Sonnet is a lyrical form of poetry, originated in Italy. The best known Italian sonneteer was Petrarch. Petrarch’s sonnet model consisted of an octave and a sestet. The model was gradually transformed when it entered the British scene to adapt to the English language and British rhythm. The progressive transformation was due to:

       1. Sir Thomas Wyatt, who mainly translated Italian sonnets from Italian into English;

2.    2. Henry Howard Earl of Surrey, who first reorganized the structure of petrarch’s model into the typical structure of the Elizabethan sonnet consisting of three quatrains and a couplet. Surrey’s contribution to the sonnet is both thematical and structural. In a few words he tailored the sonnet to the needs of the English language, but the most innovative and creative sonneteer was William Shakespeare. He was able to reshape the typical conventions of the sonnet(courtly – love poetry) to create something new.

Denotative analysis of the sonnet “Passa la nave mia colma d’oblio”

The sonnet consists of 14 lines. In Petrarch’s sonnet the reader can recognize the typical structure of the Italian sonnets. The first octave introduces the problem creating a comparison between the speakers’s life and a ship travelling in tormented seas, at midnight. The skipper is worried by private thoughts that are so sad, that seems not to care even of the terrible weather conditions. He sighes he has desires and hopes. There follows the sestet where his pessimistic, sad mood are repeated: he weeps, he regrets his life as well as the conditions of the weather puts his voyage at risk. In the ending tercet the speaker hides his feelings in the same way as he cannot see the stars. He seems unable to use reason and even worse to be able to reach the harbor, it goes without saying that there is an apparent analogy between the poet’s life and the voyage progress. Unfortunately, such life does not sound easy but rather unveils difficulties, problems, torments, that all together seem to make the poet unable to come to an autonomous  solution of his pains.

Questions

1      1.  How is the analogy life – travel expressed? (look at the figures of sound, and the semantic level)

        2. What is the function of the weather condition?

        3. In what way does the intelligent reader understand that that the travel is such a way to speak about something different?

Answers

 1. The poet's life is compared with a voyage, ho deosn't know where this voyage will bring him, but he his in love and faces up with bad weather conditions, that is they are his feelings.      

       2. The weather condition expresses the deeper feelings of the speaking voice. The reader can notice that because wind is bearer of forced sighs and trusty  fearfulness. The rain is a rain of the tears and cloud of dark disdain. So the weather conditions is an instrument to describe the feelings of the speaking voice.

d    3.An intelligent reader understands that the travel is such a way to speak about something different analysing the semantic level of the sonnet, because the sonneteer uses words like <> e <> that refers to his personal feelings. So the speaking voice wants to communicate his personal feelings making a comparison between his life and a travel.