1. Love Song Think of a song that expresses what love means to you.
Part 1: Write down the lyrics as much as possible from memory and/or paraphrase them.
Part 2: Explain why this song is meaningful to you and your understanding of “love.” Select some favorite lines and/or words and explain why you like them.

2. Renaissance Poetry or Verse Courtly love poetry Pastoral poetry
The sonnet

3. Love Song Pt. 2 Compare the two songs played in class.
What is the tone of each?
What kind of love, or what perception or truth about love, is being expressed?
What was the purpose?
What lines are especially effective or poetic?

4. All forms of lyric poetry
The term lyric comes from the Greek word lyra, a musical instrument
Refers to poems that were originally sung and accompanied by music
Retain the form and musical quality of a song
Usually short poems that express personal feelings

5. Can be contrasted with epic poetry
Not long—usually short
Not narratives—lyric poems don’t tell a story
Not about a hero doing great nation-saving deeds
About the internal, private thoughts and feelings of the individual
Not written in 3rd person
Written in the 1st person

6. Subject matter of lyric poems usually is love, loss of love, doomed love, unrequited love
Later subjects expanded to include religious and philosophical themes, reflections on nature, mortality and the passing of time, youth, loss of youth, loss of innocence

7. A common feature is the refrain—a line or several lines that repeat throughout the poem, either exactly or with variations (similar to the chorus in a song)
Made up of stanzas and lines
Usually has a fixed rhyme scheme
Usually has a regular meter, based on the number of syllables and stress

8. Meter
Refers to the number and pattern of beats or stresses in a line of poetry
In other words, it’s a way of describing rhythm
Foot is a term used to the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables
There are 4 different “feet” or types of rhythm:
Iamb--unstressed, stressed (galloping horse)
Trochee--stressed, unstressed (beating heart)
Anapest--unstressed, unstressed, stressed
Dactyl--stressed, unstressed, unstressed

9. We can also talk about the number of feet in a line
We can also talk about the number of feet in a line. Tetrameter=4 feet Pentameter=5 feet Hexameter=6 feet

10. Courtly Love Originated in the courts of medieval France
Modeled on the feudal relationship between a knight and his liege or lord
But this was a relationship between the knight and a courtly lady, a lady above him in status (usually the wife of the lord)

11. Courtly Love
Idea of this relationship was an ennobling, ideal, platonic love (at least in the beginning)
The knight’s love for the lady inspires him to heroic deeds (keeps him in line)
Courtly love found its expression in the lyric poems sung by troubadours

12. Courtly love poetry
A popular theme of such love poetry was unrequited love—love that is ignored or rejected. Usually the rejected lover is portrayed as desolate and anguished, totally in the power of the beloved.

13. Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503-1542) A diplomat in the service of Henry VIII
Traveled widely; responsible for bringing various forms of Italian lyric poetry to England

14. “My Lute, Awake”
In the style of the native English dance song, a lively and forceful kind of verse written to be sung to the accompaniment of the lute

15. Queen Elizabeth
Daughter of Henry VIII & his second wife, Anne Boleyn
Well-educated, well-read, multilingual & wrote poetry
Queen of England for 45 years
A glorious period in English history
Known as the “Virgin Queen”; she never married

16. “On Monsieur’s Departure” Composed sometime between 1568 & 1570
Structure:
Rhyme scheme:
Meter:
Speaker:
Subject:
Apostrophe:
Paraphrase:
Purpose:
Tone:
Figurative Language
→Paradoxes:

17. Review
How does “My Lute Awake” fit the characteristics of courtly love?
How does “On Monsieur’s Departure”?
Compare and contrast the portrayals of unrequited love in both poems. Think especially about the attitudes of the speakers, or the tone, of each poem.

18. Journal: Courtly Love
After completing the Venn Diagram, answer the following questions: What are your overall impressions of courtly love? Do you see any influences from the courtly love tradition in our society today? How does the courtly view of love compare to how we see love, romance, and relationships today?

19. Pastoral Poetry
Pastoral comes from the Latin word pastor, meaning “shepherd”
Presents an idealized view of the life of shepherds and of country or rural life in general
Common topics of pastoral poetry include love and seduction, the value of poetry itself, death & mourning, the corruption of the city vs. the “purity” of country life

20. Pastoral Paintings

22. “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love” by Christopher Marlowe
Form/structure:
Rhyme scheme:
Meter/Rhythm:
Speaker:
Apostrophe:
Purpose:
Tone:
Imagery:
Figurative
Language:

23. “The Nymph’s Reply” by Sir Walter Raleigh
Form/structure:
Rhyme scheme:
Meter/Rhythm:
Speaker:
Apostrophe:
Purpose:
Tone:
Imagery:
Alliteration/Assonance/
Consonance:

24. Pastoral Ponderings
Do the seasons and/or age affect how likely people are to fall in love?
Do you believe an ideal love is possible? Does all love necessarily have its time when it must end?
Who do you identify with more--the speaker of “The Passionate Shepherd” or the speaker of “The Nymph’s Reply”? Explain.

25. The Sonnet Length: 14-lines
Subjects: of a lyrical nature—a focus on personal feelings and thoughts
Meter: Iambic pentameter (lines containing 5 metrical units, each consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable)
Structure and rhyme scheme: a particular structure and rhyme scheme, Patrarchan or Shakespearean
Originated in Italy; comes from the Italian word meaning “little song”
Francesco Petrarch ( )—Perfected the Italian form of the sonnet

26. The Petrarchan Sonnet 2-part structure: an octave
(8 lines) followed by a sestet
(6 lines)
The octave had an abbaabba
rhyme scheme
The sestet had a cdecde or a
cdcdcd rhyme scheme
Typically, the octave describes a problem or asks a question & the sestet gives the resolution to it
The 9th line consists of a “turn,” signaling the move to a resolution or a change in tone or mood

27. The Sonnet
The lovelorn Sir Thomas Wyatt (of “My Lute, Awake” fame) introduced the sonnet to the English court
English poets modified the Italian form to better suit the rhyme-poor English language
Though Shakespeare was not the first English poet to write sonnets, he used the form with such distinction that the English sonnet came to be known as the Shakespearian Sonnet

28. Shakespearian Sonnet
3 quatrains (4 lines) followed by a rhyming couplet (2 lines)
Rhyme scheme is abba cdcd
efef gg
Meter is iambic pentameter

29. Shakespearian Sonnet
The first quatrain introduces a situation, which is explored in the next two quatrains
A turn, or shift in thought, occurs in the third quatrain or in the couplet
The couplet often brings resolution and closure
The couplet may be thought of as the “punch line”

30. Francesco Petrarch Born shortly after 1300 in Italy; died in 1374
Studied law, classics, & finally entered the service of the Church
On Good Friday in April, 1327, he saw Laura for the first time
Fell madly in love & proceeded to write 366 sonnets to her

31. Laura
Not much is known about her but she is believed to have been Laura de Noves, a married woman
Chances are they never even spoke
She died in 1348 of the plague
He died in 1374; many of the sonnets were written after her death

32. Edmund Spenser Born to a relatively poor London family but managed
to work his way through
Cambridge University
Established literary
connections there and began
his poetic career
Served the nobility throughout his life in whose households he met many other court writers who were promoting the new English poetry of the Elizabethan Age
Experimented with verse forms
His most famous work is the poetic romance titled The Faerie Queen

33. TP-CASTT Title Paraphrase Connotation (Figurative Language)
Attitude/Tone
Shifts (in speaker, tone or mood)
Title (again)
Theme

34. Title
Ponder the title before reading the poem (what does it say to you, what associations come to mind, what predictions can you make about the poem)

35. Paraphrase
Translate the poem into your own words

36. Connotation
Contemplate the poem for meaning beyond the literal level (look at word choice—which words have a very specific connotation—and look at use of figurative language

37. Attitude/Tone
Observe both the speaker’s and the poet’s attitude (tone) toward his/her subject matter

38. Shifts
Notice shifts in speakers and in attitudes

39. Title
Examine the title again, this time on an interpretive level

40. Theme
Determine what the poet is saying