Sonnet Essay Examples

Drama dominates our syllabus but the Renaissance was a Golden Age not just for English drama, but also for English poetry. But what was English poetry? George Puttenham’s The Arte of English Poesie (1589) and Sir Philip Sidney’s The Defense of Poesie (1595): early attempts to think about English poetry as a distinct national tradition. […]

With Shakespeare’s 30th sonnet, arguably one of his most famous sonnets, the speaker introduces a theme of discontent with life itself brought on by reflection of sad memories, which contrasts the theme of love present in the sonnets preceding it. This exploration of the new theme only lasts for a short while, as the speaker […]

Analysis of Millay’s “Not in a silver casket cool with pearls” Edna St. Vincent Millay’s unconventional childhood, growing up without a father because her mom kicked him out and having to learn independence and responsibility by the age of twelve, influenced her poetry and shaped her as an motivated and self-sufficient individual. By the time […]

Romantic love has been the subject of endless contemplation for poets of all periods. Intangible and complex, love is the highest manifestation of humanity. No topic in poetry has received more attention than romantic love. Conversely, the ultimate expression of love is through poetry. In each poetic period, the representation of romantic love has been […]

In “The Windhover” by Gerard Manley Hopkins and “The Oven Bird” by Robert Frost, birds are compared with different meanings conveyed through the content, presentation, and observation style. Hopkins, a Jesuit, uses windhover’s characteristics to describe Jesus Christ while Frost’s “The Oven Bird” depicts the change of seasons and questions of life and death through […]

Sonnet Eighteen is one of the most famous sonnets written by William Shakespeare. The sonnet is about the love that another has for his lover. Many argue that the sonnet is actually written about another man, but either way it is about love. Sonnet eighteen’s theme is that even though the summer and things of […]

A sonnet is a poem fourteen lines in length. Sonnets follow various rhyming patterns, such as the idea of three quatrains and a rhyming couplet, as was promoted by the sonnets written by William Shakespeare. The Iambic Pentameter, the idea of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable, is a common feature of sonnets, […]

A sonnet is a 14-line poem written in iambic pentameter, which means each line has 10 syllables with 5 stressed and 5 unstressed. Sonnets typically follow a strict rhyme scheme and often have regular breaks, like the one in this case, after the eighth line. The first eight lines of both poems, known as the […]

In both types of sonnets, Shakespearean and Petrarchan, there are different ideas expressed by the poets but the actual sonnets have similarities and differences. These poets are mainly focused on the elements of death, love, religion and the passage of time and how these themes affected themselves and their lives. These sonnets were extremely popular […]

The sonnet is a type of poem that consists of 14 lines and follows a strict, yet modifiable, pattern of rhyming. Often, the themes within these poems are centered around love and/or loss. Since the 16th century, the sonnet form has held a significant role in English poetry. Particularly during the Elizabethan era, thousands of […]

The sonnets have fourteen lines and are structured into three quatrains and an ending couplet. The rhyme pattern is abab, cdcd, efef, gg and the rhythm is iambic pentameter.Sonnet 18 is written to the poets loved one. The voice of the poem seems to be Shakespeare himself as in the beginning line he says ‘shall […]

A sonnet is a type of poem, which poets often use to express their feelings. The themes of most sonnets are subjects such as war and death or love and happiness. Sonnets are useful because the poet can tell the reader what they want to say in just fourteen short lines.The person who wrote the […]

This period in history, which was approximately between the years of 1540 and 1600, saw an explosion of literature, particularly in the genres of drama and poetry. Shakespeare, the dominant and most famous writer of this period, is regarded by many as the greatest ever writer in the English language. Although the period is recognised […]

Shakespeare is revered for his mastery in both playwriting and sonnet composition. Over 150 sonnets were written by Shakespeare, predominantly on love and affection. Two of his renowned sonnets, Sonnet 29 and Sonnet 130, will be analyzed in this essay. While Sonnet 29 provides an understanding of readers’ expectations during the sixteenth century, Sonnet 130 […]

Unmatched in the history of our literature, the period of the late 16th century, specifically the last 10 to 15 years, saw an incredible surge in poetic activity. During a particular era in history, a significant amount of intelligence was devoted to crafting poetry – particularly in the form of Sonnets. These Sonnets frequently expressed […]

‘The Sick Equation’ is about a boy whose parents are constantly arguing with each other. Because of this, the boy began to believe that love did not really exist, as he had grown up around people who never loved each other.He thought that even if his parents did stay together, someone, maybe even him, would […]

I have chosen to come the three poems ‘Valentine’ by Carol Anne Duffy and the two Shakespearean poems ‘My Mistress’ Eyes are Nothing Like the Sun’ and ‘Sonnet XVIII,’ as I feel they are three poems that can be compared well together. There are a multitude of similarities and differences shared between the three poems. […]

John Clare was born in 1793 and died at the age of seventy-one in 1864. Clare came from a poor background and left school at the age of twelve to become a farm labourer. He had many jobs in the earlier years of his life as a Potboy, a Ploughboy and a Gardener. When he […]

This poem is about someone experiencing love for the first time. “I ne’er was struck before that hour With love so sudden and so sweet.” The poet compares the face of the woman to a flower “Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower.” He describes how the feeling of love affects him physically “my […]

Identity and distinctiveness has habitually been subjected to in most of John Donne’s poems, in this case the “Holy Sonnet IV”, as has been questioned in Carol Ann Duffy’s “Originally”. In these poems, which have been written centuries apart, both poets display well the loss of identity suffered by them and the great impact of […]

This unit aims to provide an overview of Spender’s Alienator sonnets, focusing on their use of formal elements and literary influences. The analysis will involve three sonnets from the Amaretto, exploring the influence of Italian court poets such as Patriarch and the reworking of the sonnet. It will also touch upon the conflict between Christian […]

Analysis of Sonnet 64 When I have seen by Time’s fell hand defac’d The rich proud cost of outworn buried age; When sometime lofty towers I see down raz’d, And brass eternal slave to mortal rage; When I have seen the hungry ocean gain Advantage on the kingdom of the shore, And the firm soil […]