The Dark Lady
There is nothing like the woman of Shakespeare’s sonnets in all the sonnet literature of the Renaissance we have looked at thus far. The women of the sonnet tradition were mostly idealizations, while Shakespeare’s leading lady represents nothing close to the ideal beauty of a woman of this time. The Elizabethan ideal of beauty was blonde, while Shakespeare’s heroine was dark, and the blackness of her hair and eyes and heart is so heavily stressed that she has come to be known as the “Dark Lady.” He insists upon her darkness; first the darkness of her beauty and later the darkness of her deeds. From the beginning, even when his passion for her was untouched by regret, his praise for her beauty was marked by uncertainty. The traditional and popular ideal of the time made him distrust the direction of his senses.
The series of the so-called Dark Lady begins with sonnet 127, opening with, “In the old age black was not counted fair/ Or if it were, it bore not beauty’s name” (ll. 1-2). In this sonnet, Shakespeare reflects upon the established social definitions of beauty. He forcefully speaks about cosmetic modifications to natural features, a practice which he detests, calling it “a bastard shame” (l. 4). Regardless of a woman’s physical attractiveness, Shakespeare contends that the use of make-up constitutes an act of insincerity and dishonesty, as the made-up face is a “false borrowed face” (l. 6) that is disgraceful. Even for the woman who is “not born fair” (l. 11), making oneself up is an act of “Sland’ring creation with a false esteem” (l. 12). With this assertive statement, Shakespeare seems to suggest that beauty can be found in every person, though that beauty may not always be physical. In his book of commentary on Shakespeare’s sonnets, Carl D. Atkins states, “those who are not born beautiful but only appear so through artificial means, thus misrepresenting nature, gain false esteem” (314). Above all, Shakespeare seems to call for...