Typically, freedom is considered a desirable gift that people yearn for and work towards obtaining. Freedom is hardly seen in a negative light as it is known to be an opportunity to pursue happiness without any restriction. William Wordsworth’s Italian sonnet, “Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room”, brings forth opposing ideas on what freedom can do. With the examples of nuns, hermits, students, maids, weavers, and himself, Wordsworth authenticates the idea that limited freedom provides structure, allowing people to live and work more carefree and comfortably.

Wordsworth lists five different types of people in his sonnet: nuns, hermits, students, maids, and weavers. His very specific choice of these people contributes to his argument because they all have something in common; they present lives and jobs that lack freedom. It is made obvious they are bound from freedom by the way Wordsworth describes their different stations in which they frequent due to their lifestyles. The word choices such as the nun’s “narrow room” and the hermit’s “cells” provides the reader the sense a small room, representing a nun’s or hermit’s lack of room to do as they please (Wordsworth 1-2). The line “And student with their pensive citadels” uses word choice that represents confinement because citadels are meant to protect and keep things out, much like a student is protected from outside ideas by being told what to learn and how to go about learning it (3). While Wordsworth’s word choices make it apparent this group of people lack freedom, he also makes it clear that they are ok with this lack of freedom. Nuns “fret not”, “hermits are contented, maids and weavers “sit blithe and happy”; he makes sure the reader understands they are happy and carefree at their jobs and with their lifestyles (1-5). Describing the group of people as “bees that soar for bloom” who end up spending “the hour in foxglove bells” suggests they are fine with what they do because the bees are where they want to be, in the flowers (5-7).

Wordsworth’s idea that limited freedom is a good thing can be found when he uses the term “prison”. The term “prison” is used as a metaphor, saying that a structured lifestyle we live by, just as nuns, hermits, students, maids, and weavers do, is the “prison, into which we doom ourselves” (8-9). By using this metaphor, the sonnet suggests that they should not be content, yet the first lines state that they are. The two instances of the use of the term prison do not contain different meaning. They do not contain similar meaning either, but identical meaning, in order to contradict each other, creating a paradox. By using this technique, Wordsworth challenges his first idea, thus saying that a structured life is not a prison at all. Instead of clearly stating that in the first place, Wordsworth uses the paradox to surprise readers, forcing them to analyze how a prison cannot be a prison, and to change the mood of the poem. This is placed where the volta is found in Italian sonnets, which is information that also illustrates the idea that Wordsworth meant for this paradox to be a turning point in the poem.

The last sestet of the sonnet contains Wordsworth’s personal experience that not only contributes to the argument being made, but gives reason as to why Wordsworth felt strong enough about the subject to have written a poem about it. Wordsworth’s tells the story of writing a sonnet, claiming “’twas pastime to be bound/Within the Sonnet’s scanty plot of ground” (10-11). He found leisure in the sonnets limitations, finding that the strict rules of a sonnet helped him, making it easier for him to get passed his writer’s block. He was a writer who found “solace” in having a strict format to follow, which contributes to the idea that people with different professions and lifestyles must also find comfort in the set of rules that they fall under (14). When Wordsworth refers to “too much liberty” as a “weight”, it signifies the times he had trouble with writer’s block were the times when he could write in any style about anything (13).

The poems own structure supports the message that it sends. The fact that Wordsworth conveys the theme through an Italian sonnet, one of the most challenging poetic structures, proves that with his own limited freedom, he accomplished a successful sonnet. It not only follows the rules which one must follow for an Italian sonnet, but also conveyed a clear and meaningful message. This specific structure of the poem is important because of the fact that the poem is about the importance and positives of having limited freedom. The structure is also supportive of the theme by further backing up Wordsworth’s claim that he found comfort in writing sonnets. Had the poem been in freestyle, his claim would not have been as sound. 

William Wordsworth’s poem, “Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Room”, uses personal experience and the poems very own structure to show how limited freedom helps him with his profession as a writer. Without stopping at how it affects him personally, Wordsworth then goes on to conclude that he shares this comfort with nuns, hermits, students, maids, and weavers. While the lack of freedom can seem prison-like, which Wordsworth points out, the people living these lifestyles could never see it as a prison because they enjoy the structure. Structured lifestyles make life, jobs, and tasks easier because too much liberty can be almost overwhelming and a burden. 
