Hey everyone.

I've just been reading some posts and you guys are pretty helpful. But I'm having trouble analysing Sonnet 32 by Browning and I can't find anything about it. If you could help me out that would be great. I get that the general idea is about falling in love fast and that leads to a weak relationship, but I'm completely lost on the last few lines:

"I did not wrong myself so, but I placed
A wrong on thee. For perfect strains may float
'Neath master-hands, from instruments defaced,—
And great souls, at one stroke, may do and dote"

If you can help me, thanks so much!!

Megan

Megan, let's take a look at the entire poem:

XXXII

The first time that the sun rose on thine oath
To love me, I looked forward to the moon
To slacken all those bonds which seemed too soon
And quickly tied to make a lasting troth.
Quick-loving hearts, I thought, may quickly loathe;
And, looking on myself, I seemed not one
For such man's love!—more like an out-of-tune
Worn viol, a good singer would be wroth
To spoil his song with, and which, snatched in haste,
Is laid down at the first ill-sounding note.
I did not wrong myself so, but I placed
A wrong on thee. For perfect strains may float
'Neath master-hands, from instruments defaced,—
And great souls, at one stroke, may do and doat.

Megan I agree with your original idea that the poem is about the author declaring her love too soon. But what I think she's saying here is that although she might take longer to make a relationship work, she is in the hands of a master (lover) who, like a virtuoso performer, needs no warm up to be great.


Les

Thank you so much!! That exactly makes sense and helped me finish my presentation!

Thanks!! :)

Megan

I shan't complain about rhyming troth with oath, Liz. Nor will I object to wroth, for that matter. In my benevolence, I shall even pass over doat. However, at snatched in haste, even one so hospitable as I must draw the line!