WRITE YOUR OWN SONNET

Shakespeare was not the first writer to write sonnets. Petrarch, an Italian poet in the 14th century, was one of the first to make this form popular. His poems are known as Petrarchan or Italian sonnets. (The origin of the word comes from the French and Italian words for “sound” and “song,”)

Shakespeare, however, made the form famous, and it is his form that has been emulated ever since. To write your own Shakespearean sonnet, you need four elements. First, the poem should be 14-lines. (However, if you don’t mind settling for a B on this assignment, you could shorten yours to 10 lines.)

Second, you need to write your poem in iambic pentameter, which means five units of iambs. See below for examples of iambs.

Third, you should follow the rhyme scheme for a Shakespearean sonnet: abab cdcd efef gg. (If you write a ten-line poem, your rhyme scheme will be abab cdcd ee. See below for examples.)

Finally, and perhaps most challengingly, your sonnet should end with a concluding couplet. As you can see from the examples below, Shakespeare states his theme in the final couplet of his poems. Sometimes this couplet summarizes what is said above, but often it contradicts the earlier lines. See “My mistress’eyes are nothing like the sun” for a good example.

Sounds easy, right? It’s actually quite challenging, but I know you are up for it. Remember the following focus areas:

(10) fourteen lines

(15) iambic pentameter

(10) rhyme scheme

(15) couplet clincher

Here is an almost perfect example of a Shakespearean sonnet. Note the rhyme scheme, the meter (iambic pentameter) and the way that the last two lines conclude—and contradict—the first twelve lines.

Sonnet CXXX
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; A
Coral is far more red than her lips' red; B
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; A dun: a dull grayish brown
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. B
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white, C damasked: to ornament
But no such roses see I in her cheeks; D
And in some perfumes is there more delight C
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. D
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know E
That music hath a far more pleasing sound; F
I grant I never saw a goddess go; E
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground: F
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare G
As any she belied with false compare. G belie: to prove false

Please label the rhyme scheme for the poem below. Then, take a close look at it. In this one, the main point of the poem shifts earlier than the final couplet. Can you find the line where the main idea changes, and begins to express the theme? Look for a transition word.

Sonnet XVIII

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 dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd; (unchanged)
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest; (owns)
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee. (“This” = “This poem I have written for you.”)

One more, just for fun! While still a love poem, the theme is a bit different here. Shakespeare wrote this one late in his life; and it seems to be about growing old (The “time of year,” that leaves fall; also “twilight” has arrived.) What do you think he is saying here about the quality of love?

Sonnet LXXIII

That time of year thou mayst in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.
In me thou seest the twilight of such day
As 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
Consumed with that which it was nourish'd by.
This thou perceivest, which makes thy love more strong,
To love that well which thou must leave ere long.