§ 314. A powerful impulse was given to sonnet-writing by Wordsworth, who wrote about 500 sonnets, and who, not least on account of his copiousness, has been called the English Petrarch. He, indeed, followed his Italian model more closely than his predecessors with regard to the form and the relationship of the different parts to each other.
The usual scheme of his quatrains is a b b a, a b b a, but there is also a form with a third rhyme a b b a, a c c a, which frequently occurs. The rhyme-arrangement of the terzetti is exceedingly various, and there are also a great many sub-species with regard to the structure of the first part. Very often the first quatrain has enclosing rhymes and the second crossed rhymes, or vice versa; these being either formed by two or three rhymes. As the main types of the Wordsworth sonnet the following, which, however, admit of many variations in the terzetti, may be mentioned: a b b a b a b a c d e c e d (ii. 303), a b b a a b a b c d e e d c (viii. 57), a b a b b a a b c d c d c d (vi. 113), a b a b a b b a c d d c d c (viii. 29), a b b a a c a c d e e d e d (vii. 82), a b b a c a c a d e d e e d (viii. 109) or a b b a c a c a d e d e f f (viii. 77), &c., a b a b b c c b d e f e f d (vii. 29). There are of this type also forms in which the terzetti have the structure d d f e e f (vii. 334), or d e f d e f (viii. 68), &c., and a b a b a c a c d e d e d e (viii. 28). Cf. Metrik, ii, § 555.
Very often Wordsworth’s sonnets differ from those of the Italian poets and agree with the Miltonic type in that the two chief parts are not separated from each other by a pause[202]; and even if there is no run-on line the train of thought is continuous. For this reason his sonnets give us rather the impression of a picture or of a description than of a reflective poem following the Italian requirements, according to which the sonnet should consist of: assertion (quatrain i), proof (quatrain ii), confirmation (terzet i), conclusion (terzet ii) (cf. p. 373). The following sonnet by Wordsworth, strictly on the Italian model in its rhyme-arrangement, may serve as an example:
With Ships the sea was sprinkled far and nigh,
Like stars in heaven, and joyously it showed;
Some lying fast at anchor in the road,
Some veering up and down, one knew not why.
A goodly Vessel did I then espy
Come like a giant from a haven broad;
And lustily along the bay she strode,