Your force to break, blow, burn, and make me new. That I may rise and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend It's a really complicated and interesting take on religion.īatter my heart, three-person’d God, for youĪs yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend It's like a lusty attempt at talking about God. This is a love poem, but hidden inside a prayer. The best lack all conviction, while the worstįinally, let's look at John Donne's Breathe Shine and Seek. The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere Things fall apart the centre cannot hold You can see how malleable this is to design the story inside the poem. It's written in blank verse, but it still has the rhythm we've discussed. In the Beginning how the Heav’ns and EarthĪnother of my favorite works done in this style is W. That Shepherd, who first taught the chosen Seed, Sing Heav’nly Muse, that on the secret top Restore us, and regain the blissful Seat, Of that Forbidden Tree, whose mortal tastīrought Death into the World, and all our woe, Of Mans First Disobedience, and the Fruit Another hugely famous work done in this style was John Milton's Paradise Lost. Of course, other people than Shakespeare write in iambic pentameter. That makes calamity of so long life… 'Hamlet' Credit: Castle Rock Iambic Pentameter Examples in Literature When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

To sleep, perchance to dream-ay, there’s the rub:įor in that sleep of death what dreams may come, That flesh is heir to: ’tis a consummation The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks Or to take arms against a sea of troublesĪnd by opposing end them. The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,

Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer To be, or not to be, that is the question: Read it with your da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM. And it's one of the most famous monologues of all time. This monologue from Hamlet is written in iambic pentameter. Shall I | compARE | thee TO | a SUM | mers DAY?ĭa DUM | da DUM | da DUM | da DUM | da DUMĪre you getting the hang of it? Okay, let's move on from sonnets and look at one of his plays. Take Shakespeare's Sonnet 12-'When I do count the clock that tells the time.' Say it out loud and hear the 'da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM.' Or how about Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18? 'Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?' Let's break it down together. In fact, they're probably the most accessible way to learn this technique.

William Shakespeare famously used iambic pentameter in his plays and sonnets. Iambic Pentameter Examples with William Shakespeare

Sonnet iambic pentameter template