Shakespeare Sonnets

Thanks to Shakespeare, awkward boys who can't come up with a pickup line to save their lives can have the reliable fall back of “Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate.” Shakespeare penned more than 150 sonnets that talk about romance, love, beauty, mortality, politics, lust, and even sex.

The 154 sonnets of Shakespeare were first published in 1609. they follow the structure of three four-line stanzas and a final couplet in iambic pentameter with a rhyme scheme of abab cdcd efef gg. This is now recognized as the Shakespearean sonnet. Not all of his sonnets followed this pattern though as some have fifteen lines and one is composed in iambic tetrameter.

The subjects of Shakespeare's sonnets created various speculations about the author himself. Some have questioned his sexuality because of his sonnets that expressed love towards a young man. Others have also theorized a heterosexual extramarital love affair as other sonnets were addressed to a certain mistress. A number of Shakespeare readers have interpreted his works though to be parodies of traditional love sonnets. Shakespeare also tackled topics in his sonnets that other poets steered clear from such as political events, a more open view on sex, and revision of traditional gender roles.