It Just Has to be A Sonnet

When you try to express love, there is no form to do so greater than the sonnet. It’s been that way for ages.

In today’s class, we looked at an excerpt from Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare. It was the scene when Romeo meets Juliet for the first time. They talk about loving each other through a sonnet. Let me explain a bit… the play is written in verse, and Shakespeare is pretty much a master sonneteer. The exchange is in the form of a sonnet. It has interlocking lines (The rhyme scheme pattern) that show how the characters connect with each other.

I’m not going to go into too much detail about the play here, but let’s shift focus to the sonnet. The sonnet was popularized by Petrarch and then later by Shakespeare too. Here’s the thing, though: sonnets are mostly written about unrequited love.

Petrarch wrote the Canzoniere to his Laura. Shakespeare wrote to his Dark Lady and Fair Youth. Sidney wrote his Astrophil and Stella to Lady Penelope Devereux. Spenser wrote his Amoretti to his wife Elizabeth. Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote Sonnets of the Portuguese to her husband, Robert Browning.

Do you see what I’m getting at? If you write someone a sonnet, it’s automatically a way to confess your love to someone. Spenser’s sonnets were so successful that he got to marry Elizabeth. Does that mean writing a sonnet for someone can make someone fall in love with you? Not completely… I mean, look at Petrarch. No matter how much he expressed his love for Laura, his love remained unrequited.

These days, we don’t write sonnets anymore, but the intention still remains. We tend to profess our love through some kind of poetry or verse. This just shows that the tradition is the same even though we don’t follow it anymore. The sonnet was a totally socially accepted way of saying something ridiculously intense to someone. They are a way of idealising the beloved and turning her into something almost otherworldly. I think that’s the most magical part of it all. Sonnets aren’t so popular these days, but the idea of romance and idealisation hasn’t changed.