The poets remembered today never fully obeyed the limitations of their poetic forms. The sonnet, with its many rules and strict iambic pentameter, is made to be modified. For example, Edmund Spenser changed its form so much that he developed his own brand of sonnet (Abrams and Harpham 369). Roughly 200 years later, William Wordsworth stretches the sonnet’s limitations in his own way in “Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room”. In the tradition of Donne and Milton, the way that Wordsworth modifies the sonnet while still identifying with the sonnet form affects how readers are meant to experience the poem. The persona of Wordsworth’s sonnet has the reader question the need for restrictions throughout the poem, first rejecting it as soon as the opening trochee, then embracing it in the final lines. Wordsworth’s sonnet is Petrarchan, but several substitutions push the sonnet’s limitations while still …show more content…
Whereas “[s]it blithe and happy” continues the thought about the previous line’s maids and weaver (Wordsworth 4), “bees that soar for bloom” (5) is a sudden shift from humans being content while confined to animals flying about in the traditional sense of freedom. The speaker still claims that even the bees have sentenced themselves to a prison that is not so terrible after all (Wordsworth 8-9). As expected from a Romantic poet’s work (Abrams and Harpham 239), the lines before the volta are filled with natural imagery that echoes in the sonnet’s final lines as well. “High as the highest Peak of Furness-fells” (Wordsworth 6) evokes the meditative grandeur of both the Romantic tradition (Abrams and Harpham 239) and of the poem as a whole, which gives the reader a sense of longing for a bee’s dull routine. Yet, as the sonnet’s persona implies, the reader might already be a part of this dull, yet comforting routine (Wordsworth
Billy Collins, the writer of Sonnet, uses a comical effect to make fun of old sonnets, how they were written and the older poets, through the use of literary terms. The fact that Billy Collins speaks with a mockery tone of Petrarch, causes readers to understand how he feels about the old sonnet writers and their work. Collins' tone expresses a negative look on old sonnets, but also looks on the bright side of them. He addresses the issue of how older sonnets were written by old poets in order to explain to readers why he wants to change the face of sonnets today. He is trying to get this main point across to readers so that they understand why he wants this change.
In the poem "Nuns fret not at their convent's narrow room" by Williams Wordsworth, he expressed in great detail the meaning of confinement. This poem is a sonnet that consists of 14 lines, and one couplet. Also, this poem is an iambic pentameter which has 10 syllables per line and five sets of unstressed syllables followed by stressed syllables. The Volta or turning point of thought in this poem is discover when Wordsworth stated "In truth the prison, into which we are doom" (Wordsworth 8).
The imposition of the British aggressor is even made apparent through the structure of the work, the two sonnet form stanzas not only highlight the inadequacy of the loveless union, but with their Shakespearean rhyme scheme also imply the cultural dominance of English tradition. The use of half rhymes, such as ‘pulse’ and ‘burst’ or ‘pain’ and ‘within’ leaves the stanzas feel...
"Poetry is the revelation of a feeling that the poet believes to be interior and personal [but] which the reader recognizes as his own." (Salvatore Quasimodo). There is something about the human spirit that causes us to rejoice in shared experience. We can connect on a deep level with our fellow man when we believe that somehow someone else understands us as they relate their own joys and hardships; and perhaps nowhere better is this relationship expressed than in that of the poet and his reader. For the current assignment I had the privilege (and challenge) of writing an imitation of William Shakespeare’s "Sonnet 87". This poem touched a place in my heart because I have actually given this sonnet to someone before as it then communicated my thoughts and feelings far better than I could. For this reason, Sonnet 87 was an easy choice for this project, although not quite so easy an undertaking as I endeavored to match Shakespeare’s structure and bring out his themes through similar word choice.
Wordsworth shows the possibility of finding freedom within his poem by choosing to write within the Italian sonnet’s rules. What makes an Italian sonnet unique is the division and pattern of its rhyme scheme. It is usually structured in an ABBA, ABBA, CDE, CDE pattern, and broken into two main parts, the octave (the first eight lines) and the sestet (the final six). The meter of “Nuns” can be labeled as iambic pentameter, yet along with the meter, the poem differs from the norm in two more ways. The first difference is in the rhyme scheme. In a typical Italian sonnet, the sestet follows a CDE, CDE pattern, in “Nuns” however, it follows the pattern CDD, CCD. It’s minute, but adds emphases to the 13th line, which contains the poem’s second anomaly. All the poem’s lines have an ...
Moran, Daniel. “Sonnet XXIX.” Poetry for Students. Ed. David Galens. Vol. 16. Detroit: Gale, 2002. 146-147. Print.
...e speaker admits she is worried and confused when she says, “The sonnet is the story of a woman’s struggle to make choices regarding love.” (14) Her mind is disturbed from the trials of love.
..., D. E. (2009, November 7). The Sonnet, Subjectivity, and Gender. Retrieved October 11, 2011, from mit.edu: www.mit.edu/~shaslang/WGS/HendersonSSG.pdf
Moran, Daniel. “Sonnet XXIX.” Poetry for Students. Ed. David Galens. Vol. 16. Detroit: Gale, 2002. 146-147. Print.
The fourteen line sonnet is constructed by three quatrains and one couplet. With the organization of the poem, Shakespeare accomplishes to work out a different idea in each of the three quatrains as he writes the sonnet to lend itself naturally. Each of the quatrain contains a pair of images that create one universal idea in the quatrain. The poem is written in a iambic pentameter with a rhyme scheme of ABAB CDCD EFEF GG. Giving the poem a smooth rhyming transition from stanza to
---. "Sonnet 130." The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Vol. 1. M. H. Abrams, ed. W. W. Norton (New York): 1993.
Sir Thomas Wyatt is credited as one of the first poets to bring the sonnet form into English literature, a form in which the speaker’s sincerity for, most commonly, a distant mysterious woman whom he loves, is believed to be the focal point of the poetry. From the selection of works which Wyatt wrote we can see many point in which the focal point is seemingly the earnestness of his love for his muse as authenticated by what he states in the poem itself. However, there is a sense of underlying meaning throughout his works which the reader must tease out themselves to see that that in fact is the focal point of his poetry.
John Donne and William Shakespeare are each notorious for their brilliant poetry. William Shakespeare is said to be the founder of proper sonnets, while John Donne is proclaimed to be the chief metaphysical poet. Each poet has survived the changing centuries and will forever stand the test of time. Although both John Donne and William Shakespeare share a common theme of love in their poems, they each use different tactics to portray this underlying meaning. With a closer examination it can be determined that Donne and Shakespeare have similar qualities in their writing.
The structure of the poem sets up Wordsworth’s arguments that nature and children are two separate entities inexplicably linked to divinity. It is written in the form of an Italian sonnet, which
The sonnet, “Composed Upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802,” shows Wordsworth’s appreciating the beauty of London and demonstrating it as “emotion recollected in tranquility.” It’s characteristic of his love for solitude that it is set in the early morning when there is no bustle and noise.