There are, of course, other types of sonnets,as well, but I'll stick for now to just the basic three (Italian, Spenserian, English), with a brief look at some non-standard sonnets. Each of the three major types of sonnets accomplishesthis in a somewhat different way. Basically, in a sonnet, youshow two related but differing things to the reader in order to communicatesomething about them. Then move not, while my prayer's effect I take.Basic Sonnet Forms Basic Sonnet Forms Nelson Miller From the Cayuse Press Writers Exchange BoardĪ sonnet is fundamentally a dialectical construct which allows the poet to examine the nature and ramifications of two usually contrastive ideas,emotions, states of mind, beliefs, actions, events, images, etc., byjuxtaposing the two against each other, and possibly resolving or justrevealing the tensions created and operative between the two. Saints do not move, though grant for prayers' sake. They pray - grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.

O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do E Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too? EĪy, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer. Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, Cįor saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch, CĪnd palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss. To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss. My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand A This holy shrine, the gentle sin is this: B In this next example (from Act I, Scene 5), you can see how this conversation between Romeo and Juliet is actually a sonnet. Shakespeare also disguised sonnets within the dialogue of the play. What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend. The which if you with patient ears attend, G Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage F Which, but their children's end, naught could remove, E The fearful passage of their death-mark'd love, EĪnd the continuance of their parents' rage, F Bįrom forth the fatal loins of these two foes CĪ pair of star-crossed lovers take their life Dĭoth with their death bury their parents' strife.

Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean. In fair Verona, where we lay our scene, Bįrom ancient grudge break to new mutiny, A The most obvious way sonnets are included in 'Romeo and Juliet' is as complete poems. To review, a Shakespearean sonnet is a 14-line poem that includes three quatrains followed by one couplet, with the rhyme scheme ABAB CDCD EFEF GG.īelow, you will find two examples of techniques Shakespeare used to incorporate sonnets into 'Romeo and Juliet.' The rhyme scheme is included in purple. In addition, Shakespeare included sonnets in the play. On almost every page of the play, you can find examples of couplets or quatrains incorporated into the characters' dialogue. Shakespeare included rhyme throughout the dialogue of 'Romeo and Juliet'.

Simple sonnet examples by students