William ShakespeareSonnets

History of the sonnet

• Originated in Italy in the 13th century

• Petrarchan or Italian sonnet names after Petrarch, a Roman Catholic priest who popularized the form.

• The English word “sonnet” comes from the Italian word “sonetto,” meaning “little song.”

Petrarchan Sonnet• Composed of an

eight-line stanza (octave) and a six-line stanza (sestet).

• Rhyme scheme: ABBA, ABBA; CDE, CDE.

Shakespearean Sonnet• Composed of three

four-line stanzas and a couplet.• Rhyme scheme:

ABAB, CDCD, EFEF,GG.

Iambic Pentameter

“Iambic pentameter is the rhythm of our English language and of our bodies—a line of that poetry has the same rhythm as our heartbeat. A line of iambic pentameter fills the human lung perfectly, so it’s the rhythm of speech.” --Ben Crystal

Shakespeare’s sonnets

• Shakespearean sonnet (also called the English sonnet) has three four-line stanzas (quatrains) and a two-line couplet.

• Shakepeare wrote 154 of them written in the 1590s when the theaters were closed during an outbreak of plague.

• Sonnet is a form of lyric poetry with 14 lines and a specific rhyme scheme.

• Lyric poetry presents the deep feelings and emotions of the poet as opposed to poetry that tells a story or presents witty observation.

• The topic of most sonnets written in Shakespeare’s time is love—or a theme related to love.

• Sonnets 1-126 are addressed to an unidentified young man

• Some suggest these sonnets are an expression of homosexual love.

• No evidence exists in the records of Shakespeare’s life to support these claims.

• Platonic (intimate and affectionate, but not sexual) love of a man for a man was more often expressed in the 16th century than it is today.

• In 127-154, Shakespeare turns his attention mostly to a “dark lady.”

Sonnet 18

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer's lease hath all too short a date:

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade

Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;

Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou growest:

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

a

a

b

f

b

c

d

e

c

f

e

d

g

g

quatrain

quatrain

quatrain

couplet

Sonnet 18

• Poet begins by comparing the subject to summer

• Slowly builds the image of the friend into a perfect being

• By third quatrain, he is summer

Sonnet 116

Let me not to the marriage of true mindsAdmit impediments. Love is not loveWhich alters when it alteration finds,Or bends with the remover to remove:O no! it is an ever-fixed markThat looks on tempests and is never shaken;It is the star to every wandering bark,Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeksWithin his bending sickle's compass come:Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,But bears it out even to the edge of doom.If this be error and upon me proved,I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Sonnet 116

• Marriage: why does God require a covenant?• Guiding star: Polaris, fixed, unchanging

Sonnet 130My 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 delightThan in the breath that from my mistress reeks.I love to hear her speak, yet well I knowThat 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 rareAs any she belied with false compare.

Sonnet 130

• Shakespeare was being pragmatic and honest

• Poem shows his disdain for flowery compliments

• Written as a parody of Petrarchan sonnets

• “Mistress” did not necessarily mean the same thing it does today

Just in Casehttp://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=related&v=UC-f0drvdmM (rap)

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0Muodrjq4Jg (sonnet 130)