Sonnet 20 Sonnet 20 Sonnet 20 is one of the best-known of 154 sonnets written by the English playwright and poet William Shakespeare. Part of the Fair Youth sequence (which comprises sonnets 1-126), the subject of the sonnet is widely interpreted as being male, thereby raising questions about the sexuality of its author. In this sonnet (as in, for example, Sonnet 53) the beloved's beauty is compared to both a man's and a woman's. Sonnet 20 is a typical English or Shakespearean sonnet, containing three quatrains and a couplet for a total of fourteen lines. It follows the rhyme scheme of this
Sonnet 32 character. Sonnet 32 is highly dependent upon the relationship between the subject and speaker of the sonnet. The speaker of the sonnet reflects upon "his own mortality" in comparing himself to the young man whom he loves, whether romantically or in friendship it is unclear. The speaker refers to himself as the "deceased lover" which is significant as it highlights the age difference between the two men, a perpetual theme throughout Sonnet 32 as well as the rest of the handsome youth sonnets. After accepting, his eventual death, the speaker takes on a "self-deprecating" tone referring to his poetry as