Capel Lofft and the English Sonnet Tradition 1770-1815

Using previously unknown or neglected material this study offers a significant revision of the English Romantic sonnet tradition. Combining detailed analyses of poems with broader historical approaches, the author investigates a wide range of issues: the role women writers played in the revival of the sonnet, gender and the choice of genre, the relation between poetry and politics, and the extent to which the sonnet of Sensibility provided the subsoil for the 'Greater Romantic lyric'.