Sonnet 129

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Sonnet 129 in the 1609 Quarto
Q1 Q2 Q3 C The expense of spirit in a waste of shame Is lust in action; and till action, lust Is perjur’d, murderous, bloody, full of blame, Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust; Enjoy’d no sooner but despised straight; Past reason hunted; and no sooner had, Past reason hated, as a swallow’d bait, On purpose laid to make the taker mad: Mad in pursuit, and in possession so; Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme; A bliss in proof, and prov’d, a very woe; Before, a joy propos’d; behind, a dream. All this the world well knows; yet none knows well To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell. 4 8 12 14 —William Shakespeare

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Q2



Q3



C

The expense of spirit in a waste of shame
Is lust in action; and till action, lust
Is perjur’d, murderous, bloody, full of blame,
Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust;
Enjoy’d no sooner but despised straight;
Past reason hunted; and no sooner had,
Past reason hated, as a swallow’d bait,
On purpose laid to make the taker mad:
Mad in pursuit, and in possession so;
Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme;
A bliss in proof, and prov’d, a very woe;
Before, a joy propos’d; behind, a dream.
All this the world well knows; yet none knows well
To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.

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12

14

Sonnet 129 is one of the 154 sonnets written by William Shakespeare. The 154 sonnets are typically divided between the "Fair Youth" sonnets (1–126) and the "Dark Lady" sonnets (127–152). There is no evidence that this division follows the chronology of the sonnets. The composition date is unknown but it was published along with the rest of the sonnets in the 1609 Quarto.

Sonnet 129 is one of Shakespeare's most famous sonnets and centers on the idea of the human mind and its primal urges. The sonnet consists of an unknown narrator having an internal mediation with himself about his sexuality; he fears it and harvests feelings of self-disgust for having such desires. "Omne animal post coitum triste est" is a Latin saying that is often quoted in association to sonnet 129. The phrase literally translates into "after sex, every animal is sad." That is the message the sonnet conveys. Shakespeare builds up the sonnet with imagery and desire, and ends it with the feeling of being a victim to lust, as well as the feelings of defeat and disappointment that ensue after the act is done and the desire is no longer there. "Sonnet 129 fixes and deprecates lust with...murderous precision" and Shakespeare leaves us questioning our own primal urges.

Sonnet 129 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 8th line exemplifies a regular iambic pentameter: