Shakespeare also wrote 154 sonnets. Two of his most famous sonnets are Sonnet 18, "Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day?" and Sonnet 73, "That Time of Year Thou Mayst in Me Behold." Sonnets are written in an iambic pentameter. Each iamb consists of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable. In an iambic pentameter, this is repeated five times. There is also a rhyme scheme. Sonnets consist of three quatrains, followed by a couplet at the end. Each quatrain has an ABAB rhyme scheme. Put into the whole sonnet, the rhyme scheme is ABAB,CDCD,EFEF,GG. Both sonnets are displayed below.
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Sonnet 18
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May:
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd:
And every fair from fair sometimes declines.
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimm'd:
But thy eternal summer shall not fade.
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand’rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to Time thou grow’st.
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May:
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd:
And every fair from fair sometimes declines.
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimm'd:
But thy eternal summer shall not fade.
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand’rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to Time thou grow’st.
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
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Sonnet 73
That time of year thou may'st in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.
In me thou see'st the twilight of such day,
As after sunset fadeth in the west,
Which by-and-by black night doth take away,
Death's second self, that seals up all in rest.
In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire
That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,
As the death-bed whereon it must expire
Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by.
This thou perceivest, which makes thy love more strong,
To love that well which thou must leave ere long.
That time of year thou may'st in me behold
When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang
Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,
Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.
In me thou see'st the twilight of such day,
As after sunset fadeth in the west,
Which by-and-by black night doth take away,
Death's second self, that seals up all in rest.
In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire
That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,
As the death-bed whereon it must expire
Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by.
This thou perceivest, which makes thy love more strong,
To love that well which thou must leave ere long.