Content
Sonnet 32 is highly dependent upon the relationship between the subject and speaker of the sonnet. The speaker of the sonnet reflects upon “his own mortality” in comparing himself to the young man whom he loves, whether romantically or in friendship it is unclear. The speaker refers to himself as the “deceased lover” which is significant as it highlights the age difference between the two men, a perpetual theme throughout Sonnet 32 as well as the rest of the handsome youth sonnets. After accepting, his eventual death, the speaker takes on a “self-deprecating” tone referring to his poetry as “poor rude lines” (4) and beseeching the youth to remember him after his death. This emphasis on his failure in poetry is imperative as it frames the rest of the sonnet and the speaker’s request for the young man to remember him “for his love” (14).
The nature of this love is in disagreement however. While some critics believe that the love the speaker refers to is in actuality a “romantic” love, others are convinced that the “love” (14) referred to is a “platonic love”. Regardless of the type of love that is illustrated within the sonnet, romantic or platonic, the love declaration should be considered significant as it characterizes the speaker’s tone and content. However, the audience should “take with a pinch of salt” the seemingly modest self-denunciation and claims of inadequacy put forth by the speaker; due to the fact that they are simply a means by which the speaker emphasizes his affection for the subject.
Subsequently, the content of Sonnet 32 is dependent upon the outlook of the speaker and the love he feels for the subject.
Read more about this topic: Sonnet 32
Famous quotes containing the word content:
“I were content to wearie out my paine,
To bee Narsissus so she were a spring
To drowne in hir those woes my heart do wring:
And more I wish transformed to remaine:
That whilest I thus in pleasures lappe did lye,
I might refresh desire, which else would die.”
—Thomas Lodge (1558?–1625)
“I was not content to believe in a personal devil and serve him, in the ordinary sense of the word. I wanted to get hold of him personally and become his chief of staff.”
—Aleister Crowley (1875–1947)
“First it must be known that only a spoken word or a conventional sign is an equivocal or univocal term; therefore a mental content or concept is, strictly speaking, neither equivocal nor univocal.”
—William of Occam (c. 1285–1349)