WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Also known as “That boring guy who writes stuff we don’t like”

 Born in 1564 in a city called Stratford-Upon-Avon in England.  Married to Anne Hathaway in He was 18 and she was 26. Their first child, Susanna was born six months later  They also had twins, Hamnet and Judith in Hamnet died in WHO WAS WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE?

THE BARD!  Credited with writing 37 plays  Some of his most famous works include Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Macbeth, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Julius Caesar, Antony and Cleopatra and Othello.  He is also credited with writing 154 sonnets

THE SONNETS  The subject of sonnets is a fair young man, presumably a friend or wealthy patron of Shakespeare’s. These are the love poems and, some make a case that there is a homosexual relationship between the bard and the young man.  The other main muse in his sonnets is The Dark Lady. This could be a reference to a woman who is not blonde or a woman of color, an African woman.

SONNET 18

SHAKESPEAREAN SONNET  An 18 line stanza written in iambic pentameter, that employs the rhyme scheme abab, cdcd, efef, gg, and can be divided into three quatrains and a couplet.

IAMBIC PENTAMETER  Line of poetry that can be divided into 5 metric feet with alternately unstressed and stressed syllables. Shall I/ compare/ thee to/ a sum/ mer’s day Thou art/ more lov/ ly and/ more temp/ orate

SONNET 29

PARAPHRASE  A restatement of a text in another form or other words, often to simplify or clarify meaning.