Sonnets Essay Research Paper Sonnets An Insight

Sonnets Essay, Research Paper

Sonnets: An Insight into Shakespeare’s Mind.

During Elizabethan times, 1550-1625, a great writer’s explosive way of writing brought forth-new life to poetry. This outstanding poet, author and playwright, was William Shakespeare. Shakespeare wrote fourteen-line poems called sonnets. Although Shakespeare is known for his masterpiece plays, his sonnets are also worthy of this credit. These autobiographical sonnets are tales of love, deception, and betrayal. Although it is presumable that Shakespeare did write these sonnets about his own life, some experts are still puzzled by the possibilities. It seems as though Shakespeare poured his whole self into the sonnets. However, the idea of the sonnets being fictional comes few and far between. If one man can so exquisitely write fictional stories about love and still include a controversial issue in them, then where do we draw the line between fact and fiction. On account of much research, I have found that the belief of the majority of experts I reviewed was that the sonnets are most likely to be autobiographical. Some evidence shows this theory may be true. Therefore, Shakespeare, according to many experts, used his real life affair with a man and a woman in his sonnets. His recreations of pain, joy, and sorrow help to add to the drama of the sonnets. Also, Shakespeare has shown the possibility of writing to a distinct person. Many experts ponder the question of whom. Although they have narrowed down the group of possible candidate many agree on one specific in each category.

As the Black Death was making its voyage from Sicily to conquer the European countries, an eager Shakespeare might have been contemplating whether or not to write a comedy or a drama. However, as soon as the plague did reach Europe, theaters closed and there was nowhere for Shakespeare.s plays to be performed. This posed a problem for the young author. Shakespeare had to somehow exert his ability to another area of writing. What better way to fulfill his urge than to write sonnets. The sonnet was being used as a common way for expressing one’s love for another. Shakespeare thought of this common way of writing as an outlet to do just what everyone else was doing. He would express his innermost thoughts and feelings to the people he loved.

The sonnet is a fourteen line lyrical poem written in iambic pentameter, a meter in which five accents are placed on the stressed and unstressed syllables in each line. English poets were eager to find some way to make their sonnet better so “when sixteenth century English poets discovered the Italian sonnet, they decided to alter the rhyme scheme to a-b-a-b, c-d-c-d, e-f-e-f, g-g” (Rozakis 354). Shakespeare used this discovered form in his sonnets. The concluding lines of the poem resolve the problem discussed in the above twelve lines of the sonnet. After Shakespeare.s death the English sonnet that he so profoundly popularized was renamed the Shakespearean Sonnet (Rozakis355).

After researching the grouping of the sonnets there is still much controversy about Thomas Thorpe’s arrangement. Many of the experts doubt the accuracy of the order in which they are found today. The sonnets are currently found in an order called Thorpe Quarto. This order seems practical and does not pose any unanswered questions. .Thorpe.s arrangement groups the Sonnets by whom he is supposedly writing to. Then they are numbered for practicality since no titles were provided.(Wilson). However, researchers find that this arrangement was just a guess on Thorpe’s part and was not grouped by the poet himself. Nevertheless, when the sonnets are re-arranged they have no order or sense to them. Thorpe’s arrangement also gave experts the ability to look at the sonnets in a way in which you could take the individuals addressed and say that there are two distinct groups.

The first group of sonnets, which run from sonnets one to one hundred twenty six, address two people of the male gender. Sonnets one hundred twenty seven to one hundred fifty six have a distinct person as to whom he is speaking, he addresses a “dark lady” who is supposedly seductive and sexy (”The Sonnets”1). This group of sonnets has been the contradicting side of many experts’ theories. Sonnets one hundred fifty three and one hundred and fifty four are unusually unrelated to the two groupings. They relate to a Greek poem about Cupid and his torch (”The Sonnets”1). The first group then can be split into two smaller sub-groups. Sonnets one to seventeen tell how Shakespeare wants to marry and have children (”The Sonnets”1). In addition to the sonnets about a young man, sonnets seventy-eight to eighty-six are about a “Rival Poet, ” who experts say “temporarily wins the favor and presumably, patronage, of the friend. (”The Sonnets”1).

The First Group is entitled by Thomas Thorpe is “The Friend,”. Shakespeare was said to have a love for the boy written about. This statement brings up the question of homosexuality or bisexuality on the part of William Shakespeare. On the contrary, .Shakespeare also said that his love for the boy was purely spiritual.. (Wilson). Shakespeare says in his sonnets that he “wants to marry and have children of his own, but only with a woman” (Martin). The controversial identity of Shakespeare’s male lover has perplexed many experts. Yet, written on the inside cover of the 1609 edition of the