By: Garin Kilpatrick
Sonnet 76 is a Shakespearean Sonnet that shares a striking thematic semblance to his much longer poem A Lover’s Complaint. The Theme of Sonnet 76 is youth and in within the Sonnet Shakespeare does a candid job of confronting his ability to spin his own style by Spending again what is already spent.
Sonnet 76 mirrors Shakespeare’s A lover’s complaint by touching on the themes of youth and love. Despite sharing the same themes as A Lovers Complaint, Sonnet 76 has managed to do so without quite as much controversy. A Lovers Complaint was so controversial that Slate.com Author Ron Rosenbaum even questioned should “A Lover’s Complaint” be kicked out of the canon? I disagree with Ron and the idea that abolishing any of Shakespeare’s work from the Shakespearean canon could be a good thing.
My impression of the impact of Shakespeare is more along the lines of this quote attributed to Ben Johnson:
“He was not for an age, but for all time.”
The sonnet below is no timid example of Shakespeare’s timelessness.
