by Matthew Jackson

Created on: December 17, 2008

The sonnet is one of the most celebrated forms of prose poetry. Sonnets are divided into two main categories, Italian sonnets and English sonnets. While the Italian sonnet has many accomplishments, they pale when compared to those of the dominant English sonnet.

The Italian sonnet was invented by a poet name Petrarch, and is often called a Petarchian Sonnet. It is composed of fourteen, ten syllable lines of unstressed, followed by stressed syllables. This is called Iambic Pentameter. The couplet is divided into an octave (8 lines) and a Sestet (6 lines). During the first 8 lines of the poem a problem was posed, and a solution was proposed during the last six. This form of sonnet was immediately adopted by writers all over Europe. One of the most famoouse collections of Italian sonnets is The Faerie Queene by edmund spencer, about queen Elizibeth. The Italian Sonnet would remain the dominant form of Sonnet until a man named William Shakespeare appeared.

Shakespeare was arguably the most influential and famous European writer ever, and for good reason. As he studied literature he came across the Italian sonnet and found some ways to improve upon its form. He decided to expand the problem portion of the poem from 8 lines to twelve. This allowed for the author to go into a much more detailed dilemma. The solution was presented in a rhyming couplet at the end, giving each sonnet a snappy showy finish. The Collection of Shakespeare's sonnets is one of the greatest works of poetry. His outline of the sonnet was used by poets for centuries to come and is still the prevalent sonnet taught today. Many of the most famous poems of all time have been English sonnets, such as Sonnet 55 and Sonnet 130 by William Shakespeare and Sonnet 32 by Elizabeth Barrette Browning.

The English sonnet is more fun and entertaining to read or hear than the Italian sonnet. The problems are more in depth and the solutions are forced to be more creative. The English sonnet still remains more popular today, than the Italian, a testament to the continued preference of format. The worst produced in the form of the English Sonnet have traditionally been more famous than the Italian and for those reasons, the English sonnet is superior.

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