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Shakespearean Sonnets and “Who We Are” The reason
so many love and study Shakespeare is that he seemed to have an ability to
pin down the human condition and
identify what makes people tick. His stories are unique, not for the
setting or the special effects, but because of the people and the
circumstances; anyone at any age, in any generation, can relate to these
stories and characters. These stories of the human condition are not limited to Shakespeare’s plays; he has also accomplished this feat through his sonnets.
As we will see in the following few examples, the themes of Shakespeare’s sonnets have been repeated through a multitude of genres, but most recognizably in music. |
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First, what is a sonnet? The English
Sonnet is a poem form consisting of 14 lines, each with ten stressed and
unstressed syllables known as iambic pentameter,
with a set rhyme scheme of: a b a b c d c d e f e f g g. The rhymes may be ear-rhymes or eye-rhymes: an
ear-rhyme is one that rhymes in sound, e.g. “increase” and “decrease”;
an eye-rhyme is one that rhymes by sight, e.g. “compare” and “are”.
This rhyme sequence sets the usual structure of the sonnet as three quatrains
(sets of four lines) concluding with 1 couplet (a pair of lines)... This
structuring provides a framework on which to build the words, phrases,
themes, rhymes, syncopation, punctuation and rhythm of the sonnet making it,
at its best, a self-contained work of art. |