Sonnet 43 Flashcards
Themes
Love, quantified
Themes of Love
She tries to quantify her love in a logical way, and then becomes focused on religion and spiritual love even after death
Quotes about holy love
“To the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach”
“For the ends of being and ideal grace”
“I love thee freely as men strive for right”
“I love thee purely as they turn from praise”
“In my old friends and with my childhoods faith.”
“With my lost saints”
“And if god choose I shall but love the better after death”
Context
Sonnet 43 is the most famous out of Brownings 44 sonnets, she was inspired by her lover Robert Browning and this was her way of passionately showing her love, and her attempts to define her love
Structure
In sonnet form, so will try to elevate her love and put her emotions towards her lover on a pedestal. No iambic pentameter or regular rhythm as love should be free flowing, her lines are also emjombed to show this. She has an ABBA rhyming pattern which seems strange and features half rhymes to show not everything is logical in love
Language
Capital letters on “Being” and “Grace” to show how those spiritual and religious ideas are crucial.
She issues formal rhetoric and asks a question to the audience of the poem, Robert Browning and it is autobiographical as she references her “childhood faiths”
She issues exclamation marks to show the playful and loving nature of their romance.
