Shakespeare’s Sonnets

154
 Structure
● 1st quatrain: deals with the moral
● 2nd quatrain and 3rd quatrain: the subject
● final couplet: sums up the argument of the piece
● iambic pentameter
● rhyme scheme: ABAB CDCD EFEF GG
● first 126 addressed to a young man
● the last 28 addressed to or referred to a woman
 Sonnet 1
From fairest creatures we desire increase,

That thereby beauty’s rose might never die,

But as the riper should by time decease,

His tender heir might bear his memory;

But thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes,

Feed’st thy light’s flame with self-substantial fuel,

Making a famine where abundance lies,

Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel.

Thou that art now the world’s fresh ornament

And only herald to the gaudy spring,

Within thine own bud buriest thy content,

And, tender churl, mak’st waste in niggarding.

Pity the world, or else this glutton be,

To eat the world’s due, by the grave and thee.

Lines 1-4

From fairest creatures we desire increase, A

That thereby beauty’s rose might never die, B

But as the riper should by time decease, A

His tender heir might bear his memory: B

Lines 5-8

But thou, contracted to thine own bright eyes, C

Feed’st thy light’st flame with self-substantial fuel, D

Making a famine where abundance lies, C

Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel. D

Lines 9-12

Thou that art now the world’s fresh ornament E

And only herald to the gaudy spring, F

Within thine own bud buriest thy content E

And, tender churl, makest waste in niggarding. F

Lines 13-14

Pity the world, or else this glutton be, G

To eat the world’s due, by the grave and thee. G