In Shakespeare's "Marriage Sonnet 8," the speaker for the first time evokes the joyful state of marriage itself, as he continues urging the young man to produce an heir.
First Quatrain – “Music to hear, why hear’st thou music sadly?”
The speaker uses a music metaphor to try to convince the young man that marriage and music result in a beautiful harmony. In the first quatrain, the speaker observes the young man’s melancholy reaction to music. He then questions the young man’s sad features, claiming that “Sweets with sweets war not, joy delights in joy.” Because the young man is himself a pleasing, handsome, “sweet” individual, he should identify with the music, which possesses these same worthwhile qualities.
The speaker then further questions the lad’s reaction by asking him if he would love something that he was not glad to receive or if it would disappoint him to receive that which pleases him. And the question sounds somewhat tricky, but the speaker, as usual, is leading the young man to think about his bachelorhood in a negative way.
Second Quatrain – “If the true concord of well-tuned sounds”
The speaker wants the young man to understand that “the true concord of well-tuned sounds” is found in a good marriage; the metaphor of musical harmony is lost on the man who “confounds / In singleness the parts that thou shouldst bear.” As a music score has its individual parts that when combined produce a pleasing sound, a good marriage that produces pleasing offspring has the power to enrich the world in a like manner.
Third Quatrain – “Mark how one string, sweet husband to another”
In the third quatrain, the speaker likens the father, mother, and child to strings that when plucked in the proper order produce the beautiful song: “one pleasing note do sing.” The speaker again wants the young man to accept his urging to become this family man and not to continue wasting his beauty on himself and ultimately fail to pass on his pleasing qualities. His employment of the music metaphor again demonstrates the speaker’s concern with beauty.
In this quatrain, the speaker actually mentions the mother of the child that he craves so much; not only will the child resemble the father who sired him, but his very existence will also produce a “happy mother.” And the happy family will add to the world a beauty and grace in a similar way that a symphony does.
Couplet - “Whose speechless song, being many, seeming one”
In the couplet, the speaker injects his usual denigration of the single state, chiding the young man to realize that this beautiful music that has in the opening made the young man melancholy is a “speechless song” that should remind the lad that if he remains single and childless he will have no music.
Other articles on Shakespeare:
Sonnet Commentaries
Sonnet 1, Sonnet 2, Sonnet 3, Sonnet 4, Sonnet 5, Sonnet 6, Sonnet 7, Sonnet 8, Sonnet 9, Sonnet 10, Sonnet 11, Sonnet 12, Sonnet 18, Sonnet 19, Sonnet 116, Sonnet 126, Sonnet 130
