Sonnet 147 By: Cheryl Larson (stunning) Elena Fox (beautiful) 2A

Background This sonnet was written to the Dark Lady, which Sonnets are written to. This particular sonnet was written to the narrator’s mistress, who seems to be very unfaithful. The narrator wants to know why, in spite of his judgment of reason, he is still enslaved by his mistress.

Paraphrase 1. My love is as a fever, longing still My love is like a fever, still longing

Paraphrase 2. For that which longer nurseth the disease, For that which feeds on the disease,

Paraphrase 3. Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill, Feeding on what prolongs the illness,

Paraphrase 4. The uncertain sickly appetite to please. All to please the unhealthy desires of the body.

Paraphrase 5. My reason, the physician to my love, My reason, love’s doctor,

Paraphrase 6. Angry that his prescriptions are not kept, Angry that I do not follow his directions,

Paraphrase 7. Hath left me, and now I desperate now approve Has left me, and desperate I find that

Paraphrase 8. Desire is death, which physic did except. Desire leads to death, which reason will not allow.

Paraphrase 9. Past cure I am, now reason is past care, Now reason is past curing, now I am past cure,

Paraphrase 10. And frantic-mad with evermore unrest; And I am frantic with continual unrest.

Paraphrase 11. My thoughts and my discourse as madmen’s are, My thoughts and my words are like a madman’s,

Paraphrase 12. At random from the vainly express’d; Lies foolishly uttered;

Paraphrase 13. For I have sworn thee fair and thought thee bright, For I thought you were moral and bright (shining as a star),

Paraphrase 14. Who art as black as hell, as dark as night. But you really are black as hell and dark as night.

Analysis Shakespeare attacks the morality of his mistress, and this shows that their overall relationship is tumultuous (disorderly) and perplexing. The narrator of this poem is struggling to cope with his lover’s infidelity (disloyalty) and his desire to still be sexually intimate with her. The narrator is confused by his urges, and his reason is at odds with his “sickly appetite” for the dark lady. In the end, the narrator deems himself insane, because he calls his mistress just and moral, when she is clearly not.

Troublesome Vocabulary Sickly (4)- love is like an illness or disease to the narrator The physician to my love (5)- the narrator’s reason acts as his doctor, advising him on what he should do Approve (7)- find by experience Black (14)- a play on the dark complexion of the narrator’s mistress