Sonnet 43 Flashcards

1
Q

Title & Form

A

Petrarchan sonnet
•14 lines
•iambic pentameter mimics normal speech - metre is disrupted by pauses and repetition, making the reader sound passionate
• Themes of love and devotion
• ‘thee’ direct and personal, but also universal
• enjambement, overflowing with love
• Caesura - breathless with excitement
• juxtaposition between ‘breath and death* emphasises abiding love

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2
Q

Structure

A

Octave - love is divine
Sestet - temporal phrases
‘Counts’ - methodical and intense
Introductory question is clear, linear structure

Anaphora - same words show her inability to explain the depth of her love whilst emphasising her hyperbolic adjectives

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3
Q

Constant positive tone

A

Superficial view of love

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4
Q

Metaphysical semantic field

A
soul
Being
Grace
Right 
Praise 
saints
God 

Religious allusions insinuate that her love is unconditional, is present throughout all aspects of her life, is what gives her life meaning

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5
Q

How do I love thee?

A

Rhetorical question, she wants to be asked - flattery

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6
Q

I love thee

A

Repetition shows devotions

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7
Q

depth and breadth and height

A

Hyperbolic
Swelling imagery- polysyndeton
Devotion

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8
Q

by sun and candlelight

A

loved in everything, light imagery

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8
Q

strive for Right

A

love is as important as freedom

Virtuous, morally right

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10
Q

In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith

With my lost saints

Smiles, tears, of all my life

A

Juxtaposition
Shows there has been a journey

The love is not pure, but it is real. Idolising? He has replaced her faith?

Enthusiastic tone, exclamatory for impact

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11
Q

death

A

Lack of negative tone - her love has enlightened her and she no longer fears death
Eternal love
Her belief in its purity exacerbated

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12
Q

Context

More?

A

Religious felt strongly by 19th century readers

About her future husband Robert Browning published in 1850

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