Let The Muse Be Free...

External Form #3: "One the Sonnet" by John Keats can be found on page 1025 of the Norton.

John Keat's sonnet, "On the Sonnet" follows neither the traditional Shakespearean or Petrarchan forms of the sonnet. Keats is actually criticizing both of these forms of the sonnet, saying that have such a restricted structure loses the essence of poetry.

Keats begins by alluding to Andromeda; it is a Greek myth of a woman who was chained to rock and left to die by the sea. He is paralleling the poem with Andromeda in saying that by using these "dull rhymes," poets are leaving their sonnets and poems out to be swallowed and forgotten forever. Keats wants the reader to think out of the box and go beyond Shakespeare and Petrarch. He refers to a letter he wrote called "Poesy", in which he expressed his distaste for the current accepted forms of the sonnet.

He also talks about the"misers of sound and syllable." A miser is someone who is afraid of spending money. In reference to this poem, Keats seems to be saying that in writing sonnets, poets become misers of sounds and syllables and instead of using them as they please they savor them and ultimately lose the meaning of the poem. Keats' final advice to use is to "let the Muse be free" and allow our imaginations to wander. He doesn't want us to be afraid of stepping out of the restrictions of a traditional sonnet. Actually, he encourages us to do so and move beyond the restrictions of time.