Analysis Of Whoso List To Hunt

The sonnet, Whoso List to Hunt, by Sir Thomas Wyatt, describes the act of chasing after unrequited love. This poem illustrates this chase through the narrator’s experience of chasing after a female deer. Specifically, the poet describes the narrator’s perspective in the first line “Whoso list to hunt, I know where is an hind.” This line creates the image of a man asking which people in the audience enjoys the chase for love. In addition to this question, the man reveals information to the select audience that enjoys the chase by revealing the location of an hind. Following this introduction, the sonnet establishes its tone in the lines “But as for me, alas, I may no more: The vain travail hath wearied me so sore.” With regards to that line, the sonnet utilizes somber verbs and adjectives such as vain, wearied, and sore to construct the poet’s feelings toward his futile chase for love. As this newly created melancholy mood lingers throughout the poem, my sympathetic feelings towards this beaten down poet question why the narrator continues to chase after this deer. As a result of this thought, I …show more content…
For instance, the sonnet is written in iambic pentameter which produces a feeling of steadiness. As a result of this strict order of stressed and unstressed syllables, the sonnet reads with a lack of emotion through its predictability. Similarly, this relates to the somber tone the narrator feels toward the futile chase for love. In addition to its rhythm, the construction of this sonnet also produces the sound of exhaustion through its line endings. For instance, the abrupt ending of the line “but as she fleeth afore,” is resolved by the following line “Fainting I follow.” For this reason, the poem illustrates the feeling of a lack of breath between lines. Thus, the lack of breath illustrates how hard this man is chasing after the