Sonnet 43 by Elizabeth Barret Browning

Question 1

What does EBB use Sonnet 43 as a vehicle to?

Answer 1

• To express her love for her husband, who she credited with saving her from a live of misery
• The sonnet form reinforces the passionate love she feels towards him because sonnets are typically thought of as being love poems

Question 2

Initially point

Answer 2

EBB starts off by addressing her intensely passionate love for Robert Browning

Question 3

The poem begins… (qoute 1)

Answer 3

“How do I love thee, let me count the ways”

• The first person speaker (which makes the poem more intimate) uses the rhetorical tone through “how do I love thee” to attempt to preemptively measure her love for him.
• “let me count the ways” emphasises the extent of her love for him

Question 4

The poem begins… (qoute 2)

Answer 4

• “I love thee to the depth, breath and height, my soul can reach”
• suggests that she loves him to the stars and back, there is no limite for the love that she has for him

Question 5

However point

Answer 5

Her description of her love moves away from an over romanticised version of love, to a more mundane and genuine description of love

Question 6

However as the poem develops… (qoute 1)

Answer 6

“I love thee to the level of every day’s”

-highlights that her love extends to every day life as opposed to an over romanticised version of love, which adds credibility to the love experienced in their relationship

Question 7

Ultimately point

Answer 7

She further reinforces her love for Robert

Question 8

Ultimately… (qoute 1)

Answer 8

“Smiles, tears, Of all my life! -“

• This exclamatory sentence emphasises the overpowering nature of love
• This is juxtaposed by the dash which serves to break her language, and shows that she cannot articulate her feelings without being overwhelmed
• Asyndetic listing of the nouns shows that she loves him through the good and bad.

Question 9

Ultimately…(qoute 2)

Answer 9

“I shall love thee better after death”

• the comparative “better” suggests that this is only beginning and their love has room to develop
• reference to after life gives their love eternal connotations, which would have been typical of a couple during this extremely religious 19th century