Time: Invincible and Inevitable in Shakespeare's Sonnets Anonymous 11th Grade

The passage of time is something that we all see as inevitable. Eventually in time all things will fade; specifically as noted in the twelfth sonnet beauty, but also that all humans eventually die. Shakespeare’s twelfth sonnet tries to explore the issue of time overcoming all, and beauty fading. It does this through the eyes of a speaker, talking about a person who is either their lover or a close friend. In the sonnet, Shakespeare gives us a wide variety of cues to indicate to us what the speaker is talking about, and what their feelings are. Through almost all of the sonnet the speaker is trying to address the issues of time, and its power. At the end of the sonnet the speaker experiences a revelation about what is important to do and pass on in the limited time that we have before we die.

In Shakespeare’s twelfth sonnet, we see through the use of description, rhythm and meter, and revelation, the speaker’s understanding of the passage of time, and why reproduction should be the ultimate goal and importance in our lifetime. Shakespeare in his twelfth sonnet uses description of the passage of time by the speaker to convey what he thinks is either important, or unimportant and fades in time. The first two quatrains of the...