The arrangement of the Dark Land sonnets does not seem adequate. Their numbering was done by Thomas Thorpe, who published all sonnets of Shakespeare for the first time in 1609, probably without the poet’s permission. Many critics, including Dowden, Stirling and Auden tried to establish the correct order of these poems without success.

The next important question is about the identity of the woman. This problem as well remains unsolved, although there are a lot of theories. One of the suggestions is Mary (or Mall) Fitton, who was Maid of Honour to the Queen and by the way she was the mistress of William Herbert (the Earl of Pembroke), who is suggested to be the subje

And in some perfumes is there more delight

As any she belied with false compare.“

In sonnet 129 we met enormous hatred, and here we meet love although not in the traditional way. This sonnet is clearly a parody of the conventional love sonnet, which was made popular in England by Sir Philip Sidney’s Astrophel and Stella. Compared to that poem it is easy to see which elements of the ordinary love sonnet Shakespeare is mocking. For instance there is no use of grandiose metaphor or allusion, he does not compare his love to Venus and there is no evocation to Morpheus. The ordinary beauty and humanity of his lover are the things important to Shakespeare in this sonnet, and he deliberately uses typical love poetry metaphors against themselves. This poem contains references to objects of perfection, but they are to illustrate that the lover is not as beautiful as those. In the three quatrains the straightforward theme of his lover’s simplicity is developed and is neatly concluded in the final couplet, by saying that his love is as rare as such a mock-love sonnet.

Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;

Some topics in this essay:
Mary Fitton, Stella Compared, Dark Lady, Lady Sonnets, William Shakespeare, Stirling Auden, Earl Pembroke, Thomas Thorpe, Lucy Negro, dark lady, William Herbert, love sonnet, dark lady sonnets, sonnet sequence, sonnets sequence, mary fitton, love rare, intercourse towards, past reason, physical love, shakespeare writes,