William Shakespeare was born on 26 April 1564 and died on 23 April 1616. He was a famous playwright and an English poet. In the English language, William Shakespeare is regarded as one of the greatest writer and is also considered as one of the pre-eminent dramatist. According to recent research, he has written various poems, 38 plays and 154 sonnets, as well as a variety of other poems. Many of the times, he is known as national poet of England and "Bard of Avon" or simply "The Bard".

William Shakespeare was born in Stratford-upon-Avon and was raised here. At the age of eighteen he married Anne Hathaway and then from which hey had three children. Shakespeare went to London between 1585 and 1592 and there he became an actor, writer and Lord Chamberlain’s Men, which was later known as King’s Men’s part owner and from this he got huge financial success. Shakespeare died in 1613 at the age of 52 in Stratford.

Play

All of the plays, which were attributed to Shakespeare, were not completely written by him. Revision, collaboration or both are found sometimes in writings of Shakespeare. Accurate establishment of Shakespeare’s plays cannot be made for chronology. During his lifetime, quarto versions were printed which varied the quality. However, no evidence was found regarding the involvement of Shakespeare in this publication. In 1623, after seven years of death of Shakespeare, two former colleague of Shakespeare, John Heminges and Henry Condell published the book First Folio. There were 36 Shakespeare's plays, and remained the only extant source for around sixteen of them.

Sonnets

Collection of approximately 154 poems combines to a sonnet of Shakespeare which has the themes of love, beauty, and mortality and this style is named as the Shakespearean sonnet, and today also this is in use. The poem included in the sonnet comprises of 14 lines with 3 quatrains, and closing couplet follows these lines and quatrains. The rhyme scheme which is followed is abab cdcd efef gg (each letter corresponding to a rhyming line).

In the year 1609, from these 154 poems, two poems were published in SHAKE-SPEARE'S Sonnets; which numbers are138 ("When my love swears that she is made of truth") and 144 ("Two loves have I, of comfort and despair") and these were initially published in 1599 in The Passionate Pilgrim.

Style

When we will look and read Shakespeare poems and plays it will be observed that some passages written by Shakespeare are in prose, and his plays and poems large portion is written in iambic pentameter. In order to strengthen the rhythm, punctuation was added in his early works. For evaluating the poetry of drama, Shakespeare and other dramatists of his time occasionally used this type of blank verses for dialogues between characters. Macbeth is a typical example for the same, in which stage was left by Macbeth in order to murder Duncan and he says:
“Hear it not Duncan; for it is a knell that summons thee to heaven or to hell.”

Reputation

Shakespeare was not pre-eminent in his life but gained popularity during the same. He was singled out by Francis Meres in 1598, from the English poets group, which was compared by him with the Greece and Rome greatest, and he was described among the English poets as "the most excellent" for both comedy and tragedy. Ben Johnson, who was his rival, after his death, gave him both praise and criticism. According to him, Shakespeare was "soul of the age, the applause, delight, the wonder of our stage".