Sonnets | Background

Sonnets are rhymed poems consisting of fourteen lines, the first eight making up the octet and the last six lines being the sestet. The Shakespearean sonnet—which differs slightly from the Italian (or Petrarchian) sonnet and the Spenserian sonnet—ends with a rhymed couplet and follows the rhyme scheme abab cdcd efef gg. Thus, the octet/sestet structure can be alternatively divided into three quatrains (sets of four lines) with alternating rhymes concluding in a rhymed couplet. With the lone exception of Sonnet 145, the meter of Shakespeare's sonnets is iambic pentameter,...

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