One of the biggest pleasures of learning English, is being able to read the wonderful books that English-speaking authors have written.

When I was doing my master’s in English literature, I was introduced to many of those wonderful books.

In this lesson I’m going to read out to you one of the most beautiful poems ever written in the English language: William Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18. Then, we’re going to go through each line and I’m going to give you the modern English version. And after that we’re going to read the poem together, out loud.

Here’s the poem.

Sonnet 18, by William Shakespeare

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Let me read it once more.

Let’s now look at our sonnet line by line. First I’m going to give you Shakespeare’s line, and then I’m going give you

The modern English version

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Should I compare you to a summer’s day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
You are more handsome and more constant:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
Strong winds shake the beautiful May flowers,

And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;
And summer is too short;

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
Every so often the sun is too hot,

And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And often it hides behind the clouds;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,
And everything beautiful at some point loses its beauty,

By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
Accidentally or by the inevitable passing of time.

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
But your youth will not disappear,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor will you lose the beauty that you possess;

Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
Nor will you die,

When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
Because in my eternal poem you will live forever.

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
For as long as there are people on this earth,

So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
This poem will live on, and will make you immortal.

I love that last line: So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Before we read it out together, let me give you

Some pronunciation tips

Here are a few words from the poem that you may have trouble with:

The sound: /ʌ/

These seven words all have the vowel sound: /ʌ/

summer, lovely, rough, bud, sometime, untrimmed, but.

I’ll say them again.

The silent R

In the British English accent that I teach, which is known as Standard British English, Received Pronunciation or BBC English, the final R and the R before a consonant are silent.

In our poem, the R is silent in these thirteen words: compare, summer, art, more, darling, short, fair, or, nature, course, eternal, nor, wander’st.

Notice that, in those thirteen words, when the R comes after a stressed vowel, that vowel is long: compare, art, more, darling, short, fair, or, course, eternal, nor.

But when the R comes after a non-stressed vowel, that vowel is short: summer, nature, wander’st.

The sounds: /θ/ /ð/

/θ/ is the sound you’re familiar with from words like: thank, thing, earth, strength.

In our poem, that sound appears only in two words: hath, death.

But the sound /ð/ appears in seven words: thee, thou, the, thy, that, breathe, this.

This sound gives the poem an elegant touch. Listen to these three lines:

• Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
• Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
• But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

If you want to practise the sounds /θ/ /ð/ have a look at my English pronunciation course.

Let’s now practise reading the poem out loud. Say the lines after me:

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Let’s read it out one more time.

Learn the 45 British English sounds
with Maria’s pronunciation course