Explain how the 'Carpe Diem' theme is expressed in Andrew Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress."

- Marvell’s ‘To His Coy Mistress’ is built on ‘Crape-Dime’ theme. In his poem we find a lover more active in the courtship urges his lady-love to make love at her youth. The shy mistress remains always from the immediate response but the lover builds the logic of syllogism and concludes that the only way of courtship is enjoying life while ones are young.

These assumed prepositions are used to awaken the lady-love from her negation to physical union out of her shyness. The only object as we understand is to enjoy the bliss of mutual love hence the ‘Carpe-Diem’ theme becomes the supreme goal.

The second stanza introduces the reality of life. In the real world the lover and the lady-love are placed in a transient or they could surely be devoured by time and the lady-love would grow and die. The lover would not be able to make love in the ‘marble vault’. Her long preserved virginity would be tasted by warms. Again the lover can feel and it is sure that the lady-love has her ‘quaint honour’. She is within full of desire of love-making. But for her shyness she is simply making a ‘crime’.

Here once again we find that all arguments are made to show the lady-love the reality of life and to make her conscious of what she should do. The concept ‘Crape-Diem’ has been built on argument.

The concluding stanza becomes a conclusion of the lover. And the conclusion is drawn from the first two stanzas. As life is not placed in eternity and as the lover and the lady-love would grow and die, so they should not loss a single moment of youth. For, youth is fast-fading. This idea has been decorated, with a number of images as ‘willing soul’, (transpires) ‘instant fires’, ‘amourous birds of prey’, ‘one ball’, ‘rough strife’, ‘iron gates of life’. These images are suggestive to signify the quick and violent love-making. Besides, during the love-making the lover and the lady-love would be forgetful the effect of time upon them aesthetic delight in which they would be dipped into estasy would be to them the highest bliss of the mundane existence,

“Thus though we can not make our sun

Stand still yet we make him run”

Marvell’s ‘To His Coy Mistress’ is a logical exhibition of carpe-diem theme. In this lyric Marvell avoiding the emotional out burst of his predecessors, analyzes, explains, and concludes the essence of ‘Carpe-Diem’. That is “Gather ye rose, buds while ye may” or “Seize the day” (from Horace’s odes) or “To the virgins, to make much of time” or “Go, lovely rose” etc. hence the present poem in its contents bears the epitome of the essentials of ‘Carpe-Diem’.