Sonnet 116

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Sonnet 116 in the 1609 Quarto (where it is mis-numbered as 119)
Q1 Q2 Q3 C Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark, That looks on tempests and is never shaken; It is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken. Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle’s compass come; Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved. 4 8 12 14 —William Shakespeare

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Q2



Q3



C

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.
Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle’s compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

4



8



12

14

Shakespeare's Sonnet 116 was first published in 1609. Its structure and form are a typical example of the Shakespearean sonnet.

The poet begins by stating he should not stand in the way of "the marriage of true minds", and that love cannot be true if it changes for any reason; true love should be constant, through any difficulties. In the seventh line, the poet makes a nautical reference, alluding to love being much like the north star is to sailors. Love also should not fade with time; instead, true love is, as is the polar star, "ever-fixèd" and lasts forever.

"The movement of 116, like its tone, is careful, controlled, laborious…it defines and redefines its subject in each quatrain, and this subject becomes increasingly vulnerable". It starts out as motionless and distant, remote, independent—then moves to be "less remote, more tangible and earthbound", and the final couplet brings a sense of "coming back down to earth". Ideal love is deteriorating throughout the sonnet and continues to do so through the couplet.

Sonnet 116 is an English or Shakespearean sonnet. The English sonnet has three quatrains, followed by a final rhyming couplet. It follows the typical rhyme scheme of the form abab cdcd efef gg and is composed in iambic pentameter, a type of poetic metre based on five pairs of metrically weak/strong syllabic positions. The 10th line exemplifies a regular iambic pentameter: