WRITE A SHORT NOTE ON "SONNET", "ELEGY" AND "EPIC".

THE SONNET: The Sonnet is a lyric of single stanza of fourteen iambic pentameter
lines linked by an intricate rhyme scheme. The Sonnet has its Italian origin. The first
sonnet was written by Geocomo Lentino and Pier delle Vinge at the court of Fedrick-II in
about 1230. Some hundred years letter the form was further developed by the renaissance
poets Dante, Petrarch and Shakespeare.
It was Francisco Petrarch that the sonnet form is commonly associated. The Petrarch
sonnet has its own unique structure. The Petrarch sonnets consist of an octave rhyming
abba abba followed by a sestet. The octave can be broken down into two quatrains;
likewise the sestet can be broken down into two tersets. The octave presents an idea to be
contrasted by the ending sestet. The subjects of the Petrarchan sonnet mainly revolve
around the hopes and pains of an adoring lover.
William Shakespeare utilized the sonnet in love poetry of his own employing the sonnet
structure conventionalized by English poets Wyatt and Surrey. This structure is known as
the English or Shakespearean sonnet; consist of three quatrains and a concluding couplet
with the rhyme scheme abab cdcd efef gg.
A further variation of the English sonnet was introduced by Edmund Spenser, a major
renaissance figure. The rhyme scheme of his sonnets is abab bcbc cdcd ee. This type of
sonnet is described as linked sonnet because the rhyme of the last line of the first
quatrain is repeated in the first line of the second quatrain and likewise thyme of the last
line of the second quatrain is repeated in the first line of the third quatrain.
THE ELEGY: The elegy is the most natural form of poetry denotes any poem written in
a particular that of alternating pentameter and hexameter lines. Such a meter was
consistently used to register complains about love in the classical period of Greek and
Roman literature. The general pattern of the elegy as prevalent in the Augustan period
was a lamentation for the dead followed by consolation or deification of the dead. John
Drydens To the Memory of Mr. Oldham is such an elegy.
THE EPIC: The epic is a long narrative poem on a serious subject, told in a formal and
elevated style. Its revolves around a heroic figure on whose actions depends the fate of a
tribe, a nation or even the entire human race as in the case of Miltans Paradise Lost
where the actions of Adam and Eve determine the history of civilization. Valmikis the
Ramayana revolves around the exploits and rule of Lord Rama in Ayodhya.
The Epic is divided into two groups- the Primary Epic and the Secondary Epic. Primary
Epic has a choric character reflecting sentiments and ambitions of a nation whereas the
Secondary Epic is being written in an elevated style mainly an exercise in literary
excellence.