The Sonnet

The sonnet is one of the poetic forms that can be found in lyric
poetry from Europe. The term "sonnet" derives from the Occitan word
sonet and the Italian word sonetto, both meaning "little song". By the
thirteenth century, it had come to signify a poem of fourteen lines that
follows a strict rhyme scheme and specific structure.

The Italian sonnet was created by Giacomo da Lentini, head of the

Sicilian School under Frederick II.[1] Guittone d'Arezzo rediscovered
it and brought it to Tuscany where he adapted it to his language when he
founded the Neo-Sicilian School (1235–1294). He wrote almost 300
sonnets. Other Italian poets of the time, including Dante Alighieri
(1265–1321) and Guido Cavalcanti (c. 1250–1300) wrote sonnets, but
the most famous early sonneteer was Petrarca (known in English as
Petrarch).
The Italian sonnets included two parts. First, the octave (two
quatrains), which describe a problem, followed by a sestet (two tercets),
which gives the resolution to it. Typically, the ninth line creates a "turn"
or volta which signals the move from proposition to resolution.

English sonnets were introduced by Thomas Wyatt in the early

16th century. His sonnets and those of his contemporary the Earl of
Surrey were chiefly translations from the Italian of Petrarch and the
French of Ronsard and others. While Wyatt introduced the sonnet into
English, it was Surrey who gave them the rhyming meter, and division
into quatrains that now characterizes the English sonnet.

One of the best-known sonnet writers is William Shakespeare, who

wrote 154 of them. A Shakespearean, or English sonnet consists of 14
lines, each line contains ten syllables, and each line is written in iambic
pentameter in which a pattern of a non-emphasized syllable followed by
an emphasized syllable is repeated five times. The rhyme scheme in a
Shakespearean sonnet is ABAB CDCD EFEF GG in which the last two
lines are a rhyming couplet. Traditionally, English poets employ iambic
pentameter when writing sonnets.
Mr. Yehia El Naggar
1
Mr. Yehia El Naggar
2