Lady Mary
Lady Mary Wroth was a member of a distinguished literary family during the Renaissance. She was the niece of Mary Herbert, an eminent writer and patron during the 16th century. Mary married Robert Roth, but their marriage was unhappy. In the meantime, Lady Mary began to vent her grief with the help of poetry. Thus, her sonnet In this strange labyrinth represents the author’s throwing about the mysteries that love keeps. The significance of Lady Mary for literature is that she was the first female poet in England to write a complete sequence of sonnets called from Pamphilia to Amphilanthus.
“In this strange Labyrinth how shall I turn/Ways are on all sides”
The image of one who is lost in the labyrinth of love and is desperately looking for a way out is common in the sonnets of the Renaissance. In many gardens at this time there were labyrinths that played the role of an entertainment event. Thus, the very name of the sonnet personifies the labyrinth in which every lover rushes about. The lyrical hero describes the difficult situation in which he found himself with the help of the words “In this strange Labyrinth how shall I turn/Ways are on all sides” (Wroth). Different paths diverge in all directions, but none of them seems right.
The origins of the labyrinth referred to in the poem find their origin in the myth of Theseus. The hero was saved by a woman named Ariadne, who gave him a golden thread so that Theseus could find a way out of the labyrinth of the Minotaur.
“Leave all, and take the thread of Love”
However, Lady Mary in the sonnet uses a labyrinth to create a metaphor for suffocation, which crushes her own desires, forcing a woman to be silent and do housework during the Renaissance. The symbol of modern conventions of that era are destroying her and do not allow her to live a full life.
The heroine does not have the right to tell Amphilanthus about her love, however, she is unable to avoid her feelings and vows to ‘leave all, and take the thread of Love’ (Wroth). This thread symbolizes divine love for Christ. It allows her to find the only way back, but the thread is too thin and the heroine can easily go astray. Thus, the labyrinth is not only a symbol of loss, but also a trap in which a person finds himself because of his feelings.
The way, the truth, and the light
In addition, there is a religious allusion in the sonnet. In the New Testament, Jesus indicates that he is the way, the truth, and the light. Thus, the lyrical hero’s anger is due to the fact that the speaker is faced with many ways representing love. However, these are all personifications of one person’s romantic love for another, and none of them are “the way”, which means the love of Christ.
Finally, the heroine makes her decision in the third stanza. She understands that it seems impossible for her to choose one path that she will take and she chooses all paths. Thus, the heroine asks “let me take the right, or left hand way”. She tolerates her insecurities and moves on by enduring suffering. However, at the end, the focus shifts and the heroine realizes that she wants to leave the labyrinth. Thus, she wants to follow the thread of love, no matter how this road ends.