Introduction to Sonnets
English and Italian Sonnets
Background of Sonnets
• The first sonnets were written in 13th and 14th century Italy &
were love poems addressed to noble women or they honored
their wealthy nobleman patrons who supported the poet.
There are different types of sonnets:
• English/Shakespearean
• Italian/Petrarchian
Sonnets
English/Shakespearean Sonnet
• A 14 line poem made up of
three quatrains and a
couplet with a specific endrhyme scheme.
• The beat of the poem is
iambic pentameter.
William Shakespeare
What is Rhyme Scheme?
• The pattern of rhyme in a poem.
• To identify rhyme scheme, assign a letter of
the alphabet to each rhymed sound at the end
of a line.
• If that sound is repeated later on in the poem,
that line receives the same letter
• Abab/cdcd/efef/gg
For example:
Shall I compare thee to a summers day
Though 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
A
B
A
B
For example:
• The rhyme scheme of a Shakespearean Sonnet
is abab/cdcd/efef/gg.
• Example:
Shall I compare thee to a summers day
Though 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
A
B
A
B
Example: Sonnet 129
What is a quatrain?
• Quatrain: a stanza or poem of four lines, usually with
alternating rhymes
• Each quatrain is one unit of thought in the poem,
similar to a paragraph in prose.
Shall I compare thee to a summers day
Though 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
A
B
A
B
What is a couplet?
• Two lines that rhyme and are of the same
length
• In Shakespeare’s sonnets, the ending couplet
comments on the preceding three quatrains.
• Example:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.
What is iambic pentameter?
• Meter is the measured, patterned
arrangement of syllables, according to stress
and length in a poem.
• The most common meter in English verse is
the iamb, an unstressed syllable followed by a
stressed syllable.
Iambic Pentameter
• Five pairs of alternating unstressed and stressed syllables
• The rhythm in each line sounds like: ba-BUM / ba-BUM / baBUM / ba-BUM / ba-BUM
• Most of Shakespeare’s famous quotations fit into this rhythm
• Each pair of syllables is called an iamb. Each iamb is made up
of one unstressed and one stressed beat (ba-BUM).
Examples:
•
If mu- / -sic be / the food / of love, / play on.
•
Is this / a dag- / -ger I / see be- / fore me?
•
I AM A PIRATE WITH A WOODEN LEG!
Why this form?
• Often used to develop a sequence of
metaphors or ideas, one in each quatrain,
while the couplet offers either a summary or a
new take on the preceding images or ideas.
• The rhyme scheme, because of the way it
directs the ear, reinforces the dramatic feel of
the sonnet
More info…
Shakespeare subverts the traditional themes of
love sonnets—the traditional love poems in
praise of beauty and worth:
• for instance, some sonnets are believed to be
written to a man
• the love poems to a woman are almost all
bitter and negative
Organization of Sonnets
• The young man
• The dark lady
• The speaker
Who…
The speaker expresses passionate concern and desire
for the young man, and praises his beauty. Sonnets 1126 are addressed to the young man and discuss the
effects of having great beauty and the responsibility of
being beautiful. (The speaker is a dramatic, fictional
character – NOT Shakespeare.)
• The dark lady is sexual, and faithless, characteristics in
direct opposition to lovers in traditional poems.
Sonnets 127-152are addressed to her and warn about
the dangers of lust and love. The speaker loves her,
lusts after her, and hates her too!
• Several sonnets compare the idealized love found in
poems with the messy, complicated love found in real
life. (art and artifice)
Symbols and Ideas
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Flowers
Trees
Stars
Weather
Seasons
are symbols that are
used throughout the
sonnets
• Death
• Passage of Time
• Art vs. Artificial
are ideas that are
repeated throughout
the sonnets
Shakespeare dedicated his sonnets to “Mr. W. H.,” and the
identity of this man remains unknown.
Here is a conventional breakdown of the sonnets
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1-17 urge the fair young man to marry and have kids; admiration, deference, and
possessiveness develop
18-26 pay tribute to him. Sonnet 20 may indicate platonic love and rule out homosexual
implications, or not.
27-32 indicate sorrow at an enforced separation.
33-35, 40-42 concern the Dark Lady and the friend.
36-39, 43-47 recount the friend's absence from London
48-55 indicate the poet's removal from the friend.
56-58, 61 form a group on loneliness.
59-60, 62-65 are a series on time and beauty.
66-70, 94-96 on the world's corruption.
71-74, 81 brood upon death.
75-77 praise the friend as the inspirer of verse.
78-80, 82-86 reproach the friend for bestowing favors on the Rival Poet.
87-93 regret loss of the friend's confidence
.97-103, 113-114 recount another absence of the friend.
104-108, 115-116 are congratulatory.
109-112, 116-126 seek the restoration of the friendship.
127-128, 130 give taunting compliments to the Dark Lady.
129, 146, 147, 152 bitterly reject her.
135, 137, 143 pun on the name "Will," whether that's really his or a pen name.
153, 154 are translations of Greek epigrams referring to the hot springs at Bath.