SONNET: A lyric poem of fourteen lines, usually in iambic pentameter, with rhymes arranged according to certain definite patterns. It usually expresses a single, complete idea or thought with a reversal, twist, or change of direction in the concluding lines. There are three common forms:
(1) Italian or Petrarchan
(2) English or Shakespearean
- · 14 lines
- · Meter: iambic pentameter
- o 5 iambic feet
- o Each foot comprised of one stressed and one unstressed syllable -- /
- Rhyme scheme for Elizabethan sonnet: abab cdcd efef gg
(3) Miltonic
The Petrarchan sonnet has an eight line stanza (called an octave) followed by a six line stanza (called a sestet). The octave has two quatrains rhyming abba, abba, the first of which presents the theme, the second further develops it. In the sestet, the first three lines reflect on or exemplify the theme, while the last three bring the poem to a unified end. The sestet may be arranged cdecde, cdcdcd, or cdedce.
The Shakespearean sonnet uses three quatrains; each rhymed differently, with a final, independently rhymed couplet that makes an effective, unifying climax to the whole. Its rhyme scheme is abab, cdcd, efef, gg. Typically, the final two lines follow a "turn" or a "volta," (sometimes spelled volte, like volte-face) because they reverse, undercut, or turn from the original line of thought to take the idea in a new direction.
The Miltonic sonnet is similar to the Petrarchan sonnet, but it does not divide its thought between the octave and the sestet--the sense or line of thinking runs straight from the eighth to ninth line. Also, Milton expands the sonnet's repertoire to deal not only with love as the earlier sonnets did, but also to include politics, religion, and personal matters.
SONNET SEQUENCE: Also called a sonnet cycle, this term refers to a gathering or arrangement of sonnets by a single author so that the sonnets in that group or arrangement deal with a single theme, situation, a particular lady, or alternatively deal with what appears to be a sequential story. Petrarch, Sidney, Spenser, and Shakespeare all engaged in this practice, or at least the early editors of their works did. The first major sonnet cycle in English was Sir Philip Sidney's Astrophil and Stella (written in the early 1580s, published in 1591). Others include Daniel's Delia, Lodge's Phillis, Drayton's Idea's Mirror, Constable's Diana, and Spenser's Amoretti. Shakespeare's 154 sonnets, however, are best known of any sonnet sequences today.
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