AP Open Question #2

1985. A critic has said that one important measure of a superior work of literature is its ability to produce in the reader a healthy confusion of pleasure and disquietude. Select a literary work that produces this "healthy confusion." Write an essay in which you explain the sources of the "pleasure and disquietude" experienced by the readers of the work.

Addyson Miklos

Nichole Wilson

AP Literature and Composition

23 February 2014

William Shakespeare’s ability to create a tone that is joyful yet uncomfortable is astounding. This unusual mixture is most readily seen in Sonnet 20, a confusing sonnet in its expression of love. Shakespeare employs juxtaposition and diction to convey the power the subject holds over his heart, while revealing this subject is a man; a societal offense during the Shakespearean era.

The beautiful and idea of love and pleasure is evident in this sonnet. Shakespeare describes the subject as “the master-mistress of my passion” (3). This is a powerful admission of love; the word passion reveals that this subject is all Shakespeare desires, the goal of his love is what Shakespeare strives to achieve. Referring to the subject as the “master-mistress” illuminates that the subject has total control and power over Shakespeare. This is also seen when Shakespeare describes the subject as “A man in hue, all hues in his controlling” (7). The word “controlling” is how Shakespeare conveys his idolization of the subject.

However, the idea that Shakespeare’s lover is a man creates an air of disquietude in his works. When Shakespeare describes the subject as “master-mistress,” this juxtaposition of a male and female role reveals the identity of the subject as a man who has seduced another man. It is made obvious that the subject of the speaker’s attention is a man when the subject is referred to as “a man in hue.” The blatant statement of the true identity of the subject aids in creating a mood of disquietude in the reader. In the final couplet of the poem, Shakespeare realizes he must make peace with the physical impossibility of a relationship with the subject, because nature “pricked thee out for women’s pleasure

Mine be thy love, and thy love’s use their treasure” (13-14). The diction Shakespeare employs, specifically the word “pricked” refers to the male anatomy, which creates the physical blockade of a public or physical relationship.

            Shakespeare has the ability to write in ways that emotionally puzzle the reader. The literary devices he employs in his works create a mood that encompasses both pleasure and disquietude. The idolization of the subject makes the audience idolize the subject too; however, the implications of a forbidden homosexual relationship cause the reader to feel uncomfortable for both the speaker and the subject.