William Shakespeare Sonnet Structure

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Student: Redian Cobo Professor: Vladimir Levchev Course: ENG 210a Sonnet XII by William Shakespeare William Shakespeare is considered one of the greatest English writers. He was known for his talent in writing but also for his personality and creativity in literature field. Regarding his carrier as a writer, he was focused more on creating plays and sonnets. He published in 1609 the “Sonnets”, which was a book with a lot of poems. Part of this book was also the “Sonnet XII”. Those kind of poems were called sonnets, this for their special structure. It is one of the best sonnets in all the history of writing. Shakespeare describes the slow flowing of time and brings all things to an end. I believe that …show more content…

Each of its lines has ten syllables. Also it is written in fourteen lines. The structure of the twelve first lines consists of three quatrains with four lines each. The last two lines are called couplet. Basically, Shakespeare in the quatrains introduces the reader with the problem and on the couplet defines the solution. Furthermore, the rhyme scheme is abab on the quatrains, an alternated one. On the other hand, the rhyme scheme of the couplet is aa. To begin with, Shakespeare introduces the reader with the main symbol of the sonnet on the first line, which is time. Furthermore, on the second line he uses metaphoric epithets like “brave day” and “hideous night”. Both epithets establish the antithesis between each other, which gives to the sonnet the tone of contrast. This tone helps the reader to realize the difference between the beginning of time or life with the end of it. In addition, on the third and fourth line Shakespeare makes a comparison between “the violet past prime” and “all silvered o’er with white”. In the context of the sonnet, prime is the period of perfection and on the other hand, silvered with white curls means the time passing

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