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Article: Italic typography and Wordsworth's later sonnets as visual poetry.(Willim Wordsworth)(Critical essay)
- Article from:
- Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900
- Article date:
- September 22, 2007
- Author:
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It will easily be perceived that the only part of this Sonnet which is
of any value is the lines printed in Italics.
--William Wordsworth on Thomas Gray. (1)
The upsurge of critical interest in the Romantic sonnet revival, though mainly centered on prolific women sonneteers such as Charlotte Smith and Mary Robinson, has in recent years led to renewed efforts to establish the significance of the form in William Wordsworth's oeuvre. (2) Once again the question has been raised of why this allegedly simple poet of nature, who composed in "a selection of the language really spoken by men," should have invested so heavily in the stylized, artificial, and ...