sonnets + iambic pentameter

• Engels
• Middelbare school
• vwo
• Leerjaar 5

Why is a sonnet better than a play, according to this fragment?

1. it is easier to write
2. people remember it for a lot longer
3. a play is often not well-visited
4. the weather has no influence on it

Shakespeare wrote how many sonnets?

1. 49
2. 82
3. 137
4. 154

What modern-day comparison is made by the end of the fragment? A sonnet resembles a...

Shakespearean Sonnets

- A sonnet = 14-line poem

- Iambic Pentameter = emphasis on 2nd syllable
                                             & every line has 10 syllables (or 5 feet)

   "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day"

- The sonnet originally comes from Italy (Petrarch) 

   (2x4 lines + 2x3 lines);  Shakespearean = 3x4 + 1x2

- 1609: Shakespeare's Sonnets were published

First folio 1623

Common themes in Shakespeare's sonnets

Romantic Love (Dark Lady, fair youth)

Dangers of Lust and Love

Real Beauty versus Dreamt of beauty

Responsibility of Being Beautiful

Romantic Love 

• Addressing sonnets to a young man was unique in Elizabethan England. 
• Furthermore, Shakespeare used his sonnets to explore different types of love between the young man and the speaker, the young man and the dark lady, and the dark lady and the speaker. In his sequence, the speaker expresses passionate concern for the young man, praises his beauty, and articulates what we would now call homosexual desire. (Sonnets 1-126)
• The woman of Shakespeare’s sonnets, the so-called dark lady, is earthy, sexual, and faithless—characteristics in direct opposition to lovers described in other sonnet sequences, including Astrophil and Stella, by Sir Philip Sidney, a contemporary of Shakespeare, who were praised for their angelic demeanor, virginity, and steadfastness. (sonnets 127–154)

Dangers of Lust and Love

Many sonnets warn readers about the dangers of lust and love. According to some poems, lust causes us to mistake sexual desire for true love, and love itself causes us to lose our powers of perception.

Real beauty versus Cliched beauty

Real love, the sonnet implies, begins when we accept our lovers for what they are as well as what they are not. Other sonnets explain that because anyone can use artful means to make himself or herself more attractive, no one is really beautiful anymore. Thus, since anyone can become beautiful, calling someone beautiful is no longer much of a compliment.

Responsibilty of being beautiful

Shakespeare urges the young man to procreate as he is so beautiful that beauty needs to be preserved.

In other words, the young man’s beauty allows him to get away with bad behavior, but this bad behavior will eventually distort his beauty, much like a rotten spot eventually spreads. Nature gave the young man a beautiful face, but it is the young man’s responsibility to make sure that his soul is worthy of such a visage.

Sonnet 130

- Joke on the way the contemporary
 poets praised their lovers.

- Doesn't praise his lover: 
      - not white as snow
      - no beautiful red lips
      - no golden hair

- Love doesn't need to be extreme
   to be real, against unrealistic ideals

00:43

What is meant with "stress"?
Explain in your own words.

05:04

Answer in your own words: Why did Shakespeare choose Iambic Pentametre?

03:37

Explain IN YOUR OWN WORDS:
what is Iambic Pentametre?