VCCS Litonline Introduction to Literature          page 12 of 20
English 112 (English Composition II)

(Click to download Real Player.)

More Scansion of Sonnet 116

Directions:  Read about "Scansion" on the right, try to apply the "rules" by looking at the sample on the left, then click on the audio link under line 14 to hear the lines read through your Real Player™ as you scroll  through the lines.  Be sure to listen more than once to see if the reading matches the scansion marked above lines 9 - 14 of the poem.  The syllables with the yellow background should seem loudest.

 

...............//.................//..................../........../.............../

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks  9

.........../.........../............../............../...............//

Within his bending sickle's compass come;              10

............/..........//............//................/................../

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,       11

............/.........../....//......................./............./

But bears it out, even to the edge of doom.              12

......./.........../........./........../............../

If this be error and upon me proved,                         13

...../........../............../.........../.........../

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.                         14

Click here for a reading of the lines above.

Click here for an alternative reading of line 9 during a reading of the whole sonnet, which makes "Time's" louder and "fool" softer--implying that love is the fool of something besides time.

"Iambic Pentameter"

Using the 4 rules offered in the scansion column (one page back), a reader of this poem might mark the 5 louder syllables per line as shown. The length and (on this page) darkness of the marks are an attempt to show the relative loudness of each syllable throughout the poem.

Double marks show the loudest syllables in these lines--in particular, the nots on this page and the word even. Notice that EV-en is a trochee (say TROE-key) that occurs after a long pause. This variation in the rhythm is deliberate and carefully placed to emphasize the speaker's most forceful claim about love--that it lasts until death.
Selecting the Best Way to Read a Line

typehand.gif (8738 bytes)Which of the louder syllables should be read as the loudest in the line?  Re-open your word processor and explain for ONE of the comparisons offered below, which one of two readings of the line makes more sense.  Tell which syllable is emphasized in the way you prefer the line to be read, and tell what meaning you associate with that reading as opposed to the other way of reading that is presented.

  • first half of line 9   Love's NOT time's fool . . . ||  Love's not TIME'S fool . . .

  • Line 12   But bears it out, EVen to the edge of doom.  ||  But bears it out, eVEN to the edge of doom.

(*Click here for a hint on re-opening a word processor.)
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