Transcript The history of the sonnet

The history of the sonnet
by Nathalie French
for my padawans in 10B
Definition of a sonnet
What are we talking about?
A sonnet is fundamentally a dialectical construction
which allows the poet to examine the nature and
ramifications of two usually contrastive ideas,
emotions, states of mind, beliefs, actions, events,
images, etc., by juxtaposing the two against each
other, and possibly resolving or just revealing the
tensions created and operative between the two.
Does this make any sense?
Let me try and explain…
Who is who in Sonnetland?
• Petrarch
• Wyatt
• Spenser
• Shakespeare
Solasi Nel Mio Cor
– Petrarch (1304-1374)
She ruled in beauty o'er this heart of mine,
A noble lady in a humble home,
And now her time for heavenly bliss has come,
'Tis I am mortal proved, and she divine.
The soul that all its blessings must resign,
And love whose light no more on earth finds room,
Might rend the rocks with pity for their doom,
Yet none their sorrows can in words enshrine;
They weep within my heart; and ears are deaf
Save mine alone, and I am crushed with care,
And naught remains to me save mournful breath.
Assuredly but dust and shade we are,
Assuredly desire is blind and brief,
Assuredly its hope but ends in death.
Translated by Thomas Wentworth Higginson
Like To These Immeasurable Mountains
– Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503-1542)
Like to these immeasurable mountains
Is my painful life, the burden of ire:
For of great height be they and high is my desire,
And I of tears and they be full of fountains.
Under craggy rocks they have full barren plains;
Hard thoughts in me my woeful mind doth tire.
Small fruit and many leaves their tops do attire;
Small effect with great trust in me remains.
The boist'rous winds oft their high boughs do blast;
Hot sighs from me continually be shed.
Cattle in them and in me love is fed.
Immovable am I and they are full steadfast.
Of the restless birds they have the tune and note,
And I always plaints that pass thorough my throat.
Sonnet 95
-Edmund Spenser (1552-1599)
One day I wrote her name upon the strand,
But came the waves and washed it away:
Again I wrote it with a second hand,
But came the tide, and made my pains his prey.
Vain man, said she, that dost in vain assay
A mortal thing so to immortalize!
For I myself shall like to this decay,
And eek my name be wiped out likewise.
Not so (quoth I), let baser things devise
To die in dust, but you shall live by fame:
My verse your virtues rare shall eternize,
And in the heavens write your glorious name;
Where, whenas death shall all the world subdue,
Our love shall live, and later life renew.
Sonnet 18
– William Shakespeare (1564-1616)
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.
Iambic pentametre
Poetry and therefore sonnets are written with a
certain flow. In Shakespeare’s case, it is iambic
pentametre.
Watch this explaination
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p226OX39O
Ls
Further explanation
Iamb means unstressed (da)-stressed (DUM)
da DUM
Penta means five in Old Greek
da DUM da DUM da DUM da DUM da DUM
- V - V
- V - V
V
Shall I com-pare thee to a sum-mer’s day
Homework
Remember your sonnet number? Go to
http://www.shakespeares-sonnets.com and find
the sonnet you are going to learn by heart.
Make two prints of the original sonnet and one
of the modern translation. Start reciting your
sonnet with the use of iambic pentametre
Also complete the worksheet Scrumptious
Shakespeare