Like As the Waves Make Towards the Pebbled Shore is the first line of Sonnet 60 by the great English playwright and poet William Shakespeare. Shakespeare is considered the finest dramatist who wrote in the English language. He is also one of the best poets in English literature. See Shakespeare, William.
Shakespeare’s sonnets were published in 1609, when he had already become a successful playwright. No one knows when Shakespeare wrote the poems, but he probably composed them over several years. There are 154 sonnets in the sequence, though some scholars believe that a different author may have written Sonnets 153 and 154, which focus on Cupid, the god of love in Roman mythology. Only two of the sonnets were published before 1609, in a collection called The Passionate Pilgrim (1599).
Like almost all of Shakespeare’s sonnets, Sonnet 60 consists of three quatrains (four-line units) followed by a concluding couplet (two-line unit). Each quatrain has a rhyme scheme of abab, cdcd, efef, with the final couplet a rhyming one (gg).
Like as the waves make towards the pebbled shore, So do our minutes hasten to their end; Each changing place with that which goes before, In sequent toil all forwards do contend. Nativity, once in the main of light, Crawls to maturity, wherewith being crowned, Crooked eclipses ‘gainst his glory fight, And Time that gave doth now his gift confound. Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth, And delves the parallels in beauty’s brow, Feeds on the rarities of nature’s truth, And nothing stands but for his scythe to mow. And yet to times in hope my verse shall stand, Praising thy worth, despite his cruel hand.
This sonnet deals with the destructiveness of time, a central Shakespearean theme. In a series of striking images, the sonnet develops the idea of time’s remorseless attack on life, beauty, and glory.
Like the other sonnets in the sequence of 1 to 126, this verse is addressed to an unnamed young nobleman. The youth’s beauty and worth are the focus of the poet’s praise in these sonnets. The young man’s qualities frequently inspire the poet to reflect on time and to challenge time’s ravages through his verse.
Sonnet 60 is a good example of the use of the sonnet structure to develop theme. Each of the three quatrains is written around a central image but also develops its own idea. The concluding couplet sums up—or in this case, dramatically reverses—the preceding ideas.
Quatrain 1 depicts the steady march of time, using the perpetual motion of waves as its starting image. In “sequent toil” (successive, continuing effort), all things relentlessly “contend” (strive) forward. Quatrain 2 describes newborn life, or “nativity,” entering the “main” (ocean) of light—that is, the world. But the “crawl” toward maturity only results in defeated glory. Quatrain 3 describes how the flourish of youth is “transfixed,” or pierced, by time. Time ages beauty’s features as it “delves the parallels in beauty’s brow” and feeds on nature’s finest things (“rarities”). Thus, the poet mournfully concludes, nothing can “stand” that is not eventually cut down by time.
The final couplet, after the building momentum of these three quatrains, creates a dramatic contrast. To “times in hope”—that is, times to come—the poet’s verse will provide immortality for his friend, where life cannot. Whereas living things cannot “stand” against time’s “cruel hand,” poetry can.
For more information about Shakespeare’s sonnets, see Shakespeare, William (Shakespeare’s poems).
