Day 16 Shakespearean (or English) Sonnet

In dicussing the English Form of the sonnet, Hugh Holman has noted that “In the best English sonnets, the three quatrains serve as the narrative -- presenting the situation, problem or question -- with a distinct image developed in each quatrain, building toward the couplet. The couplet at the end is usually a commentary on the foregoing and is usually epigrammatic in form.”

Millay’s Shakespearean sonnet approaches the subject of Love by first discussing all the things it is NOT. Note her use of alliteration, sensory details, and repetition. Although she uses the quatrains and couplet structure, there is also an interesting turn between the first eight lines and the last six, that is reminiscent of the Italian Form as wel.

S 5 10

Love Is Not All by Edna St. Vincent Millay Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain; Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink And rise and sink and rise and sink again; Love can not fill the thickened lung with breath, Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone; Yet many a man is making friends with death Even as I speak, for lack of love alone. It well may be that in a difficult hour, Pinned down by pain and moaning for release, Or nagged by want past resolution’s power, I might be driven to sell your love for peace, Or trade the memory of this night for food. It well may be. I do not think I would.

Go to the website analyzing this poem or download the PowerPoint.

Your Turn: Write your own poem, using a similar contradiction, focusing on what something is not, the exceptions.

Listen to Millay read this poem.