THE DARK LADY

Today we look at Shakespeare and his Dark Lady, the woman described in his sonnets, from 127 to 154. She was so called because she seems to have had black hair and a dark complexion. I have chosen to start with Sonnet 151, the poem that best portrays the comparison between Shakespeare’s love for the Fair Youth and that for the Dark Lady. The poet illustrates this by comparing the feelings of the soul with the desires of the flesh.

Shakespeare starts by referring to love as being too young. Love here is seen as sexual love; as lust. He equates this love to conscience, since conscience and the soul are the same. He then reiterates by asking rhetorically: "Yet who knows not conscience is born of love?". In other words, it is obvious that "conscience" is triggered off by love. Therefore, he tells the “gentle cheater” not to criticise him for his mistake, because her “sweet self” may be guilty of the same faults. Shakespeare then focuses on the relationship between body and soul, and between himself and the dark lady.  She betrays him and so he betrays his soul for his rebellious body. His soul tells his body that it can triumph in love, and so his physical urge does not wait, but at the sound of her name rises up and points to her as its prize. The sexually charged connotative image of rising up and pointing to her is evidently meant to highlight the physical urge (penile erection), juxtaposed with the soul. Because of her betrayal, he betrays his "nobler part" which is his soul. Basically, the poet is saying that his physical body ("gross body") betrays his soul, every time he lets himself be seduced by her. The poet realises that his flesh is proud of having her and of being ‘at her service’. The image is again a sexually constructed picture of the consummation of the sexual act from start to finish, completing the business and falling down beside her afterwards. He tells her not to take it for granted that his conscience is in any way less because she makes his flesh rise and fall for her love.  

The dichotomy between the brazen physical act, which he links here to this relationship with the woman, is in stark contrast to the ethereal love and superior feelings Shakespeare expresses for the Fair Youth in the sonnet sequence dedicated to him. It is as though the poet is angry that nature had given the youth that little ‘extra’ (a penis) which has now forced the poet to live in this schizophrenic state torn between sex and love;  body and soul. 

Love is too young to know what conscience is,

Yet who knows not conscience is born of love?

Then, gentle cheater, urge not my amiss,

Lest guilty of my faults thy sweet self prove:

For, thou betraying me, I do betray

My nobler part to my gross body's treason;

My soul doth tell my body that he may

Triumph in love; flesh stays no farther reason,

But rising at thy name doth point out thee,

As his triumphant prize. Proud of this pride,

He is contented thy poor drudge to be,

To stand in thy affairs, fall by thy side.

No want of conscience hold it that I call

Her love, for whose dear love I rise and fall.