Ice and Fire – Sonnet 30
Edmund Spenser
My Love is like to ice, and I to fire:
How comes it then that this her cold so
great
Is not dissolved through my so hot desire,
But harder grows the more I her entreat?
Or how comes it that my exceeding heat
Is not allayed by her heart-frozen cold,
But that I burn much more in boiling sweat,
And feel my flames augmented manifold?
What more miraculous thing may be told,
That fire, which all things melts, should
harden ice,
And ice, which is congeal’d with senseless
cold,
Should kindle fire by wonderful device?
Such is the power of love in gentle mind,
That it can alter all the course of kind.
Rhyme Scheme - ab ab/bc bc/cd cd/ee
The
Sonnet “ICE
AND FIRE” (Number Thirtieth) is taken out from the collection
named Amoretti (a collection of 89 sonnets by Edmund Spenser addressed to
Elizabeth Boyle). The poem follows the tradition of the Elizabethan Age. Poet has
used full of far-fetched turns of thoughts aimed at showing the sad plight of a
devoted lover. The lover finds his beloved coldhearted. He calls her heart
frozen. The lover describes himself as he is burning and feeling his flames augmented.
|| Analysis ||
The theme of this sonnet is the power of love, which can cause alteration of
feelings, emotion, and the natural course of life. This sonnet, therefore, has a very
popular subject matter- the lover trying hard to immortalize the relationship. The
poem is a sonnet grouped into three quatrains and a couplet. “Spencer splits
his poem into four different sections, each section being a question”. The woman
in this sonnet is compared to ice whose feelings of coldness keeps her
disinterested towards the burning love of the speaker. She is a heartless,
insensitive woman who is not ready to meltdown on the speaker's efforts and
love. The speaker is thus shocked to notice such a type of behaviour and wonders
that his exceeding passions of love are responsible for the increasing
indifference in the woman. The speaker surprisingly is hopeful that one day his
burning passions of love will melt her down and she will understand his love
and true feelings. Love sometimes seems
unattainable but you do not truly know it is out of reach unless you try,
Edmund Spenser portrays this message in his poem “My Love is Like to Ice.” This
poem was taken out from his literary work the “Amoretti,” which was written as
a part of the courtship of his second wife Elizabeth Boyle. This poem can be
seen as his struggle for love, knowing the intent of the poet’s reason for
writing such beautiful poetry gives us the advantage when analyzing. Spenser
uses two interesting elements to convey his feelings and emotions in reference
to love to show us why love is mutual and should not be given up just. Symbolism
is seen throughout the poem very often with respect to human emotions and
feelings. The nature of these two elements shows the reader that there is no
such thing as impossible love. Spenser splits his poem into four different
sections, each section being a question, which illustrates human emotions and
feelings through different states of love. The first section carries its own
tone and mood, set by the first line, “My love is like to ice, and I to fire,”
Spenser chooses two elements that are incompatible and completely opposite from
each other. The speaker in Spenser's sonnet 'My Love Is Like to Ice' is the
mask the poet adopts, using an ancient rhetorical device. The poet and the
speaker (or persona, which literally means 'mask') are not necessarily the
same. You can consider it the perceiving consciousness if you prefer; the main
thing is to avoid the confusion and misunderstanding that accompanies the
error.
The rhyme scheme of the first quatrain is ABAB/fire, great, desire, entreat; the
second is BCBC / heat, cold, sweat, manifold; the third rhymes CDCD / told,
ice, cold, device; and the couplet rhymes EE/mind, kind. The rhyme includes
near rhyme in great - entreat and heat - sweat. Keep in mind that in Spenser's
day, poetry was considered a rhetorical game more often than not.
The first line is a simile that compares his beloved - one to ice and the speaker to a fire that for some reason does not thaw his frozen love. The more he pursues her, the faster she flees (the colder she gets!). There is a 'law of contraries' being created here that defies natural law - those laws like gravity that operate on one and all in normal circumstances. Nevertheless, these are not normal times, the speaker alleges. This is a time for miracles in the realm of romance. We are in a foreign place where the usual laws do not apply. The couplet resolves the dilemma by sleight of language - the power of love can overrule natural love and change our very nature. Our 'kind' (humankind) can be changed to its very core.
NICE JOB.
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