The Sonnet

Critical Idiom #26

by John Fuller

Provides information on the development and structure of Italian and English sonnets and the technical aspects of rhyme scheme and sequence

Genres: Poetry, Criticism

94 pages, Unknown Binding

First published December 1, 1972

About the author

John Fuller is an English poet, author and critic. He is an Emeritus Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford, where he was Tutor in English.

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Reviews

[Will · Rating 3 out of 5]

Somewhat dense and perhaps fussy, this was an informative though hardly what you might call enjoyable volume.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although the details page gives it 94 pages, the Routledge paperback reprint of this book has only 49 pages of main text, divided into four chapters which deal with the Italian sonnet (in both Italian and English: the "legitimate form", according to Fuller), the English form of the sonnet, "variants and curiosities", and the sonnet sequence. Despite, or perhaps partly because of, its brevity, The Sonnet is not a light read, and it assumes some prior familiarity with poetic terms, without explaining all of them for the non-expert reader. I'm still not really sure what "open rhyme" and "closed rhyme" are even now—but I do have a much better understanding of the history, development, forms, and features of the sonnet. There are enough examples to illustrate the technical details, and Fuller is not afraid to judge as he explains and describes, which stops the book being too dry.