Analysis of 'Sonnet 43: How Do I Love Thee?' by Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

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Vicky Collard 12C

Analysis of ‘Sonnet 43: How Do I Love Thee?’

 And ‘Sonnet CXXX’

The two poems I have chosen to include in my collection of love poetry are the sonnets ‘How Do I Love Thee?’ and ‘Sonnet CXXX.’

These two poems are both written in sonnet form and they both refer to love.

‘Sonnet 43: How Do I Love Thee?’ is written by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, it is a petrachan sonnet, which means it consists of an octet and a sestet.

The rhyming pattern is as follows:

A, B, B, A, C, D, D, C – Octet.

E, F, E, F, E, F – Sestet.

The tone throughout this sonnet is passionate and romantic; this is because the poem is written by a woman to her partner about her love for him.

The question in the title and the first line of the poem is ‘How do I love thee?’ The poet dedicates the rest of the poem to answering her own question and expressing the ways in which she loves her partner.

The poet uses the words ‘I love thee’ repeatedly to accentuate her love and by using it time and time again it shows her infatuation with her partner.

In the second line the poet uses the dimensions ‘depth’, ‘breadth’ and ‘height’ to show how far her love goes. In this part of the poem the poet also uses enjambment, this gives us the feeling that this love really does reach far and wide.

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The line ‘By sun and candlelight’ links into the idea of the love reaching far and wide, as this line is a connotation of night and day. This suggests that this woman loves her partner not only during the day but during the dark hours of the night too.

This poem contains a spiritual/religious lexical set, the words ‘grace’, ‘praise’, ‘saint’ and ‘God’ are included in this set. The poet has used this lexical set to give us the idea that this woman’s love is deep and true, that she loves her partner with not only her body but her ...

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