Explore the Craft of Writing Poetry The Sonnet Sonnet Comparison Chart
Curtal or Curtailed Sonnet is a Petrarchan Sonnet which is proportionately ¾ in size. It is a 19th century innovation by English poet Gerard Anthony Hopkins who prefaced his publication Poems (1918) with an explanation of the verse form which he used in 3 of his sonnets.
The elements of the Curtal sonnet is:
11 lines, proportionately ¾ of a Petrarchan Sonnet structure, a sixain followed by a quatrain followed by a tail or half line.
metered, L1-L10 iambic pentameter , L11 is trimeter.
rhymed, rhyme