1. different time periods
INTERPRET the poem’s
meaning/ideas
ANALYSE HOW
a poet creates this
meaning
UNDERSTAND how
time/context effects
meaning.
SYNTHESISE ideas from
different time periods

2. Shakespeare: Sonnet 130

3. Starter…
Today’s techniques: Intensifiers Syntactic Parallelism Intransitive verb Heroic Couplet Conceit

4. Today… Learning objective: Learning outcome: Assessment Objective:
To be able to DESCRIBE the traditional sonnet form.
To be able to EXPLAIN how and why Shakespeare changes this form.
Learning outcome:
At the end of the lesson you will annotated the poem and responded to key ideas.
Assessment Objective:
AO1 – apply concept from linguistic study using subject terminology where appropriate.
AO2 – analyse ways in which meanings are shaped in texts.

5. Petrarch (and his sonnets) …
14th century poet whose work has come to be recognised as the founding sonnet form. He wrote sonnets about love (amongst other things). Used a set form of 14 lines containing an octave (made up of two quatrains) and a sestet (made up of three tercets). Rhyme scheme was ABBA ABBA CD CD CD. The intended recipient of his sonnets, ‘Laura’, was completely idealised (both imaginary and perfect).

6. Context
During the Renaissance sonnets typically glorified how women looked and were brimming with hyperboles (exaggerations) such as “thy lips are like a thread of scarlet” (Song of Solomon King James Bible).
A common term for these sonnets are blazon sonnets.
Shakespeare’s Sonnet 130 is SATIRICAL because it makes fun of the sonnets of his time.

7. Shakespeare: Sonnet 130 My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask’d, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.
I am now going to look at some important lines. Following on from this we will look at the elements of the CONE. If you're familiar with this you'll know it's important to have plenty of juicy knowledge and comfortability with analysing the lexis, structure, imagery, sound and syntax of poems. 

8. Meaning:
Sonnet 130 makes fun of exaggerative language to give a more realistic depiction of a woman. As we go through the poem we are made to feel as if the mistress isn’t very attractive. However, the poem finishes on a romantic note because the woman is unique and it’s not fair for her to be misrepresented and lied to through false comparisons. Overall the speaker does love her but doesn’t need to be exaggerative to express his love.
A theme of honesty is present in this poem which could demonstrate how genuine his love is.

9. My mistress eyes are nothing like the sun
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet , by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare
The first word is a 1ST person possessive pronoun - a possessive pronoun shows us that the woman belongs to the speaker
Noun - this has a Modern English Meaning ( ) for a woman that a man loves. We know the speaker loves this woman from this title.
My mistress eyes are nothing like the sun
WHAT? He's just called her his mistress yet now he uses a negative simile "nothing like" to say she doesn't have sun-like eyes
Ok so here's the first line and first impression the reader gets of the poem. The first word that we see is a possessive pronoun by this I mean it is showing that the mistress belongs to someone. This relates to how women were viewed as a man's possession at the time. I want to point out the word mistress to you because it doesn't have today's meaning of a woman who a man has a relationship with who isn't his wife. Actually it is a term of endearment just meaning a woman that is loved by somebody in Middle English This first line is supposed to shock you, because we have just learned that he loves this woman because he called her his mistress but the line follows on with a a negative simile. Instead of being complimentary he says she has eyes nothing like the sun therefore we think straight away that the speaker is insulting the woman he loves.  This line is CRUCIAL because it makes it clear that this is not a typical sonnet that will be overly romanticised and it is clearly divergent from other sonnets. From this line we are led through other similar comparisons that we will explore now.

10. The actual red coral is literally more red than her lips
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun:
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet , by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare
repetition of the word red because it is the colour associated with love
The actual red coral is literally more red than her lips
Coral is far more red than her lips' red
So the speaker has just told us that the woman doesn't have sun filled eyes. Ok fine, but then his camera lense spans down and he describes the colour of her lips to us. We are ready to here a beautiful compliment surely? Not quite. Shakespeare compares her physical features again but this time with coral. His reference to colours then allow us to paint a picture of her onto our blank canvas. You may be thinking that it's not disastrous that she doesn't have deep red lips, however a sign of beauty was to have red lips and the colour red was regularly idealised with women's beauty. Just have a pause and flick to your next poem in the anthology called There is a Garden in her Face and note how many times the colour red is referenced there too.
"far more" intensifying the fact that her lips are definitely not a deep red colour

11. Syntactic Parallelism
The writer is saying that the woman doesn't have white skin or golden hair which were both things that were beautiful features for women
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun:
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet , by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare
Syntactic Parallelism
both sentences begin with the conjunction "if"
both have a conditional clause broken by a semi-colon
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
Both of these sentences look very similar. Why? Well they both begin with if which is a conjunction that is beginning a conditional clause. Not only that but spot that both sentences are broken like this if X be Y, why then is Y not what it's supposed to be. So if snow is white why then are the colour of her breasts not sparkling white like snow. Similarly if hairs are like golden wire, the mistress actually has black wires. It is important to note the metaphor here, in Shakespeare's time hair was referred to as wires because of golden wire. This presumed that beautiful woman should have light hair. However the write breaks away from this and states that actually his love has black hair. 
Metaphor: the word wires is not literal, it refers to golden wire, as women who had beautiful hair were told they had hair like golden wire

12. My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun:
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet , by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare
Begins with the first person pronoun 'I'
so that we hear the speaker's account and it reaffirms his opinion
Damasked means a blend or variegated pattern. The speaker is saying he has seen blended red and white roses but not a blend of white skin and red cheeks
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
So far we know the woman has pale lips, black hair and eyes that don't beam like sunrays. But there's more. These two lines compare her cheeks to red and white damasked roses. Damasked means a blend so the speaker is saying his mistress doesn't have a blend of white rosey cheeks against the porcelian white skin he mentioned before. By saying the blend of red and white is found in roses but not in her cheeks he is stressing that it is possible in roses but a perfect blend of red and white isn't possible on his mistress' cheeks because well she is a human being. Shakespeare is being very clever as he is picking at how unrealistic the bar has been set for women to be perfect. A bit like how unrealistic it is to compare women today to the idealised Kardashian. 
Foregrounded disjunction "but". Hold tight as this prepares us for the negative that is about to follow.

13. Repetition of the possessive pronoun “my” from previous lines emphasizes the speaker’s ownership of the woman
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun:
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet , by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare
Begins with the foregrounded conjunction “and” so we anticipate more comparisons
And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks
The line starts with a conjunction “and” so we are ready for another comparison. Here Shakespeare is comparing his mistress’ breath to the smell of perfume. It is crucial that you note that “reeks” does not mean smell, it actually means the action of breathing out not smell. The meaning of smell for the word reeks didn’t come about until after this poem was published in the late 17th century. If you think about it is fair to think that the woman doesn’t breath out the beautiful smells of actual perfume every time she lets out some carbon dioxide from her mouth. He is showing how ridiculous it is to think that someone could genuinely breath out the beautiful smells of perfume.
Reeks here does not mean smell it means breath, the meaning of smell didn’t come about until after the 17th century

14. “love” – an abstract noun he shows us here a redeemable feature is that he love to speak with her
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun:
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet , by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare
Here’s the turning point as we prepare for some negativity with the disjunction “yet”
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music have a far more pleasing sound;
The line starts with a conjunction “and” so we are ready for another comparison. Here Shakespeare is comparing his mistress’ breath to the smell of perfume. It is crucial that you note that “reeks” does not mean smell, it actually means the action of breathing out not smell. The meaning of smell for the word reeks didn’t come about until after this poem was published in the late 17th century. If you think about it is fair to think that the woman doesn’t breath out the beautiful smells of actual perfume every time she lets out some carbon dioxide from her mouth. He is showing how ridiculous it is to think that someone could genuinely breath out the beautiful smells of perfume.
Adjective “pleasing” suggests that music is more relaxing and enjoyable than listening to her voice

15. The way she walked was not the way of mortals but of angelic forms,
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun:
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet , by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare
Petrarch sonnet:
The way she walked was not the way of mortals but of angelic forms,
Reference to how women were supposed to walk like an angel
“ I grant” a declarative phrase so we are set up to believe what is about to follow
I grant I never saw a goddess go; My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground
Tread ( intransitive verb) – shows she just walks normally like any other human on the ground and not in the air.

16. Declaring a vow so we know he is being serious about what he is about to say
“And yet”: a conjunction and a contrastive verb. Foregrounds the twist (volta) in the sonnet.
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun:
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet , by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare
“my love” possessive phrase again – referring to the mistress
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare.
VOLTA – THE TWIST IN THE RHYMING COUPLET
The line starts with a conjunction “and” so we are ready for another comparison. Here Shakespeare is comparing his mistress’ breath to the smell of perfume. It is crucial that you note that “reeks” does not mean smell, it actually means the action of breathing out not smell. The meaning of smell for the word reeks didn’t come about until after this poem was published in the late 17th century. If you think about it is fair to think that the woman doesn’t breath out the beautiful smells of actual perfume every time she lets out some carbon dioxide from her mouth. He is showing how ridiculous it is to think that someone could genuinely breath out the beautiful smells of perfume.
Paraphrase:
I think that my love is unique compared to others but she has been lied to by false comparisons in blazon sonnets.

17. Rhyme scheme? Number of lines? Structure? Purpose? Meter? Content?
How is Shakespeare’s sonnet different to Petrarch’s?
14th century poet whose work has come to be recognised as the founding sonnet form. He wrote sonnets about love (amongst other things). Used a set form of 14 lines containing an octave (made up of two quatrains) and a sestet (made up of three tercets). Rhyme scheme was ABBA ABBA CD CD CD. The intended recipient of his sonnets, ‘Laura’, was completely idealised (both imaginary and perfect).
Rhyme scheme?
Number of lines?
Structure?
Purpose?
Meter?
Content?

22. How does Shakespeare subvert the traditional sonnet form in Sonnet 130?