Shakespearean Sonnets All That You Needed To Know…and MORE!

What is a Sonnet?  A form of poetry invented in Italy  14 lines with a specific rhyme scheme  The term sonnet derives from the Italian word sonetto, which means "little song"

Before Shakespeare… The Italian poet Petrarch ( ) popularized the sonnet more than two centuries before Shakespeare was born.

SHAKESPEARE!  William Shakespeare wrote 154 sonnets  Sonnets 1 through 126: address an unidentified young man with outstanding physical and intellectual attributes.  The first 17 of these urge the young man to marry so that he can pass on his superior qualities to a child!

Shakespeare! cont…  In Sonnet 18, Shakespeare declares his own poetry may be all that is necessary to immortalize the young man and his qualities.  In Sonnets , Shakespeare addresses a mysterious "dark lady"–a sensuous, irresistible woman of questionable morals who captivates him

Shakespeare! cont..  Shakespeare wrote his sonnets in London in the 1590s during an outbreak of plague that closed theaters and prevented playwrights from staging their dramas.

Anatomy of the Shakespearean Sonnet  Rhyme Scheme of Shakespeare’s sonnets: ABAB CDCD EFEF GG  The first, second, and third stanzas have four lines with alternate rhymes, called quatrains  The fourth stanza is called a couplet.

Anatomy of the Shakespearean Sonnet, continued…  Shakespearean Sonnets always begin with a QUESTION or a PROBLEM  The TURN in a sonnet (indicated by But, And, or So) precedes a shift or change in the sonnet

Anatomy of the Shakespearean Sonnet, continued…  Shakespearean sonnets also incorporate iambic pentameter in each line  Iamb = two syllables: unstressed stressed (U /)  Pentameter = five times per line  TOTAL: 10 syllables per line

Iambic Pentameter exemplified Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? U / U / U / U / U / Notating the different stresses is called scansion.

Sonnet #18 1. Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? 2. Thou art more lovely and more temperate. 3. Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, 4. And summer's lease hath all too short a date. 5. Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, 6. And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; 7. And every fair from fair sometime declines, 8. By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd; 9. But thy eternal summer shall not fade 10. Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st; 11. Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, 12. When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st: 13. So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, 14. So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Sonnet #18 1. Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? 2. Thou art more lovely and more temperate. 3. Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, 4. And summer's lease hath all too short a date. 5. Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, 6. And often is his gold complexion dimm'd; 7. And every fair from fair sometime declines, 8. By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd; 9. But thy eternal summer shall not fade 10. Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st; 11. Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, 12. When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st: 13. So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, 14. So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.