Search results
A sonnet is a short lyric poem that consists of 14 lines, typically written in iambic pentameter (a 10-syllable pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables) and following a specific rhyme scheme (of which there are several — we’ll go over this point more in just a moment).
A curtal sonnet is made up of eleven lines total, which is three-quarters the length of a traditional sonnet. Petrarchan sonnets are made up of an octave and a sestet, right? So a curtal sonnet shrinks the octave to three-quarters of its length, shortening it from eight lines to six lines.
- Sonnet Definition
- Sonnet Examples
- Why Do Writers Choose to Write Sonnets?
- Other Helpful Sonnet Resources
What is a sonnet? Here’s a quick and simple definition: Some additional key details about sonnets: 1. For hundreds of years, the sonnet form was reserved for poems about unrequited love, but since the 17th century sonnets have been written about a wide variety of subjects. 2. Sonnets have become so popular, and are written in so many places, that o...
Sonnet in Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet"
The prologue to Shakespeare's famous verse drama Romeo and Juliet is written in the style of an English or "Shakespearean" sonnet, in iambic pentameter and with a rhyme scheme of ABAB CDCD EFEF GG.
Milton's "When I Consider How My Light is Spent"
Milton wrote sonnets that were not about unrequited love, breaking with the Petrarchan and Shakespearean traditions. Rather, Milton's sonnets were often meditations on life and death. This sonnet follows the traditional Petrarchan rhyme scheme of ABBA ABBA CDECDE.
Milton's "On the New Forcers of Conscience under the Long Parliament"
This 1646 sonnet is an example of the sonnet variation Milton created, known as "caudate sonnet," in which the traditional 14-line sonnet is followed by a brief concluding stanza or stanzas called a "coda." Notice Milton's use of indentation to denote places where the traditional sonnet's stanza breaks would occur—accentuating the first, fifth, ninth, and twelfth lines that would traditionally be the first lines of stanzas. The six lines of the coda are indented inversely to the system of ind...
As an early practitioner of the sonnet, the 13th century Italian poet Francesco Petrarch defined the sonnet's subject matter for centuries to come: until the 17th century, virtually all sonnets that were written in any language were, like Petrarch's sonnets, expressions of unrequited love. The sonnet's structure was well-suited to the subject becau...
A sonnet is a poem generally structured in the form of 14 lines, usually iambic pentameter, that expresses a thought or idea and utilizes an established rhyme scheme. As a poetic form, the sonnet was developed by an early thirteenth-century Italian poet, Giacomo da Lentini.
A sonnet is a fourteen-line lyric poem, traditionally written in iambic pentameter—that is, in lines ten syllables long, with accents falling on every second syllable, as in: “Shall I com pare thee to a sum mer’s day?”
Octave: An eight-line verse form, usually consisting of two quatrains. In a sonnet, the octave establishes the theme, argument, and tone of the poem. Sestet: A six-line verse form. In a sonnet, the sestet complicates the subject matter and themes of the poem before bringing it to a close.
Traditionally, sonnets are fourteen-line poems that follow a strict rhyme scheme and conform to the metrical pattern of iambic pentameter. The word sonnet comes from the Italian word “sonneto,” meaning “little song.”
People also ask
What is a sestet in a sonnet?
How many lines are in a sonnet?
How many quatrains does a sonnet have?
What rhyme scheme does a curtal sonnet follow?
