Sonnets Checking for Understanding and Studying Figurative Language

Sonnets

Checking for Understanding and Studying Figurative Language

Good Morning!

1. Take out your narrative poem. Put your name on your work

2. Take out your sonnet packet.

Analysis of Sonnet 29

I will inevitably lose fame, fortune, and false friends. I will inevitably be surpassed by another artist, who is more gifted and more beautiful (in craft) than I am. When this is starting to happen, I feel bad for myself. I find comfort in you [subject] and my worth is validated.


Love should be celebrated with marriage. Love does not falter when the road gets rocky. Love is a star that guides those bonded by it. Love does not end. Love is unconditional. If I [Shakespeare] am proven wrong, then my career and what I stand for is a lie, so I will take back everything I’ve written.


• In me you see an aging man. As I approach my death, you will love me ever more because you will know that you are on the brink of losing me. Your grief will amplify your love.


No amount of fortune, war, or royalty could outlive the legacy of poetry. Since I’ve written about you [his love] in my poetry, you are immortal. Your legacy will also be more permanent than anything else.

(Mars is the Roman god of war)


Should I compare you to summer? I shouldn’t because while summer is fleeting, you will always be beautiful and youthful. Nature causes people to age and lose their looks, but my poetry will live on forever and since you are part of it, your beauty and youth will also be immortal.


My mistress [archaic meaning = sweetheart].

My sweetheart’s eyes are not like the sun. Her lips are not as red as coral. Her skin is more grey than white. Her hair is wiry. She does not have blush-filled cheeks. My sweetheart’s breath is far from perfume. Her voice is not sweet. And yet I love her more than anything.


• I’ve [Shakespeare] traveled far and I’m so happy to stop and to go to sleep. Alas, my journey is not done! In my dreams I begin a new journey to you, the path and the events illuminated by my soul. There I see you [shadow = not true, but dreams projection]; you make night beautiful. Between my thoughts of you by day and my dreams of you at night, I find no peace from missing you.


My eye is the painter; I’ve painted you in my heart. My eyes are the windows to my soul—look into them and you can see that I love you. Your eyes mirror my eyes, allowing me to recognize my own love for you. My eyes lack a valuable skill: I can see my love, you can see my love, but I cannot see your love.

(Here we see that love unifies Shakespeare and the subject, but we see perhaps the beginnings of a downfall)

Alliterative sentence that describes the painting “La Mariee” by Chagall

A metaphor that describes all or part of “Old Guitarist” by Pablo Picasso

Simile inspired by this painting, “Mirage” by Salvador Dali

Personification inspired by “Tree of Life” by Gustav Klimt

Onomatopoeia inspired by “Starry Night” by Vincent Van Gogh

A sonnet is

• a lyric poem• consisting of fourteen lines• written in iambic pentameter• with a definite rhyme scheme• and a definite thought structure• deals with emotions and feeling

Iambic pentameter consists of

• five measures, units, or meters, of• iambs

An iamb is a metrical foot consisting of

an unstressed syllable Ufollowed by an stressed syllable /.

Shakespearian sonnets: unstressed/stressed

U /a gain

U / U / im mor tal ize

Iambic Pentameter

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

Rhyme Scheme

• Shakespearean (English, or Elizabethan) rhyme scheme:

abab, cdcd, efef, gg

Sonnet 18Shall 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.

ABABCdCDEFEFGG

Thought Structure

• Octave/ sestetThe octave, eight lines, presents a situation or

idea. After the eighth line there is a turn in the poem.

The sestet (sextet), six lines, responds, to the situation or idea in the octave.

• Quatrain, quatrain, quatrain, coupletEach quatrain, four lines, describes and idea or

situation which leads to a conclusion or response in the couplet, two lines.

Sonnet 18Shall 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:

ButBut 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 29When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyesI all alone beweep my outcast state,And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,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;

YetYet in these thoughts my self almost despising,Haply I think on thee, and then my state,Like to the lark at break of day arisingFrom sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate; For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings

That 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 73

That time of year thou mayst in me beholdWhen yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hangUpon those boughs which shake against the cold,Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.In me thou see'st the twilight of such dayAs after sunset fadeth in the west;Which by and by black night doth take away,Death's second self, that seals up all in rest. In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire,That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,As the death-bed, whereon it must expire,Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by.This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong,To love that well, which thou must leave ere long.

1st Quatrain

Year - Fall

2nd Quatrain Day - Twilight

3rd QuatrainFire - Coals

“This” is ll.1-12

Directions for Sonnet or Ode

• Inspiration: Selected Shakespeare poems• Include your “found” sonnet (number and determine the

rhyme scheme). Also include your well-written paragraph that summarizes the meaning of the poem. Finally, include a well-written paragraph that explores the connections between the themes, ideas, or symbols in the sonnet and a piece of artwork.

• Write your own sonnet or ode. The piece must be fourteen lines, have a specific rhyme scheme (ababcdcdefefgg), consistent syllable use (rhythm), and adhere to a specific structure: octave/sestet or three quatrains and a couplet.

• Create a piece of art that represents your poem.

Sonnet As I observe the contents of my life, (a)I see that to many I’m not a prize. (b)Proud and high strung, I’ll not be the best wife, (a)but for you I will always, always try. (b)

I may not prepare the food you covet, (c)since I may not know how nor care to learn. (d)I don’t like Taco Bell, but you lovit, (c) when I cook chicken, ala not burned. (d)

I’m not so good at grand gestures, you know. (e)I get shy at cheezy proclamations. (f)Yet, when I look at you, face all aglow, (e)I see a glint of approximation. (f)

Even so, when mirrored by your eyes, I see (g)That you will always love me, just for me. (g)

Ode to ChocolateChocolate is my dearest friend (a)Alone or in a candy bar, (b)Eaten again and again, (a)Lo, sometimes I go too far… (b)

In the morning with my jo, (c)After my little lunch break, (d)A snacky-snack of yummo, (c)After dinner and when I wake. (d)

The best is so tough to place, (e)Take-Fives and Snickers are tied, (f)But then Reeses wins the race, (e)Tasting mighty dignified. (f)

Little morsel, here we go, (g)I’m eating you nice and slow! (g)

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Sonnets Checking for Understanding and Studying Figurative Language