KEATS’S CRAFTSMANSHIP1 1814-1817 Spenserian stanza (9 lines: 8 iambic pentameters + 1 Alexandrine / iambic heptameter) Endymion Heroic couplets (rhyming pairs of lines in iambic pentameter) Sonnets of 1816 (“Woman!...”; “Light feet…”; Petrarchan sonnet (an “octave” of 8 lines + a “Ah, who can ever…”) “sestet” of 6 lines, for a total of 14 lines in iambic pentameter) Imitation of Spenser 1818 Later sonnets (“When To…[“Time’s sea”]) Fancy Isabella; or, The Pot of Basil Hyperion I have fears…”; Shakespearian sonnet (three quatrains of 4 lines each, and a final couplet for a total of 14 lines in iambic pentameter) Rondeau, rhyming pairs of lines in trochaic tetrameters Ottava rima (eight lines in iambic pentameter; rhyme scheme: a-b-a-b-a-b-c-c) Blank verse (iambic pentameters, unrhymed) 1819 The Eve of St. Agnes La Belle Dame sans Merci Great Odes Lamia The Fall of Hyperion Spenserian stanza (9 lines: 8 iambic pentameters + 1 Alexandrine / iambic heptameter) Ballad, twelve four-line stanzas (quatrains) in alternating iambic tetrameter and trimeter lines Loose Pindaric form, stanzas of varying length and rhyme schemes Heroic couplets (rhyming pairs of lines in iambic pentameter), but with occasional triplets and Alexandrines Blank verse (iambic pentameters, unrhymed) 1 Cfr. W.J. BATE, The Stylistic Development of Keats, Humanities Press, New York, 1945 e M.R. RIDLEY, Keats’s Craftsmanship, A Study in Poetic Development, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1933. 1 KEATS’S MATURER STYLE 2
© Copyright 2024