Sonnet 29 When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes
William Shakespeare
When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries
And look upon myself and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possess'd,
Desiring this man's art and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remember'd such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.
Analysis
The Shakespearean love poem, Sonnet 29, begins at a state
of utter dejection and rises to a state of bliss.
In Shakespeare's love poem, Sonnet 29, Shakespeare elegantly
moves the speaker from the lowest possible state in which
a human being can exist, to a state that nearly reaches
the angels.
To follow the movement of the sonnet, the reader needs to
notice Shakespeare's artful use and placement of a single
word: State. The word, state (as in state of being, or station
in life) is used three times, toward the beginning, middle, and
end of the poem. The reader should notice how that 'state' changes
in these various positions in the 14 lines of the sonnet.
Doing so will elevate the reader, along with the poem, from
the lowest state of being, to the highest
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