Lutz 2016
English 12AP
Shakespeare’s Sonnets
Aside from structural and formal elements, the one quality that most sonnets have in common is their topic: love. Shakespeare was no exception. There seems no end to what people have to say about this most important of all human emotions. He alone wrote 154 sonnets that all follow suit.
The Greeks categorized love into several types, three of which are as follow:
1. eros: this is puppy love, romantic infatuation, etc. This is when the entire world seems rosy and wonderful just because you’ve met that someone special. You tingle all over, blissfully ignorant to the fact that you have no idea who that person really is or if, in 40 years, you’ll still care for him/her.
2. philos: philos grows out of eros. Philos demands a “give-and-take,” and in this love a person comes to realize that he/she cares about the person because he/she has come to love him/her as a friend. This is deeper than simply being attracted to a person because of superficial reasons.
3. agape: pronounced “ah-gah-pay”; this is one of the highest forms of love. Agape is an unconditional love, a selfless love. This is when we love people even when we see that they have many flaws and their actions might not even deserve our love.
I have given you three sonnets. For each, follow the directions below:
1. Read the sonnet and mark the rhyme scheme in the right margin.
2. Refer to “Making Sense of Sonnets” to determine
a. whether this is an English, Italian, or Spenserian sonnet.
b. what the structural pattern of meaning is (e.g., examples & conclusion,
metaphors & application, situation & comment, idea & example, or question &
answer) by labeling the structural pattern as it unfolds (i.e., bracket the quatrain
as a metaphor or the sestet as a question).
Note: the structural patterns in your notes are the most common, but they may
appear in either the English or the Italian
3. Determine what kind of love the speaker is illustrating. Label the poem and write a
single chunk that defends your label.