🌹 Stanza 165 - Literary Analysis

Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis

📖 Original Stanza

O hard-believing love! how strange it seems
Not to believe, and yet too credulous;
Thy weal and woe are both of them extremes;
Despair and hope make thee ridiculous:      
The one doth flatter thee in thoughts unlikely,
In likely thoughts the other kills thee quickly.

🔍 Line-by-Line Analysis

Line 1: "O hard-believing love! how strange it seems"

• "O hard-believing love!": This is an apostrophe and a paradox. "Hard-believing" here suggests love that is difficult to convince or that finds it hard to believe certain truths, particularly unpleasant ones like rejection. It also implies a stubbornness or resistance to reality. Shakespeare chooses this phrase to highlight the ironic nature of love which, despite its inherent trust, can be strangely incredulous when faced with unfavorable outcomes.
• "how strange it seems": This expresses the speaker's (Venus's) astonishment and bewilderment at the contradictory nature of love, reflecting a sense of irony and disillusionment.
• Meaning: "Oh, love, so resistant to belief! It seems so peculiar."

Line 2: "Not to believe, and yet too credulous;"

• "Not to believe": This refers to love's inability or refusal to accept harsh realities, such as the beloved's indifference or the inevitability of sorrow. It implies a denial of truth.
• "and yet too credulous": This is the contrasting paradox. Love is simultaneously too willing to believe in flattering falsehoods, unrealistic hopes, or the faintest signs of encouragement, even when illogical. Shakespeare uses this juxtaposition to underscore love's irrationality and susceptibility to self-deception.
• Meaning: "It refuses to believe what's real, and yet it's too easily convinced by falsehoods."

Line 3: "Thy weal and woe are both of them extremes;"

• "Thy": An archaic form of "your," referring to "love" (which is personified).
• "weal": Prosperity, well-being, happiness, or success.
• "woe": Misfortune, sorrow, distress, or failure.
• "are both of them extremes": Love experiences its joys and sorrows with intense, absolute quality, never settling for moderation. It suggests an absence of a middle ground, swinging violently between euphoria and despair. Shakespeare emphasizes the dramatic, all-consuming nature of love's emotional spectrum.
• Meaning: "Your happiness and your sorrow are both experienced at their absolute limits."

Line 4: "Despair and hope make thee ridiculous:"

• "Despair and hope": These represent the two contrasting emotional states that love fluctuates between, directly linked to "woe" and "weal" respectively. They are presented as active forces.
• "make thee ridiculous": The constant, wild oscillation between these two intense emotional states (hope for the impossible, despair over the inevitable) makes love appear foolish, absurd, or undignified in its irrationality. It strips love of its composure and reason.
• Meaning: "The way you swing between extreme hopelessness and extreme optimism makes you seem foolish."

Line 5: "The one doth flatter thee in thoughts unlikely,"

• "The one": Refers to "hope" from the previous line.
• "doth flatter thee": Hope actively deceives or encourages love with pleasing but false assurances. It provides a comforting illusion.
• "in thoughts unlikely": These are fantasies, improbable scenarios, or unrealistic expectations that hope generates. Hope thrives on imagination rather than reality. Shakespeare highlights how hope can lead to self-deception by creating appealing but untrue narratives.
• Meaning: "Hope deceives you with pleasant but improbable fantasies,"

Line 6: "In likely thoughts the other kills thee quickly."

• "the other": Refers to "despair" from line 4.
• "In likely thoughts": These are realistic, probable, or even inevitable truths, often harsh ones that love tries to deny. Despair forces love to confront these unvarnished realities.
• "kills thee quickly": Despair, by exposing love to these harsh realities, crushes it swiftly and completely. It's a sudden, painful end to illusions, emphasizing the brutal and devastating impact of truth on a love built on fantasy. The hyperbole underscores the emotional intensity.
• Meaning: "while despair, when it faces you with probable realities, destroys you very quickly."

🎭 Literary Devices

🎯 Overall Meaning & Significance in the Context of the Poem

This stanza offers a profound and rather cynical psychological analysis of the nature of love, particularly unrequited or frustrated love, as experienced by Venus. It portrays love not as a noble or purely uplifting force, but as a paradoxical, irrational, and often self-defeating emotion. Venus, consumed by her desire for Adonis, is experiencing these very contradictions: she clings to the slightest hope despite his clear rejection (credulous), yet despairs violently when faced with the reality of his indifference (hard-believing).

The stanza's significance lies in its articulation of: * The Destructive Nature of Unrequited Passion: It vividly describes how love, when unreciprocated, can lead to a tormenting cycle of unrealistic hope and crushing despair, rendering the lover "ridiculous" in their emotional extremes. This mirrors Venus's desperate and increasingly undignified pursuit of Adonis throughout the poem. * The Conflict Between Illusion and Reality: Love is depicted as being perpetually caught between comforting illusions (fed by hope) and brutal realities (delivered by despair). This reflects Venus's struggle to accept Adonis's aversion to love and his preference for the hunt. * The Vulnerability of the Lover: By showing love as "credulous" and easily "flattered" but also "killed quickly," the stanza highlights the profound vulnerability of anyone in its grip, especially when their affections are not returned. Venus's divine power is rendered impotent by her human-like emotions. * Foreboding: The stanza, by portraying love's capacity for destruction and the pain it inflicts, subtly foreshadows the tragic outcome of Venus's pursuit and Adonis's ultimate demise, which is precipitated by his rejection of love and embrace of a violent, solitary pursuit.

Ultimately, this stanza is a lament about love's inherent irrationality, its capacity for self-deception, and the emotional turmoil it inflicts, making it a central piece in the poem's exploration of desire, rejection, and suffering.