Biology is not kind to humans, nor is time. Shakespeare emphasizes this idea in his sonnets 15, 65 & 73. All three sonnets take the reader on an inevitable quest we’re all too familiar with: life. Life consists of urgency, uncertainty, beauty, unpleasant moments, and finite time, and this is evident in selected poems by Shakespeare. In Sonnet 15, beauty only exists for a moment, and it is destroyed by time. Sonnet 65 addresses the question of how beauty, something so frail, can be protected against mortality. Lastly, in Sonnet 73, Shakespeare writes to inform his beloved that he will die soon. Sonnets 15, 65, and 73 make the case that Shakespeare views time as a destroyer and thief of beauty, and that it has psychologically manipulated us into a sense of urgency. For the sake of brevity, my analysis will focus on Sonnet 15, which is by far my favorite, second to Sonnet 29.

Beauty only exists for a moment and is finite in Shakespeare’s Sonnet 15. In this sonnet, Shakespeare takes us on a journey of growth, decline, and mortality, calling on the younger generation to reproduce to preserve beauty and reminding us that time will eventually forget it. In the first quatrain, Shakespeare argues that “everything that grows / Holds in perfection for a little moment” (Shakespeare 1-2), meaning that anything living reaches a prime stage and lasts only a flash. As assumed, a great number of people understand that Shakespeare lived his life on the stage. With this context in mind, he argues that life is nothing but a show and that one must not take it seriously; life has been written in the stars, “Whereon the stars in secret influence comment” (4), arguing that our fates have been decided. On the flip side, one can argue that Shakespeare is interpreting human life as a performance whose beauty is temporary. The “stars” in this sonnet closely resemble their historical usage as a navigation and religious guide, and an element that would help tell generational stories of belonging, mystery, and wander. In the second quatrain, Shakespeare utilizes a simile to compare humans to plants, “men as plants increase” (5), to demonstrate that humans are governed by the same natural forces of growth, decay, and death, “cheered and checked even by the selfsame sky” (6). Just as plants, living humans reach a prime stage of growth until their youthful stage starts to decline, “Vaunt in their youthful sap, at height decrease” (7). In the third and final quatrain, the idea that everything that grows remains in its prime for a flash before time starts to decay beauty is expressed: “Where wasteful Time debateth with Decay”(11). Another important aspect of this sonnet is that, in line eleven, it evokes the sensation that “Time” and “Decay” are debating when the optimal moment to begin consuming beauty is. “Decay,” in a sense, has taken the role of the grim reaper who is hovering over a living being, waiting for the perfect moment to welcome the dead.

Collectively, sonnets 15, 65, and 73 argue that Shakespeare views time as a thief of beauty, an unstoppable force, creating a sense of urgency. Overall, Sonnet 15 emphasizes the brevity of beauty and human struggle to preserve it in the forces of decay.

Sources

Shakespeare, William. “Sonnet 15.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature, edited by Stephen Greenblatt et al., vol B, 11th ed., W.W. Norton & Company, 2024, p. 626