On the Sonnets of Robert Frost

"The sonnet is the strictest form I have behaved in, and only then by pretending it wasn't a sonnet," Frost once wrote to Louis Untermeyer. Frost wrote his sonnets in couplets, triplets, and terza rima; frequently, he combined elements of the Italian and English forms. His genuis was in incorporating diverse styles, renewing reader interest in the form while retaining its accessibility. Several of the sonnets discussed are generally recognized as among the finest poems written in the twentieth century.

This is the first work to examine all the 37 poems published that are, based on the poet's own prose writings on the subject, defined as true sonnets. It also provides a discussion of why some Frost works commonly accepted as sonnets do not meet his own criteria. Of course, the book provides content analyses of the sonnets with discussions of the various structures used.