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Sonnet 129
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Symbols & Motifs
The Bait
In the second quatrain, the speaker introduces the imagery of “swallowed bait” (Line 7), using it as a symbol of how desire, consummation, and regret work together. He says that bait is purposefully “laid to make the taker mad” (Line 8), depicting lust as something that, like bait, lures the lover into something detrimental to his well-being. The lover then behaves in a “mad,” or irrational, manner in succumbing to lust. The results of having “swallowed” the “bait” of lust are clear: The lover’s former lust is immediately “[p]ast reason hated” (Line 7), speaking to the anger and disgust the speaker insists the lover will feel afterward. This imagery of bait and entrapment presents lustful behavior as animalistic and degrading, embodying the dangers that lurk within lust throughout the sonnet.
Loss of Control
Loss of control, even to the point of madness, is an important motif in the poem. The speaker centers his depiction of lust upon the idea that, once the lover is in the throes of lust, he will lose all self-restraint and end up experiencing something he will later regret.
Even before the speaker makes the comparison to the baited animal, he introduces the idea of lust as an overwhelming and inhumane force. He does this through the adjectives he chooses to describe the feeling of lust. He calls it “perjured, murd’rous, bloody, full of blame / Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust” (Lines 3-4). At the end of the poem, he compares it to “hell” (Line 14). Lust is thus a malevolent force that brings nothing good to those it entraps. In turn, those who experience it are defined by the speaker as “mad”: Lust makes “the taker mad / Mad in pursuit, and in possession so” (Lines 8-9, emphasis added). In repeating the adjective “mad,” the speaker stresses lust as an experience of irrationality and the loss of restraint. Lust leads to “extreme” (Line 10) emotions and behavior, leaving the lover helpless in the throes of his own lust.
Expectation Versus Reality
The sonnet is built around the central motif of the contrast between expectation versus reality in the midst of lust. The speaker insists that while lovers conceive of lust as offering something blissful and worth pursuing, the reality is that lust is deceitful and leads only to disappointment. Lust is “[e]njoyed no sooner but despisèd straight” (Line 5) and “no sooner had” (Line 6) before it is “[p]ast reason hated” (Line 7), leading to immediate disillusionment as soon as gratification is achieved. The speaker claims that before consummation, lovers regard the fulfillment of their desires as “A bliss” (Line 11), “a joy proposed” (Line 12), and “heaven” (Line 14), only to discover after consummation that lust is “a very woe” (Line 11), an empty, fleeting “dream” (Line 12), and even a “hell” (Line 14) in place of the expected paradise. In creating these series of contrasts, the speaker creates a consistent emphasis on the notion that lust never manages to live up to what eager lovers wish it to be.
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By William Shakespeare
