To His Coy Mistress is a great poem by Andrew Marvell. Here, he discusses the theme of “Carpe Diem”. In the following content, we are going to discuss To His Coy Mistress Summary.
Writer’s Intro: Andrew Marvell (1621-1678) – is one of the greatest English poets of the 17th Century. He is the son of a priest. Most importantly, he is the assistant of John Milton, another great epic writer.
To His Coy Mistress Summary
“To His Coy Mistress” is divided into three stanzas and based on the theme of “Carpe Diem”. It means that one should enjoy the present moment without caring for any criticism whatsoever.
The narrator is an anonymous man speaking to an anonymous shy woman who does not actually respond the call of her husband for physical relationship. So, he shows her every logical point to remove her shyness and make physical relationship with her husband. In the first stanza, the narrator tells the mistress—not a woman on the side but simply a lady—that if they had had more time and space, her “coyness” or teasing/shyness wouldn’t be an issue. He goes on to describe how much he would complement and admire her if time permitted. He would praise on every inch of her body until he got to the heart.
In the second stanza, the narrator basically tells her: “But we don’t have time and we’re about to get old and die.” He says that life is short but death is eternal and time is running out. In addition, the speaker warns the woman that when she’s buried in her coffin, the worms will take her virginity if she doesn’t have physical relationship with him before they die. And, if she refuses to sleep with him, all his sexual desire will burn up into ashes for all time.
In the third stanza the speaker begs the lady to have physical relationship with him while they are still young. He points out a pair of birds mating and suggests that that is how their lovemaking should be—raw, passionate, and primitive. The narrator claims in the final couplet that while they cannot stop time, they can swap places with it.. According to him, whenever they have physical relationship, they pursue time, instead of the other way around. Thus, physical relationship makes the day more pleasurable and it makes the day go by much faster.
That is the end of our content to his coy mistress summary. Thank you for being with us.
If you want to read more summaries, you can check the following articles:
– The Definition of Love
