Suburban Sonnet Essay Questions

How does Harwood use the form of the sonnet in “Suburban Sonnet?”

On the one hand, “Suburban Sonnet” is framed and written as a traditional sonnet. It is divided into fourteen lines and follows a set rhyme structure. It primarily employs iambic pentameter, a pattern of verse that is also typical for the traditional sonnet. Sonnets typically focus on a specific topic and develop a theme related to that topic over the course of the poem. Here, “Suburban Sonnet” focuses on the concept of domestic life and develops a theme of regret.

On the other hand, Harwood also introduces modern elements to the sonnet form. A traditional Petrarchan sonnet follows an ABBAABBA rhyme pattern. By contrast, Harwood introduces multiple rhyme schemes over the course of the poem. The first eight lines (an octet) follow an ABABCDCD pattern. The final six lines (a sextet) introduce a new rhyme pattern, EFGEFG. In addition, the primary distinction between “Suburban Sonnet” and a traditional sonnet is thematic. Historically, sonnets were typically written to celebrate or romanticize their theme. Instead, Harwood’s poem analyzes and critiques the concepts of domestic life and gender roles. She thus turns the traditional sonnet on its head, exposing the unrealistic romanticization of suburbia and focusing on the sense of regret, as well as the mundanity and pain (through imagery including aching body parts, a burned pot, a dead mouse) of the idealized domestic routine.

What does the ending mean?

The poem ends with a bleak image: the woman is forced to abandon her piano practice in order to dispose of a dead mouse that has frightened her children. By concluding the poem with the theme of death, Harwood implies that the woman’s dreams are also dead. This stark, disturbing image also elevates the stakes of the poem. Unlike her children, who do not comprehend death—they are only aware that the “soft corpse won’t move" (line 12)—the woman is forced to confront the dark reality of death. In doing so, she is also confronting the dream of her musical ambitions. Furthermore, the fact that the mouse is caught in a trap is also symbolic. Like the mouse, the woman is caught in a trap because she is confined to the strict routines and duties of a suburban housewife in the 1960s. The image of the mousetrap thus introduces the theme of captivity, which complements the theme of death. It heightens the claustrophobic tone that has been building throughout the poem as the woman rushes from duty to duty. The woman also presumably set the mousetrap herself since she is charged with domestic duties. This reflects how the woman is forced to sabotage her own musical ambitions because she has placed herself in the role of a domestic housewife and mother. She has walked into the trap of gender roles, like the now-dead mouse walked into the physical trap.

The final symbol in the poem’s concluding lines is the magazine paper. This paper instructs its audience—presumably housewives like the woman in the poem—on how to turn “stale bread” into “[t]asty dishes” for the family to consume. This paper serves as another reminder in the poem that women are often charged with performing laborious domestic duties for which they receive no compensation. It also symbolizes the idealization and false representation of domestic roles. The paper suggests that even unappetizing things like stale bread can and should be glamorized and transformed into something more palatable. This represents how society attempts to idealize motherhood and housewife culture without allowing women to express their real pain and problems. The paper is ironic, given the chaos depicted in the poem, and Harwood uses it to establish the fact that her own poem runs counter to the typical, falsified representation of women in literature.