What should I write a sonnet about?

Question

I've got to write a Petrarchan sonnet in a fairly short period of time. Taking any and all ideas.

Answer 1

Wow. Ari told you how to write a Petrarchan sonnet without answering your question at all. The short answer is you could write about anything--that being the beauty of poetry.

But some suggestions are try having fun with it. There's plenty of stuff in the "news" to make fun of. So you could write a poem about how everyone is obsessing over Britney Spears' younger sister being pregnant while say another car bomb just went off in Baghdad. The idea being to create an absurd juxtaposition. Or the anticipation of voting in the next season of American Idol, but not getting off the couch to vote in the primary elections. Absurd, yet happens all the time.

Answer 2

Try these steps:
1. Choose your style of sonnet. The two most common kinds of sonnet are the Petrarchan (Italian) sonnet and the Shakespearean (English) sonnet. Note that the Petrarchan consists of quatrains (the octave) and a closing sestet in the pattern ABBA ABBA CDE CDE. The letters represent a rhyme (i.e., a's should rhyme with a's and b's should rhyme with b's). The Shakespearean style is two unique quatrains followed by two like and one unlike couplet: ABAB CDCD EF EF GG. However, it can also be quatrains and a couplet. In The Art of Shakespeare's Sonnets, Helen Vendler describes it as Q1, Q2, Q3, and C. The structure is essentially the same, though, with the couplet being the finisher.
2. Write your lines in iambic pentameter. This is where every other syllable is stressed, so that each line ends with a strong rhyme. There are also ten syllables in each line, five of which have emphasis (pentameter). The ninth line of the sonnet (Shakespearean/Italian style) usually has a turn or a change of tone)
3. Keep writing! It will probably take you a few drafts to be happy with your sonnet, but don't get discouraged. Keep the trusty thesaurus by your side and you'll be fine.

Tips:
a) Don't feel that it is necessary to stay within the strict patterns of Shakespearean and Petrarchan sonnet styles; poetry is a fluid art form, so feel free to alter the rhyme scheme or shape of a sonnet to suit your vision. For example, "Sonnet 145" was in tetrameter.
b) Read other poets' sonnets for examples and inspiration. Many poets have written in this style, including Shakespeare, Elizabeth Barret Browning, William Wordsworth, John Milton, P. B. Shelley, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Pablo Neruda, and more.
c) Try reading by every other syllable say louder and harder; it makes it much easier to make a sonnet.

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