The Dark Lady

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
   And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
   As any she belied with false compare. 

Reading this Shakespearian sonnet, I couldn’t help but wonder: Who are these people? More specifically, I wanted to know who the dark lady was. I’m also curious as to whether this was actually real or not. The two main people I found that the dark lady could be were: Lucy Morgan and Mrs. Florio. Lucy Morgan was a black brothel owner. The dark lady is arrogant and caters to all, so the owner of a brothel is a likely choice. I also saw that the lady might be Mrs. Florio, wife of an Italian translator. This choice is more appealing because the dark lady is definitely married. The dark lady, in addition to her arrogance, is a wanton wife who had children.

I thought it was interesting that the narrator continues to describe his mistress in a negative manner. Her lips are not red. Her eyes don’t shine. Her breath reeks. Her voice isn’t soothing. Even her walk is ungraceful. Yet, he loves her. Perhaps this is a message about love going deeper than the surface. However, if that was a poem about me, I would be a bit offended. At least, I would be until the couplet. Re-reading the sonnet, I realized it served as parody for love. The mistress defies all stereotypical characteristics of love and beauty. Still, the love is all consuming. He loves her anyways. Thus, the typical theme of love prevailing against all odds is upheld.

Shakespeare Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date: 

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm'd;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st; 

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. 

This is one of the young man sonnets, so the love interest is most likely the man. The narrator could also be giving advice about love. The first quatrain compares the young man to a summer day, saying he is lovely and fair, but he doesn’t last. The second quatrain builds upon this by explaining that sometimes the sun, aka the young man, is too bright and other times he fades. I saw the last quatrain as the main point of this poem. The young man will last forever. He will not fade. Even Death won’t get in the way. Of course, this is typical of most sonnets. Much like other sonnets, this sonnet also deals with love lasting over time. The coda is “eyes.” It links back to the second quatrain in which the eye of heaven, the sun, shines. In the couplet, the eye belongs to a human. The coda is the third quatrain summarized. As long as men exist, love will last. This is, again, typical of sonnets, which usually concern love. The significance of being compared to summer and to the sun and then to an eternal summer is the heat. Summer is hot; it is dull and drags on. On the other hand, summer is also the fun, light season. Thus, the connotation of summer could be negative. That is likely why the narrator says, “thou art more lovely and more temperate.” Basically, he is summer, but less extreme. I think it is interesting that this is a young man sonnet, however. The sonnet seems to be written romantically. It is about love. This makes me wonder if there was a love triangle in which the narrator, later on, loves both the woman and the young man. This also makes me wonder who Shakespeare was. Who was the man that loved a man who loved a woman, and then also loved that woman? It’s a confusing triangle, and it might be fictional, but I still wonder.

Enlightenment and the Apocalypse

For most of invisible man, I assumed that the Invisible Man would eventually be enlightened. Following Plato's Allegory, this meant he would come out of the cave, see the light, and then return to share his knowledge. However, the ending is full of violence. Additionally, the invisible man goes into the cave, not out of it. He literally goes in a manhole; he goes into the dark. Still, based on the prologue and epilogue, an enlightening clearly takes place.

I came to a possible explanation for this as I was researching the apocalyptic imagery prevalent throughout the ending. The word apocalypse comes from the greek word apocalupsis. The literal translation from Greek is "to uncover." The Oxford dictionary also describes it at an "unveiling." This is significant because the statue at Invisible Man's closet was veiled. The narrator also wasn't sure if the veil was being lifted or not. Thus, this veil is the cave from Plato's Allegory. The veil is related to the heavy smoke and haze and dreams mentioned repeatedly throughout the novel. The darkness is when the Invisible Man can finally see. Thus, his enlightenment is a result of the darkness. Plus, it isn’t until he is in the darkness that he sees real light. The supposedly brightest places of society aren’t even bright enough.

Still, I was very surprised by the apocalyptic imagery. The apocalypse is supposed to create a Heaven on Earth, but that doesn’t happen. The world is still full of blind or sleeping people. This led me to wonder whether the apocalypse was then a personal one? Or maybe the enlightenment of just the Invisible Man is the apocalypse. One theory that I had, that nobody else really agreed with, was that the Invisible Man, who is given no identity, is meant to represent humanity. Thus, the apocalypse hasn’t happened yet, but the novel is a version of how it could happen. Honestly, I’m just trying to figure out what all of it means. The black horseman, who should represent Ras as he comes in on a black horse, is famine. However, Ras isn’t bringing famine. Unless the riots turn into a full-scale debilitating war, nobody really should die of starvation. So, is Ras the black horse? Is the apocalypse actually happening? Or is Ellison just referring to the apocalypse to emphasize the severity of the event?