Poetry – Introduction to the sonnet

1. Poetry – Introduction to the sonnet

2. Don’t put the emphasis on the wrong syllable Understanding accent

3. Explanation of meter • What is the meter of your last name? • Think: • How would you pronounce it clearly to someone who is learning it from the first time? Using meter

4. 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 dimmed, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st, Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st, So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. Sample sonnet

5. a lyric poem consisting of fourteen lines written in iambic pentameter with a definite rhyme scheme and a definite thought structure A lyric poem deals with emotions, feelings Iambic pentameter consists of five measures, units, or meters, of iambs A sonnet is…

6. An iamb is a metrical foot consisting of an unaccented syllable U followed by an accented syllable /.

7. U / U / U / U / U / • One day I wrote her name u pon the strand, U / U / U / U / U / • But came the waves and wash ed it a way: U / U / U / U / U / • A gain I wrote it with a sec ond hand, U / U / U / U / U / • But came the tide, and made my pains his prey • Edmund Spenser, Amoretti, Sonnet 75 1 2 3 4 5

8. Petrarchan (Italian) rime scheme: abba, abba, cd, cd, cd abba, abba, cde, cde • Shakespearean (English, or Elizabethan) rime scheme: abab, cdcd, efef, gg Rhyme scheme

9. 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 dimmed, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st, Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st, So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. A B A B C d C D E F E F G G Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18

10. Octave/ sestet • The octave, eight lines, presents a situation or idea. • The sestet (sextet), six lines, responds, to the situation or idea in the octave. • Quatrain, quatrain, quatrain, couplet • Each quatrain, four lines, describes and idea or situation which leads to a conclusion or response in the couplet, two lines. Thought structure

11. 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 dimmed, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st, Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st,So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. The octave describes the ways in which the summer’s day is inferior to the beloved. The sestet describes the ways in which the beloved is superior to the summer’s day. Sonnet 18

12. When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes I all alonebetween my outcast state, And troubledeaf heaven with my bootlesscries, And look upon myself, and curse my fate, Wishing me like to one more rich in hope, Featured like him, like him with friends possessed, Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope, With what I most enjoy contented least; Yet in these thoughts my self almost despising, Haply I think on thee, and then my state, Like to the lark at break of day arising From sullen earth, singshymns at heaven's gate; For thy sweet love remembered such wealth bringsThat then I scorn to change my state with kings. The diction of the octave implies the speaker’s self-pity and depression. The sestet’s diction, in conrast, is joyful. Sonnet 29

13. Sonnet 130 My 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 rare   As any she belied with false compare. Rude or reality?

14. Holy Sonnet 10

15. Original version of Holy Sonnet 10 • Different punctuation • No semi colon, and no capital D • This portrays death as nothing more than a pause, a comma • Nothing more than a breath • Not a grand, dramatic event to be shouted about with capital letters What’s in a comma?

16. Does the speaker truly have the confidence that is conveyed, or is he convincing himself that he is not afraid of death? • If you have to pick out the one most effective argument in the poem , which one would it be? • Does the comparison between death and sleep make sense outside of a theological context? Is the speaker justified in thinking that death will bring pleasure? • Do you think it’s truly possible to welcome the experience of death in the way that the poem seems to suggest? Or, is everyone afraid of death, and some people just pretend not to be? Study questions