How does the following excerpt add to the development of the theme of the essay Literary History: The Development of the Sonnet?
Traditional sonnets have fourteen lines, each of which is written in iambic pentameter. That is, each line has five metric units, or feet, and each foot consists of an unstressed syllable (marked ? ) followed by a stressed syllable (marked ? ). The rhythm of a line of iambic pentameter is shown in this example from Spenser’s Sonnet 30:
My love is like to ice, and I to fire
Sonnets also have set rhyme schemes, determined by the final sounds in the lines. To identify the rhyme scheme of a poem, begin with the first line and assign letters, in alphabetical order, to the sounds at the end of the lines. Lines that end with the same sound should be assigned the same letter. In Sidney’s Sonnet 39, for example, the rhyme scheme for the first four lines would be abab.
Come sleep! O sleep, the certain knot of peace, a
The baiting place of wit, the balm of woe, b
The poor man’s wealth, the prisoner’s release, a
The indifferent judge between the high and low b
A. it praises sleep
B. It implies that iambic pentameter as a superior use of meter.
C. It explains the mechanics of the sonnet form.
D. It intimidates the reader with the arcane complexity of formal poetics.