Sonnet – from A Handbook to Literature

A poem almost invariably of 14 lines and following one of several set rhyme schemes.  The two basic sonnet types are the ITALIAN or PETRARCHAN and the ENGLISH or SHAKESPEAREAN.

The ITALIAN form is distinguished by its division into the OCTAVE and the SESTET: the octave rhyming – abba abba – and the sestet – cde cde or cd cd cd.

The octave presents a narrative, states a proposition, or raises a question.

The sestet drives home the narrative by making an abstract comment, applies the proposition, or solves the problem.

The octave-sestet division is not always kept; the rhyme scheme is often varied, but within the limitation that no Italian sonnet properly allows more than five rhymes overall, and no rhymed couplets in the sestet.

Ideally, the sense of the lines falls into groups different from the rhyme groups, thus – ab – ba – ab – ba – cde – cde – so that nowhere do we encounter a pat couplet.

The least objectionable departures are the – abba acca – octave and the – cd cd cd – sestet.

Iambic pentameter is usual.  Certain poets have, however, experimented with other meters.

In the ENGLISH form, four divisions are used: three QUATRAINS (each with a rhyme scheme of its own, usually rhyming alternate lines) and a rhymed concluding COUPLET.  The typical rhyme scheme is – abab cdcd efef gg.

The SPENSERIAN sonnet complicates the Shakespearean form, linking rhymes among the quatrains – abab bcbc cdcd ee.  (Note how the rhyme scheme resembles that of the Spenserian stanza.)

History:

The sonnet developed in Italy probably in the 13^th century (the 1200’s).  Petrarch, in the 14^th century (the 1300’s), raised it to its greatest Italian perfection and gave it, for English readers at least, his name.

The form was introduced into England by Thomas Wyatt, who translated Petrarchan sonnets and left more than 30 of his own compositions in English.  Surrey, and associate, shares with Wyatt the credit for introducing the form to England and is important as an early modifier of the Italian sonnet.

Gradually, the Italian sonnet pattern was changed, and, because Shakespeare attained fame for the greatest poems of this modified type, his name has often been given to the English form.

Among the most famous sonneteers in England have been Sidney, Shakespeare, Milton, Wordsworth, Keats, D. G. Rossetti, Meredith, Auden, and Geoffrey Hill.  Longfellow, Robinson, Frost, Cummings, and Berryman are generally credited with writing some of the best sonnets in America.

Certain poets following the example of Petrarch have written a series of sonnets linked to one another and dealing with a single, although sometimes generalized, subject.  Such series are called sonnet sequences.  Some of the most famous in English literature are

• Shakespeare’s Sonnets
• Sidney’s Astrophil and Stella
• Spenser’s Amoretti
• Rossetti’s House of Life
• Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Sonnets from the Portuguese
• Meredith’s Modern Love

John Berryman, Allen Tate, W. H. Auden, and Marilyn Hacker have done distinguished work in the sonnet sequence in this century.  In the last decade of his life, Robert Lowell wrote scores of 14-lined poems that, without rhyming of adhering to any very strict pattern of rhythm, manage to preserve the appearance of sonnets, along with something of their spirit, passion, and personal focus.

Petrarchan Conceit:

The kind of conceit used by Petrarch in his love sonnets and widely imitated or ridiculed by Renaissance English sonneteers.  It rests on exaggerated comparisons expressing the beauty, cruelty, and charm of the beloved and the suffering of the forlorn lover.  Hyperbolic analogies to ships at sea, marble tombs, wars, and alarums are used.  Oxymoron is common.  Shakespeare, in Sonnet 130, satirizes the Petrarchan conventions while giving a reasonably accurate catalog of some of the more common.