Handout for Shakespeare's Sonnets
From UCSB English Department Knowledge Base
| Welcome to the English Department Knowledge Base at the University of California, Santa Barbara. |
|---|
Kris McAbee
Fall 2002
Engl 101
- Consider Sonnet 130. What kind of relationship does this poem describe? Compare the metaphors in this poem to the Petrarchan conventions discussed last week.
- Look at Poem 126. What is distinctive about this poem? In what ways does the poem itself point toward its position as a transition in this sequence of sonnets? Consider it in the context of the other Shakespeare sonnets we have read for class.
- Follow the puns in Sonnet 135. What are the different meanings of “will” in each line? What sort of reading do these puns mean for the poem as a whole?
- Consider Sonnets 127-129. What kind of relationship do they have to each other? Do they follow each other logically? If so, what kind of progression do they show, or what story do they tell? Would changing their order change their meaning?
- Look at Sonnet 71. What view of immortality does it present? How does this view relate to the issues of immortality presented in last week’s poems? What is the speaker’s tone—Somber? Ironic? Bitter? Conceited?
