Marvells to His Coy Mistress: The Essence Of Time :: essays research papers

Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress": The Essence of Time The male species has a very creative mind. The creative mind becomes particularly active when the case involves the female species. In Andrew Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress," the author shows how his creative mind is put to use. Marvell, uses time in an attempt to manipulate his coy mistress. Time is depicted in three different manners. First, Marvell uses "ideal time." In ideal time, he tells how many years he would spend loving her if they were given the opportunity. He explains to his mistress that if time allowed, he would spend hundreds of years just to admire her physical being. Next, he implicates "real time," to persuade her to become accessible to him. In real time, Marvell gives examples of her aging and how she will go to the grave with her pride if she doesn't give in. Finally, the use of "optimum time" plays on her emotions of how sweet the opportunity to make love to her would be. Marvell tells his mistress that the act would be almost animalistic and intense. Throughout the poem, he uses the phases of time in an attempt to frighten her into having sex with him. All three stanza's in the poem represent a different time frame. The first gives his mistress a feeling of unconditional love. He leads her to believe he would give all he has to her as long as time will permit. During the second stanza, Marvell plays on her fear of getting old. He warns her that her beauty isn't everlasting and that she will end up unhappy alone if she doesn't give in. Marvell's use of optimum time, the best time, show's his emotions. He appears to become aggravated. This seems to be his ace in the hole. In my opinion, he uses what he believes to be the dearest thing to her,