HOW IS A SONNET CONSTRUCTED???
The sonnet originally meant any short lyric, or “little song,” but eventually became formalized. The Italian sonnet is made up of fourteen iambic pentameter lines in an eight and a six-line stanza, each with a specific rhetorical slant: the first stanza poses a question or problem which the second stanza answers or resolves. The rhyme scheme is as follows: stanza 1: abba abba stanza 2: cdecde or cdcdcd The English or Shakespearean sonnet has a different rhetoric. A problem is posed in the first four-line stanza, is further developed in another four-line stanza, then is reconsidered or answered tentatively in the next four-line stanza, and finally is answered definitively in a final couplet. The rhyme scheme is as follows: stanza 1: abab stanza 2: cdcd stanza 3: efef stanza 4: gg Some English sonnets vary from this scheme, and many poets have modified or otherwise loosened the traditional requirements for the sonnet. A sequence of seven sonnets is known as a “crown.” A sequence of fifte
