SHAKESPEAREAN SONNET PETRARCHAN SONNET WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE?

WHAT THEY HAVE IN COMMON  14 lines  Strict rhyme scheme.  Specific structure.  Each line containing ten syllables and written in iambic pentameter, in which a pattern of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable is repeated five times.

SHAKESPEAREAN SONNET  Also called Elizabethan Sonnet.  The Shakespearean sonnet is broken down into 3 quatrains and 1 couplet.  The ending couplet of a Shakespearean sonnet usually reverses the tone or message of the previous quatrains.  Rhyme scheme: ABAB-CDCD-EFEF-GG

PETRARCHAN SONNET  Also called the Italian Sonnet.  The Italian commonly is made up of two quatrains (or octave), followed by two tercets (or sestet).  Thematically, an Italian sonnet most often relates a conflict (whether physical or spiritual) in the first octave, and comes to a solution in the sestet.  Typically, the ninth line creates what is called the "turn" or "volta," which signals the move from proposition to resolution.  The Italian sonnet has a more complex frame work, and has more variations.  The two quatrains usually runs: ABBA-ABBA, or ABAB-BABA, while the second half was either devided into a sestet of CDC-CDC, or a two tercets of CDE-CDE.