Sonnet means “little song.” In the introduction to The Penguin Book of the Sonnet, Phillis Levin calls the sonnet “a monument of praise, a field of play, a chamber of sudden change.” This fourteen-line form provokes, polarizes, and galvanizes people. After the Renaissance, the sonnet became the unpopular kid at the party until the Romantics revived it in the 19th century. In the early 20th century, poets used the sonnet as a wrestling ring in which to test their mettle. In the 1980s, Diane Wakowski equated the writing of a sonnet with fascism. Since then, poets have been testing the sonnet's subversive potential, indicting from within the form's problematic legacy.
Photo by Nick Brookenheimer on Unsplash
Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash
