Persuasive Essay On The Existence of True Love in Shakespeare’s “Let Me Not To The Marriage of True Friends” and “How Do I Love Thee” By Browning
Introduction
Various pieces of literature have shown us the magic of true love, which exists even in the smallest and grandest scenarios in life. True love in poetry can move both the earth and the stars. Most essentially, it has the strength to withstand even the most challenging or intense situations. This persuasive essay will show the existence of true love in two literature sources that have received extensive reviews from a wide range of renowned scholars. They are Shakespeare’s, “Let Me Not to the Marriage of True Minds,” and “How Do I Love Thee?” by Elizabeth B Browning. It will vividly explain the different literary styles used by both Shakespeare and Browning to showcase true love in their sonnets.
Metaphoric Expression
This is an influential figure of speech writing style where indirect comparisons are made between two completely different objects. In Browning’s poem, the author uses this style to compare her soul to a three-dimensional physical object. She writes, “I love thee to the depth and breadth and height,” to show that her love can fill every space of such an object.
The same style, although somewhat different, is also echoed in Shakespeare’s poem, “Let Me Not The Marriage Of True Minds.” He uses the marriage metaphor to show its similarities to real or true love. When he says, “Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments,” in the first lines of the poem to express the thought that when two people are indeed in love with each other, nothing no ‘impediment’ should bring them apart or stand in their way (citation).
Perhaps Shakespeare was referring to his feeling of being an unknown young adult. Having lived in an unhappy marriage, he is merely rationalizing the sense that there’s no reason for any young man in his position to be denied true love even if he is married.
Imagery and Hyperbole
This is another powerful writing style used in both poems to showcase the existence of true love. First, in Browning’s poem, the use of imagery is meant to help the reader in perceiving things using their five basic senses. For instance, she writes, “Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light,” to show that her desire for true love is similar to how one needs light to see. This can also be argued to represent hyperbole, which is an exaggeration meant to emphasize or lure the reader to accepting a given idea. Whichever the case, Browning uses these two styles to perfection when explaining her need, desire, and expression of true love.
In Shakespeare’s Sonnet, there’s some beautiful and vivid use of Imagery primarily when he writes, “Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds or bends with the remover to remove.” He says this to cement his idea that love conquers all by letting the reader know that if love changes or ends, then it was not really love in the first place. Similarly, if someone tries to ‘extinguish’ it, he or she is bound to fail. Shakespeare, however, does not stop there. With the help of imagery and a sufficient amount of hyperbole, he describes love as something that’s ever-constant and unchanging even when faced with tempests or harrowing storms. He compares love to the stars guiding ships or back on the high seas.
Use of Anaphora or Repetition
This is the repetition of expressions, words, or phrases in the first section of every verse. For instance, in Elizabeth Browning’s poem, the phrase ‘love’ is used extensively to emphasize her ideas about love. This phrase appears in almost every line and keeps the readers directly fixed onto the message she is trying to communicate. Through this form of repetition, she wants anyone reading the poem to understand that true love is free, pure, and filled with passion. For example, in three consecutive sentences, she starts with the phrases, “I love thee freely,” “I love thee purely,” and “I love thee purely.”
Shakespeare uses the same style in repeating the phrase love at almost the start of every clause and sentence to show his negative view towards what people perceive to be true love. He warns the reader and his ‘lover’ that what appears to be love is not, in a genuine sense, ‘true love.’ His poem shows that what we refer to as ‘love’ is simply the resemblance or meager appearance of love. For example, he mentions that a lover’s cheeks and rosy lips get damaged and worn out with time. Hence, people shouldn’t base their assumption of love by looking at the physical components of a person as these won’t last long. He goes on to further show his readers that even death can’t stop the existence and growth of true love. It might kill the lovers but not the ‘deep feeling’ they have for each other.
Conclusion
It’s evident that from the two poems, the existence of love and indeed ‘true love’ is something which both Browning and Shakespeare want their readers to understand. Both poems show that love is a powerful feeling that’s capable of conquering anything. However, despite their similarities in the message being communicated, both poems use a different tone of expression. Shakespeare is more arrogant and scoffs at the idea of what people call ‘true love’ while Browning’s poem is a revelation of the growing love she feels for her lover.