"Fear no more the heat of the sun" is written by William Shakespeare, in the time Elizabethan England, during the later part of the renaissance period, when society was very structured, and different from today. Shakespeare was an infamous poet and playwright who wrote many sonnets and plays- tragedies, comedies and histories, whose common themes were love, life and death. "Fear no more", is derived from the play Cymbeline, one of his later comedies. It is a Dirge or funeral song for the heroine Imogen. In this poem, Shakespeare presents a very strong argument to the reader, and does this using numerous poetic devices.
Shakespeare exercises complex metaphors to depict the struggles one undergoes in life, and to contrast between life and death. Through this he creates meaning-to "fear no more" life for everything will come to an end. He urges the reader to overcome all melancholic sentiments that lead one to oppose a peaceful death, after the battle of life. In each stanza, there are a series of metaphors which conclude with the repeated "come to dust"- a metaphor for death, death being the tenor and dust is the vehicle. In stanza one, line four the metaphor "tane thy wages" depicts life to be a job- to be done in a set period of time, the vehicle being "wages" and the tenor being "job". In lines 5 an 6 of stanza one he compares chimney sweepers to Golden lads and girls, meaning young or old, rich or poor, everything will die. In Stanza two, He compares strength to weakness.
Connotations are ideas or associations that are suggested by a word. In stanza one, line five, "Golden" is a connotation of young. In stanza two, line four- "to thee the reed is as the oak"-connotes strength and weakness- comparing the strength of the oak to the weakness of the reed, meaning that strong or weak it ultimately doesn't matter for death is inevitable. Shakespeare employs this device to outline different groups of people, and qualities- young or old, strong or weak which will face death.