Sonnet 149 metrical variant, an initial reversal: Initial reversals are potentially present in lines 3, 4, and 14, and a mid-line reversal is potentially present in line 6. The meter demands that line 2's "cruel" be pronounced as two syllables, and line 11's "defect" (although a noun) be stressed on the second syllable. Sonnet 149 Sonnet 149 is one of 154 sonnets written by the English playwright and poet William Shakespeare. It is considered a Dark Lady sonnet, as are all from 127 to 152. Sonnet 149 is an English or Shakespearean sonnet. The English sonnet has three quatrains, followed by a
Curtal sonnet but primarily as a novelty, in contrast to Hopkins's quite serious use. Curtal sonnet The curtal sonnet is a form invented by Gerard Manley Hopkins, and used in three of his poems. It is an eleven-line (or, more accurately, ten-and-a-half-line) sonnet, but rather than the first eleven lines of a standard sonnet it consists of precisely ¾ of the structure of a Petrarchan sonnet shrunk proportionally. The octave of a sonnet becomes a sestet and the sestet a quatrain plus an additional "tail piece." That is, the first eight lines of a sonnet are translated into the first six lines