Sonnets
Sonnets. The English Sonnet. Is the poetic form favored by William Shakespeare (though he did not invent sonnets). They are also called Shakespearean sonnets because he perfected the form. A sonnet is fourteen lines long.
Sonnets
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Presentation Transcript
The English Sonnet • Is the poetic form favored by William Shakespeare (though he did not invent sonnets). • They are also called Shakespearean sonnets because he perfected the form.
A sonnet is fourteen lines long. • It is divided into three quatrains (rhyming four-line stanzas) and a concluding couplet (a pair of rhyming lines). • The rhyming scheme is: • ABAB CDCD EFEF GG • Each quatrain makes a point or gives an example, and the couplet sums up the whole poem.
It is written in iambic pentameter. • In iambic meter each unstressed syllable is followed by a stressed syllable. • There are 5 iambic units on each line of a sonnet (10 syllables).