Pluck the keen teeth from the fierce tiger's jaws, And burn the long-liv'd Phoenix in her blood; Make glad and sorry seasons as thou fleets, 5 And do whate'er thou wilt, swift-footed Time, To the wide world and all her fading sweets; But I forbid thee one more heinous crime: O, carve not with the hours my love's fair brow, 10 Nor draw no lines there with thine antique pen! Him in thy course untainted do allow For beauty's pattern to succeeding men. Yet do thy worst, old Time! Despite thy wrong My love shall in my verse ever live young.

„stutze du des Löwen Klauen“

➢ Theme: love; beauty (outward form of the beloved (who is male)); time that destroys this beauty -> but -

speaker says “I write you down as beautiful, my lines will survive time as long as people read the poem you will remain beautiful”  eternity (death)

- l.1: Devouring Time -> personification of time; considered to be a god-like structure; mighty enough to kill (lion as the king of the animals – powerful, making him incapable of hunting again) - l.2: devour -> onomatopoeia (to pronounce the word write, you have to grow open your mouth which imitates the -

action “devouring” -> sound-imitating)

- l.2: her own sweet brood -> a) lion becomes incapable of hunting, incapable of living, dies → circle of life (generations coming and going) a) b) rush action: earth might open (earthquake…) and devour everything on it; famines, natural catastrophes… - l.3: sharp sounds -> keen teeth (double e), fierce tiger’s (two ie – constructions) sounds unpleasant (time -

destroys again)

- l.4: Phoenix -> fantastic bird that lives for a very long time (500 years), then goes up in flames and falls to ashes, comes back (combines a long live with a death but coming back to life)  first quatrain: time presented as very powerful at the beginning; starts with powerful representatives that time might destroy (lion), goes into more general terms that can be destroyed (sweet brood), back to another powerful individual that can be destroyed (tiger), then comes back to a summarizing individual that combines hopes of mankind (eternity) -> at the end – time seems less powerful  second quatrain: less dramatic; time reduced to everyday visit; images of passing away - l.8: speaker first time mentioned as the “I” that speaks - l.9+10: doesn’t want his beloved to grow old and show signs of ageing; antique pen – that makes old; allow my lover to stay beautiful (wants that for one particular person – one individual) - time might destroy his beauty but poetry reserves the beloved’s beauty as long as people read it - give him eternity -> and time can do nothing against it - overcome mortality -> dream of mankind; captures that idea “Vita brevis ars longa” – Life is short, the art is longer...