Did you write a Shakespearean sonnet?

Did you write a Shakespearean sonnet? One can divide humanity into two groups--those who can beidentified as the real author of a Shakespearean sonnet Shakespearean sonnetn.The sonnet form used by Shakespeare, composed of three quatrains and a terminal couplet in iambic pentameter with the rhyme pattern abab cdcd efef gg. Also called Elizabethan sonnet, English sonnet. , and those whocannot. Willard Espy revealed in his book The Word's Gotten Out(Clarkson Potter, 1989) the method for establishing authorship: look forthe first letter of a name anywhere in the first line of a given sonnet sonnet,poem of 14 lines, usually in iambic pentameter, restricted to a definite rhyme scheme. There are two prominent types: the Italian, or Petrarchan, sonnet, composed of an octave and a sestet (rhyming abbaabba cdecde ,the second letter of the name anywhere in the second line of the samesonnet, and so on until the full name is spelled out. Sure enough,WILLARD ESPY appears in Sonnet 114: or Whether doth my mind, being crown'd with you, drink up the monarch's plague, this flattery? or whether shaLl I say mine eye saith true, and that your Love taught it this alchemy, to mAke of monsters and things indigest such cheRubims as your sweet self resemble, creating every bad a perfect best as fast as objects to his beams assemble? o, 'tiS the first! 'Tis flatt'ry in my seeing, and my great mind most kingly drinks it uP. mine eYe well knows what with his gust is greeing. and to his palate doth preserve the cup. if it be poison'd, 'tis the lesser sin that mine eye loves it and doth first begin. It was a near miss--the P in Espy is the last letter on the line! How surprising is this result? Not very, it turns out. This essayassesses the mathematical likelihood, and provides the Word Ways readerwith a method of determining whether a search through the 154 sonnetshas a chance of revealing his name. The letter frequencies of the sonnets more or less resemble thosefound in present-day English-language texts. However, to allow fordifferences due to vocabulary choice, the first 30 sonnets were examinedto determine how many lines out of 420 contained each letter at leastonce. For the rare letters JQXZ, all 154 sonnets were examined. Theresulting probabilities are given below, in the first column followingthe letter. A .90 1/2 B .13 9 C .37 4 D .74 1 E .99+ 0 F .47 3 G .45 3 H .94 0 I .90 1/2 J .03 15 K .07 12 L .75 1 M .59 2 N .90 1/2 O .93 0 P .33 5 Q .02 17 R .87 1 S .93 0 T .97 0 U .68 2 V .10 10 W .56 2 X .02 16 Y .58 2 Z .01 21 To calculate quickly one's chance of success, select thoseintegers from the rightmost right��most?adj.Farthest to the right: in the rightmost lane of the highway.Adj. 1. rightmost - farthest to the right; "in the rightmost line of traffic" column corresponding to the letters ofone's name. If the sum is 19, there is an 80 per cent chance thatat least one of the 154 sonnets will contain your name; if 24, 50 percent; and if 28, only 20 per cent. For example, WILLARD ESPY correspondsto 2+1/2+1+1+1/2+1+1+0+0+5+2 = 14, which suggests that the probabilityof success is about 90 per cent! If one's total suggests some likelihood of success, the searchthrough the sonnets can be made a little less tedious by selecting therarest (highest-scoring) letter in one's name and searching thatline first in each sonnet. How do present and past editors of Word Ways fare? ROSS ECKLERappears three times, in Sonnets 34, 89 and 93. DMITRI BORGMANN, whorequires all fourteen lines in the sonnet, appears but once, in Sonnet114 (the one featuring Espy as well). Alas, HOWARD BERGERSON has a nameof fifteen letters, denying him his chance for immortality immortality,attribute of deathlessness ascribed to the soul in many religions and philosophies. Forthright belief in immortality of the body is rare. Immortality of the soul is a cardinal tenet of Islam and is held generally in Judaism, although it is not an . What about FRANCIS BACON, the putative Alleged; supposed; reputed.A putative father is the individual who is alleged to be the father of an illegitimate child.A putative marriage is one that has been contracted in Good Faith and pursuant to ignorance, by one or both parties, that certain author of Shakespeare'splays William Shakespeare's plays have the reputation of being among the greatest in the English language and in Western literature. His plays are traditionally divided into the genres of tragedy, history, and comedy. ? His score is 231/2, suggesting a 50-50 chance of appearing in asonnet, but none of the sonnets qualifies. However, since his name hasonly twelve letters, one can give him an additional chance by allowinghis name to start on the second or third line of a sonnet. Thisstratagem STRATAGEM. A deception either by words or actions, in times of war, in order to obtain an advantage over an enemy. 2. Such stratagems, though contrary to morality, have been justified, unless they have been accompanied by perfidy, injurious to the rights of results in success; he appears in Sonnets 60, 104 and 107, andtwice in Sonnet 89! say that thou didst forsake me for some fault, and i will comment upon that ofFence. speak oF my lameness, and i stRaight will halt, against my Reasons, mAking no defence. thou cAnst Not, love, disgrace me half so ill, to set a form upoN desired Change, as i'll myself disgraCe, knowing thy will. I will acquaintance strangle and look Strange. be aBSent from thy walks, and in my tongue, thy sweet Beloved name no more shAll dwell, lest i (too muCh profAne) should do it wrong and haply Of our old aCquaintance tell. for thee, agaiNst myself i'll vOw debate, for i must Ne'er love him whom thou dost hate. The time-honored way of imbedding a name in a poem requires thatthe letters be the first on each line. The odds that this willaccidentally happen are vanishingly van��ish?intr.v. van��ished, van��ish��ing, van��ish��es1. a. To pass out of sight, especially quickly; disappear. See Synonyms at disappear.b. To pass out of existence.2. small; poems containing acrosticsare constructed with this restraint in mind (for example, LewisCarroll's poems to Alice Liddell Alice Pleasance Liddell (May 4, 1852 – November 15, 1934) was the inspiration for the children's classic Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. Her surname Liddell is pronounced ). The acrostic acrostic(əkrŏ`stĭk), arrangement of words or lines in which a series of initial, final, or other corresponding letters, when taken together, stand in a set order to form a word, a phrase, the alphabet, or the like. TITAnIA appears inShakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream A Midsummer Night's Dream is a romantic comedy by William Shakespeare written sometime in the 1590s. It portrays the adventures of four young Athenian lovers and a group of amateur actors, their interactions with the Duke and Duchess of Athens, Theseus and Hippolyta, and ", at thestart of six lines spoken by Titania herself. The August 1985 Word Wayssuggests that a self-referential acrostic like this was very likelyinserted by Shakespeare. A. ROSS ECKLER For the centenarian researcher, see A. Ross Eckler, Jr.Albert Ross Eckler (May 22, 1901 - March 14, 1991) served as deputy director of the United States Census Bureau from 1949 to 1965, and its director from 1965 until 1969. Morristown, New Jersey Morristown is a town in Morris County, New Jersey, United States. As of the United States 2000 Census, the town population was 18,544. Its estimated population in 2004 was 18,842. It is the county seat of Morris CountyGR6.