Sonnet notes 1

Sonnet 1, line 5: “But thou contracted to thine own bright eyes”

This is our first introduction to the Young Man of The Sonnets. (There’s only a hint that a man is being addressed—the pronoun his used twice, and especially the mention of an heir in line 4. Although his was often used as a neuter pronoun, where we would say “its,” and a woman can certainly have an heir, somehow even these first 5 lines don’t sound like they would be addressed to a woman.) Most interesting is the subtle way line 5 describes the youth. Although the point is to emphasize both his beauty and his selfishness—contracted to thine own bright eyes, the next line, Feed’st thy light’s flame with self-substantial fuel, makes the reference to Narcissus hard to miss. I can almost see the Young Man smiling at his own reflection in a pool of water. It leaves me with a vague sense of discomfort about this fellow.

[The story of Narcissus is told by Ovid in Book 3 of Metamorphoses. The parallel to this story was first noted by Von Mauntz in 1894. Narcissus sees his own “bright image” and is consumed “by his own flames.” See H. E. Rollins, A New Variorum Edition of Shakespeare: The Sonnets. 2 vols (Philadelphia: Lippincott) 1:8, 1944.]