Sonnet_54

Sonnet 54 In Sonnet 54, Spenser portrays the world as a theatre, in which, the speaker is the actor who plays all of the parts. The person he loves is the “spectator” at the plays. This spectator is not impressed by the actor, which causes him to put on his best performance. This ultimately brings the actor to realize that the spectator whom he is trying to impress will never respect his attempts, as she mocks him. The speaker takes his acting very seriously, which the reader can tell by the line “this world’s theatre.” His whole world is acting, but it has a downfall. He has a love who is never impressed as she “idly sits.” The spectator watches the actor while he plays all of his parts, but she does not give the reaction that the actor expects while she is “disguising diversely [his] troubled wits.” The actor is actually acting his hardest, and troubling himself, just to get a reaction out of the spectator. In the second quatrain, the speaker describes all of the parts that he plays, and tells of the great deal of emotion he puts into each scene. The actor tries to amaze his love sonnet, actor, spectator, plays, acting, speaker, parts, must, love, laughs, impress, emotion, because, world, work, while, watches, tried, thinks, theatre, stone, shows, reaction, never, mocks, impressed, heart, harder, give, cries, change, causes, attempts, actor’s