Read Shakespeare's Sonnet 57 and write your answers to the questions.

Being your slave, what should I do but tend

Upon the hours and times of your desire?

I have no precious time at all to spend

Nor services to do, till you require.

Nor dare I chide the world-without-end hour

Whilst I, my sovereign, watch the clock for you,

Nor think the bitterness of absence sour

When you have bid your servant once adieu;

Nor dare I question with my jealous thought

Where you may be, or your affairs suppose,

But like a sad slave, stay and think of nought

Save, where you are, how happy you make those.

So true a fool is love, that in your will,

Though you do any thing, he thinks no ill.

1. What question does the poet ask himself ?

2. How does he answer it? (Write out the question and the answer.)

3. Who is the poem addressed to?

4. What is the poet doing in this poem? Telling the reader about his loved one? Complaining that he hasn't been given enough attention by her? Trying to criticise himself? Trying to say how unhappy and sad he is? Trying to say how much he loves her? Something else?

5. What type of person does the poet compare himself with?

6. What kind of slave is he?

7. Can you explain in your own words what has made the poet think that he is a slave to his beloved?

8. Can we guess from the poem whether the poet's beloved cares for him and is faithful to him?

9. What does the poet mean when he uses an unusual compound adjective "world-without-end"?

10. What kind of poem is this?

11. How many beats are there in each line? Are the lines regular or irregular? What is the rhyme scheme of the poem? (Write it out.)

12. How is the poet trying to convey his feelings to the reader? By using a rhetorical question? By using the pattern "Nor dare I..."? By using the repetition of the syntactic structure "Nor dare I..."? In some other ways? Does the poet make effective use of these devices?

13. a rhetorical question — question used for effect but not seeking answer;

14. a beat — main accent in music or verse.

15. What is the main feeling we get from the poem?

16. What is the poem about?

17. What people can this sonnet appeal to? Does it appeal to you?

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