a kind of sonnet

[Leanne]

I'm actually fine with being proved wrong -- that's because I am not the ultimate authority on all things, and enjoy being shown something I didn't already know. I haven't read all of Spenser's work, save The Faerie Queene and a few of his sonnets. Though I like his interlocking quatrains as a sonnet form, I didn't study his writing further because I find him tedious and his subject matter is most objectionable (he was a sycophant and an inciter of religious hatred, but of course we all have hobbies). I have read all of Shakespeare's work, so far as I know, and he didn't use any Alexandrines in sonnets (to my knowledge, but my recollection may be faulty), only in some of the plays. I don't know of any other well-remembered Elizabethan writer to have used the line in a sonnet, though it does occasionally show up in dramatic blank verse -- I think Marlowe might have thrown in a couple, which is probably what really got him killed.

So Jeffrey, despite Spenser's sonnets still bearing no resemblance to your own, you are correct and I thank you for the knowledge.