Sonnet 25

Sonnet 25 is one of 154 sonnets published by the English playwright and poet William Shakespeare in the Quarto of 1609. It is a part of the Fair Youth sequence.

In the sonnet the poem expresses the poet's contentedness in comparison to others, though they may have titles, honors, or are favored at court, or are noted warriors. It prefigures the more famous treatment of class differences found in Sonnet 29. There are noted similarities in this sonnet and in the relationship of Romeo and Juliet.^{[citation needed]}

Q1 The Speaker contrasts those who are fortunate (whether by the astrological influence of real "stars", or the social influence of their superiors, metaphorical "stars") with himself who, favored with no such public recognition, nevertheless can revel ("joy" is used as a verb) in what he holds most dear. Q2 These seeming fortunates display their "pride" (i.e. self-esteem, or finery) like an opening marigold, but only so long as their prince ("sun") favors them. (Elizabethans knew the marigold as a flower that opened in the presence, and closed in the absence, of the sun.) Q3 Similarly, even a warrior renowned for "a thousand victories" may be stripped of his honor and forgotten after a single defeat. C But the Speaker is happy in his mutual love, from which he cannot be removed, either by himself or by others.

Sonnet 25 is an English or Shakespearean sonnet, formed of three quatrains and a final couplet in iambic pentameter, a type of metre based on five pairs of metrically weak/strong syllabic positions. The 12th line exemplifies a regular iambic pentameter:

The 10th line begins with a common metrical variant, the initial reversal:

The 6th line also has a potential initial reversal, as well as the rightward movement of the fourth ictus (resulting in a four-position figure, × × / /, sometimes referred to as a minor ionic):

Potential initial reversals also occur in lines 1 and 11, with line 8 potentially exhibiting both an initial and midline reversal. Minor ionics appear in lines 2 and 3.

The meter demands a few variant pronunciations: line 3's "favourites" functions as 3 syllables, and line 9's "warrior" as 2 syllables. The final -ed is syllabic in line 7's 3-syllable "burièd", line 9's 3-syllable "famousèd" and line 11's 2-syllable "razèd". Stephen Booth notes that the original typography suggests that the final rhymes may have been intended to be trisyllabic: "belovèd" and "removèd", although other editors (like John Kerrigan) prefer the standard 2-syllable pronunciations.