case choice by rhyme

[Baker, John]

        It's clear from the context of the sonnet, which I did not quote
in full in my prior post.  Shakespeare is criticizing the false
comparisons poets make about their mistresses:

MY mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun
Coral is far more red than her lips' red:
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound:
I grant I never saw a goddess go,-
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
  And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
  As any she belied with false compare.


John Baker


-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf
Of Joel S. Berson
Sent: Thursday, September 22, 2005 9:38 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: Re: case choice by rhyme

Please tell me why this "she" should be read as the object of "belied"
rather than the subject".

At 9/21/2005 03:50 PM, you wrote:
>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>-----------------------
>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>Poster:       "Baker, John" <JMB at STRADLEY.COM>
>Subject:      Re: case choice by rhyme
>-----------------------------------------------------------------------
>--------
>
>         It's not new.  Compare Shakespeare's Sonnet CXXX:
>
>"And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with
>false compare."
>
>         Shakespeare didn't need the rhyme, but he did need a
>monosyllabic reference for his dark lady.
>
>John Baker