The art of the sonnet

Review by Choice Review

This volume presents a hundred example sonnets--from Thomas Wyatt's "Whoso list to hunt" (1557) to D. A. Powell's "corydon & alexis, redux" (2009)--each accompanied by two to five pages of explication and commentary by either Burt (Harvard) or Mikics (Univ. of Houston). The sonnets include both the familiar (Milton's "On the Late Massacre in Piedmont," Wordsworth's "London, 1802," Shelley's "Ozymandias") and the unfamiliar, in forms both conventional and unconventional (for example, Gwendolyn Brooks's "To a Winter Squirrel"). Leigh Hunt is represented by "The Fish, the Man, and the Spirit," a series of three sonnets. Some of the selections are surprising, but the editors' discussions are informative and reasonable (though occasionally one will claim that Wallace Stevens "reaches back" to Whitman in referring to an internal flame). The discussions are also readable--even when the prose gets a little angular, it is never loaded down with technical or faddish terms. And the book is attractive physically. This is a volume of poetry and criticism that a nonspecialist could read front to back with real pleasure. Or at least front to pretty far back. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers. G. W. Clift formerly, Kansas State University

Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.

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Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

The sonnet may well be the poetic form that most often comes to mind when anyone thinks of poetry. Fourteen lines long, in open and closed structures, sonnets have been prominent over the past 400 years of poetic history. In this unusual book-half anthology, half collection of essays-Burt and Mikics, both prolific critics of poetry (Burt is also a poet himself) choose 100 sonnets and for each offer a thoughtful, scholarly, though highly accessible commentary. The oldest poem is Thomas Wyatt's "Whoso List to Hunt" (1557), and the newest is by the contemporary poet D.A. Powell, first published last year. In between, there's everything from Shakespeare and Wordsworth to Robert Lowell and Lucie Brock-Broido. Of "Redemption," George Herbert's sonnet about the Resurrection of Christ, Mikics writes, "Herbert's Savior... shocks us into attention." Of one of Ted Berrigan's sonnets, Burt says, "The disorientation, the wildness, is part of the point: no more organized poem would do." While this anthology would make a wonderful textbook for a prosody class, its best audience may be anyone who wants to delve deeply into the heart of poetry. Learned as well as passionate, this book is a delight. (Apr.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

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Review by Library Journal Review

Burt (English, Harvard) and Mikics (English, Univ. of Houston) have written an illuminating text that promises many hours of reading pleasure and greater understanding of this poetic form. They begin with an essay that covers the history of the sonnet and highlights many outstanding examples, while also explaining how and why these were selected. The authors then proceed to analyze 100 examples, with each writing an essay on 50 of the 100 sonnets. One of the most valuable aspects of this book is that many of the sonnets are not famous, or even well known. The authors have deliberately given the reader a broad selection, beginning with the 1557 sonnet "Whoso list to hunt" by Thomas Wyatt and ending with the 2009 work "corydon & alexis, redux" by D.A. Powell. These 100 give the reader the opportunity to see how the sonnet form has evolved throughout the centuries, as well as discovering sonnets that may have been ignored or "lost" and explaining why they should be given greater notice now. The essays on each sonnet are illuminating and wide ranging. VERDICT The writing here is clear and inspiring; recommended for all literature collections.-Susan L. Peters, Univ. of Texas, Galveston (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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