Mental Time Travel in Shakespeare’s Sonnets: Aesthetic Art in Neuropsychological Perspectives

Abstract

This study means to analyze Shakespeare’s use of mental time travel (MTT) in his collection of sonnets, especially those addressed to his young friend. It also hopes to amplify that Shakespeare’s versification of MTT anticipates modern neuropsychological studies on the topic. The article tackles MTT in light of four different premises induced from the sonnets subject to analysis: first, MTT occurs in the sonnets in correlation with objective time; second, the dual constructive and destructive nature of time triggers the need for the memory-based MTT; third, the disparaging effect of time on the poet and the friend’s mother is meant to stimulate the young friend to heed the future of his extraordinary beauty under the strokes of ruthless time; and, fourth, the destructive force of time on non-human beings and natural phenomena provides another stimulus to urge the young friend to heed the dangers of time on his future.